Plays of Near Far | Page 7

people; sung in the evening. I heard it as I loitered home from the meadows beyond the marshes. There is no ease in the song, and yet ...
MOOMOOMON: Hum it to us.
ZOON: They sang it together, the two that were not of our people.
[He hums a song. They all lift up their heads from their listlessness.
MELIFLOR (wonderingly): That is a song that is new.
ZOON: Yes, it is new to me.
MELIFLOR: It is like an old song.
ZOON: Yes, perhaps it is old.
MELIFLOR: What is the song?
ZOON: It tells of love.
THE PRINCES: Ah-h!
[They seem to wake as though young and strong out of sleep. There is a great commotion among them. The sentries outside are utterly unmoved. OOMUZ, without sharing any of the excitement of the Princes, now nods his head solemnly as he had once shaken it.
MOOMOOMON: Love! It must have been that that I felt that day in the twilight as I came back round the peak of Zing-gee Mountain.
XIMENUNG: You felt it, Moomoomon? Tell us.
MOOMOOMON: All the air seemed gold, seemed gold of a sudden. Through it I saw fair fields, glittering green far down, glimpsed between clumps of the heather. The gold was all about them, yet they shone with their own fair colours. Ah, how can I tell you all I saw? My feet seemed scarce to touch the slope of the mountain; I too seemed one with the golden air in which all things were shining.
XIMENUNG: And this was Love?
MOOMOOMON: I know not. It was some strange new thing. It was strange and new like this song.
MELIFLOR: Perhaps, it was some other strange new thing.
MOOMOOMON: Perhaps. I know not.
ZOON: No. It was Love.
MOOMOOMON: And then that evening in the golden light I knew the purpose of Earth and why all things are.
XIMENUNG: What is the purpose, Moomoomon?
MOOMOOMON: I know not. I was content. I troubled not to remember.
ZOON: It was love.
XIMENUNG: Let us love.
OTHERS: Aye.
HUZ: Aye, that is best of all.
MELIFLOR: No, Princes. The best is idleness. Out of the idle hours all good things come.
HUZ: I will love. That is best.
MELIFLOR: It is like all things, the gift of the idle hours. The workers never love. Their fancies are fastened to the work they do, and do not roam towards love.
ALL: Love! Let us love.
MELIFLOR: We will love in idleness and praise the idle hours.
XIMENUNG: Whom will you love, lord of the shimmering fields?
MELIFLOR: I have but to show myself loitering by lanes in the evening.
XIMENUNG: I too will be there.
MELIFLOR: And when they see me ...
XIMENUNG: They will see me too ...
MELIFLOR (rising): Behold me.
XIMENUNG: So I do.
MELIFLOR: Will they look towards you when this is there?
XIMENUNG: Are birch-trees seen at dawn fairer than I?
MELIFLOR: Behold me; not a poplar is straighter, not a flower is fairer. I will loiter along the lanes at evening.
[He draws his sword. XIMENUNG does the same. MOOMOOMON draws his too and places it between them.
MOOMOOMON: Be at peace. I will go to the lanes, and there need be no quarrel between you, for I....
OTHERS: No, no, no....
HUZ: We will all go.
ANOTHER: We will all love. Hurrah for love.
[They have all risen. They wave their swords on high, not threatening each other. Zoon alone has not risen.
MOOMOOMON (to ZOON): You do not speak, Prince of Zoon. Will you not love along the idle hours?
ZOON: Yes, yes. I love.
MOOMOOMON: Come then to the lanes to loiter. It draws towards evening. Let us all come to the lanes, where the honeysuckle is hanging.
ZOON: I love not in the lanes.
MOOMOOMON: Not in the lanes? Then...!
OTHERS: Not in the lanes?
ZOON: I love her than whom there is no greater on earth--(Some PRINCES: Ah!) unless it be that name that frightens Oomuz.
MOOMOOMON: He loves the...!
XIMENUNG: The ...
MELIFLOR: The Queen!
[OOMUZ nods his head again.
ZOON: The Queen.
MOOMOOMON: If the Queen knew such a thing she would flee from the palace.
ZOON: I would pursue.
MOOMOOMON: She would go by Aether Mountain, where her mother went once before her.
ZOON: I would follow.
HUZ: We would all follow.
MELIFLOR: I would follow too. I would dance after her down the little street: the bright heels of my shoes would twinkle: my cloak would float out behind me: I would pursue her and call her name, beyond the street and over the moor as far as Aether Mountain: but I would not come up with her: that would be too daring.
ZOON: Love is not a toy, Prince Meliflor. Love is no less than a mood of Destiny.
MELIFLOR: Pooh! We must enjoy the idle hours that are for us alone.
ZOON: There will be no idle hours on Aether Mountain, following from crag to crag; if it be true that she would go that way.
MOOMOOMON: It is true. They know it. They say her mother went that way before. It is one of the royal