Ah, fevered crying haste, have done!
Yet let your coursing swifter run!
Now let the still night fall.
I hear the water lapping ’gainst the wall,
I open wide my door unto the sea
Whence Death, thy keeper, brings thee back to me.
So mild he waits without, yet laughs at Life,
That cannot give her hirelings such a wife.
Day, have I not paid the toll?
My body given the whole
That will let pass my soul?
The roses of the morn lie thick on my Love’s bier,
And she is risen; she is no longer here.
A star upon the stern she beckons me.
Sweet Death, one dawn, let me go back with thee,
Sweet Death, take me from out the noisy light
Into thy night, thy comforting still night.
Yea, soon, for my Love’s sake,
Sweet Death my hand will take,
And I shall not awake
Till past the blooming isle.
Then shall my eyelids quiver ’neath her smile,
And I shall gaze, and from my Love’s clear eyes
Shall learn her slow wide learning, and be wise,
Shall learn the speech they speak across the sea:
’Tis a large language my Love speaks to me.
Then far beyond to sail,
And further further coasts to hail,
And ventures shall not fail.
And missionary dreams my Love and I
We’ll hover mid the world’s troubled sky,
And sleeping men to discontent shall tease,
To venture further skies and wider seas.
Have I not guessed the meaning of the dark?
Thy hand, O Death! To-night let me embark.
“To Every Man a Damsel or Two”
By C. S.
HE wandered up the carpeted steps, rather afraid all the while of the
two tall men in uniform who opened the great doors wide to let him into
the soft warm light and babble of voices within. At the top he paused,
and slowly unbuttoned his overcoat, not knowing which way to turn; but
the crowd swept him up, and carried him round, until he found himself
leaning against a padded wall of plush, looking over a sea of heads at
the stage far beneath. He turned round, and stood watching the happy
crowd, which laughed, and talked, and nodded ceaselessly to itself.
Near him, on a sofa, with a table before her, was a woman spreading
herself out like some great beautiful butterfly on a bed of velvet
pansies. He stood admiring her half unconsciously for some time, and at
last, remembering that he was tired and sleepy, and seeing that there
was still plenty of room, he threaded his way across and sat down.
The butterfly began tossing a wonderful little brown satin shoe, and
tapping it against the leg of the table. Then the parasol slipped
across him, and fell to the ground. He hastened to pick it up, lifting
his hat as he did so. She seemed surprised, and glancing at a man
leaning against the wall, caught his eye, and they both laughed. He
blushed a good deal, and wondered what he had done wrong. She spread
herself out still further in his direction, and cast side glances at
him from under her Gainsborough.
“What were you laughing at just now?” he said impulsively.
“My dear boy, when?”
“With that man.”
“Which man?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said, blushing again.
She looked up, and winked at the man leaning against the wall.
“Have I offended you by speaking to you?” he said, looking with much
concern into her eyes.
She put a little scented net of a handkerchief up to her mouth, and
went into uncontrollable fits of laughter.
“What a funny boy you are!” she gasped. “Do do it again.”
He looked at her in amazement, and moved a little further away.
“I’m going to tell the waiter to bring me a port--after that last bit
of business.”
“I don’t understand all this,” he said desperately: “I wish I had never
spoken to you; I wish I had never come in here at all.”
“You’re very rude all of a sudden. Now don’t be troublesome and say
you’re too broke to pay for drinks,” she added as the waiter put the
port down with great deliberation opposite her, and held out the empty
tray respectfully to him. He stared.
“Why don’t you pay, you cuckoo?”
Mechanically he put down a florin, and the waiter counted out the
change.
There was a pause. She fingered the stem of her wine-glass, taking
little sips, and watching him all the while.
“How often have you been here before?” she said, suddenly catching at
his sleeve. “You must tell me. I fancy I know your face: surely I’ve
met you before somewhere?”
“This is the first time I have ever been to a music-hall,” he said
doggedly.
She drank off her port directly.
“Come--come away at once. Yes, all right--I’m coming with you; so go
along.”
“But I’ve only just paid to come in,” he said hesitatingly.
“Never mind the paying,” and she stamped her little satin foot, “but
do as I tell you, and go.” And taking his arm, she led him through the
doors down to the steps, where the wind blew cold, and the gas jets
roared fitfully above.
“Go,” she said, pushing him out, “and never come here again; stick to
the theatres, you will like them best.” And she ran up the steps and
was gone.
He rushed after her. The two tall men in uniform stepped before the
doors.
“No re-admission, sir,” said one, bowing respectfully and touching his
cap.
“But that lady,” he said, bewildered, and looking from one to the other.
The men laughed, and one of them, shrugging his shoulders, pointed to
the box-office.
He turned, and walked down the steps. Was it all a dream? He glanced at
his coat. The flower in his buttonhole had gone.
A Song and a Tale
By Nora Hopper
I--Lament of the Last Leprechaun
FOR the red shoon of the Shee,
For the falling o’ the leaf,
For the wind among the reeds,
My grief!
For the sorrow of the sea,
For the song’s unquickened seeds,
For the sleeping of the Shee,
My grief!
For dishonoured whitethorn-tree,
For the runes that no man reads,
Where the grey stones face the sea,
My grief!
Lissakeole, that used to be
Filled with music night and noon,
For their ancient revelry,
My grief!
For the empty fairy shoon,
Hollow rath and yellow leaf;
Hands unkissed to sun or moon:
My grief--my grief!
II--Aonan-na-Righ
AONAN-NA-RIGH they called him in Tir Ailella[I.]--“Darling of the
King”--but it was in idle sport, for Cathal the Red hated the son of
his old age as men now have forgotten to hate; and once Aonan had
sprung from his sleep with a sharp skene thrust through his arm, that
had meant to drink his life-blood; and once again he had found himself
alone in the heart of the battle, and he had scarcely won out of the
press with his life--and with the standard of the Danish enemy. Thus it
was seen that neither did the Danish spears love the “King’s Darling”;
and the sennachies made a song of this, and it was chanted before the
King for the first time when he sat robed and crowned for the Beltane
feast, and Aonan stood at his left hand, pouring out honey-wine into
his father’s cup. And before he drank, Cathal the King stared hard at
the cup-bearer, and the red light that burned in his eyes was darkened
because of the likeness in Aonan’s face to his mother Acaill (dead and
buried long since), whom Cathal had loved better than his first wife
Eiver, who was a king’s daughter, and better than the Danish slave
Astrild, who bore him five sons, elder and better-loved than Aonan, for
all the base blood in their veins. And of these, two were dead in the
battle that had spared Aonan, and there were left to Cathal the King
only the Druid Coloman, and Toran the boaster, and Guthbinn of the
sweet voice, who as yet was too young to fight.
“Drink, Aonan-na-Righ,” shrilled Astrild from her seat at the King’s
left hand. “Drink: lest there be death in the cup.”
Aonan took up the golden cup, and gave her back smile for smile. “I
drink,” he said, “to my mother, Acaill of Orgiall.”
But the King snatched the cup from his fingers, and dashed it down on
the board, so that the yellow mead spilled and stained Astrild’s cloak;
but she did not dare complain, for there was the red light in Cathal’s
eyes that was wont to make the boldest afraid.
“Bring me another cup,” he said to one that stood near. “And now, will
none of ye do honour to the toast of Aonan-na-Righ? Bring ye also a cup
for the prince; and, Guthbinn, put your harp aside.”
So in silence they drank to the memory of Acaill of Orgiall, and
afterwards they sought to spin together the threads of their broken
mirth, but not easily, for Astrild, who was wont to be gayest, sat
pale, with her hand on the knife hidden in her breast; and the King sat
dumb and frowning, thinking, as Astrild knew, of dead Acaill: how he
had loved and hated her, and, having slain her father and brothers, and
brought her to Dunna Scaith a Golden Hostage wearing a golden chain,
he had wedded her for her beauty’s sake; and how until her child was
born she had never so much as smiled or frowned for him; and how, when
her babe lay in her arms, she sent for her husband, and said: “I thank
thee, Cathal, who hast set me free by means of this babe. I bless thee
for this last gift of thine, who for all thine other gifts have cursed
thee.” And Cathal remembered how he had held babe and mother to his
heart, and said: “Good to hear soft words from thy mouth at last, O
Acaill! Speak again to me, and softly.” But she had not answered, for
her first soft words to him were her last. And Astrild, watching him,
saw his face grow black and angry, and she smiled softly to herself,
and aloud she said:
“Oh, Guthbinn, sing again, and sing of thy brothers who fell
to-day--sing of Oscar, the swift in battle, and Uaithne, of the dark
eyes. And will my lord give leave that I, their mother, go to weep for
them in my own poor house where they were born?”
“No,” said Cathal. “I bought you and your tears, girl, with gold rings,
from Ocaill of Connaught. Sing to me now, and keep thy tears for
to-morrow.” So Astrild drove back her sorrow, and began to sing, while
her son Guthbinn plucked slow music from his harpstrings.
“Earrach, Samhradh, Foghmhar, and Geimhridh,
Are over all and done:
And now the web forgets the weaver,
And earth forgets the sun.
I sowed no seed, and pulled no blossom,
Ate not of the green corn:
With empty hands and empty bosom,
Behold, I stand forlorn.
Windflower I sang, and Flower o’ Sorrow,
Half-Summer, World’s Delight:
I took no thought o’ the coming morrow,
No care for the coming night.”
Guthbinn’s hand faltered on the harpstrings, and the singer stopped
swiftly: but King Cathal stayed the tears in her heart with an angry
word. “Have I had not always had my will? And it is not my will now
for you to weep.” So Astrild sat still, and she looked at her sons:
but Toran was busy boasting of the white neck and blue eyes of the new
slave-girl he had won, and Coloman was dreaming, as he sat with his
eyes on the stars that showed through the open door: and only Guthbinn
met her eyes and answered them, though he seemed to be busy with his
harp. And presently Cathal rose up, bidding all keep their seats and
finish out the feast, but Astrild and Aonan he bade follow him. And
so they went into the farthest chamber of the House of Shields, which
looked upon a deep ditch. Now the end of the chamber was a wall of
wattles, and here there was cut a door that led out on a high bank
which overlooked the ditch. And the King went out upon the bank, where
there was a chair placed ready for him, and Astrild sat at his knee,
and Aonan-na-Righ stood a little way off. And Cathal sat still for a
time, holding Astrild’s hand in his, and presently he said: “Who put
the death in the cup to-night, Astrild, thou or Guthbinn?” And Astrild
tried to draw her hand away and to rise, but he held her in her place,
and asked again, “Guthbinn, or thou?” until she answered him sullenly
as she knelt, “King, it was I.”
“Belike, Guthbinn’s hand did thy bidding,” he said, in laughing
fashion. “Was the death for me or for Aonan yonder, thou Red-Hair?”
And Astrild laughed as she answered, “For Aonan-na-Righ, my lord.” And
then she shrieked and sought to rise, for she saw death in the king’s
face as it bent over her.
“If thou hadst sought to slay thy master, Red-Hair, I might have
forgiven thee,” Cathal said; “but what had my son to do with thee, my
light-o’-love?”
“Give me a day,” Astrild said desperately, “and I will kill father and
son, and set the light-o’-love’s children on your throne, Cathal.”
“I doubt it not, my wild-cat, but I will not give ye the day:” Cathal
laughed. “Good courage, girl--and call thy Danish gods to aid, for
there is none other to help thee, now.”
“What will my lord do?” Aonan said quickly, as the Dane turned a white
face and flaming eyes to him. “Wouldst kill her?”
“Ay,” said Cathal the King. “But first she shall leave her beauty
behind her, lest she meet thy mother in the Land of Youth, and Acaill
be jealous.”
“Leave her beauty and breath, lord,” Aonan said, drawing nearer. “If my
mother Acaill lived she would not have her slain. My king, she pleased
thee once; put her from thee if she vexes thee now; but leave her life,
since something thou owest her.”
“She would have slain thee to-day, Aonan, and if I have dealt ill by
thee, I let no other deal thus. Yet if thou prayest me for thy life,
girl, for love of Acaill I will give it thee.”
And Cathal laughed, for he knew the Dane would not plead in that name.
Astrild laughed too. “Spare thy breath, son of Acaill,” she said
scornfully. “To-morrow the cord may be round thy neck, and thou be in
need of breath; now lord, the cord for mine----”
Cathal smiled grimly.
“Blackheart,” he said, “thou hast no lack of courage. Now up,” and he
loosened her hands, “and fly if thou wilt--swim the ditch, and get thee
to Drumcoll-choille--and Guthbinn shall die in thy stead. What! Thou
wouldst liefer die? Back then to yonder chamber, where my men will deal
with thee as I have ordered, and be as patient as in thee lies. A kiss
first, Red-Hair; and hearken from yonder chamber if thou wilt, while
Aonan sings a dirge for thee.”
She went; and presently there rang from within the chamber the shrill
scream of a woman’s agony, and Cathal laughed to see Aonan’s face turn
white. “She is not as patient as thou,” he said, “but she will learn.
Keep thou my word to her, Aonan; sing a dirge for her beauty a-dying.”
“I cannot sing,” Aonan-na-Righ said, shivering as there rose another
shriek. “Let them slay her, my lord, and have done.”
“My will runs otherwise,” said Cathal, smiling. “Sing, if thou lovest
thy life.”
“My lord knows that I do not,” Aonan answered; and Cathal smiled again.
“Belike not; but sing and lessen the Dane’s punishment. When the song
is finished she shall be released, and even tended well.”
So Aonan sang the song of the Dane-land over the water, and the Danes
that died in the Valley of Keening--which is now called Waterford; of
the white skin and red hair of Astrild; of her grace and daring; of the
sons that lay dead on the battle-place; of Coloman the dreamer that
read the stars; and of the beautiful boy whose breast was a nest of
nightingales. And then he sang--more softly--of the Isle of the Noble
where Acaill dwelt, and how she would have shadowed Astrild with her
pity if she had lived; and then he stopped singing and knelt before the
King, dumb for a moment with the passion of his pity, for from the open
door they could hear a woman moaning still.
“Lord,” he said, “make an end. My life for hers--if a life the King
must have; or my pain for hers--if the King must needs feed his ears
with cries.”
“Graciously spoken, and like Acaill’s son,” King Cathal said. “And
Astrild shall be set free. You within the chamber take the Dane to her
son the lord Coloman’s keeping; and thou, my son Aonan, tarry here till
I return. I may have a fancy to send thee with a message to thy mother
before dawn. Nay, but come with me, and we will go see Coloman, and ask
how his mother does. Give me thine arm to lean on; I am tired, Aonan,
I am old, and an end has come to my pleasure in slaying.... Coloman!”
They were in Coloman’s chamber now, and the Druid turned from
star-gazing to greet the King, with a new dark look in his gentle face.
“Coloman, how does thy mother do now? She had grown too bold in her
pride, but we did not slay her because of Aonan here. How works our
medicine that we designed to temper her beauty?”
“Well, lord. No man will kiss my mother’s beauty more.”
“Good: now she will turn her feet into ways of gentleness, perhaps.
Thou holdest me a grudge for this medicine o’ mine, my son Coloman?”
“Lord, she is my mother,” the Druid said, looking down.
“The scars will heal,” Cathal said; “but--Aonan here has only seen her
beautiful. Coloman, wouldst thou have him see her scarred and foul to
see?”
“No, lord,” the Druid said fiercely. Cathal laughed.
“Have a gift of me, then, O Coloman,” he said. “Spare him from sight of
a marred beauty, in what way thou canst. I give thee his eyes for thy
mother’s scars.”
The two young men looked at each other steadily: then Aonan spoke.
“Take the payment that the King offers thee, Coloman, without fear: a
debt is a debt.”
“And the debt is heavy.”
Coloman said hoarsely: “Lord, wilt thou go and leave Aonan-na-Righ to
me? And wilt thou send to me thy cunning men, Flathartach and Fadhar? I
must have help.”
“Aonan-na-Righ will not hinder thee, Coloman,” said the King,
mockingly. “He desires greatly to meet with his mother: and do thou
commend me also to the Lady Eivir, whom I wedded first, and who loved
me well.”
“Call me also to thy mother’s memory,” Toran the boaster cried
presently, when all was made ready, and Coloman bade draw the irons
from the brazier--“if thou goest so far, Darling of the King.”
“I will remember,” Aonan said: and then fire and flesh met.
* * * * *
At the next Beltane feast Cathal the Red slept beside Acaill in the
burial-place of the kings at Brugh, and Guthbinn sat in the high seat,
Toran the boaster at his right hand. But Coloman the Druid stood on
the tower-top, reading the faces of the stars; and along the road that
wound its dusty way to the country of the Golden Hostages there toiled
two dark figures: a woman and a man. Now the woman was hooded and
masked, but under the grey hood the moonlight found a gleam of ruddy
hair; and the man she led by the hand and watched over as a mother
watches her son. Yet the woman was Danish Astrild, and the blind man
was Aonan-na-Righ.
FOOTNOTE:
[I.] Now Tirerrill, Co. Sligo.
“De Profundis”
By S. Cornish Watkins
The hot white road winds on and on before,
The hot white road fades into haze behind,
With clinging dust each hedge is powdered o’er,
The sun is high, no shelter can we find.
A dusty bird upon a dusty spray
Sings o’er and o’er a little dreary song,
There is no rest, no rest, the livelong day,
And we are weary, and the way is long.
We know not whence we come, or whither wend,
What goal may be to which our journey draws,
Fate binds this burden on us, and the end
We know not, care not, and we must not pause.
A motley train we move. The young, the old,
Women and men, with feeble steps or strong,
Driven, like herded sheep, from fold to fold--
Oh, we are weary, and the way is long.
Vain whispers have we known, and hopes as vain;
And one, he bore a banner with a cross,
And spake wild words of comfort after pain,
And future gain to balance present loss.
But where he is we wot not. We have lost
All hopes we had, all faiths or right or wrong,
We have been shaken, shattered, tempest-tost,
And we are weary, and the way is long.
Yet still, within each bosom smoulders there
Some little spark that might have been divine,
Something that will not let us quite despair,
Something we cannot, if we would, resign.
Some day the spark may quicken and may guide,
And fire the soul within us, dead so long,
So may there be, when falls the eventide,
A joyous ending to a grievous song.
Two Pictures
By P. Wilson Steer
I. The Mirror
II. Skirt Dancing
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
A Study in Sentimentality
By Hubert Crackanthorpe
A PHANTOM regiment of giant mist-pillars swept silently across the
valley; beaded drops loaded each tuft of coarse, dull-tinted grass; the
peat-hags gaped like black, dripping flesh-wounds in the earth’s side;
the distance suggested rectangular fields and wooded slopes--vague,
grey, phantasmagoric; and down over everything floated the damp of fine
rain.
Alec’s heavy tread crunched the turfed bridle-path rhythmically, and
from the stiff rim of his clerical hat the water dribbled on to his
shoulders.
It was a rugged, irregular, almost uncouth face, and now the features
were vacantly huddled in a set expression, obviously habitual. The
cheeks were hunched up, almost concealing the small eyes; a wet wisp
of hair straggled over the puckered forehead, and the ragged, fair
moustache was spangled by the rain.
At his approach the sheep scampered up the fell-side; then, stood
staring through the mist in anxious stupidity. And Alec, shaking the
water from his hat, strode forward with an almost imperceptible gleam
on his face. It was so that he liked the valley--all colourless and
blurred, with the sky close overhead, like a low, leaden ceiling.
By-and-by, a cluster of cottages loomed ahead--a choppy pool of black
slate roofs, wanly a-glimmer in the wet. As he entered the village, a
group of hard-featured men threw him a curt chorus of greetings, to
which he raised his stick in response, mechanically.
He mounted the hill. Three furnace-chimneys craned their thin necks
to grime the sky with a dribbling, smoky breath; high on a bank of
coal-dust, blurred silhouettes of trucks stood waiting in forlorn
strings; women, limp, with unkempt hair, and loose, bedraggled skirts,
stood round the doorways in gossiping groups.
“Which is Mrs. Matheson’s?” he stopped to ask.
“There--oop there, Mr. Burkett--by yon ash--where them childer’s
standin’,” they answered, all speaking together, eagerly. “Look ye!
that be Mrs. Matheson herself.”
Alec went up to the woman. His face clouded a little, and the puffs
from his pipe came briskly in rapid succession.
“Mrs. Matheson, I’ve only just heard----Tell me, how did it happen?” he
asked gently.
She was a stout, red-faced woman, and her eyes were all bloodshot with
much crying. She wiped them hastily with the corner of her apron before
answering.
“It was there, Mr. Burkett, by them rails. He was jest playin’ aboot
in t’ road wi’ Arnison’s childer. At half-past one, t’ grandmoother
stepped across to fetch me a jug o’ fresh water an’ she see’d him
settin’ in door there. Then--mabbee twenty minutes later--t’ rain coome
on an’ I thought to go to fetch him in. But I could’na see na sign of
him anywhere. We looked oop and doon, and thought, mabbee, he’d toddled
roond to t’ back. An’ then, all at once, Dan Arnison called to us that
he was leein’ in t’ water, doon in beck-pool. An’ Dan ran straight
doon, an’ carried him oop to me; but ’twas na use. He was quite cold
and drownded. An’ I went----” But the sobs, rising thickly, swallowed
the rest.
Alec put his hand on her shoulder soothingly.
“Ay, I know’d ye’d be grieved, Mr. Burkett. He was the bonniest boy in
all t’ parish.”
She lifted the apron to her eyes again, while he crossed to the
railings. The wood of the posts was splintered and worm-eaten, and the
lower rail was broken away. Below, the rock shelved down some fifteen
feet to the beck-pool, black and oily-looking.
“It’s a very dangerous place,” he said, half to himself.
“Ay, Mr. Burkett, you’re right,” interrupted a bent and wizened old
woman, tottering forward.
“This be grandmoother, Mr. Burkett,” Mrs. Matheson explained. “’Twas
grandmoother that see’d him last----”
“Ay, Mr. Burkett,” the old woman began in a high, tremulous treble.
“When I went fer to fill t’ jug fer Maggie he was a-settin’ on t’ steps
there playin with t’ kitten, an’ he called after me, ‘Nanny!’ quite
happy-like; but I took na notice, but jest went on fer t’ water. I
shawed Mr. Allison the broken rail last month, when he was gittin’ t’
rents, and I told him he ought to put it into repair, with all them
wee childer playin’ all daytime on t’ road. Didn’t I, Maggie?” Mrs.
Matheson assented incoherently. “An’ he was very civil-like, was Mr.
Allison, and he said he’d hev’ it seen to. It’s alus that way, Mr.
Burkett,” the old woman concluded, shaking her head wisely. “Folks wait
till some accident occurs, and then they think to bestir themselves.”
Alec turned to the mother, and touched her thick, nerveless hand.
“There, there, Mrs. Matheson, don’t take on so,” he said.
At his touch her sobbing suddenly ceased, and she let her apron fall.
“Will ye na coome inside, Mr. Burkett?” she asked.
And they all three went in together.
The little room had been scrubbed and tidied, and a number of chairs,
ranged round the table, blocked the floor.