Chapter 14

MAURYA. How would the like of her get a good price for a pig?

BARTLEY (_to_ CATHLEEN). If the west wind holds with the last bit of the moon let you and Nora get up weed enough for another cock for the kelp. It's hard set we'll be from this day with no one in it but one man to work.

MAURYA. It's hard set we'll be surely the day you're drownd'd with the rest. What way will I live and the girls with me, and I an old woman looking for the grave?

(BARTLEY _lays down the halter, takes off his old coat, and puts on a newer one of the same flannel._)

BARTLEY (_to_ NORA). Is she coming to the pier?

NORA (_looking out_). She's passing the green head and letting fall her sails.

BARTLEY (_getting his purse and tobacco_). I'll have half an hour to go down, and you'll see me coming again in two days, or in three days, or maybe in four days if the wind is bad.

MAURYA (_turning round to the fire, and putting her shawl over her head_). Isn't it a hard and cruel man won't hear a word from an old woman, and she holding him from the sea?

CATHLEEN. It's the life of a young man to be going on the sea, and who would listen to an old woman with one thing and she saying it over?

BARTLEY (_taking the halter_). I must go now quickly. I'll ride down on the red mare, and the gray pony'll run behind me. The blessing of God on you.

(_He goes out._)

MAURYA (_crying out as he is in the door_). He's gone now, God spare us, and we'll not see him again. He's gone now, and when the black night is falling I'll have no son left me in the world.

CATHLEEN. Why wouldn't you give him your blessing and he looking round in the door? Isn't it sorrow enough is on everyone in this house without your sending him out with an unlucky word behind him, and a hard word in his ear?

(MAURYA _takes up the tongs and begins raking the fire aimlessly without looking round._)

NORA (_turning towards her_). You're taking away the turf from the cake.

CATHLEEN (_crying out_). The Son of God forgive us, Nora, we're after forgetting his bit of bread.

(_She comes over to the fire._)

NORA. And it's destroyed he'll be going till dark night, and he after eating nothing since the sun went up.

CATHLEEN (_turning the cake out of the oven_). It's destroyed he'll be, surely. There's no sense left on any person in a house where an old woman will be talking for ever.

(MAURYA _sways herself on her stool._)

CATHLEEN (_cutting off some of the bread and rolling it in a cloth, to_ MAURYA). Let you go down now to the spring well and give him this and he passing. You'll see him then and the dark word will be broken, and you can say, "God speed you," the way he'll be easy in his mind.

MAURYA (_taking the bread_). Will I be in it as soon as himself?

CATHLEEN. If you go now quickly.

MAURYA (_standing up unsteadily_). It's hard set I am to walk.

CATHLEEN (_looking at her anxiously_). Give her the stick, Nora, or maybe she'll slip on the big stones.

NORA. What stick?

CATHLEEN. The stick Michael brought from Connemara.

MAURYA (_taking a stick NORA gives her_). In the big world the old people do be leaving things after them for their sons and children, but in this place it is the young men do be leaving things behind for them that do be old.

(_She goes out slowly. NORA goes over to the ladder._)

CATHLEEN. Wait, Nora, maybe she'd turn back quickly. She's that sorry, God help her, you wouldn't know the thing she'd do.

NORA. Is she gone round by the bush?

CATHLEEN (_looking out_). She's gone now. Throw it down quickly, for the Lord knows when she'll be out of it again.

NORA (_getting the bundle from the loft_). The young priest said he'd be passing to-morrow, and we might go down and speak to him below if it's Michael's they are surely.

CATHLEEN (_taking the bundle_). Did he say what way they were found?

NORA (_coming down_). "There were two men," says he, "and they rowing round with poteen before the cocks crowed, and the oar of one of them caught the body, and they passing the black cliffs of the north."

CATHLEEN (_trying to open the bundle_). Give me a knife, Nora; the string's perished with the salt water, and there's a black knot on it you wouldn't loosen in a week.

NORA (_giving her a knife_). I've heard tell it was a long way to Donegal.

CATHLEEN (_cutting the string_). It is surely. There was a man in here a while ago--the man sold us that knife--and he said if you set off walking from the rocks beyond, it would be seven days you'd be in Donegal.

NORA. And what time would a man take, and he floating?

(CATHLEEN _opens the bundle and takes out a bit of a stocking. They look at them eagerly._)

CATHLEEN (_in a low voice_). The Lord spare us, Nora! Isn't it a queer hard thing to say if it's his they are surely?

NORA. I'll get his shirt off the hook the way we can put the one flannel on the other. (_She looks through some clothes hanging in the corner_) It's not with them, Cathleen, and where will it be?

CATHLEEN. I'm thinking Bartley put it on him in the morning, for his own shirt was heavy with the salt in it. (_Pointing to the corner_) There's a bit of a sleeve was of the same stuff. Give me that and it will do.

(NORA _brings it to her and they compare the flannel._)

CATHLEEN. It's the same stuff, Nora; but if it is itself, aren't there great rolls of it in the shops of Galway, and isn't it many another man may have a shirt of it as well as Michael himself?

NORA (_who has taken up the stocking and counted the stitches, crying out_) It's Michael, Cathleen, it's Michael; God spare his soul and what will herself say when she hears this story, and Bartley on the sea?

CATHLEEN (_taking the stocking_). It's a plain stocking.

NORA. It's the second one of the third pair I knitted, and I put up three score stitches, and I dropped four of them.

CATHLEEN (_counts the stitches_). It's that number is in it. (_Crying out_) Ah, Nora, isn't it a bitter thing to think of him floating that way to the far north, and no one to keen him but the black hags that do be flying on the sea?

NORA (_swinging herself round, and throwing out her arms on the clothes_). And isn't it a pitiful thing when there is nothing left of a man who was a great rower and fisher, but a bit of an old shirt and a plain stocking?

CATHLEEN (_after an instant_). Tell me is herself coming, Nora? I hear a little sound on the path.

NORA (_looking out_). She is, Cathleen. She's coming up to the door.

CATHLEEN. Put these things away before she'll come in. Maybe it's easier she'll be after giving her blessing to Bartley, and we won't let on we've heard anything the time he's on the sea.

NORA (_helping CATHLEEN to close the bundle_). We'll put them here in the corner.

(_They put them into a hole in the chimney corner. CATHLEEN goes back to the spinning wheel._)

NORA. Will she see it was crying I was?

CATHLEEN. Keep your back to the door the way the light'll not be on you.

(NORA _sits down at the chimney corner, with her back to the door._ MAURYA _comes in very slowly, without looking at the girls, and goes over to her stool at the other side of the fire. The cloth with the bread is still in her hand. The girls look at each other, and_ NORA _points to the bundle of bread._)

CATHLEEN (_offer spinning for a moment_), You didn't give him his bit of bread?

(MAURYA _begins to keen softly, without turning round._)

CATHLEEN. Did you see him riding down?

(MAURYA _goes on keening._)

CATHLEEN (_a little impatiently_). God forgive you; isn't it a better thing to raise your voice and tell what you seen, than to be making lamentation for a thing that's done? Did you see Bartley, I'm saying to you.

MAURYA (_with a weak voice_). My heart's broken from this day.

CATHLEEN (_as before_). Did you see Bartley?

MAURYA. I seen the fearfulest thing.

CATHLEEN (_leaves her wheel and looks out_). God forgive you; he's riding the mare now over the green head, and the gray pony behind him.

MAURYA (_starts, so that her shawl falls back from her head and shows her white tossed hair; with a frightened voice_). The gray pony behind him.

CATHLEEN (_coming to the fire_). What is it ails you, at all?

MAURYA (_speaking very slowly_). I've seen the fearfulest thing any person has seen, since the day Bride Dara seen the dead man with the child in his arms.

CATHLEEN AND NORA. Uah.

(_They crouch down in front of the old woman at the fire._)

NORA. Tell us what it is you seen.

MAURYA. I went down to the spring-well, and I stood there saying a prayer to myself. Then Bartley came along, and he riding on the red mare with the gray pony behind him. (_She puts up her hands, as if to hide something from her eyes._) The Son of God spare us, Nora!

CATHLEEN. What is it you seen?

MAURYA. I seen Michael himself.

CATHLEEN (_speaking softly_). You did not, mother; it wasn't Michael you seen, for his body is after being found in the far north, and he's got a clean burial by the grace of God.

MAURYA (_a little defiantly_). I'm after seeing him this day, and he riding and galloping. Bartley came first on the red mare; and I tried to say "God speed you," but something choked the words in my throat. He went by quickly; and, "The blessing of God on you," says he, and I could say nothing. I looked up then, and I crying, at the gray pony, and there was Michael upon it--with fine clothes on him, and new shoes on his feet.

CATHLEEN (_begins to keen_). It's destroyed we are from this day. It's destroyed, surely.

NORA. Didn't the young priest say the Almighty God wouldn't leave her destitute with no son living?

MAUKYA (_in a low voice, but clearly_). It's little the like of him knows of the sea.... Bartley will be lost now, and let you call in Eamon and make me a good coffin out of the white boards, for I won't live after them. I've had a husband, and a husband's father, and six sons in this house--six fine men, though it was a hard birth I had with every one of them and they coming to the world--and some of them were found and some of them were not found, but they're gone now, the lot of them.... There were Stephen, and Shawn, were lost in the great wind, and found after in the Bay of Gregory of the Golden Mouth, and carried up the two of them on the one plank, and in by that door.

(_She pauses for a moment, the girls start as if they heard something through the door that is half-open behind them._)

NORA (_in a whisper_). Did you hear that, Cathleen? Did you hear a noise in the northeast?

CATHLEEN (_in a whisper_). There's someone after crying out by the seashore.

MAURYA (_continues without hearing anything_). There was Sheamus and his father, and his own father again, were lost in a dark night, and not a stick or sign was seen of them when the sun went up. There was Patch after was drowned out of a curagh that turned over. I was sitting here with Bartley, and he a baby, lying on my two knees, and I seen two women, and three women, and four women coming in, and they crossing themselves, and not saying a word. I looked out then, and there were men coming after them, and they holding a thing in the half of a red sail, and water dripping out of it--it was a dry day, Nora--and leaving a track to the door.

(_She pauses again with her hand stretched out towards the door. It opens softly and old women begin to come in, crossing themselves on the threshold, and kneeling down in front of the stage with red petticoats over their heads._)

MAURYA (_half in a dream, to Cathleen_). Is it Patch, or Michael, or what is it at all?

CATHLEEN. Michael is after being found in the far north, and when he is found there how could he be here in this place?

MAURYA. There does be a power of young men floating round in the sea, and what way would they know if it was Michael they had, or another man like him, for when a man is nine days in the sea, and the wind blowing, it's hard set his own mother would be to say what man was it.

CATHLEEN. It's Michael, God spare him, for they're after sending us a bit of his clothes from the far north.

(_She reaches out and hands MAURYA the clothes that belonged to_ MICHAEL. MAURYA _stands up slowly, and takes them in her hands._ NORA _looks out._)

NORA. They're carrying a thing among them and there's water dripping out of it and leaving a track by the big stones.

CATHLEEN (_in a whisper to the women who have come in_). Is it Bartley it is?

ONE OF THE WOMEN. It is surely, God rest his soul.

(_Two younger women come in and pull out the table. Then men carry in the body of_ BARTLEY, _laid on a plank, with a bit of a sail over it, and lay it on the table._)

CATHLEEN (_to the women, as they are doing so_). What way was he drowned?

ONE OF THE WOMEN. The gray pony knocked him into the sea, and he was washed out where there is a great surf on the white rocks.

(MAURYA _has gone over and knelt down at the head of the table. The women are keening softly and swaying themselves with a slow movement._ CATHLEEN _and_ NORA _kneel at the other end of the table. The men kneel near the door._)

MAURYA (_raising her head and speaking as if she did not see the people around her_). They're all gone now, and there isn't anything more the sea can do to me.... I'll have no call now to be up crying and praying when the wind breaks from the south, and you can hear the surf is in the east, and the surf is in the west, making a great stir with the two noises, and they hitting one on the other. I'll have no call now to be going down and getting Holy Water in the dark nights after Samhain, and I won't care what way the sea is when the other women will be keening. (_To_ NORA) Give me the Holy Water, Nora; there's a small sup still on the dresser.

(NORA _gives it to her._)

MAURYA (_drops_ MICHAEL'S _clothes across_ BARTLEY'S _feet, and sprinkles the Holy Water over him_). It isn't that I haven't prayed for you, BARTLEY, to the Almighty God. It isn't that I haven't said prayers in the dark night till you wouldn't know what I'd be saying; but it's a great rest I'll have now, and it's time surely. It's a great rest I'll have now, and great sleeping in the long nights after Samhain, if it's only a bit of wet flour we do have to eat, and maybe a fish that would be stinking.

(_She kneels down again, crossing herself, and saying prayers under her breath._)

CATHLEEN (_to an old man_). Maybe yourself and Eamon would make a coffin when the sun rises. We have fine white boards herself bought, God help her, thinking Michael would be found, and I have a new cake you can eat while you'll be working.

THE OLD MAN (_looking at the boards_). Are there nails with them?

CATHLEEN. There are not, Colum; we didn't think of the nails.

ANOTHER MAN. It's a great wonder she wouldn't think of the nails, and all the coffins she's seen made already.

CATHLEEN. It's getting old she is, and broken.

(MAURYA _stands up again very slowly and spreads out the pieces of_ MICHAEL'S _clothes beside the body, sprinkling them with the last of the Holy Water._)

NORA (_in a whisper to_ CATHLEEN). She's quiet now and easy; but the day Michael was drowned you could hear her crying out from this to the spring-well. It's fonder she was of Michael, and would anyone have thought that?

CATHLEEN (_slowly and clearly_). An old woman will be soon tired with anything she will do, and isn't it nine days herself is after crying and keening, and making great sorrow in the house?

MAURYA (_puts the empty cup mouth downwards on the table, and lays her hands together on_ BARTLEY'S _feet_). They're all together this time, and the end is come. May the Almighty God have mercy on Bartley's soul, and on Michael's soul, and on the souls of Sheamus and Patch, and Stephen and Shawn (_bending her head_); and may He have mercy on my soul, Nora, and on the soul of everyone is left living in the world.

(_She pauses, and the keen rises a little more loudly from the women, then sinks away._)

MAURYA (_continuing_). Michael has a clean burial in the far north, by the grace of the Almighty God. Bartley will have a fine coffin out of the white boards, and a deep grave surely. What more can we want than that? No man at all can be living for ever, and we must be satisfied.

(_She kneels down again, and the curtain falls slowly_).

THE LAND OF HEART'S DESIRE[1]

William Butler Yeats

[Footnote 1: Reprinted by arrangement with Mr. Yeats and the Macmillan Company, New York, publishers of Mr. Yeats's Collected Works (1912).]

CHARACTERS

MAURTEEN BRUIN BRIDGET BRUIN, his wife SHAWN BRUIN, their son MAIRE BRUIN, wife of Shawn FATHER HART A FAERY CHILD

SCENE: _In the Barony of Kilmacowan, in the county of Sligo, at a remote time._

SETTING: _a room with a hearth on the floor in the middle of a deep alcove on the right. There are benches in the alcove, and a table; a crucifix on the wall. The alcove is full of a glow of light from the fire. There is an open door facing the audience, to the left, and to the left of this a bench. Through the door one can see the forest. It is night, but the moon or a late sunset glimmers through the trees, and carries the eye far off into a vague, mysterious world. MAURTEEN BRUIN, SHAWN BRUIN, and BRIDGET BRUIN sit in the alcove at the table, or about the fire. They are dressed in the costume of some remote time, and near them sits an old priest, FATHER HART, in the garb of a friar. There is food and drink upon the table. MAIRE BRUIN stands by the door, reading a yellow manuscript. If she looks up, she can see through the door into the wood._

BRIDGET BRUIN Because I bade her go and feed the calves, She took that old book down out of the thatch And has been doubled over it all day. We should be deafened by her groans and moans Had she to work as some do, Father Hart, Get up at dawn like me, and mend and scour; Or ride abroad in the boisterous night like you, The pyx and blessed bread under your arm.

SHAWN BRUIN You are too cross.

BRIDGET BRUIN The young side with the young.

MAURTEEN BRUIN She quarrels with my wife a bit at times, And is too deep just now in the old book! But do not blame her greatly; she will grow As quiet as a puff-ball in a tree When but the moons of marriage dawn and die For half a score of times.

FATHER HART Their hearts are wild As be the hearts of birds, till children come.

BRIDGET BRUIN She would not mind the griddle, milk the cow, Or even lay the knives and spread the cloth.

FATHER HART I never saw her read a book before; What may it be?

MAURTEEN BRUIN I do not rightly know; It has been in the thatch for fifty years. My father told me my grandfather wrote it, Killed a red heifer and bound it with the hide. But draw your chair this way--supper is spread; And little good he got out of the book, Because it filled his house with roaming bards, And roaming ballad-makers and the like, And wasted all his goods.--Here is the wine: The griddle bread's beside you, Father Hart. Colleen, what have you got there in the book That you must leave the bread to cool? Had I, Or had my father, read or written books There were no stocking stuffed with golden guineas To come, when I am dead, to Shawn and you.

FATHER HART You should not fill your head with foolish dreams. What are you reading?

MARIE BRUIN How a Princess Edane, A daughter of a King of Ireland, heard A voice singing on a May Eve like this, And followed, half awake and half asleep, Until she came into the Land of Faëry, Where nobody gets old and godly and grave, Where nobody gets old and crafty and wise, Where nobody gets old and bitter of tongue; And she is still there, busied with a dance, Deep in the dewy shadow of a wood, Or where stars walk upon a mountain-top.

MAURTEEN BRUIN Persuade the colleen to put by the book: My grandfather would mutter just such things, And he was no judge of a dog or horse, And any idle boy could blarney him: Just speak your mind.

FATHER HART Put it away, my colleen. God spreads the heavens above us like great wings, And gives a little round of deeds and days, And then come the wrecked angels and set snares, And bait them with light hopes and heavy dreams, Until the heart is puffed with pride and goes, Half shuddering and half joyous, from God's peace: And it was some wrecked angel, blind from tears, Who flattered Edane's heart with merry words. My colleen, I have seen some other girls Restless and ill at ease, but years went by And they grew like their neighbours and were glad In minding children, working at the churn, And gossiping of weddings and of wakes; For life moves out of a red flare of dreams Into a common light of common hours, Until old age bring the red flare again.

MAURTEEN BRUIN That's true--but she's too young to know it's true.

BRIDGET BRUIN She's old enough to know that it is wrong To mope and idle.

SHAWN BRUIN I've little blame for her; And mother's tongue were harder still to bear, But for her fancies: this is May Eve too, When the good people post about the world, And surely one may think of them to-night. Maire, have you the primroses to fling Before the door to make a golden path For them to bring good luck into the house? Remember, they may steal new-married brides After the fall of twilight on May Eve.

(MAIRE BRUIN _goes over to the window and takes flowers from the bowl and strews them outside the door._)

FATHER HART You do well, daughter, because God permits Great power to the good people on May Eve.

SHAWN BRUIN They can work all their will with primroses; Change them to golden money, or little flames To burn up those who do them any wrong.

MARIE BRUIN (_in a dreamy voice_) I had no sooner flung them by the door Than the wind cried and hurried them away; And then a child came running in the wind And caught them in her hands and fondled them: Her dress was green: her hair was of red gold; Her face was pale as water before dawn.

FATHER HART Whose child can this be?

MAURTEEN BRUIN No one's child at all. She often dreams that someone has gone by When there was nothing but a puff of wind.

MARIE BRUIN They will not bring good luck into the house, For they have blown the primroses away; Yet I am glad that I was courteous to them, For are not they, likewise, children of God?

FATHER HART Colleen, they are the children of the fiend, And they have power until the end of Time, When God shall fight with them a great pitched battle And hack them into pieces.

MARIE BRUIN He will smile, Father, perhaps, and open His great door, And call the pretty and kind into His house.

FATHER HART Did but the lawless angels see that door, They would fall, slain by everlasting peace; And when such angels knock upon our doors Who goes with them must drive through the same storm.

(_A knock at the door._ MAIRE BRUIN _opens it and then goes to the dresser and fills a porringer with milk and hands it through the door, and takes it back empty and closes the door._)

MARIE BRUIN A little queer old woman cloaked in green, Who came to beg a porringer of milk.

BRIDGET BRUIN The good people go asking milk and fire Upon May Eve--Woe on the house that gives, For they have power upon it for a year. I knew you would bring evil on the house.

MAURTEEN BRUIN Who was she?

MARIE BRUIN Both the tongue and face were strange.

MAURTEEN BRUIN Some strangers came last week to Clover Hill; She must be one of them.

BRIDGET BRUIN I am afraid.

MAURTEEN BRUIN The priest will keep all harm out of the house.

FATHER HART The cross will keep all harm out of the house While it hangs there.