The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats. Volume 3 of 8. The Countess Cathleen. The Land of Heart's Desire. The Unicorn from the Stars

ACT III

Hall of the COUNTESS CATHLEEN as before. SERVANT enters and goes towards the oratory door.

SERVANTHere is yet another would see your ladyship.CATHLEEN [within]Who calls me?SERVANTThere is a man would speak with you,And by his face he has some pressing news,Some moving tale.CATHLEEN [coming to chapel door]I cannot rest or pray,For all day long the messengers run hitherOn one another’s heels, and every messageMore evil than the one that had gone before.Who is the messenger?SERVANTAleel, the poet.CATHLEENThere is no hour he is not welcome to me,Because I know of nothing but a harp-stringThat can remember happiness.[SERVANT goes out and ALEEL comes in.And nowI grow forgetful of evil for awhile.ALEELI have come to bid you leave this castle, and flyOut of these woods.CATHLEENWhat evil is there here,That is not everywhere from this to the sea?ALEELThey who have sent me walk invisible.CATHLEENMen say that the wise people of the rathsHave given you wisdom.ALEELI lay in the duskUpon the grassy margin of a lakeAmong the hills, where none of mortal creaturesBut the swan comes – my sleep became a fire.One walked in the fire with birds about his head.CATHLEENAy, Aengus of the birds.ALEELHe may be Aengus,But it may be he bears an angelical name.Lady, he bid me call you from these woods;He bids you bring Oona, your foster-mother,And some few serving-men and live in the hillsAmong the sounds of music and the lightOf waters till the evil days are gone.[He kneels.]For here some terrible death is waiting you;Some unimaginable evil, some great darknessThat fable has not dreamt of, nor sun nor moonScattered.CATHLEENAnd he had birds about his head?ALEELYes, yes, white birds. He bids you leave this houseWith some old trusty serving-man, who will feedAll that are starving and shelter all that wanderWhile there is food and house-room.CATHLEENHe bids me goWhere none of mortal creatures but the swanDabbles, and there you would pluck the harp when the treesHad made a heavy shadow about our door,And talk among the rustling of the reedsWhen night hunted the foolish sun away,With stillness and pale tapers. No – no – no.I cannot. Although I weep, I do not weepBecause that life would be most happy, and hereI find no way, no end. Nor do I weepBecause I had longed to look upon your face,But that a night of prayer has made me weary.ALEEL[Throwing his arms about her feet.]Let Him that made mankind, the angels and devilsAnd death and plenty mend what He has made,For when we labour in vain and eye still seesHeart breaks in vain.CATHLEENHow would that quiet end?ALEELHow but in healing?CATHLEENYou have seen my tears.And I can see your hand shake on the floor.ALEEL [faltering]I thought but of healing. He was angelical.CATHLEEN[Turning away from him.]No, not angelical, but of the old gods,Who wander about the world to waken the heart —The passionate, proud heart that all the angelsLeaving nine heavens empty would rock to sleep.

[She goes to the chapel door; ALEEL holds his clasped hands towards her for a moment hesitatingly, and then lets them fall beside him.

Do not hold out to me beseeching hands.This heart shall never waken on earth. I have swornBy her whose heart the seven sorrows have piercedTo pray before this altar until my heartHas grown to Heaven like a tree, and thereRustled its leaves till Heaven has saved my people.ALEEL [who has risen]When one so great has spoken of love to oneSo little as I, although to deny him love,What can he but hold out beseeching hands,Then let them fall beside him, knowing how greatlyThey have overdared?

[He goes towards the door of the hall. The COUNTESS CATHLEEN takes a few steps towards him.

CATHLEENIf the old tales are true,Queens have wed shepherds and kings beggar-maids;God’s procreant waters flowing about your mindHave made you more than kings or queens; and not youBut I am the empty pitcher.ALEELBeing silent,I have said all – farewell, farewell; and yet no,Give me your hand to kiss.CATHLEENI kiss your brow,But will not say farewell. I am often weary,And I would hear the harp-string.ALEELI cannot stay,For I would hide my sorrow among the hills —Listen, listen, the hills are calling me.[They listen for a moment.CATHLEENI hear the cry of curlew.ALEELThen I will outWhere I can hear wind cry and water cryAnd curlew cry: how does the saying goThat calls them the three oldest cries in the world?Farewell, farewell, I will go wander among them,Because there is no comfort under a roof-tree.[He goes out.CATHLEEN[Looking through the door after him.]I cannot see him. He has come to the great door.I must go pray. Would that my heart and mindWere as little shaken as this candle-light.[She goes into the chapel. The TWO MERCHANTS enter.SECOND MERCHANTWho was the man that came from the great doorWhile we were still in the shadow?FIRST MERCHANTAleel, her lover.SECOND MERCHANTIt may be that he has turned her thought from usAnd we can gather our merchandise in peace.FIRST MERCHANTNo, no, for she is kneeling.SECOND MERCHANTShut the door.Are all our drudges here?FIRST MERCHANT[Closing the chapel door.]I bid them follow.Can you not hear them breathing upon the stairs?I have sat this hour under the elder-tree.SECOND MERCHANTI had bid you rob her treasury, and yetI found you sitting drowsed and motionless,Your chin bowed to your knees, while on all sides,Bat-like from bough and roof and window-ledge,Clung evil souls of men, and in the woods,Like streaming flames, floated upon the windsThe elemental creatures.FIRST MERCHANTI have fared ill;She prayed so hard I could not cross the thresholdTill this young man had turned her prayer to dreams.You have had a man to kill: how have you fared?SECOND MERCHANTI lay in the image of a nine-monthed bonyeen,By Tubber-vanach cross-roads: Father JohnCame, sad and moody, murmuring many prayers;I seemed as though I came from his own sty;He saw the one brown ear; the breviary dropped;He ran; I ran, I ran into the quarry;He fell a score of yards.FIRST MERCHANTNow that he is deadWe shall be too much thronged with souls to-morrow.Did his soul escape you?SECOND MERCHANTI thrust it in the bag.But the hand that blessed the poor and raised the HostTore through the leather with sharp piety.FIRST MERCHANTWell, well, to labour – here is the treasury door.

[They go out by the left-hand door, and enter again in a little while, carrying full bags upon their shoulders.

FIRST MERCHANTBrave thought, brave thought – a shining thought of mine!She now no more may bribe the poor – no moreCheat our great master of his merchandise,While our heels dangle at the house in the woods,And grass grows on the threshold, and snails crawlAlong the window-pane and the mud floor.Brother, where wander all these dwarfish folk,Hostile to men, the people of the tides?SECOND MERCHANT[Going to the door.]They are gone. They have already wandered away,Unwilling labourers.FIRST MERCHANTI will call them hither.[He opens the window.Come hither, hither, hither, water-folk:Come, all you elemental populace;Leave lonely the long-hoarding surges: leaveThe cymbals of the waves to clash alone,And, shaking the sea-tangles from your hair,Gather about us. [After a pause.I can hear a soundAs from waves beating upon distant strands;And the sea-creatures, like a surf of light,Pour eddying through the pathways of the oaks;And as they come, the sentient grass and leavesBow towards them, and the tall, drouth-jaded oaksFondle the murmur of their flying feet.SECOND MERCHANTThe green things love unknotted hearts and minds;And neither one with angels or with us,Nor risen in arms with evil nor with good,In laughter roves the litter of the waves.

[A crowd of faces fill up the darkness outside the window. A figure separates from the others and speaks.

THE SPIRITWe come unwillingly, for she whose goldWe must now carry to the house in the woodsIs dear to all our race. On the green plain,Beside the sea, a hundred shepherds liveTo mind her sheep; and when the nightfall comesThey leave a hundred pans of white ewes’ milkOutside their doors, to feed us when the dawnHas driven us out of Finbar’s ancient house,And broken the long dance under the hill.FIRST MERCHANT[Making a sign upon the air.]Obey! I make a sign upon your hearts.THE SPIRITThe sign of evil burns upon our hearts,And we obey.

[They crowd through the window, and take out of the bags a small bag each. They are dressed in green robes and have ruddy hair. They are a little less than the size of men and women.

FIRST MERCHANTAnd now begone – begone!      [They go.I bid them go, for, being garrulousAnd flighty creatures, they had soon begunTo deafen us with their sea-gossip. NowWe must go bring more money. Brother, brother,I long to see my master’s face again,For I turn homesick.SECOND MERCHANTI too tire of toil.

[They go out, and return as before, with their bags full.

SECOND MERCHANT[Pointing to the oratory.]How may we gain this woman for our lord?This pearl, this turquoise fastened in his crownWould make it shine like His we dare not name.Now that the winds are heavy with our kind,Might we not kill her, and bear off her spiritBefore the mob of angels were astir?[A diadem and a heap of jewels fall from the bag.FIRST MERCHANTWho tore the bag?SECOND MERCHANTThe finger of Priest JohnWhen he fled through the leather. I had thoughtBecause his was an old and little spiritThe tear would hardly matter.FIRST MERCHANTThis comes, brother,Of stealing souls that are not rightly ours.If we would win this turquoise for our lord,It must go dropping down of its freewill.She will have heard the noise. She will stifle usWith holy names.

[He goes to the oratory door and opens it a little, and then closes it.]

No, she has fallen asleep.SECOND MERCHANTThe noise wakened the household. While you spokeI heard chairs moved, and heard folk’s shuffling feet.And now they are coming hither.A VOICE [within]It was here.ANOTHER VOICENo, further away.ANOTHER VOICEIt was in the western tower.ANOTHER VOICECome quickly; we will search the western tower.FIRST MERCHANTWe still have time – they search the distant rooms.Call hither the fading and the unfading fires.SECOND MERCHANT[Going to the window.]There are none here. They tired and strayed from hence —Unwilling labourers.FIRST MERCHANTI will draw them in.[He cries through the window.Come hither, you lost souls of men, who diedIn drunken sleep, and by each other’s handsWhen they had bartered you – come hither allWho mourn among the scenery of your sins,Turning to animal and reptile forms,The visages of passions; hither, hither —Leave marshes and the reed-encumbered pools,You shapeless fires, that were the souls of men,And are a fading wretchedness.SECOND MERCHANTThey come not.FIRST MERCHANT[Making a sign upon the air.]Come hither, hither, hither.SECOND MERCHANTI can hearA crying as of storm-distempered reeds.The fading and the unfading fires rise upLike steam out of the earth; the grass and leavesShiver and shrink away and sway about,Blown by unnatural gusts of ice-cold air.FIRST MERCHANTThey are one with all the beings of decay,Ill longings, madness, lightning, famine, drouth.

[The whole stage is gradually filled with vague forms, some animal shapes, some human, some mere lights.

Come you – and you – and you, and lift these bags.A SPIRITWe are too violent; mere shapes of storm.FIRST MERCHANTCome you – and you – and you, and lift these bags.A SPIRITWe are too feeble, fading out of life.FIRST MERCHANTCome you, and you, who are the latest dead,And still wear human shape: the shape of power.

[The two robbing peasants of the last scene come forward. Their faces have withered from much pain.

Now, brawlers, lift the bags of gold.FIRST PEASANTYes, yes!Unwillingly, unwillingly; for she,Whose gold we bear upon our shoulders thus,Has endless pity even for lost soulsIn her good heart. At moments, now and then,When plunged in horror, brooding each alone,A memory of her face floats in on us.It brings a crowned misery, half repose,And we wail one to other; we obey,For heaven’s many-angled star reversed,Now sign of evil, burns into our hearts.FIRST MERCHANTWhen these pale sapphires and these diademsAnd these small bags of money are in our house,The burning shall give over – now begone.SECOND MERCHANT[Lifting the diadem to put it upon his head.]No – no – no. I will carry the diadem.FIRST MERCHANTNo, brother, not yet.For none can carry her treasures wholly awayBut spirits that are too light for good and evil,Or, being evil, can remember good.Begone! [The spirits vanish.] I bade them go, for they are lonely,And when they see aught living love to sigh.[Pointing to the oratory.] Brother, I heard a sound in there – a soundThat troubles me.SECOND MERCHANT[Going to the door of the oratory and peering through it.]Upon the altar stepsThe Countess tosses, murmuring in her sleepA broken Paternoster.[The FIRST MERCHANT goes to the door and stands beside him.]She is grown still.FIRST MERCHANTA great plan floats into my mind – no wonder,For I come from the ninth and mightiest Hell,Where all are kings. I will wake her from her sleep,And mix with all her thoughts a thought to serve.[He calls through the door.May we be well remembered in your prayers!

[The COUNTESS CATHLEEN wakes, and comes to the door of the oratory. The MERCHANTS descend into the room again. She stands at the top of the stone steps.

CATHLEENWhat would you, sirs?FIRST MERCHANTWe are two merchant men,New come from foreign lands. We bring you news.Forgive our sudden entry: the great doorWas open, we came in to seek a face.CATHLEENThe door stands always open to receive,With kindly welcome, starved and sickly folk,Or any who would fly the woful times.Merchants, you bring me news?FIRST MERCHANTWe saw a manHeavy with sickness in the Bog of Allan,Whom you had bid buy cattle. Near Fair HeadWe saw your grain ships lying all becalmedIn the dark night, and not less still than theyBurned all their mirrored lanthorns in the sea.CATHLEENMy thanks to God, to Mary, and the angels,I still have bags of money, and can buyMeal from the merchants who have stored it up,To prosper on the hunger of the poor.You have been far, and know the signs of things:When will this yellow vapour no more hangAnd creep about the fields, and this great heatVanish away – and grass show its green shoots?FIRST MERCHANTThere is no sign of change – day copies day,Green things are dead – the cattle too are dead,Or dying – and on all the vapour hangsAnd fattens with disease and glows with heat.In you is all the hope of all the land.CATHLEENAnd heard you of the demons who buy souls?FIRST MERCHANTThere are some men who hold they have wolves’ heads,And say their limbs, dried by the infinite flame,Have all the speed of storms; others againSay they are gross and little; while a fewWill have it they seem much as mortals are,But tall and brown and travelled, like us, lady.Yet all agree a power is in their looksThat makes men bow, and flings a casting-netAbout their souls, and that all men would goAnd barter those poor flames – their spirits – onlyYou bribe them with the safety of your gold.CATHLEENPraise be to God, to Mary, and the angels,That I am wealthy. Wherefore do they sell?FIRST MERCHANTThe demons give a hundred crowns and moreFor a poor soul like his who lies asleepBy your great door under the porter’s niche;A little soul not worth a hundred pence.But, for a soul like yours, I heard them say,They would give five hundred thousand crowns and more.CATHLEENHow can a heap of crowns pay for a soul?Is the green grave so terrible a thing?FIRST MERCHANTSome sell because the money gleams, and someBecause they are in terror of the grave,And some because their neighbours sold before,And some because there is a kind of joyIn casting hope away, in losing joy,In ceasing all resistance, in at lastOpening one’s arms to the eternal flames,In casting all sails out upon the wind:To this – full of the gaiety of the lost —Would all folk hurry if your gold were gone.CATHLEENThere is a something, merchant, in your voiceThat makes me fear. When you were telling howA man may lose his soul and lose his God,Your eyes lighted, and the strange wearinessThat hangs about you vanished. When you toldHow my poor money serves the people – both —Merchants, forgive me – seemed to smile.FIRST MERCHANTMan’s sinsMove us to laughter only, we have seenSo many lands and seen so many men.How strange that all these people should be swungAs on a lady’s shoe-string – under themThe glowing leagues of never-ending flame!CATHLEENThere is a something in you that I fear:A something not of us. Were you not bornIn some most distant corner of the world?

[The SECOND MERCHANT, who has been listening at the door to the right, comes forward, and as he comes a sound of voices and feet is heard through the door to his left.

SECOND MERCHANT [aside to FIRST MERCHANT]Away now – they are in the passage – hurry,For they will know us, and freeze up our heartsWith Ave Marys, and burn all our skinWith holy water.FIRST MERCHANTFarewell: we must rideMany a mile before the morning come;Our horses beat the ground impatiently.

[They go out to R. A number of peasants enter at the same moment by the opposite door.

CATHLEENWhat would you?A PEASANTAs we nodded by the fire,Telling old histories, we heard a noiseOf falling money. We have searched in vain.CATHLEENYou are too timid. I heard naught at all.THE OLD PEASANTAy, we are timid, for a rich man’s wordCan shake our houses, and a moon of drouthShrivel our seedlings in the barren earth;We are the slaves of wind, and hail, and flood;Fear jogs our elbow in the market-place,And nods beside us on the chimney-seat.Ill-bodings are as native unto our heartsAs are their spots unto the woodpeckers.CATHLEENYou need not shake with bodings in this house.[Oona enters from the door to L.OONAThe treasure-room is broken in – mavrone – mavrone;The door stands open and the gold is gone.[The peasants raise a lamenting cry.CATHLEEN.Be silent. [The cry ceases.Saw you any one?OONAMavrone,That my good mistress should lose all this money.CATHLEENYou three upon my right hand, ride and ride;I will give a farm to him who finds the thieves.

[A man with keys at his girdle has entered while she was speaking.

A PEASANTThe porter trembles.THE PORTERIt is all no use;Demons were here. I sat beside the doorIn my stone niche, and two owls passed me by,Whispering with human voices.THE OLD PEASANTGod forsakes us.CATHLEENOld man, old man, He never closed a doorUnless one opened. I am desolate,For a most sad resolve wakes in my heart:But always I have faith. Old men and women,Be silent; He does not forsake the world,But stands before it modelling in the clayAnd moulding there His image. Age by ageThe clay wars with His fingers and pleads hardFor its old, heavy, dull, and shapeless ease;At times it crumbles and a nation falls,Now moves awry and demon hordes are born.[The peasants cross themselves.But leave me now, for I am desolate,I hear a whisper from beyond the thunder.[She steps down from the oratory door.Yet stay an instant. When we meet againI may have grown forgetful. Oona, takeThese two – the larder and the dairy keys.[To THE OLD PEASANT.] But take you this. It opens the small roomOf herbs for medicine, of hellebore,Of vervain, monkshood, plantain, and self-healAnd all the others; and the book of curesIs on the upper shelf. You understand,Because you doctored goats and cattle once.THE OLD PEASANTWhy do you do this, lady – did you seeYour coffin in a dream?CATHLEENAh, no, not that,A sad resolve wakes in me. I have heardA sound of wailing in unnumbered hovels,And I must go down, down, I know not where.Pray for the poor folk who are crazed with famine;Pray, you good neighbours.

[The peasants all kneel. The COUNTESS CATHLEEN ascends the steps to the door of the oratory, and, turning round, stands there motionless for a little, and then cries in a loud voice.]

Mary, queen of angels,And all you clouds on clouds of saints, farewell!

ACT IV

The cabin of SHEMUS RUA. The TWO MERCHANTS are sitting one at each end of the table, with rolls of parchment and many little heaps of gold before them. Through an open door, at the back, one sees into an inner room, in which there is a bed. On the bed is the body of MAIRE with candles about it.

FIRST MERCHANTThe woman may keep robbing us no more,For there are only mice now in her coffers.SECOND MERCHANTLast night, closed in the image of an owl,I hurried to the cliffs of Donegal,And saw, creeping on the uneasy surge,Those ships that bring the woman grain and meal;They are five days from us.FIRST MERCHANTI hurried East,A gray owl flitting, flitting in the dew,And saw nine hundred oxen toil through MeathDriven on by goads of iron; they, too, brother,Are full five days from us.SECOND MERCHANTFive days for traffic.

[While they have been speaking the peasants have come in, led by TEIG and SHEMUS, who take their stations, one on each side of the door, and keep them marshalled into rude order and encourage them from time to time with gestures and whispered words.

Here throng they; since the drouth they go in throngs,Like autumn leaves blown by the dreary winds.Come, deal – come, deal.FIRST MERCHANTWho will come deal with us?SHEMUSThey are out of spirit, sir, with lack of food,Save four or five. Here, sir, is one of these;The others will gain courage in good time.A MIDDLE-AGED MANI come to deal if you give honest price.FIRST MERCHANT[Reading in a parchment.]John Maher, a man of substance, with dull mind,And quiet senses and unventurous heart.The angels think him safe. Two hundred crowns,All for a soul, a little breath of wind.THE MANI ask three hundred crowns. You have read there,That no mere lapse of days can make me yours.FIRST MERCHANTThere is something more writ here – often at nightHe is wakeful from a dread of growing poor.There is this crack in you – two hundred crowns.[THE MAN takes them and goes.SECOND MERCHANTCome, deal – one would half think you had no souls.If only for the credit of your parishes,Come, deal, deal, deal, or will you always starve?Maire, the wife of Shemus, would not deal,She starved – she lies in there with red wallflowers,And candles stuck in bottles round her bed.A WOMANWhat price, now, will you give for mine?FIRST MERCHANTAy, ay,Soft, handsome, and still young – not much, I think.[Reading in the parchment.She has love letters in a little jarOn the high shelf between the pepper-potAnd wood-cased hour-glass.THE WOMANO, the scandalous parchment!FIRST MERCHANT [reading]She hides them from her husband, who buys horses,And is not much at home. You are almost safe.I give you fifty crowns.[She turns to go.A hundred, then.[She takes them, and goes into the crowd.Come – deal, deal, deal; it is for charityWe buy such souls at all; a thousand sinsMade them our master’s long before we came.Come, deal – come, deal. You seem resolved to starveUntil your bones show through your skin. Come, deal,Or live on nettles, grass, and dandelion.Or do you dream the famine will go by?The famine is hale and hearty; it is mineAnd my great master’s; it shall no wise ceaseUntil our purpose end: the yellow vapourThat brought it bears it over your dried fieldsAnd fills with violent phantoms of the lost,And grows more deadly as day copies day.See how it dims the daylight. Is that peaceKnown to the birds of prey so dread a thing?They, and the souls obedient to our master,And those who live with that great other spiritHave gained an end, a peace, while you but tossAnd swing upon a moving balance beam.[ALEEL enters; the wires of his harp are broken.ALEELHere, take my soul, for I am tired of it;I do not ask a price.FIRST MERCHANT [reading]A man of songs:Alone in the hushed passion of romance,His mind ran all on sidheoges and on talesOf Fenian labours and the Red Branch kings,And he cared nothing for the life of man:But now all changes.ALEELAy, because her face,The face of Countess Cathleen, dwells with me:The sadness of the world upon her brow:The crying of these strings grew burdensome,Therefore I tore them; see; now take my soul.FIRST MERCHANTWe cannot take your soul, for it is hers.ALEELAh, take it; take it. It nowise can help her,And, therefore, do I tire of it.FIRST MERCHANTNo; no.We may not touch it.ALEELIs your power so small,Must I then bear it with me all my days?May scorn close deep about you!FIRST MERCHANTLead him hence;He troubles me.

[TEIG and SHEMUS lead ALEEL into the crowd.