No More Learning

_

Now, brawlers, lift the bags of gold.

FIRST PEASANT.

Yes, yes!
Unwillingly, unwillingly; for she,
Whose gold we bear upon our shoulders thus,
Has endless pity even for lost souls
In 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 MERCHANT.

When these pale sapphires and these diadems
And 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 MERCHANT.

No, brother, not yet.
For none can carry her treasures wholly away
But 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 sound
That troubles me.

SECOND MERCHANT.

[_Going to the door of the oratory and peering through it. _]

Upon the altar steps
The Countess tosses, murmuring in her sleep
A broken _Paternoster_.

[_The FIRST MERCHANT goes to the door and stands beside him. _]

She is grown still.

FIRST MERCHANT.

A 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. _

CATHLEEN.

What would you, sirs?

FIRST MERCHANT.

We are two merchant men,
New come from foreign lands. We bring you news.
Forgive our sudden entry: the great door
Was open, we came in to seek a face.

CATHLEEN.

The 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 MERCHANT.

We saw a man
Heavy with sickness in the Bog of Allan,
Whom you had bid buy cattle. Near Fair Head
We saw your grain ships lying all becalmed
In the dark night, and not less still than they
Burned all their mirrored lanthorns in the sea.

CATHLEEN.

My thanks to God, to Mary, and the angels,
I still have bags of money, and can buy
Meal 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 hang
And creep about the fields, and this great heat
Vanish away--and grass show its green shoots?

FIRST MERCHANT.

There is no sign of change--day copies day,
Green things are dead--the cattle too are dead,
Or dying--and on all the vapour hangs
And fattens with disease and glows with heat.
In you is all the hope of all the land.

CATHLEEN.

And heard you of the demons who buy souls?

FIRST MERCHANT.

There 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 again
Say they are gross and little; while a few
Will 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 looks
That makes men bow, and flings a casting-net
About their souls, and that all men would go
And barter those poor flames--their spirits--only
You bribe them with the safety of your gold.

CATHLEEN.

Praise be to God, to Mary, and the angels,
That I am wealthy. Wherefore do they sell?

FIRST MERCHANT.

The demons give a hundred crowns and more
For a poor soul like his who lies asleep
By 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.

CATHLEEN.

How can a heap of crowns pay for a soul?
Is the green grave so terrible a thing?

FIRST MERCHANT.

Some sell because the money gleams, and some
Because they are in terror of the grave,
And some because their neighbours sold before,
And some because there is a kind of joy
In casting hope away, in losing joy,
In ceasing all resistance, in at last
Opening 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.

CATHLEEN.

There is a something, merchant, in your voice
That makes me fear. When you were telling how
A man may lose his soul and lose his God,
Your eyes lighted, and the strange weariness
That hangs about you vanished. When you told
How my poor money serves the people--both--
Merchants, forgive me--seemed to smile.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Man's sins
Move us to laughter only, we have seen
So many lands and seen so many men.
How strange that all these people should be swung
As on a lady's shoe-string--under them
The glowing leagues of never-ending flame!

CATHLEEN.

There is a something in you that I fear:
A something not of us. Were you not born
In 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 hearts
With Ave Marys, and burn all our skin
With holy water.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Farewell: we must ride
Many 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. _

CATHLEEN.

What would you?

A PEASANT.

As we nodded by the fire,
Telling old histories, we heard a noise
Of falling money. We have searched in vain.

CATHLEEN.

You are too timid. I heard naught at all.

THE OLD PEASANT.

Ay, we are timid, for a rich man's word
Can shake our houses, and a moon of drouth
Shrivel 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 hearts
As are their spots unto the woodpeckers.

CATHLEEN.

You need not shake with bodings in this house.

[_OONA enters from the door to L. _

OONA.

The 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?

OONA.

Mavrone,
That my good mistress should lose all this money.

CATHLEEN.

You 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 PEASANT.

The porter trembles.

THE PORTER.

It is all no use;
Demons were here. I sat beside the door
In my stone niche, and two owls passed me by,
Whispering with human voices.

THE OLD PEASANT.

God forsakes us.

CATHLEEN.

Old man, old man, He never closed a door
Unless 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 clay
And moulding there His image. Age by age
The clay wars with His fingers and pleads hard
For 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 again
I may have grown forgetful. Oona, take
These two--the larder and the dairy keys.
[_To THE OLD PEASANT. _] But take you this. It opens the small room
Of herbs for medicine, of hellebore,
Of vervain, monkshood, plantain, and self-heal
And all the others; and the book of cures
Is on the upper shelf. You understand,
Because you doctored goats and cattle once.

THE OLD PEASANT.

Why do you do this, lady--did you see
Your coffin in a dream?

CATHLEEN.

Ah, no, not that,
A sad resolve wakes in me. I have heard
A 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 MERCHANT.

The woman may keep robbing us no more,
For there are only mice now in her coffers.

SECOND MERCHANT.

Last 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 MERCHANT.

I hurried East,
A gray owl flitting, flitting in the dew,
And saw nine hundred oxen toil through Meath
Driven on by goads of iron; they, too, brother,
Are full five days from us.

SECOND MERCHANT.

Five 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 MERCHANT.

Who will come deal with us?

SHEMUS.

They 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 MAN.

I 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 MAN.

I ask three hundred crowns. You have read there,
That no mere lapse of days can make me yours.

FIRST MERCHANT.

There is something more writ here--often at night
He is wakeful from a dread of growing poor.
There is this crack in you--two hundred crowns.

[_THE MAN takes them and goes. _

SECOND MERCHANT.

Come, 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 WOMAN.

What price, now, will you give for mine?

FIRST MERCHANT.

Ay, ay,
Soft, handsome, and still young--not much, I think.

[_Reading in the parchment. _

She has love letters in a little jar
On the high shelf between the pepper-pot
And wood-cased hour-glass.

THE WOMAN.

O, 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 charity
We buy such souls at all; a thousand sins
Made them our master's long before we came.
Come, deal--come, deal. You seem resolved to starve
Until 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 mine
And my great master's; it shall no wise cease
Until our purpose end: the yellow vapour
That brought it bears it over your dried fields
And fills with violent phantoms of the lost,
And grows more deadly as day copies day.
See how it dims the daylight. Is that peace
Known 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 spirit
Have gained an end, a peace, while you but toss
And swing upon a moving balance beam.

[_ALEEL enters; the wires of his harp are broken. _

ALEEL.

Here, 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 tales
Of Fenian labours and the Red Branch kings,
And he cared nothing for the life of man:
But now all changes.

ALEEL.

Ay, 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 MERCHANT.

We cannot take your soul, for it is hers.

ALEEL.

Ah, take it; take it. It nowise can help her,
And, therefore, do I tire of it.

FIRST MERCHANT.

No; no.
We may not touch it.

ALEEL.

Is your power so small,
Must I then bear it with me all my days?
May scorn close deep about you!

FIRST MERCHANT.

Lead him hence;
He troubles me.

[_TEIG and SHEMUS lead ALEEL into the crowd. _

SECOND MERCHANT.

His gaze has filled me, brother,
With shaking and a dreadful fear.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Lean forward
And kiss the circlet where my master's lips
Were pressed upon it when he sent us hither:
You will have peace once more.

[_The SECOND MERCHANT kisses the gold circlet that is
about the head of the FIRST MERCHANT. _

SHEMUS.

He is called Aleel,
And has been crazy now these many days;
But has no harm in him: his fits soon pass,
And one can go and lead him like a child.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Come, deal, deal, deal, deal, deal; you are all dumb?

SHEMUS.

They say you beat the woman down too low.

FIRST MERCHANT.

I offer this great price: a thousand crowns
For an old woman who was always ugly.

[_An old peasant woman comes forward, and he takes up a parchment and
reads. _]

There is but little set down here against her;
She stole fowl sometimes when the harvest failed,
But always went to chapel twice a week,
And paid her dues when prosperous. Take your money.

THE OLD PEASANT WOMAN [_curtseying_].

God bless you, sir. [_She screams. _
O, sir, a pain went through me.

FIRST MERCHANT.

That name is like a fire to all damned souls.
Begone. [_She goes. _] See how the red gold pieces glitter.
Deal: do you fear because an old hag screamed?
Are you all cowards?

A PEASANT.

Nay, I am no coward.
I will sell half my soul.

FIRST MERCHANT.

How half your soul?

THE PEASANT.

Half my chance of heaven.

FIRST MERCHANT.

It is writ here
This man in all things takes the moderate course,
He sits on midmost of the balance beam,
And no man has had good of him or evil.
Begone, we will not buy you.

SECOND MERCHANT.

Deal, come, deal.

FIRST MERCHANT.

What, will you keep us from our ancient home,
And from the eternal revelry? Come, deal,
And we will hence to our great master again.
Come, deal, deal, deal.

THE PEASANTS SHOUT.

The Countess Cathleen comes!

CATHLEEN [_entering_].

And so you trade once more?

FIRST MERCHANT.

In spite of you.
What brings you here, saint with the sapphire eyes?

CATHLEEN.

I come to barter a soul for a great price.

FIRST MERCHANT.

What matter if the soul be worth the price?

CATHLEEN.

The people starve, therefore the people go
Thronging to you. I hear a cry come from them,
And it is in my ears by night and day;
And I would have five hundred thousand crowns,
That I may feed them till the dearth go by;
And have the wretched spirits you have bought
For your gold crowns released and sent to God.
The soul that I would barter is my soul.

A PEASANT.

Do not, do not; the souls of us poor folk
Are not precious to God as your soul is.
O! what would heaven do without you, lady?

ANOTHER PEASANT.

Look how their claws clutch in their leathern gloves.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Five hundred thousand crowns; we give the price,
The gold is here; the spirits, while you speak,
Begin to labour upward, for your face
Sheds a great light on them and fills their hearts
With those unveilings of the fickle light,
Whereby our heavy labours have been marred
Since first His spirit moved upon the deeps
And stole them from us; even before this day
The souls were but half ours, for your bright eyes
Had pierced them through and robbed them of content.
But you must sign, for we omit no form
In buying a soul like yours; sign with this quill;
It was a feather growing on the cock
That crowed when Peter dared deny his Master,
And all who use it have great honour in Hell.

[_CATHLEEN leans forward to sign. _

ALEEL.

[_Rushing forward and snatching the parchment from her. _]

Leave all things to the builder of the heavens.

CATHLEEN.

I have no thoughts: I hear a cry--a cry.

ALEEL.

[_Casting the parchment on the ground. _]

I had a vision under a green hedge,
A hedge of hips and haws--men yet shall hear
The archangels rolling Satan's empty skull
Over the mountain-tops.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Take him away.

[_TEIG and SHEMUS drag him roughly away so that he
falls upon the floor among the peasants. CATHLEEN picks
up the parchment and signs, and then turns towards the
peasants. _

CATHLEEN.

Take up the money; and now come with me.
When we are far from this polluted place
I will give everybody money enough.

[_She goes out, the peasants crowding round her and
kissing her dress. ALEEL and the TWO MERCHANTS are left
alone. _

SECOND MERCHANT.

Now are our days of heavy labour done.

FIRST MERCHANT.

We have a precious jewel for Satan's crown.

SECOND MERCHANT.

We must away, and wait until she dies,
Sitting above her tower as two gray owls,
Watching as many years as may be, guarding
Our precious jewel; waiting to seize her soul.

FIRST MERCHANT.

We need but hover over her head in the air,
For she has only minutes: when she came
I saw the dimness of the tomb in her,
And marked her walking as with leaden shoes
And looking on the ground as though the worms
Were calling her, and when she wrote her name
Her heart began to break. Hush! hush! I hear
The brazen door of Hell move on its hinges,
And the eternal revelry float hither
To hearten us.

SECOND MERCHANT.

Leap, feathered, on the air
And meet them with her soul caught in your claws.

[_They rush out. ALEEL crawls into the middle of the
room. The twilight has fallen and gradually darkens
as the scene goes on. There is a distant muttering of
thunder and a sound of rising storm. _

ALEEL.

The brazen door stands wide, and Balor comes
Borne in his heavy car, and demons have lifted
The age-weary eyelids from the eyes that of old
Turned gods to stone; Barach the traitor comes;
And the lascivious race, Cailitin,
That cast a druid weakness and decay
Over Sualtam's and old Dectora's child;
And that great king Hell first took hold upon
When he killed Naisi and broke Deirdre's heart;
And all their heads are twisted to one side,
For when they lived they warred on beauty and peace
With obstinate, crafty, sidelong bitterness.

[_OONA enters, but remains standing by the door. ALEEL
half rises, leaning upon one arm and one knee. _]

Crouch down, old heron, out of the blind storm.

OONA.

Where is the Countess Cathleen? All this day
She has been pale and weakly: when her hand
Touched mine over the spindle her hand trembled,
And now I do not know where she has gone.

ALEEL.

Cathleen has chosen other friends than us,
And they are rising through the hollow world.

[_He points downwards. _

First, Orchil, her pale beautiful head alive,
Her body shadowy as vapour drifting
Under the dawn, for she who awoke desire
Has but a heart of blood when others die;
About her is a vapoury multitude
Of women, alluring devils with soft laughter;
Behind her a host heat of the blood made sin,
But all the little pink-white nails have grown
To be great talons.

[_He seizes OONA and drags her into the middle of the
room and points downwards with vehement gestures. The
wind roars. _]

They begin a song
And there is still some music on their tongues.

OONA.

[_Casting herself face downwards on the floor. _]

O maker of all, protect her from the demons,
And if a soul must needs be lost, take mine.

[_ALEEL kneels beside her, but does not seem to hear
her words; he is gazing down as if through the earth.
The peasants return. They carry the COUNTESS CATHLEEN
and lay her upon the ground before OONA and ALEEL. She
lies there as if dead. _]

O that so many pitchers of rough clay
Should prosper and the porcelain break in two!

[_She kisses the hands of the COUNTESS CATHLEEN. _

A PEASANT.

We were under the tree where the path turns
When she grew pale as death and fainted away,
And while we bore her hither, cloudy gusts
Blackened the world and shook us on our feet:
Draw the great bolt, for no man has beheld
So black, bitter, blinding, and sudden a storm.

[_One who is near the door draws the bolt. _

OONA.

Hush, hush, she has awakened from her swoon.

CATHLEEN.

O hold me, and hold me tightly, for the storm
Is dragging me away!

[_OONA takes her in her arms. A woman begins to wail. _

A PEASANT.

Hush.

ANOTHER PEASANT.

Hush.

A PEASANT WOMAN.

Hush.

ANOTHER PEASANT WOMAN.

Hush.

CATHLEEN [_half rising_].

Lay all the bags of money at my feet.

[_They lay the bags at her feet. _

And send and bring old Neal when I am dead,
And bid him hear each man and judge and give:
He doctors you with herbs, and can best say
Who has the less and who the greater need.

A PEASANT WOMAN.

[_At the back of the crowd. _]

And will he give enough out of the bags
To keep my children till the dearth go by?

ANOTHER PEASANT WOMAN.

O Queen of Heaven and all you blessed Saints,
Let us and ours be lost, so she be shriven.

CATHLEEN.

Bend down your faces, Oona and Aleel:
I gaze upon them as the swallow gazes
Upon the nest under the eave, before
He wander the loud waters: do not weep
Too great a while, for there is many a candle
On the high altar though one fall. Aleel,
Who sang about the people of the raths,
That know not the hard burden of the world,
Having but breath in their kind bodies, farewell!
And farewell, Oona, who spun flax with me
Soft as their sleep when every dance is done:
The storm is in my hair and I must go.

[_She dies. _

OONA.

Bring me the looking-glass.

[_A woman brings it to her out of the inner room. OONA holds the glass
over the lips of the COUNTESS CATHLEEN. All is silent for a moment; and
then she speaks in a half scream. _]

O, she is dead!

A PEASANT WOMAN.

She was the great white lily of the world.

ANOTHER PEASANT WOMAN.

She was more beautiful than the pale stars.

AN OLD PEASANT WOMAN.

The little plant I loved is broken in two.

[_ALEEL takes the looking-glass from OONA and flings it
upon the floor so that it is broken in many pieces. _

ALEEL.

I shatter you in fragments, for the face
That brimmed you up with beauty is no more:
And die, dull heart, for she whose mournful words
Made you a living spirit has passed away
And left you but a ball of passionate dust;
And you, proud earth and plumy sea, fade out,
For you may hear no more her faltering feet,
But are left lonely amid the clamorous war
Of angels upon devils.

[_He stands up; almost everyone is kneeling, but it has grown so dark
that only confused forms can be seen. _]

And I who weep
Call curses on you, Time and Fate and Change,
And have no excellent hope but the great hour
When you shall plunge headlong through bottomless space.

[_A flash of lightning followed immediately by thunder. _

A PEASANT WOMAN.