IOLLANN BEAG. Aye, good Peter of the Sword!
CIARAN. Nay, Iollann, it is Paul that carries a sword.
IOLLANN BEAG. Peter should have a sword, too. I will not have him
cheated of his sword! It was a good blow he struck!
BREASAL. Yet the Lord rebuked him for it.
IOLLANN BEAG. The Lord did wrong to rebuke him. He was always down on
Peter.
CIARAN. Peter was fiery, and the Lord was very gentle.
IOLLANN BEAG. But when He wanted a rock to build His church on He had to
go to Peter. No John of the Bosom then, but the old swordsman. Paul must
yield his sword to Peter. I do not like that Paul.
CIARAN. Paul said many hard things and many dark things. When you
understand him, Iollann, you will like him.
MAINE. Let him not arrogate a sword merely because his head was cut off,
and Iollann will tolerate him.
CIARAN. Who has brought me a poem to-day? You were to bring me poems of
Christ’s friends.
BREASAL. I have made a Song for Mary Magdalene. Shall I say it to you?
CIARAN. Do, Breasal.
BREASAL (_chants_).
O woman of the gleaming hair
(Wild hair that won men’s gaze to thee),
Weary thou turnest from the common stare,
For the _shuiler_ Christ is calling thee.
O woman, of the snowy side,
Many a lover hath lain with thee,
Yet left thee sad at the morning tide;
But thy lover Christ shall comfort thee.
O woman with the wild thing’s heart,
Old sin hath set a snare for thee;
In the forest ways forspent thou art,
But the hunter Christ shall pity thee.
O woman spendthrift of thyself,
Spendthrift of all the love in thee,
Sold unto sin for little pelf,
The captain Christ shall ransom thee.
O woman that no lover’s kiss
(Tho’ many a kiss was given thee)
Could slake thy love, is it not for this
The hero Christ shall die for thee?
CIARAN. That is a good song, Breasal. What you have said is true, that
love is a very great thing. I do not think faith will be denied to him
that loves.... Iollann was to make me a song to-day, too.
IOLLANN BEAG. I have made only a little rann. I couldn’t think of rhymes
for a big song.
CIARAN. What do you call your rann?
IOLLANN BEAG. It is the Rann of the Little Playmate. It is a rann that
John the Baptist made when he was on the way to Iosa’s house one day.
CIARAN. Sing it to us, Iollann.
IOLLANN (_sings_):
Young Iosa plays with me every day
(_With an óró and an iero_)
Tig and Pookeen and Hide-in-the-Hay
(_With an óró and an iero._)
We race in the river with otters gray,
We climb the tall trees where red squirrels play,
We watch the wee lady-bird fly far away,
(_With an óró and an iero and an imbó éro_).
_A knocking is heard._
CIARAN. Run and open the postern, Iollann.
CEALLACH. Master, this may be the King’s people.
CIARAN. If it be, Iollann will let them in.
_Iollann Beag goes to the door._
CEALLACH. Why have good men such pride?
_A King’s Messenger appears upon the threshold. Iollann Beag holds the
curtain of the door while the Messenger speaks._
THE MESSENGER. Who in this house is Ciaran?
CIARAN. I am Ciaran.
THE MESSENGER. I bring you greeting from the King.
CIARAN. Take back to him my greeting.
THE MESSENGER. The King has come to make the hunting of this wood.
CIARAN. It is the King’s privilege to hunt the woods of the cantred.
THE MESSENGER. Not far from here is a green glade of the forest in which
the King with his nobles and good men, his gillies and his runners, has
sat down to meat.
CIARAN. May it be a merry sitting for them.
THE MESSENGER. It has seemed to the King an unroyal thing to taste of
the cheer of this greenwood while he is at enmity with you; for he has
remembered the old saying that friendship is more welcome at meat than
ale or music. Therefore, he has sent me to say to you that he has put
all enmity out of his heart, and that in token thereof he invites you to
share his forest feast, such as it is, you and your pupils.
CIARAN. The King is kind. I would like well to come to him, but my rule
forbids me to leave this house.
THE MESSENGER. The King will take badly any refusal. It is not usual to
refuse a King’s invitation.
CIARAN. When I came to this place, after journeying many long roads of
land and sea, I said to myself: “I will abide here henceforth, this
shall be the sod of my death.” And I made a vow to live in this little
cloister alone, or with a few pupils, I who had been restless and a
wanderer, and a seeker after difficult things; the King will not grudge
me the loneliness of my cloister.
THE MESSENGER. I will say all this to the King. These lads will come
with me?
CIARAN. Will ye go to the King’s feast, lads?
BREASAL. May we go, Master.
CIARAN. I will not gainsay you.
MAINE. It will be a great thing to sit at the King’s table.
CEALLACH. Master, it may turn aside the King’s displeasure for your not
going if we go in your name. We may, perchance, bring the King here, and
peace will be bound between you.
CIARAN. May God be near you in the places to which you go.
CEALLACH. I am loath to leave you alone, Master.
CIARAN. Little Iollann will stay with me. Will you not, little Iollann.
_Iollann Beag looks yearningly towards the Messenger and the others as
if he would fain go; then he turns to Ciaran._
IOLLANN BEAG. I will.
CIARAN (_caressing him_). That is my good little lad.
ART. We will bring you back some of the King’s mead, Iollann.
IOLLANN BEAG. Bring me some of his apples and his hazel-nuts.
RONAN. We will, and, maybe, a roast capon, or a piece of venison.
_They all go out laughing. Ceallach turns back in the door._
CEALLACH. Good-bye, Master.
CIARAN. May you go safe, lad. (_To Iollann_). You are my whole school
now, Iollann.
IOLLANN (_sitting down at his knee_). Do you think the King will come
here?
CIARAN. Yes, I think he will come.
IOLLANN. I would like to see him. Is he a great, tall man?
CIARAN. I have not seen him for a long time; not since he and I were
lads.
IOLLANN. Were you friends?
CIARAN. We were fostered together.
IOLLANN. Is he a wicked King?
CIARAN. No; he has ruled this country well. His people love him. They
have gone into many perilous places with him, and he has never failed
them.
IOLLANN. Why then does he hate you? Why do Ceallach and the others fear
that he may do you harm?
CIARAN. For twenty years Daire and I have stood over against each other.
When we were at school we were rivals for the first place. I was first
in all manly games; Daire was first in learning. Everyone said “Ciaran
will be a great warrior and Daire will be a great poet or a great
teacher.” And yet it has not been so. I was nearly as good as he in
learning, and he was nearly as good as I in manly feats. I said that I
would be his master in all things, and he said that he would be my
master. And we strove one against the other.
IOLLANN BEAG. Why did you want to be his master?
CIARAN. I do not know. I thought that I should be happy if I were first
and Daire only second. But Daire was always first. I sought out
difficult things to do that I might become a better man than he: I went
into far countries and won renown among strange peoples, but very little
wealth and no happiness; I sailed into seas that no man before me had
sailed into, and saw islands that only God and the angels had seen
before me; I learned outland tongues and read the books of many peoples
and their old lore; and when I came back to my own country I found that
Daire was its king, and that all men loved him. Me they had forgotten.
IOLLANN BEAG. Were you sad when you came home and found that you were
forgotten?
CIARAN. No, I was glad. I said, “This is a hard thing that I have found
to do, to live lonely and unbeloved among my own kin. Daire has not done
anything as hard as this.” In one of the cities that I had sailed to I
had heard of the true, illustrious God, and of men who had gone out from
warm and pleasant houses, and from the kindly faces of neighbours to
live in desert places, where God walked alone and terrible; and I said
that I would do that hard thing, though I would fain have stayed in my
father’s house. And so I came into this wilderness, where I have lived
for seven years. For a few years I was alone; then pupils began to come
to me. By-and-bye the druids gave out word that I was teaching new
things and breaking established custom; and the King has forbade my
teaching, and I have not desisted, and so he and I stand opposed as of
old.
IOLLANN BEAG. You will win this time, little Master.
CIARAN. I think so; I hope so, dear. (_Aside._) I would I could say “I
know so.” This seems to me the hardest thing I have tried to do. Can a
soldier fight for a cause of which he is not sure? Can a teacher die for
a thing he does not believe?... Forgive me, Lord! It is my weakness that
cries out. I believe, I believe; help my unbelief. (_To Iollann Beag._)
Why do you think I shall win this time, Iollann,--I who have always
lost?
IOLLANN BEAG. Because God’s great angels will fight for you. Will they
not?
CIARAN. Yes, I think they will. All that old chivalry stands harnessed
in Heaven.
IOLLANN BEAG. Will they not come if you call them?
CIARAN. Yes, they will come. (_Aside._) Is it a true thing I tell this
child or do I lie to him? Will they come at my call? Will they come at
my call? My spirit reaches out and finds Heaven empty. The great halls
stand horseless and riderless. I have called to you, O riders, and I
have not heard the thunder of your coming. The multitudinous,
many-voiced sea and the green, quiet earth have each its children, but
where are the sons of Heaven? Where in all this temple of the world,
this dim and wondrous temple, does its God lurk?
IOLLANN BEAG. And would they come if I were to call them--old Peter, and
the Baptist John, and Michael and his riders?
CIARAN. We are taught that if one calls them with faith they will come.
IOLLANN BEAG. Could I see them and speak to them?
CIARAN. If it were necessary for any dear purpose of God’s, as to save a
soul that were in peril, we are taught that they would come in bodily
presence, and that one could see them and speak to them.
IOLLANN BEAG. If the soul of any dear friend of mine be ever in peril I
will call upon them. I will say, “Baptist John, Baptist John, attend
him. Good Peter of the Sword, strike valiantly. Young Michael, stand
near with all the heroes of Heaven!”
CIARAN (_aside_). If the soul of any dear friend of his were in peril!
The peril is near! The peril is near!
_A knock at the postern; Iollann Beag looks towards Ciaran._
CIARAN. Run, Iollann, and see who knocks. (_Iollann Beag goes out._) I
have looked back over the journey of my life as a man at evening might
look back from a hill on the roads he had travelled since morning. I
have seen with a great clearness as if I had left this green, dim wood
and climbed to the top of that far hill I have seen from me for seven
years now, yet never climbed. And I see that all my wayfaring has been
in vain. A man may not escape from that which is in himself. A man shall
not find his quest unless he kill the dearest thing he has. I thought
that I was sacrificing everything, but I have not sacrificed the old
pride of my heart. I chose self-abnegation, not out of humility, but out
of pride: and God, that terrible hidden God, has punished me by
withholding from me His most precious gift of faith. Faith comes to the
humble only.... Nay, Lord, I believe: this is but a temptation. Thou,
too, wast tempted. Thou, too, wast forsaken. O valiant Christ, give me
Thy strength! My need is great. _Iollann Beag returns._
IOLLANN BEAG. There is a warrior at the door, Master, that asks a
shelter. He says he has lost his way in the wood.
CIARAN. Bid him to come in, Iollann. (_Iollann Beag goes to the door
again._) I, too, have lost my way. I am like one that has trodden
intricate forest paths that have crossed and recrossed and never led him
to any homestead; or like a mariner that has voyaged on a shoreless sea
yearning for a glimpse of green earth, yet never descrying it. If I
could find some little place to rest, if I could but lie still at last
after so much wayfaring, after such clamour of loud-voiced winds,
methinks that would be to find God; for is not God quiet, is not God
peace? But always I go on with a cry as of baying winds or of vociferous
hounds about me.... They say the King hunts me to-day: but the King is
not so terrible a hunter as the desires and the doubts of a man’s heart.
The King I can meet unafraid, but who is not afraid of himself? (_Daire
enters, wrapped in a long mantle, and stands a little within the
threshold: Iollann Beag behind him. Ciaran looks fixedly at him; then
speaks._) You have hunted well to-day, O Daire!
DAIRE. I am famed as a hunter.
CIARAN. When I was a young man I said, “I will strive with the great
untamed elements, with the ancient, illimitable sea and the anarchic
winds;” you, in the manner of Kings, have warred with timid, furtive
creatures, and it has taught you only cruelty and craft.
DAIRE. What has your warfare taught you? I do not find you changed,
Ciaran. Your old pride but speaks a new language.... I am, as you remind
me, only a King; but I have been a good King. Have you been a good
teacher?
CIARAN. My pupils must answer.
DAIRE. Where are your pupils?
CIARAN. True; they are not here.
DAIRE. They are at an ale-feast in my tent.... (_Coming nearer to
Ciaran._) I have not come to taunt you, Ciaran. Nor should you taunt me.
You seem to me to have spent your life pursuing shadows that fled before
you; yea, pursuing ghosts over wide spaces and through the devious
places of the world: and I pity you for the noble manhood you have
wasted. I seem to you to have spent my life busy with the little, vulgar
tasks and the little, vulgar pleasures of a King: and you pity me
because I have not adventured, because I have not been tried, because I
have not suffered as you have. It should be sufficient triumph for each
of us that each pities the other.
CIARAN. You speak gently, Daire; and you speak wisely. You were always
wise. And yet, methinks, you are wrong. There is a deeper antagonism
between you and me than you are aware of. It is not merely that the
little things about you, the little, foolish, mean, discordant things of
a man’s life, have satisfied you, and that I have been discontent,
seeking things remote and holy and perilous--
DAIRE. Ghosts, ghosts!
CIARAN. Nay, they alone are real; or, rather, it alone is real. For
though its names be many, its substance is one. One man will call it
happiness, another will call it beauty, a third will call it holiness, a
fourth will call it rest. I have sought it under all its names.
DAIRE. What is it that you have sought?
CIARAN. I have sought truth.
DAIRE. And have you found truth? (_Ciaran bows his head in dejection._)
Ciaran, was it worth your while to give up all goodly life to follow
that mocking phantom? I do not say that a man should not renounce ease.
I have not loved ease. But I have loved power, and victory, and life,
and men, and women, and the gracious sun. He who renounces these things
to follow a phantom across a world has given his all for nothing.
CIARAN. Is not the mere quest often worth while, even if the thing
quested be never found?
DAIRE. And so you have not found your quest?
CIARAN. You lay subtle traps for me in your speeches, Daire. It was your
way at school when we disputed.
DAIRE. Kings must be subtle. It is by craft we rule.... Ciaran, for the
shadow you have pursued I offer you a substance; in place of vain
journeying I invite you to rest.... If you make your peace with me you
shall be the second man in my kingdom.
CIARAN (_in scorn and wrath_). The second man!
DAIRE. There speaks your old self, Ciaran. I did not mean to wound you.
I am the King, chosen by the people to rule and lead. I could not, even
if I would, place you above me; but I will place you at my right hand.
CIARAN. You would bribe me with this petty honour?
DAIRE. No. I would gain you for the service of your people. What other
service should a man take upon him?
CIARAN. I told you that you did not understand the difference between
you and me. May one not serve the people by bearing testimony in their
midst to a true thing even as by feeding them with bread?
DAIRE. Again you prate of truth. Are you fond enough to think that what
has not imposed even upon your pupils will impose upon me?
CIARAN. My pupils believe. You must not wrong them, Daire.
DAIRE. Are you sure of them?
CIARAN. Yes, I am sure. (_Aside._) Yet sometimes I thought that that
gibing Maine did not believe. It may be--
DAIRE. Where are your pupils? Why are they not here to stand by you in
your bitter need?
CIARAN. You enticed them from me by guile.
DAIRE. I invited them; they came. You could not keep them, Ciaran. Think
you my young men would have left me, in similar case? Their bodies would
have been my bulwark against a host.
CIARAN. You hint unspeakable things.
DAIRE. I do but remind you that you have to-day no disciples;
(_smiling_) except, perhaps, this little lad. Come, I will win him from
you with an apple.
CIARAN. You shall not tempt him!
DAIRE (_laughing_). Ciaran, you stand confessed: you have no faith in
your disciples; methinks you have no faith in your religion.
CIARAN. You are cruel, Daire. You were not so cruel when we were lads.
DAIRE. You have come into my country preaching to my people new things,
incredible things, things you dare not believe yourself. I will not have
this lie preached to men. If your religion be true, you must give me a
sign of its truth.
CIARAN. It is true, it is true!
DAIRE. Give me a sign. Nay, show me that you yourself believe. Call upon
your God to reveal Himself. I do not trust these skulking gods.
CIARAN. Who am I to ask that great Mystery to unveil Its face? Who are
you that a miracle should be wrought for you?
DAIRE. This is not an answer. So priests ever defend their mysteries. I
will not be put off as one would put off a child that asks questions.
Lo, here I bare my sword against God; lo, here I lift up my shield. Let
one of his great captains come down to answer the challenge!
CIARAN. This the bragging of a fool.
DAIRE. Nor does that answer me. Ciaran, you are in my power. My young
men surround this house. Yours are at an ale-feast.
CIARAN. O wise and far-seeing King! You have planned all well.
DAIRE. There is a watcher at every door of your house. There a tracker
on every path of the forest. The wild boar crouches in his lair for fear
of the men that fill this wood. Three rings of champions ring round the
tent in which your pupils feast. Your God had need to show Himself a
God!
CIARAN. Nay, slay me, Daire. I will bear testimony with my life.
DAIRE. What will that prove? Men die for false things, for ridiculous
things, for evil things. What vile cause has not its heroes? Though you
were to die here with joy and laughter you would not prove your cause a
true one. Ciaran, let God send down an angel to stand between you and
me.
CIARAN. Do you think that to save my poor life Omnipotence will display
Itself?
DAIRE. Who talks of your life? It is your soul that is at stake, and
mine, and this little boy’s, and the souls of all this nation, born and
unborn.
CIARAN (_aside_). He speaks true.
DAIRE. Nay, I will put you to the proof. (_To Iollann._) Come hither,
child. (_Iollann Beag approaches._) He is daintily fashioned, Ciaran,
this last little pupil of yours. I swear to you that he shall die unless
your God sends down an angel to rescue him. Kneel boy. (_Iollann Beag
kneels._) Speak now, if God has ears to hear. _He raises his sword._
CIARAN (_aside_). I dare not speak. My God, my God, why hast Thou
forsaken me?
IOLLANN BEAG. Fear not, little Master, I remember the word you taught
me.... Young Michael, stand near me!
_The figure of a mighty Warrior, winged, and clothed in light, seems
to stand beside the boy. Ciaran bends on one knee._
DAIRE. Who art thou, O Soldier?
MICHAEL. I am he that waiteth at the portal. I am he that hasteneth. I
am he that rideth before the squadron. I am he that holdeth a shield
over the retreat of man’s host when Satan cometh in war. I am he that
turneth and smiteth. I am he that is Captain of the Host of God.
_Daire bends slowly on one knee._
CIARAN. The Seraphim and the Cherubim stand horsed. I hear the thunder
of their coming.... O Splendour! _He falls forward, dead._