The Countess Cathleen | Page 2

woods for half a day,
I've taken nothing, for the very rats,

Badgers, and hedgehogs seem to have died of drought,
And there
was scarce a wind in the parched leaves.
TEIG. Then you have brought no dinner.
SHEMUS. After that
I sat among the beggars at the cross-roads,

And held a hollow hand among the others.
MARY. What, did you beg?
SHEMUS. I had no chance to beg,
For when the beggars saw me they
cried out
They would not have another share their alms,
And hunted
me away with sticks and stones.
TEIG. You said that you would bring us food or money.
SHEMUS. What's in the house?
TEIG. A bit of mouldy bread.
MARY. There's flour enough to make another loaf.

TEIG. And when that's gone?
MARY. There is the hen in the coop.
SHEMUS. My curse upon the beggars, my Curse upon them!
TEIG. And the last penny gone.
SHEMUS. When the hen's gone,
What can we do but live on sorrel
and dock)
And dandelion, till our mouths are green?
MARY. God, that to this hour's found bit and sup,
Will cater for us
still.
SHEMUS. His kitchen's bare.
There were five doors that I looked
through this day
And saw the dead and not a soul to wake them.
MARY. Maybe He'd have us die because He knows,
When the ear is
stopped and when the eye is stopped,
That every wicked sight is hid
from the eye,
And all fool talk from the ear.
SHEMUS. Who's passing there?
And mocking us with music?
(A stringed instrument without.)
TEIG. A young man plays it,
There's an old woman and a lady with
him.
SHEMUS. What is the trouble of the poor to her?
Nothing at all or a
harsh radishy sauce
For the day's meat.
MARY. God's pity on the rich,
Had we been through as many doors,
and seen
The dishes standing on the polished wood
In the wax
candle light, we'd be as hard,
And there's the needle's eye at the end
of all,
SHEMUS. My curse upon the rich.

TEIG. They're coming here.
SHEMUS. Then down upon that stool, down quick, I say,
And call
up a whey face and a whining voice,
And let your head be bowed
upon your knees,
MARY. Had I but time to put the place to rights.
(CATHLEEN, OONA, and ALEEL enter.)
CATHLEEN. God save all here. There is a certain house,
An old grey
castle with a kitchen garden,
A cider orchard and a plot for flowers,

Somewhere among these woods.
MARY. We know it, lady.
A place that's set among impassable walls

As though world's trouble could not find it out.
CATHLEEN. It may be that we are that trouble, for we--
Although
we've wandered in the wood this hour--
Have lost it too, yet I should
know my way,
For I lived all my childhood in that house.
MARY. Then you are Countess Cathleen?
CATHLEEN. And this woman,
Oona, my nurse, should have
remembered it,
For we were happy for a long time there.
OONA. The paths are overgrown with thickets now,
Or else some
change has come upon my sight.
CATHLEEN. And this young man, that should have known the
woods-- Because we met him on their border but now,
Wandering
and singing like a wave of the sea--
Is so wrapped up in dreams of
terrors to come
That he can give no help.
MARY. You have still some way,
But I can put you on the trodden
path
Your servants take when they are marketing.
But first sit down

and rest yourself awhile,
For my old fathers served your fathers, lady,

Longer than books can tell--and it were strange
If you and yours
should not be welcome here.
CATHLEEN. And it were stranger still were I ungrateful
For such
kind welcome but I must be gone,
For the night's gathering in.
SHEMUS. It is a long while
Since I've set eyes on bread or on what
buys it.
CATHLEEN. So you are starving even in this wood,
Where I had
thought I would find nothing changed.
But that's a dream, for the old
worm o' the world
Can eat its way into what place it pleases.
(She gives money.)
TEIG. Beautiful lady, give me something too;
I fell but now, being
weak with hunger and thirst,
And lay upon the threshold like a log.
CATHLEEN. I gave for all and that was all I had.
Look, my purse is
empty. I have passed
By starving men and women all this day,
And
they have had the rest; but take the purse,
The silver clasps on't may
be worth a trifle.
But if you'll come to-morrow to my house
You
shall have twice the sum.
(ALEEL begins to play.)
SHEMUS (muttering). What, music, music!
CATHLEEN. Ah, do not blame the finger on the string;
The doctors
bid me fly the unlucky times
And find distraction for my thoughts, or
else
Pine to my grave.
SHEMUS. I have said nothing, lady.
Why should the like of us
complain?

OONA. Have done. Sorrows that she's but read of in a book
Weigh
on her mind as if they had been her