big sword in his hand. He asked for payment of his debt, and because
neither I nor Leagerie would let him cut off our heads he began abusing
us and making little of us, and saying that we were a disgrace, and
that all Ireland was disgraced because of us. We had not a word to say.
LEAGERIE.
If you had been here you would have been as silent as we were.
CONAL.
At last he said he would come again in twelve months and give us one
more chance to keep our word and pay our debt. After that he went down
into the sea again. Will he tell the whole world of the disgrace that
has come upon us, do you think?
CUCHULAIN.
Whether he does or does not, we will stand there in the door with our
swords out and drive him down to the sea again.
CONAL.
What is the use of fighting with a man whose head laughs when it has
been cut off?
LEAGERIE.
We might run away, but he would follow us everywhere.
CONAL.
He is coming; the sea is beginning to splash and rumble as it did
before he came the last time.
CUCHULAIN.
Let us shut the door and put our backs against it.
LEAGERIE.
It is too late. Look, there he is at the door. He is standing on the
threshold.
[_A MAN dressed in red, with a great sword and red
ragged hair, and having a Golden Helmet on his head, is
standing on the threshold._
CUCHULAIN.
Go back into the sea, old red head! If you will take off heads,
take off the head of the sea turtle of Muirthemne, or of the pig
of Connaught that has a moon in his belly, or of that old juggler
Manannan, son of the sea, or of the red man of the Boyne, or of the
King of the Cats, for they are of your own sort, and it may be they
understand your ways. Go, I say, for when a man’s head is off it does
not grow again. What are you standing there for? Go down, I say. If I
cannot harm you with the sword I will put you down into the sea with my
hands. Do you laugh at me, old red head? Go down before I lay my hands
upon you.
RED MAN.
So you also believe I was in earnest when I asked for a man’s head?
It was but a drinker’s joke, an old juggling feat, to pass the time.
I am the best of all drinkers and tipsy companions, the kindest there
is among the Shape-changers of the world. Look, I have brought this
Golden Helmet as a gift. It is for you or for Leagerie or for Conal,
for the best man, and the bravest fighting-man amongst you, and you
yourselves shall choose the man. Leagerie is brave, and Conal is brave.
They risk their lives in battle, but they were not brave enough for my
jokes and my juggling. [_He lays the Golden Helmet on the ground._]
Have I been too grim a joker? Well, I am forgiven now, for there is the
Helmet, and let the strongest take it.
[_He goes out._
CONAL [_taking Helmet_].
It is my right. I am a year older than Leagerie, and I have fought in
more battles.
LEAGERIE [_strutting about stage, sings_].
Leagerie of the Battles
Has put to the sword
The cat-headed men
And carried away
Their hidden gold.
[_He snatches Helmet at the last word._
CONAL.
Give it back to me, I say. What was the treasure but withered leaves
when you got to your own door?
CUCHULAIN.
[_Taking the Helmet from LEAGERIE._]
Give it to me, I say.
CONAL.
You are too young, Cuchulain. What deeds have you to be set beside our
deeds?
CUCHULAIN.
I have not taken it for myself. It will belong to us all equally. [_He
goes to table and begins filling Helmet with ale._] We will pass it
round and drink out of it turn about and no one will be able to claim
that it belongs to him more than another. I drink to your wife, Conal,
and to your wife, Leagerie, and I drink to Emer my own wife. [_Shouting
and blowing of horns in the distance._] What is that noise?
CONAL.
It is the horseboys and the huntboys and the scullions quarrelling.
I know the sound, for I have heard it often of late. It is a good
thing that you are home, Cuchulain, for it is your own horseboy and
chariot-driver, Laeg, that is the worst of all, and now you will keep
him quiet. They take down the great hunting-horns when they cannot
drown one another’s voices by shouting. There—there—do you hear them
now? [_Shouting so as to be heard above the noise._] I drink to your
good health, Cuchulain, and to your young wife, though it were well if
she did not quarrel with my wife.
_Many men, among whom is LAEG, chariot-driver of
CUCHULAIN, come in with great horns of many fantastic
shapes._
LAEG.
I am Cuchulain’s chariot-driver, and I say that my master is the best.
ANOTHER.
He is not, but Leagerie is.
ANOTHER.
No, but Conal is.
LAEG.
Make them listen to me, Cuchulain.
ANOTHER.
No, but listen to me.
LAEG.
When I said Cuchulain should have the Helmet, they blew the horns.
ANOTHER.
Conal has it. The best man has it.
CUCHULAIN.
Silence, all of you. What is all this uproar, Laeg, and who began it?
[_The _Scullions_ and the _Horseboys_ point at LAEG and
cry, ‘_He began it_.’ They keep up an all but continual
murmur through what follows._
LAEG.
A man with a red beard came where we were sitting, and as he passed me
he cried out that they were taking a golden helmet or some such thing
from you and denying you the championship of Ireland. I stood up on
that and I cried out that you were the best of the men of Ireland. But
the others cried for Leagerie or Conal, and because I have a big voice
they got down the horns to drown my voice, and as neither I nor they
would keep silent we have come here to settle it. I demand that the
Helmet be taken from Conal and be given to you.
[_The _Horseboys_ and the _Scullions_ shout, ‘_No, no;
give it to Leagerie_,’ ‘_The best man has it_,’ etc._
CUCHULAIN.
It has not been given to Conal or to anyone. I have made it into a
drinking-cup that it may belong to all. I drank and then Conal drank.
Give it to Leagerie, Conal, that he may drink. That will make them see
that it belongs to all of us.
A SCULLION OR HORSEBOY.
Cuchulain is right.
ANOTHER.
Cuchulain is right, and I am tired blowing on the big horn.
LAEG.
Cuchulain, you drank first.
ANOTHER.
He gives it to Leagerie now, but he has taken the honour of it for
himself. Did you hear him say he drank the first? He claimed to be the
best by drinking first.
ANOTHER.
Did Cuchulain drink the first?
LAEG [_triumphantly_].
You drank the first, Cuchulain.
CONAL.
Did you claim to be better than us by drinking first?
[_LEAGERIE and CONAL draw their swords._
CUCHULAIN.
Is it that old dried herring, that old red juggler who has made us
quarrel for his own comfort? [_The _Horseboys_ and the _Scullions_
murmur excitedly._] He gave the Helmet to set us by the ears, and
because we would not quarrel over it, he goes to Laeg and tells him
that I am wronged. Who knows where he is now, or who he is stirring up
to make mischief between us? Go back to your work and do not stir from
it whatever noise comes to you or whatever shape shows itself.
A SCULLION.
Cuchulain is right. I am tired blowing on the big horn.
CUCHULAIN.
Go in silence.
[_The _Scullions_ and _Horseboys_ turn towards
the door, but stand still on hearing the voice of
LEAGERIE’S WIFE outside the door._
LEAGERIE’S WIFE.
My man is the best. I will go in the first. I will go in the first.
EMER.
My man is the best, and I will go in first.
CONAL’S WIFE.
No, for my man is the best, and it is I that should go first.
[_LEAGERIE’S WIFE and CONAL’S WIFE struggle in the
doorway._
_LEAGERIE’S WIFE sings._
My man is the best.
What other has fought
The cat-headed men
That mew in the sea
And carried away
Their long-hidden gold?
They struck with their claws
And bit with their teeth,
But Leagerie my husband
Put all to the sword.
CONAL’S WIFE.
[_Putting her hand over the other’s mouth and getting
in front of her._]
My husband has fought
With strong men in armour.
Had he a quarrel
With cats, it is certain
He’d war with none
But the stout and heavy
With good claws on them.
What glory in warring
With hollow shadows
That helplessly mew?
EMER.
[_Thrusting herself between them and forcing both of
them back with her hands._]
I am Emer, wife of Cuchulain, and no one shall go in front of me, or
sing in front of me, or praise any that I have not a mind to hear
praised.
[_CUCHULAIN puts his spear across the door._
CUCHULAIN.
All of our three wives shall come in together, and by three doors equal
in height and in breadth and in honour. Break down the bottoms of the
windows.
[_While CONAL and LEAGERIE are breaking down the
bottoms of the windows each of their wives goes to the
window where her husband is._
_While the windows are being broken down EMER sings._
My man is the best.
And Conal’s wife
And the wife of Leagerie
Know that they lie
When they praise their own
Out of envy of me.
My man is the best,
First for his own sake,
Being the bravest
And handsomest man
And the most beloved
By the women of Ireland
That envy me,
And then for his wife’s sake
Because I’m the youngest
And handsomest queen.
[_When the windows have been made into doors, CUCHULAIN
takes his spear from the door where EMER is, and all
three come in at the same moment._
EMER.
I am come to praise you and to put courage into you, Cuchulain, as a
wife should, that they may not take the championship of the men of
Ireland from you.
LEAGERIE’S WIFE.
You lie, Emer, for it is Cuchulain and Conal who are taking the
championship from my husband.
CONAL’S WIFE.
Cuchulain has taken it.
CUCHULAIN.
Townland against townland, barony against barony, kingdom against
kingdom, province against province, and if there be but two door-posts
to a door the one fighting against the other. [_He takes up the Helmet
which LEAGERIE had laid down upon the table when he went to break out
the bottom of the window._] This Helmet will bring no more wars into
Ireland. [_He throws it into the sea._]
LEAGERIE’S WIFE.
You have done that to rob my husband.
CONAL’S WIFE.
You could not keep it for yourself, and so you threw it away that
nobody else might have it.
CONAL.
You should not have done that, Cuchulain.
LEAGERIE.
You have done us a great wrong.
EMER.
Who is for Cuchulain?
CUCHULAIN.
Let no one stir.
EMER.
Who is for Cuchulain, I say?
[_She draws her dagger from her belt and sings the same
words as before, flourishing it about. While she has
been singing, CONAL’S WIFE and LEAGERIE’S WIFE have
drawn their daggers and run at her to kill her, but
CUCHULAIN has forced them back. CONAL and LEAGERIE have
drawn their swords to strike CUCHULAIN._
CONAL’S WIFE.
[_While EMER is still singing._]
Silence her voice, silence her voice, blow the horns, make a noise!
[_The _Scullions_ and _Horseboys_ blow their horns or
fight among themselves. There is a deafening noise and
a confused fight. Suddenly three black hands holding
extinguishers come through the window and extinguish
the torches. It is now pitch dark but for a very faint
light outside the house which merely shows that there
are moving forms, but not who or what they are, and in
the darkness one can hear low terrified voices._
FIRST VOICE.
Did you see them putting out the torches?
ANOTHER VOICE.
They came up out of the sea, three black men.
ANOTHER VOICE.
They have heads of cats upon them.
ANOTHER VOICE.
They came up mewing out of the sea.
ANOTHER VOICE.
How dark it is! one of them has put his hand over the moon.
[_A light gradually comes into the windows as if
shining from the sea. The RED MAN is seen standing in
the midst of the house._
RED MAN.
I demand the debt that is owing. I demand that some man shall stoop
down that I may cut his head off as my head was cut off. If my debt is
not paid, no peace shall come to Ireland, and Ireland shall lie weak
before her enemies. But if my debt is paid there shall be peace.
CUCHULAIN.
The quarrels of Ireland shall end. What is one man’s life? I will pay
the debt with my own head. [_EMER wails._] Do not cry out, Emer, for
if I were not myself, if I were not Cuchulain, one of those that God
has made reckless, the women of Ireland had not loved me, and you had
not held your head so high. [_He stoops, bending his head. Three _Black
Men_ come to the door. Two hold torches, and one stooping between them
holds up the Golden Helmet. The RED MAN gives one of the _Black Men_
his sword and takes the Helmet._] What do you wait for, old man? Come,
raise up your sword!
RED MAN.
I will not harm you, Cuchulain. I am the guardian of this land, and
age after age I come up out of the sea to try the men of Ireland. I
give you the championship because you are without fear, and you shall
win many battles with laughing lips and endure wounding and betrayal
without bitterness of heart; and when men gaze upon you, their hearts
shall grow greater and their minds clear; until the day come when I
darken your mind, that there may be an end to the story, and a song on
the harp-string.
THE IRISH DRAMATIC MOVEMENT
_The Irish dramatic movement began in May, 1899, with the performance
of certain plays by English actors who were brought to Dublin for the
purpose; and in the spring of the following year and in the autumn of
the year after that, performances of like plays were given by like
actors at the Gaiety Theatre, Dublin. In the third year I started
SAMHAIN to defend the work, and on re-reading it and reading it for
the first time throughout, have found it best to reprint my part of
it unchanged. A number has been published about once a year till very
lately, and the whole series of notes are a history of a movement which
is important because of the principles it is rooted in whatever be its
fruits, and these principles are better told of in words that rose
out of the need, than were I to explain all again and with order and
ceremony now that the old enmities and friendships are ruffled by new
ones that have other things to be done and said._
_March, 1908._
SAMHAIN: 1901
When Lady Gregory, Mr. Edward Martyn, and myself planned the Irish
Literary Theatre, we decided that it should be carried on in the form
we had projected for three years. We thought that three years would
show whether the country desired to take up the project, and make it a
part of the national life, and that we, at any rate, could return to
our proper work, in which we did not include theatrical management,
at the end of that time. A little later, Mr. George Moore[A] joined
us; and, looking back now upon our work, I doubt if it could have been
done at all without his knowledge of the stage; and certainly if the
performances of this present year bring our adventure to a successful
close, a chief part of the credit will be his. Many, however, have
helped us in various degrees, for in Ireland just now one has only to
discover an idea that seems of service to the country for friends and
helpers to start up on every hand. While we needed guarantors we had
them in plenty, and though Mr. Edward Martyn’s public spirit made it
unnecessary to call upon them, we thank them none the less.
Whether the Irish Literary Theatre has a successor made on its own
model or not, we can claim that a dramatic movement which will not
die has been started. When we began our work, we tried in vain to
get a play in Gaelic. We could not even get a condensed version of
the dialogue of Oisin and Patrick. We wrote to Gaelic enthusiasts in
vain, for their imagination had not yet turned towards the stage, and
now there are excellent Gaelic plays by Dr. Douglas Hyde, by Father
O’Leary, by Father Dineen, and by Mr. MacGinlay; and the Gaelic League
has had a competition for a one-act play in Gaelic, with what results I
do not know. There have been successful performances of plays in Gaelic
at Dublin and at Macroom, and at Letterkenny, and I think at other
places; and Mr. Fay has got together an excellent little company which
plays both in Gaelic and English. I may say, for I am perhaps writing
an epitaph, and epitaphs should be written in a genial spirit, that
we have turned a great deal of Irish imagination towards the stage.
We could not have done this if our movement had not opened a way of
expression for an impulse that was in the people themselves. The truth
is that the Irish people are at that precise stage of their history
when imagination, shaped by many stirring events, desires dramatic
expression. One has only to listen to a recitation of Raftery’s
_Argument with Death_ at some country Feis to understand this. When
Death makes a good point, or Raftery a good point, the audience applaud
delightedly, and applaud, not as a London audience would, some verbal
dexterity, some piece of smartness, but the movements of a simple and
fundamental comedy. One sees it too in the reciters themselves, whose
acting is at times all but perfect in its vivid simplicity. I heard a
little Claddagh girl tell a folk-story at Galway Feis with a restraint
and a delightful energy that could hardly have been bettered by the
most careful training.
The organization of this movement is of immediate importance. Some of
our friends propose that somebody begin at once to get a small stock
company together, and that he invite, let us say, Mr. Benson, to find
us certain well-trained actors, Irish if possible, but well trained of
a certainty, who will train our actors, and take the more difficult
parts at the beginning. These friends contend that it is necessary to
import our experts at the beginning, for our company must be able to
compete with travelling English companies, but that a few years will be
enough to make many competent Irish actors. The Corporation of Dublin
should be asked, they say, to give a small annual sum of money, such
as they give to the Academy of Music; and the Corporations of Cork
and Limerick and Waterford, and other provincial towns, to give small
endowments in the shape of a hall and attendants and lighting for a
week or two out of every year; and the Technical Board to give a small
annual sum of money to a school of acting which would teach fencing and
declamation, and gesture and the like. The stock company would perform
in Dublin perhaps three weeks in spring, and three weeks in autumn,
and go on tour the rest of the time through Ireland, and through the
English towns where there is a large Irish population. It would perform
plays in Irish and English, and also, it is proposed, the masterpieces
of the world, making a point of performing Spanish and Scandinavian,
and French, and perhaps Greek masterpieces rather more than
Shakespeare, for Shakespeare one sees, not well done indeed, but not
unendurably ill done in the Theatre of Commerce. It would do its best
to give Ireland a hardy and shapely national character by opening the
doors to the four winds of the world, instead of leaving the door that
is towards the east wind open alone. Certainly, the national character,
which is so essentially different from the English that Spanish and
French influences may well be most healthy, is at present like one of
those miserable thorn bushes by the sea that are all twisted to one
side by some prevailing wind.
It is contended that there is no reason why the company should not be
as successful as similar companies in Germany and Scandinavia, and
that it would be even of commercial advantage to Dublin by making it
a pleasanter place to live in, besides doing incalculable good to the
whole intellect of the country. One, at any rate, of those who press
the project on us has much practical knowledge of the stage and of
theatrical management, and knows what is possible and what is not
possible.
Others among our friends, and among these are some who have had more
than their share of the hard work which has built up the intellectual
movement in Ireland, argue that a theatre of this kind would require
too much money to be free, that it could not touch on politics, the
most vital passion and vital interest of the country, as they say,
and that the attitude of continual compromise between conviction and
interest, which it would necessitate, would become demoralising to
everybody concerned, especially at moments of political excitement.
They tell us that the war between an Irish Ireland and an English
Ireland is about to become much fiercer, to divide families and friends
it may be, and that the organisations that will lead in the war must
be able to say everything the people are thinking. They would have
Irishmen give their plays to a company like Mr. Fay’s, when they are
within its power, and if not, to Mr. Benson or to any other travelling
company which will play them in Ireland without committees, where
everybody compromises a little. In this way, they contend, we would
soon build up an Irish theatre from the ground, escaping to some extent
the conventions of the ordinary theatre, and English voices which
give a foreign air to one’s words. And though we might have to wait
some years, we would get even the masterpieces of the world in good
time. Let us, they think, be poor enough to whistle at the thief who
would take away some of our thoughts, and after Mr. Fay has taken his
company, as he plans, through the villages and the country towns, he
will get the little endowment that is necessary, or if he does not some
other will.
I do not know what Lady Gregory or Mr. Moore think of these projects.
I am not going to say what I think. I have spent much of my time and
more of my thought these last ten years on Irish organisation, and now
that the Irish Literary Theatre has completed the plan I had in my head
ten years ago, I want to go down again to primary ideas. I want to put
old stories into verse, and if I put them into dramatic verse it will
matter less to me henceforward who plays them than what they play, and
how they play. I hope to get our heroic age into verse, and to solve
some problems of the speaking of verse to musical notes.