{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_5795/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_5795","id":"gutenberg_5795","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5795","summary":null,"tags":["Category: British Literature","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Category: Short Stories","Fantasy fiction","Ireland -- Social life and customs -- Fiction","Mythology, Celtic -- Fiction","Nobel Prizes in Literature"],"text":"Produced by Charles Franks and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE SECRET ROSE:\n\nBy W.B. Yeats\n\nTHE SECRET ROSE:\n\n   DEDICATION TO A.E.\n   TO THE SECRET ROSE\n   THE CRUCIFIXION OF THE OUTCAST\n   OUT OF THE ROSE\n   THE WISDOM OF THE KING\n   THE HEART OF THE SPRING\n   THE CURSE OF THE FIRES AND OF THE SHADOWS\n   THE OLD MEN OF THE TWILIGHT\n   WHERE THERE IS NOTHING, THERE IS GOD\n   OF COSTELLO THE PROUD, OF OONA THE DAUGHTER OF DERMOTT, AND OF THE\n   BITTER TONGUE\n\n\nAs for living, our servants will do that for us.--_Villiers de L'Isle\nAdam._\n\n\nHelen, when she looked in her mirror, seeing the withered wrinkles\nmade in her face by old age, wept, and wondered why she had twice been\ncarried away.--_Leonardo da Vinci_.\n\n\n_My dear A.E.--I dedicate this book to you because, whether you think\nit well or ill written, you will sympathize with the sorrows and\nthe ecstasies of its personages, perhaps even more than I do myself.\nAlthough I wrote these stories at different times and in different\nmanners, and without any definite plan, they have but one subject, the\nwar of spiritual with natural order; and how can I dedicate such a book\nto anyone but to you, the one poet of modern Ireland who has moulded\na spiritual ecstasy into verse? My friends in Ireland sometimes ask me\nwhen I am going to write a really national poem or romance, and by a\nnational poem or romance I understand them to mean a poem or romance\nfounded upon some famous moment of Irish history, and built up out of\nthe thoughts and feelings which move the greater number of patriotic\nIrishmen. I on the other hand believe that poetry and romance cannot\nbe made by the most conscientious study of famous moments and of the\nthoughts and feelings of others, but only by looking into that little,\ninfinite, faltering, eternal flame that we call ourselves. If a writer\nwishes to interest a certain people among whom he has grown up, or\nfancies he has a duty towards them, he may choose for the symbols of his\nart their legends, their history, their beliefs, their opinions, because\nhe has a right to choose among things less than himself, but he cannot\nchoose among the substances of art. So far, however, as this book is\nvisionary it is Irish for Ireland, which is still predominantly Celtic,\nhas preserved with some less excellent things a gift of vision, which\nhas died out among more hurried and more successful nations: no shining\ncandelabra have prevented us from looking into the darkness, and when\none looks into the darkness there is always something there.\n\nW.B. YEATS._\n\n\n\n\nTO THE SECRET ROSE\n\n     Far off, most secret, and inviolate Rose,\n     Enfold me in my hour of hours; where those\n     Who sought thee at the Holy Sepulchre,\n     Or in the wine-vat, dwell beyond the stir\n     And tumult of defeated dreams; and deep\n     Among pale eyelids heavy with the sleep\n     Men have named beauty. Your great leaves enfold\n     The ancient beards, the helms of ruby and gold\n     Of the crowned Magi; and the king whose eyes\n     Saw the Pierced Hands and Rood of Elder rise\n     In druid vapour and make the torches dim;\n     Till vain frenzy awoke and he died; and him\n     Who met Fand walking among flaming dew,\n     By a grey shore where the wind never blew,\n     And lost the world and Emir for a kiss;\n     And him who drove the gods out of their liss\n     And till a hundred morns had flowered red\n     Feasted, and wept the barrows of his dead;\n     And the proud dreaming king who flung the crown\n     And sorrow away, and calling bard and clown\n     Dwelt among wine-stained wanderers in deep woods;\n     And him who sold tillage and house and goods,\n     And sought through lands and islands numberless years\n     Until he found with laughter and with tears\n     A woman of so shining loveliness\n     That men threshed corn at midnight by a tress,\n     A little stolen tress. I too await\n     The hour of thy great wind of love and hate.\n     When shall the stars be blown about the sky,\n     Like the sparks blown out of a smithy, and die?\n     Surely thine hour has come, thy great wind blows,\n     Far off, most secret, and inviolate Rose?\n\n\n\n\nTHE CRUCIFIXION OF THE OUTCAST.\n\nA man, with thin brown hair and a pale face, half ran, half walked,\nalong the road that wound from the south to the town of Sligo. Many\ncalled him Cumhal, the son of Cormac, and many called him the Swift,\nWild Horse; and he was a gleeman, and he wore a short parti-coloured\ndoublet, and had pointed shoes, and a bulging wallet. Also he was of the\nblood of the Ernaans, and his birth-place was the Field of Gold; but\nhis eating and sleeping places where the four provinces of Eri, and his\nabiding place was not upon the ridge of the earth. His eyes strayed from\nthe Abbey tower of the White Friars and the town battlements to a row\nof crosses which stood out against the sky upon a hill a little to the\neastward of the town, and he clenched his fist, and shook it at the\ncrosses. He knew they were not empty, for the birds were fluttering\nabout them; and he thought how, as like as not, just such another\nvagabond as himself was hanged on one of them; and he muttered: 'If it\nwere hanging or bowstringing, or stoning or beheading, it would be bad\nenough. But to have the birds pecking your eyes and the wolves eating\nyour feet! I would that the red wind of the Druids had withered in\nhis cradle the soldier of Dathi, who brought the tree of death out of\nbarbarous lands, or that the lightning, when it smote Dathi at the foot\nof the mountain, had smitten him also, or that his grave had been dug by\nthe green-haired and green-toothed merrows deep at the roots of the deep\nsea.'\n\nWhile he spoke, he shivered from head to foot, and the sweat came out\nupon his face, and he knew not why, for he had looked upon many crosses.\nHe passed over two hills and under the battlemented gate, and then round\nby a left-hand way to the door of the Abbey. It was studded with great\nnails, and when he knocked at it, he roused the lay brother who was the\nporter, and of him he asked a place in the guest-house. Then the lay\nbrother took a glowing turf on a shovel, and led the way to a big and\nnaked outhouse strewn with very dirty rushes; and lighted a rush-candle\nfixed between two of the stones of the wall, and set the glowing turf\nupon the hearth and gave him two unlighted sods and a wisp of straw,\nand showed him a blanket hanging from a nail, and a shelf with a loaf\nof bread and a jug of water, and a tub in a far corner. Then the lay\nbrother left him and went back to his place by the door. And Cumhal the\nson of Cormac began to blow upon the glowing turf that he might light\nthe two sods and the wisp of straw; but the sods and the straw would not\nlight, for they were damp. So he took off his pointed shoes, and drew\nthe tub out of the corner with the thought of washing the dust of the\nhighway from his feet; but the water was so dirty that he could not see\nthe bottom. He was very hungry, for he had not eaten all that day; so he\ndid not waste much anger upon the tub, but took up the black loaf, and\nbit into it, and then spat out the bite, for the bread was hard and\nmouldy. Still he did not give way to his anger, for he had not drunken\nthese many hours; having a hope of heath beer or wine at his day's end,\nhe had left the brooks untasted, to make his supper the more delightful.\nNow he put the jug to his lips, but he flung it from him straightway,\nfor the water was bitter and ill-smelling. Then he gave the jug a kick,\nso that it broke against the opposite wall, and he took down the blanket\nto wrap it about him for the night. But no sooner did he touch it than\nit was alive with skipping fleas. At this, beside himself with anger, he\nrushed to the door of the guest-house, but the lay brother, being well\naccustomed to such outcries, had locked it on the outside; so he emptied\nthe tub and began to beat the door with it, till the lay brother came\nto the door and asked what ailed him, and why he woke him out of sleep.\n'What ails me!' shouted Cumhal, 'are not the sods as wet as the sands\nof the Three Rosses? and are not the fleas in the blanket as many as\nthe waves of the sea and as lively? and is not the bread as hard as the\nheart of a lay brother who has forgotten God? and is not the water\nin the jug as bitter and as ill-smelling as his soul? and is not the\nfoot-water the colour that shall be upon him when he has been charred in\nthe Undying Fires?' The lay brother saw that the lock was fast, and\nwent back to his niche, for he was too sleepy to talk with comfort.\nAnd Cumhal went on beating at the door, and presently he heard the\nlay brother's foot once more, and cried out at him, 'O cowardly and\ntyrannous race of friars, persecutors of the bard and the gleeman,\nhaters of life and joy! O race that does not draw the sword and tell the\ntruth! O race that melts the bones of the people with cowardice and with\ndeceit!'\n\n'Gleeman,' said the lay brother, 'I also make rhymes; I make many while\nI sit in my niche by the door, and I sorrow to hear the bards railing\nupon the friars. Brother, I would sleep, and therefore I make known to\nyou that it is the head of the monastery, our gracious abbot, who orders\nall things concerning the lodging of travellers.'\n\n'You may sleep,' said Cumhal, 'I will sing a bard's curse on the abbot.\n'And he set the tub upside down under the window, and stood upon it, and\nbegan to sing in a very loud voice. The singing awoke the abbot, so that\nhe sat up in bed and blew a silver whistle until the lay brother came\nto him. 'I cannot get a wink of sleep with that noise,' said the abbot.\n'What is happening?'\n\n'It is a gleeman,' said the lay brother, 'who complains of the sods,\nof the bread, of the water in the jug, of the foot-water, and of the\nblanket. And now he is singing a bard's curse upon you, O brother abbot,\nand upon your father and your mother, and your grandfather and your\ngrandmother, and upon all your relations.'\n\n'Is he cursing in rhyme?'\n\n'He is cursing in rhyme, and with two assonances in every line of his\ncurse.'\n\nThe abbot pulled his night-cap off and crumpled it in his hands, and the\ncircular brown patch of hair in the middle of his bald head looked like\nan island in the midst of a pond, for in Connaught they had not yet\nabandoned the ancient tonsure for the style then coming into use. 'If we\ndo not somewhat,' he said, 'he will teach his curses to the children in\nthe street, and the girls spinning at the doors, and to the robbers upon\nBen Bulben.'\n\n'Shall I go, then,' said the other, 'and give him dry sods, a fresh\nloaf, clean water in a jug, clean foot-water, and a new blanket, and\nmake him swear by the blessed Saint Benignus, and by the sun and moon,\nthat no bond be lacking, not to tell his rhymes to the children in the\nstreet, and the girls spinning at the doors, and the robbers upon Ben\nBulben?'\n\n'Neither our Blessed Patron nor the sun and moon would avail at all,'\nsaid the abbot; 'for to-morrow or the next day the mood to curse would\ncome upon him, or a pride in those rhymes would move him, and he would\nteach his lines to the children, and the girls, and the robbers. Or else\nhe would tell another of his craft how he fared in the guest-house, and\nhe in his turn would begin to curse, and my name would wither. For learn\nthere is no steadfastness of purpose upon the roads, but only under\nroofs and between four walls. Therefore I bid you go and awaken Brother\nKevin, Brother Dove, Brother Little Wolf, Brother Bald Patrick, Brother\nBald Brandon, Brother James and Brother Peter. And they shall take the\nman, and bind him with ropes, and dip him in the river that he shall\ncease to sing. And in the morning, lest this but make him curse the\nlouder, we will crucify him.'\n\n'The crosses are all full,' said the lay brother.\n\n'Then we must make another cross. If we do not make an end of him\nanother will, for who can eat and sleep in peace while men like him\nare going about the world? Ill should we stand before blessed Saint\nBenignus, and sour would be his face when he comes to judge us at the\nLast Day, were we to spare an enemy of his when we had him under our\nthumb! Brother, the bards and the gleemen are an evil race, ever cursing\nand ever stirring up the people, and immoral and immoderate in all\nthings, and heathen in their hearts, always longing after the Son of\nLir, and Aengus, and Bridget, and the Dagda, and Dana the Mother, and\nall the false gods of the old days; always making poems in praise of\nthose kings and queens of the demons, Finvaragh, whose home is under\nCruachmaa, and Red Aodh of Cnocna-Sidhe, and Cleena of the Wave, and\nAoibhell of the Grey Rock, and him they call Donn of the Vats of the\nSea; and railing against God and Christ and the blessed Saints.' While\nhe was speaking he crossed himself, and when he had finished he drew the\nnightcap over his ears, to shut out the noise, and closed his eyes, and\ncomposed himself to sleep.\n\nThe lay brother found Brother Kevin, Brother Dove, Brother Little Wolf,\nBrother Bald Patrick, Brother Bald Brandon, Brother James and Brother\nPeter sitting up in bed, and he made them get up. Then they bound\nCumhal, and they dragged him to the river, and they dipped him in it at\nthe place which was afterwards called Buckley's Ford.\n\n'Gleeman,' said the lay brother, as they led him back to the\nguest-house, 'why do you ever use the wit which God has given you to\nmake blasphemous and immoral tales and verses? For such is the way of\nyour craft. I have, indeed, many such tales and verses well nigh by\nrote, and so I know that I speak true! And why do you praise with rhyme\nthose demons, Finvaragh, Red Aodh, Cleena, Aoibhell and Donn? I, too, am\na man of great wit and learning, but I ever glorify our gracious abbot,\nand Benignus our Patron, and the princes of the province. My soul is\ndecent and orderly, but yours is like the wind among the salley gardens.\nI said what I could for you, being also a man of many thoughts, but who\ncould help such a one as you?'\n\n'Friend,' answered the gleeman, 'my soul is indeed like the wind, and it\nblows me to and fro, and up and down, and puts many things into my mind\nand out of my mind, and therefore am I called the Swift, Wild Horse.'\nAnd he spoke no more that night, for his teeth were chattering with the\ncold.\n\nThe abbot and the friars came to him in the morning, and bade him get\nready to be crucified, and led him out of the guest-house. And while he\nstill stood upon the step a flock of great grass-barnacles passed high\nabove him with clanking cries. He lifted his arms to them and said, 'O\ngreat grass-barnacles, tarry a little, and mayhap my soul will travel\nwith you to the waste places of the shore and to the ungovernable sea!'\nAt the gate a crowd of beggars gathered about them, being come there to\nbeg from any traveller or pilgrim who might have spent the night in the\nguest-house. The abbot and the friars led the gleeman to a place in the\nwoods at some distance, where many straight young trees were growing,\nand they made him cut one down and fashion it to the right length, while\nthe beggars stood round them in a ring, talking and gesticulating. The\nabbot then bade him cut off another and shorter piece of wood, and nail\nit upon the first. So there was his cross for him; and they put it upon\nhis shoulder, for his crucifixion was to be on the top of the hill where\nthe others were. A half-mile on the way he asked them to stop and see\nhim juggle for them; for he knew, he said, all the tricks of Aengus\nthe Subtle-hearted. The old friars were for pressing on, but the young\nfriars would see him: so he did many wonders for them, even to the\ndrawing of live frogs out of his ears. But after a while they turned on\nhim, and said his tricks were dull and a shade unholy, and set the cross\non his shoulders again. Another half-mile on the way, and he asked them\nto stop and hear him jest for them, for he knew, he said, all the jests\nof Conan the Bald, upon whose back a sheep's wool grew. And the young\nfriars, when they had heard his merry tales, again bade him take up\nhis cross, for it ill became them to listen to such follies. Another\nhalf-mile on the way, he asked them to stop and hear him sing the story\nof White-breasted Deirdre, and how she endured many sorrows, and how the\nsons of Usna died to serve her. And the young friars were mad to hear\nhim, but when he had ended they grew angry, and beat him for waking\nforgotten longings in their hearts. So they set the cross upon his back\nand hurried him to the hill.\n\nWhen he was come to the top, they took the cross from him, and began to\ndig a hole to stand it in, while the beggars gathered round, and talked\namong themselves. 'I ask a favour before I die,' says Cumhal.\n\n'We will grant you no more delays,' says the abbot.\n\n'I ask no more delays, for I have drawn the sword, and told the truth,\nand lived my vision, and am content.'\n\n'Would you, then, confess?'\n\n'By sun and moon, not I; I ask but to be let eat the food I carry in my\nwallet. I carry food in my wallet whenever I go upon a journey, but I\ndo not taste of it unless I am well-nigh starved. I have not eaten now\nthese two days.'\n\n'You may eat, then,' says the abbot, and he turned to help the friars\ndig the hole.\n\nThe gleeman took a loaf and some strips of cold fried bacon out of his\nwallet and laid them upon the ground. 'I will give a tithe to the poor,'\nsays he, and he cut a tenth part from the loaf and the bacon. 'Who among\nyou is the poorest?' And thereupon was a great clamour, for the beggars\nbegan the history of their sorrows and their poverty, and their yellow\nfaces swayed like Gara Lough when the floods have filled it with water\nfrom the bogs.\n\nHe listened for a little, and, says he, 'I am myself the poorest, for\nI have travelled the bare road, and by the edges of the sea; and the\ntattered doublet of particoloured cloth upon my back and the torn\npointed shoes upon my feet have ever irked me, because of the towered\ncity full of noble raiment which was in my heart. And I have been the\nmore alone upon the roads and by the sea because I heard in my heart\nthe rustling of the rose-bordered dress of her who is more subtle than\nAengus, the Subtle-hearted, and more full of the beauty of laughter than\nConan the Bald, and more full of the wisdom of tears than White-breasted\nDeirdre, and more lovely than a bursting dawn to them that are lost in\nthe darkness. Therefore, I award the tithe to myself; but yet, because I\nam done with all things, I give it unto you.'\n\nSo he flung the bread and the strips of bacon among the beggars,\nand they fought with many cries until the last scrap was eaten. But\nmeanwhile the friars nailed the gleeman to his cross, and set it upright\nin the hole, and shovelled the earth in at the foot, and trampled it\nlevel and hard. So then they went away, but the beggars stared on,\nsitting round the cross. But when the sun was sinking, they also got up\nto go, for the air was getting chilly. And as soon as they had gone a\nlittle way, the wolves, who had been showing themselves on the edge of\na neighbouring coppice, came nearer, and the birds wheeled closer and\ncloser. 'Stay, outcasts, yet a little while,' the crucified one called\nin a weak voice to the beggars, 'and keep the beasts and the birds from\nme.' But the beggars were angry because he had called them outcasts, so\nthey threw stones and mud at him, and went their way. Then the wolves\ngathered at the foot of the cross, and the birds flew lower and lower.\nAnd presently the birds lighted all at once upon his head and arms and\nshoulders, and began to peck at him, and the wolves began to eat his\nfeet. 'Outcasts,' he moaned, 'have you also turned against the outcast?'\n\n\n\n\nOUT OF THE ROSE.\n\n\nOne winter evening an old knight in rusted chain-armour rode slowly\nalong the woody southern slope of Ben Bulben, watching the sun go down\nin crimson clouds over the sea. His horse was tired, as after a long\njourney, and he had upon his helmet the crest of no neighbouring lord or\nking, but a small rose made of rubies that glimmered every moment to a\ndeeper crimson. His white hair fell in thin curls upon his shoulders,\nand its disorder added to the melancholy of his face, which was the face\nof one of those who have come but seldom into the world, and always for\nits trouble, the dreamers who must do what they dream, the doers who\nmust dream what they do.\n\nAfter gazing a while towards the sun, he let the reins fall upon the\nneck of his horse, and, stretching out both arms towards the west, he\nsaid, 'O Divine Rose of Intellectual Flame, let the gates of thy peace\nbe opened to me at last!' And suddenly a loud squealing began in the\nwoods some hundreds of yards further up the mountain side. He stopped\nhis horse to listen, and heard behind him a sound of feet and of voices.\n'They are beating them to make them go into the narrow path by the\ngorge,' said someone, and in another moment a dozen peasants armed with\nshort spears had come up with the knight, and stood a little apart from\nhim, their blue caps in their hands. Where do you go with the\nspears?' he asked; and one who seemed the leader answered: 'A troop of\nwood-thieves came down from the hills a while ago and carried off the\npigs belonging to an old man who lives by Glen Car Lough, and we turned\nout to go after them. Now that we know they are four times more than we\nare, we follow to find the way they have taken; and will presently tell\nour story to De Courcey, and if he will not help us, to Fitzgerald; for\nDe Courcey and Fitzgerald have lately made a peace, and we do not know\nto whom we belong.'\n\n'But by that time,' said the knight, 'the pigs will have been eaten.'\n\n'A dozen men cannot do more, and it was not reasonable that the whole\nvalley should turn out and risk their lives for two, or for two dozen\npigs.'\n\n'Can you tell me,' said the knight, 'if the old man to whom the pigs\nbelong is pious and true of heart?'\n\n'He is as true as another and more pious than any, for he says a prayer\nto a saint every morning before his breakfast.'\n\n'Then it were well to fight in his cause,' said the knight, 'and if you\nwill fight against the wood-thieves I will take the main brunt of the\nbattle, and you know well that a man in armour is worth many like these\nwood-thieves, clad in wool and leather.'\n\nAnd the leader turned to his fellows and asked if they would take the\nchance; but they seemed anxious to get back to their cabins.\n\n'Are the wood-thieves treacherous and impious?'\n\n'They are treacherous in all their dealings,' said a peasant, 'and no\nman has known them to pray.'\n\n'Then,' said the knight, 'I will give five crowns for the head of every\nwood-thief killed by us in the fighting'; and he bid the leader show the\nway, and they all went on together. After a time they came to where a\nbeaten track wound into the woods, and, taking this, they doubled back\nupon their previous course, and began to ascend the wooded slope of the\nmountains. In a little while the path grew very straight and steep,\nand the knight was forced to dismount and leave his horse tied to a\ntree-stem. They knew they were on the right track: for they could see\nthe marks of pointed shoes in the soft clay and mingled with them the\ncloven footprints of the pigs. Presently the path became still more\nabrupt, and they knew by the ending of the cloven foot-prints that the\nthieves were carrying the pigs. Now and then a long mark in the clay\nshowed that a pig had slipped down, and been dragged along for a little\nway. They had journeyed thus for about twenty minutes, when a confused\nsound of voices told them that they were coming up with the thieves. And\nthen the voices ceased, and they understood that they had been overheard\nin their turn. They pressed on rapidly and cautiously, and in about five\nminutes one of them caught sight of a leather jerkin half hidden by a\nhazel-bush. An arrow struck the knight's chain-armour, but glanced off\nharmlessly, and then a flight of arrows swept by them with the buzzing\nsound of great bees. They ran and climbed, and climbed and ran towards\nthe thieves, who were now all visible standing up among the bushes\nwith their still quivering bows in their hands: for they had only their\nspears and they must at once come hand to hand. The knight was in the\nfront and smote down first one and then another of the wood-thieves. The\npeasants shouted, and, pressing on, drove the wood-thieves before them\nuntil they came out on the flat top of the mountain, and there they saw\nthe two pigs quietly grubbing in the short grass, so they ran about them\nin a circle, and began to move back again towards the narrow path: the\nold knight coming now the last of all, and striking down thief after\nthief. The peasants had got no very serious hurts among them, for he had\ndrawn the brunt of the battle upon himself, as could well be seen from\nthe bloody rents in his armour; and when they came to the entrance of\nthe narrow path he bade them drive the pigs down into the valley, while\nhe stood there to guard the way behind them. So in a moment he was\nalone, and, being weak with loss of blood, might have been ended there\nand then by the wood-thieves he had beaten off, had fear not made them\nbegone out of sight in a great hurry.\n\nAn hour passed, and they did not return; and now the knight could stand\non guard no longer, but had to lie down upon the grass. A half-hour\nmore went by, and then a young lad with what appeared to be a number of\ncock's feathers stuck round his hat, came out of the path behind him,\nand began to move about among the dead thieves, cutting their heads off,\nThen he laid the heads in a heap before the knight, and said: 'O great\nknight, I have been bid come and ask you for the crowns you promised\nfor the heads: five crowns a head. They bid me tell you that they have\nprayed to God and His Mother to give you a long life, but that they are\npoor peasants, and that they would have the money before you die. They\ntold me this over and over for fear I might forget it, and promised to\nbeat me if I did.'\n\nThe knight raised himself upon his elbow, and opening a bag that hung to\nhis belt, counted out the five crowns for each head. There were thirty\nheads in all.\n\n'O great knight,' said the lad, 'they have also bid me take all care of\nyou, and light a fire, and put this ointment upon your wounds.' And he\ngathered sticks and leaves together, and, flashing his flint and steel\nunder a mass of dry leaves, had made a very good blaze. Then, drawing of\nthe coat of mail, he began to anoint the wounds: but he did it clumsily,\nlike one who does by rote what he had been told. The knight motioned him\nto stop, and said: 'You seem a good lad.'\n\n'I would ask something of you for myself.'\n\n'There are still a few crowns,' said the knight; 'shall I give them to\nyou?'\n\n'O no,' said the lad. 'They would be no good to me. There is only one\nthing that I care about doing, and I have no need of money to do it. I\ngo from village to village and from hill to hill, and whenever I come\nacross a good cock I steal him and take him into the woods, and I keep\nhim there under a basket until I get another good cock, and then I set\nthem to fight. The people say I am an innocent, and do not do me any\nharm, and never ask me to do any work but go a message now and then. It\nis because I am an innocent that they send me to get the crowns: anyone\nelse would steal them; and they dare not come back themselves, for now\nthat you are not with them they are afraid of the wood-thieves. Did you\never hear how, when the wood-thieves are christened, the wolves are made\ntheir god-fathers, and their right arms are not christened at all?'\n\n'If you will not take these crowns, my good lad, I have nothing for you,\nI fear, unless you would have that old coat of mail which I shall soon\nneed no more.'\n\n'There was something I wanted: yes, I remember now,' said the lad. 'I\nwant you to tell me why you fought like the champions and giants in the\nstories and for so little a thing. Are you indeed a man like us? Are\nyou not rather an old wizard who lives among these hills, and will not a\nwind arise presently and crumble you into dust?'\n\n'I will tell you of myself,' replied the knight, 'for now that I am the\nlast of the fellowship, 'I may tell all and witness for God. Look at\nthe Rose of Rubies on my helmet, and see the symbol of my life and of\nmy hope.' And then he told the lad this story, but with always\nmore frequent pauses; and, while he told it, the Rose shone a deep\nblood-colour in the firelight, and the lad stuck the cock's feathers in\nthe earth in front of him, and moved them about as though he made them\nactors in the play.\n\n'I live in a land far from this, and was one of the Knights of St.\nJohn,' said the old man; 'but I was one of those in the Order who always\nlonged for more arduous labours in the service of the Most High. At last\nthere came to us a knight of Palestine, to whom the truth of truths had\nbeen revealed by God Himself. He had seen a great Rose of Fire, and a\nVoice out of the Rose had told him how men would turn from the light of\ntheir own hearts, and bow down before outer order and outer fixity, and\nthat then the light would cease, and none escape the curse except the\nfoolish good man who could not, and the passionate wicked man who would\nnot, think. Already, the Voice told him, the wayward light of the heart\nwas shining out upon the world to keep it alive, with a less clear\nlustre, and that, as it paled, a strange infection was touching the\nstars and the hills and the grass and the trees with corruption, and\nthat none of those who had seen clearly the truth and the ancient way\ncould enter into the Kingdom of God, which is in the Heart of the Rose,\nif they stayed on willingly in the corrupted world; and so they must\nprove their anger against the Powers of Corruption by dying in the\nservice of the Rose of God. While the Knight of Palestine was telling\nus these things we seemed to see in a vision a crimson Rose spreading\nitself about him, so that he seemed to speak out of its heart, and the\nair was filled with fragrance. By this we knew that it was the very\nVoice of God which spoke to us by the knight, and we gathered about\nhim and bade him direct us in all things, and teach us how to obey the\nVoice. So he bound us with an oath, and gave us signs and words whereby\nwe might know each other even after many years, and he appointed places\nof meeting, and he sent us out in troops into the world to seek good\ncauses, and die in doing battle for them. At first we thought to die\nmore readily by fasting to death in honour of some saint; but this he\ntold us was evil, for we did it for the sake of death, and thus took out\nof the hands of God the choice of the time and manner of our death, and\nby so doing made His power the less. We must choose our service for its\nexcellence, and for this alone, and leave it to God to reward us at His\nown time and in His own manner. And after this he compelled us to eat\nalways two at a table to watch each other lest we fasted unduly, for\nsome among us said that if one fasted for a love of the holiness of\nsaints and then died, the death would be acceptable. And the years\npassed, and one by one my fellows died in the Holy Land, or in warring\nupon the evil princes of the earth, or in clearing the roads of robbers;\nand among them died the knight of Palestine, and at last I was alone. I\nfought in every cause where the few contended against the many, and\nmy hair grew white, and a terrible fear lest I had fallen under the\ndispleasure of God came upon me. But, hearing at last how this western\nisle was fuller of wars and rapine than any other land, I came hither,\nand I have found the thing I sought, and, behold! I am filled with a\ngreat joy.'\n\nThereat he began to sing in Latin, and, while he sang, his voice grew\nfainter and fainter. Then his eyes closed, and his lips fell apart, and\nthe lad knew he was dead. 'He has told me a good tale,' he said, 'for\nthere was fighting in it, but I did not understand much of it, and it is\nhard to remember so long a story.'\n\nAnd, taking the knight's sword, he began to dig a grave in the soft\nclay. He dug hard, and a faint light of dawn had touched his hair and he\nhad almost done his work when a cock crowed in the valley below. 'Ah,'\nhe said, 'I must have that bird'; and he ran down the narrow path to the\nvalley.\n\n\n\n\nTHE WISDOM OF THE KING.\n\n\nThe High-Queen of the Island of Woods had died in childbirth, and\nher child was put to nurse with a woman who lived in a hut of mud and\nwicker, within the border of the wood. One night the woman sat rocking\nthe cradle, and pondering over the beauty of the child, and praying that\nthe gods might grant him wisdom equal to his beauty. There came a knock\nat the door, and she got up, not a little wondering, for the nearest\nneighbours were in the dun of the High-King a mile away; and the night\nwas now late. 'Who is knocking?' she cried, and a thin voice answered,\n'Open! for I am a crone of the grey hawk, and I come from the darkness\nof the great wood.' In terror she drew back the bolt, and a grey-clad\nwoman, of a great age, and of a height more than human, came in and\nstood by the head of the cradle. The nurse shrank back against the wall,\nunable to take her eyes from the woman, for she saw by the gleaming\nof the firelight that the feathers of the grey hawk were upon her head\ninstead of hair. But the child slept, and the fire danced, for the\none was too ignorant and the other too full of gaiety to know what a\ndreadful being stood there. 'Open!' cried another voice, 'for I am a\ncrone of the grey hawk, and I watch over his nest in the darkness of the\ngreat wood.' The nurse opened the door again, though her fingers could\nscarce hold the bolts for trembling, and another grey woman, not less\nold than the other, and with like feathers instead of hair, came in and\nstood by the first. In a little, came a third grey woman, and after her\na fourth, and then another and another and another, until the hut was\nfull of their immense bodies. They stood a long time in perfect silence\nand stillness, for they were of those whom the dropping of the sand has\nnever troubled, but at last one muttered in a low thin voice: 'Sisters,\nI knew him far away by the redness of his heart under his silver skin';\nand then another spoke: 'Sisters, I knew him because his heart fluttered\nlike a bird under a net of silver cords '; and then another took up the\nword: 'Sisters, I knew him because his heart sang like a bird that is\nhappy in a silver cage.' And after that they sang together, those who\nwere nearest rocking the cradle with long wrinkled fingers; and their\nvoices were now tender and caressing, now like the wind blowing in the\ngreat wood, and this was their song:\n\n     Out of sight is out of mind:\n     Long have man and woman-kind,\n     Heavy of will and light of mood,\n     Taken away our wheaten food,\n     Taken away our Altar stone;\n     Hail and rain and thunder alone,\n     And red hearts we turn to grey,\n     Are true till Time gutter away.\n\nWhen the song had died out, the crone who had first spoken, said: 'We\nhave nothing more to do but to mix a drop of our blood into his blood.'\nAnd she scratched her arm with the sharp point of a spindle, which she\nhad made the nurse bring to her, and let a drop of blood, grey as the\nmist, fall upon the lips of the child; and passed out into the darkness.\nThen the others passed out in silence one by one; and all the while the\nchild had not opened his pink eyelids or the fire ceased to dance, for\nthe one was too ignorant and the other too full of gaiety to know what\ngreat beings had bent over the cradle.\n\nWhen the crones were gone, the nurse came to her courage again, and\nhurried to the dun of the High-King, and cried out in the midst of the\nassembly hall that the Sidhe, whether for good or evil she knew not, had\nbent over the child that night; and the king and his poets and men of\nlaw, and his huntsmen, and his cooks, and his chief warriors went with\nher to the hut and gathered about the cradle, and were as noisy as\nmagpies, and the child sat up and looked at them.\n\nTwo years passed over, and the king died fighting against the Fer Bolg;\nand the poets and the men of law ruled in the name of the child, but\nlooked to see him become the master himself before long, for no one\nhad seen so wise a child, and tales of his endless questions about\nthe household of the gods and the making of the world went hither and\nthither among the wicker houses of the poor. Everything had been well\nbut for a miracle that began to trouble all men; and all women, who,\nindeed, talked of it without ceasing. The feathers of the grey hawk\nhad begun to grow in the child's hair, and though, his nurse cut them\ncontinually, in but a little while they would be more numerous than\never. This had not been a matter of great moment, for miracles were a\nlittle thing in those days, but for an ancient law of Eri that none who\nhad any blemish of body could sit upon the throne; and as a grey\nhawk was a wild thing of the air which had never sat at the board, or\nlistened to the songs of the poets in the light of the fire, it was not\npossible to think of one in whose hair its feathers grew as other than\nmarred and blasted; nor could the people separate from their admiration\nof the wisdom that grew in him a horror as at one of unhuman blood. Yet\nall were resolved that he should reign, for they had suffered much from\nfoolish kings and their own disorders, and moreover they desired to\nwatch out the spectacle of his days; and no one had any other fear but\nthat his great wisdom might bid him obey the law, and call some other,\nwho had but a common mind, to reign in his stead.\n\nWhen the child was seven years old the poets and the men of law were\ncalled together by the chief poet, and all these matters weighed and\nconsidered. The child had already seen that those about him had hair\nonly, and, though they had told him that they too had had feathers but\nhad lost them because of a sin committed by their forefathers, they knew\nthat he would learn the truth when he began to wander into the country\nround about. After much consideration they decreed a new law commanding\nevery one upon pain of death to mingle artificially the feathers of the\ngrey hawk into his hair; and they sent men with nets and slings and bows\ninto the countries round about to gather a sufficiency of feathers. They\ndecreed also that any who told the truth to the child should be flung\nfrom a cliff into the sea.\n\nThe years passed, and the child grew from childhood into boyhood and\nfrom boyhood into manhood, and from being curious about all things\nhe became busy with strange and subtle thoughts which came to him in\ndreams, and with distinctions between things long held the same and\nwith the resemblance of things long held different. Multitudes came from\nother lands to see him and to ask his counsel, but there were guards set\nat the frontiers, who compelled all that came to wear the feathers of\nthe grey hawk in their hair. While they listened to him his words seemed\nto make all darkness light and filled their hearts like music; but,\nalas, when they returned to their own lands his words seemed far off,\nand what they could remember too strange and subtle to help them to live\nout their hasty days. A number indeed did live differently afterwards,\nbut their new life was less excellent than the old: some among them had\nlong served a good cause, but when they heard him praise it and their\nlabour, they returned to their own lands to find what they had loved\nless lovable and their arm lighter in the battle, for he had taught them\nhow little a hair divides the false and true; others, again, who\nhad served no cause, but wrought in peace the welfare of their own\nhouseholds, when he had expounded the meaning of their purpose, found\ntheir bones softer and their will less ready for toil, for he had shown\nthem greater purposes; and numbers of the young, when they had heard him\nupon all these things, remembered certain words that became like a fire\nin their hearts, and made all kindly joys and traffic between man and\nman as nothing, and went different ways, but all into vague regret.\n\nWhen any asked him concerning the common things of life; disputes about\nthe mear of a territory, or about the straying of cattle, or about the\npenalty of blood; he would turn to those nearest him for advice; but\nthis was held to be from courtesy, for none knew that these matters were\nhidden from him by thoughts and dreams that filled his mind like the\nmarching and counter-marching of armies. Far less could any know that\nhis heart wandered lost amid throngs of overcoming thoughts and dreams,\nshuddering at its own consuming solitude.\n\nAmong those who came to look at him and to listen to him was the\ndaughter of a little king who lived a great way off; and when he saw her\nhe loved, for she was beautiful, with a strange and pale beauty unlike\nthe women of his land; but Dana, the great mother, had decreed her a\nheart that was but as the heart of others, and when she considered the\nmystery of the hawk feathers she was troubled with a great horror. He\ncalled her to him when the assembly was over and told her of her beauty,\nand praised her simply and frankly as though she were a fable of the\nbards; and he asked her humbly to give him her love, for he was\nonly subtle in his dreams. Overwhelmed with his greatness, she half\nconsented, and yet half refused, for she longed to marry some warrior\nwho could carry her over a mountain in his arms. Day by day the king\ngave her gifts; cups with ears of gold and findrinny wrought by the\ncraftsmen of distant lands; cloth from over sea, which, though woven\nwith curious figures, seemed to her less beautiful than the bright cloth\nof her own country; and still she was ever between a smile and a frown;\nbetween yielding and withholding. He laid down his wisdom at her feet,\nand told how the heroes when they die return to the world and begin\ntheir labour anew; how the kind and mirthful Men of Dea drove out the\nhuge and gloomy and misshapen People from Under the Sea; and a multitude\nof things that even the Sidhe have forgotten, either because they\nhappened so long ago or because they have not time to think of them; and\nstill she half refused, and still he hoped, because he could not believe\nthat a beauty so much like wisdom could hide a common heart.\n\nThere was a tall young man in the dun who had yellow hair, and was\nskilled in wrestling and in the training of horses; and one day when the\nking walked in the orchard, which was between the foss and the forest,\nhe heard his voice among the salley bushes which hid the waters of the\nfoss. 'My blossom,' it said, 'I hate them for making you weave these\ndingy feathers into your beautiful hair, and all that the bird of prey\nupon the throne may sleep easy o' nights'; and then the low, musical\nvoice he loved answered: 'My hair is not beautiful like yours; and now\nthat I have plucked the feathers out of your hair I will put my hands\nthrough it, thus, and thus, and thus; for it casts no shadow of terror\nand darkness upon my heart.' Then the king remembered many things that\nhe had forgotten without understanding them, doubtful words of his poets\nand his men of law, doubts that he had reasoned away, his own continual\nsolitude; and he called to the lovers in a trembling voice. They came\nfrom among the salley bushes and threw themselves at his feet and prayed\nfor pardon, and he stooped down and plucked the feathers out of the hair\nof the woman and then turned away towards the dun without a word. He\nstrode into the hall of assembly, and having gathered his poets and his\nmen of law about him, stood upon the dais and spoke in a loud, clear\nvoice: 'Men of law, why did you make me sin against the laws of Eri? Men\nof verse, why did you make me sin against the secrecy of wisdom, for law\nwas made by man for the welfare of man, but wisdom the gods have made,\nand no man shall live by its light, for it and the hail and the rain and\nthe thunder follow a way that is deadly to mortal things? Men of law and\nmen of verse, live according to your kind, and call Eocha of the Hasty\nMind to reign over you, for I set out to find my kindred.' He then came\ndown among them, and drew out of the hair of first one and then another\nthe feathers of the grey hawk, and, having scattered them over the\nrushes upon the floor, passed out, and none dared to follow him, for\nhis eyes gleamed like the eyes of the birds of prey; and no man saw him\nagain or heard his voice. Some believed that he found his eternal abode\namong the demons, and some that he dwelt henceforth with the dark and\ndreadful goddesses, who sit all night about the pools in the forest\nwatching the constellations rising and setting in those desolate\nmirrors.\n\n\n\n\nTHE HEART OF THE SPRING.\n\n\nA very old man, whose face was almost as fleshless as the foot of a\nbird, sat meditating upon the rocky shore of the flat and hazel-covered\nisle which fills the widest part of the Lough Gill. A russet-faced boy\nof seventeen years sat by his side, watching the swallows dipping for\nflies in the still water. The old man was dressed in threadbare blue\nvelvet, and the boy wore a frieze coat and a blue cap, and had about his\nneck a rosary of blue beads. Behind the two, and half hidden by trees,\nwas a little monastery. It had been burned down a long while before by\nsacrilegious men of the Queen's party, but had been roofed anew with\nrushes by the boy, that the old man might find shelter in his last days.\nHe had not set his spade, however, into the garden about it, and the\nlilies and the roses of the monks had spread out until their confused\nluxuriancy met and mingled with the narrowing circle of the fern. Beyond\nthe lilies and the roses the ferns were so deep that a child walking\namong them would be hidden from sight, even though he stood upon his\ntoes; and beyond the fern rose many hazels and small oak trees.\n\n'Master,' said the boy, 'this long fasting, and the labour of beckoning\nafter nightfall with your rod of quicken wood to the beings who dwell\nin the waters and among the hazels and oak-trees, is too much for your\nstrength. Rest from all this labour for a little, for your hand seemed\nmore heavy upon my shoulder and your feet less steady under you to-day\nthan I have known them. Men say that you are older than the eagles,\nand yet you will not seek the rest that belongs to age.' He spoke in an\neager, impulsive way, as though his heart were in the words and thoughts\nof the moment; and the old man answered slowly and deliberately, as\nthough his heart were in distant days and distant deeds.\n\n'I will tell you why I have not been able to rest,' he said. 'It is\nright that you should know, for you have served me faithfully these five\nyears and more, and even with affection, taking away thereby a little of\nthe doom of loneliness which always falls upon the wise. Now, too, that\nthe end of my labour and the triumph of my hopes is at hand, it is the\nmore needful for you to have this knowledge.'\n\n'Master, do not think that I would question you. It is for me to keep\nthe fire alight, and the thatch close against the rain, and strong, lest\nthe wind blow it among the trees; and it is for me to take the heavy\nbooks from the shelves, and to lift from its corner the great painted\nroll with the names of the Sidhe, and to possess the while an incurious\nand reverent heart, for right well I know that God has made out of His\nabundance a separate wisdom for everything which lives, and to do these\nthings is my wisdom.'\n\n'You are afraid,' said the old man, and his eyes shone with a momentary\nanger.\n\n'Sometimes at night,' said the boy, 'when you are reading, with the\nrod of quicken wood in your hand, I look out of the door and see, now\na great grey man driving swine among the hazels, and now many little\npeople in red caps who come out of the lake driving little white cows\nbefore them. I do not fear these little people so much as the grey man;\nfor, when they come near the house, they milk the cows, and they drink\nthe frothing milk, and begin to dance; and I know there is good in the\nheart that loves dancing; but I fear them for all that. And I fear the\ntall white-armed ladies who come out of the air, and move slowly hither\nand thither, crowning themselves with the roses or with the lilies, and\nshaking about their living hair, which moves, for so I have heard them\ntell each other, with the motion of their thoughts, now spreading out\nand now gathering close to their heads. They have mild, beautiful faces,\nbut, Aengus, son of Forbis, I fear all these beings, I fear the people\nof Sidhe, and I fear the art which draws them about us.'\n\n'Why,' said the old man, 'do you fear the ancient gods who made the\nspears of your father's fathers to be stout in battle, and the little\npeople who came at night from the depth of the lakes and sang among the\ncrickets upon their hearths? And in our evil day they still watch over\nthe loveliness of the earth. But I must tell you why I have fasted and\nlaboured when others would sink into the sleep of age, for without your\nhelp once more I shall have fasted and laboured to no good end. When you\nhave done for me this last thing, you may go and build your cottage and\ntill your fields, and take some girl to wife, and forget the ancient\ngods. I have saved all the gold and silver pieces that were given to me\nby earls and knights and squires for keeping them from the evil eye\nand from the love-weaving enchantments of witches, and by earls' and\nknights' and squires' ladies for keeping the people of the Sidhe from\nmaking the udders of their cattle fall dry, and taking the butter from\ntheir churns. I have saved it all for the day when my work should be at\nan end, and now that the end is at hand you shall not lack for gold and\nsilver pieces enough to make strong the roof-tree of your cottage and to\nkeep cellar and larder full. I have sought through all my life to find\nthe secret of life. I was not happy in my youth, for I knew that it\nwould pass; and I was not happy in my manhood, for I knew that age\nwas coming; and so I gave myself, in youth and manhood and age, to the\nsearch for the Great Secret. I longed for a life whose abundance\nwould fill centuries, I scorned the life of fourscore winters. I would\nbe--nay, I _will_ be!--like the Ancient Gods of the land. I read in my\nyouth, in a Hebrew manuscript I found in a Spanish monastery, that there\nis a moment after the Sun has entered the Ram and before he has passed\nthe Lion, which trembles with the Song of the Immortal Powers, and that\nwhosoever finds this moment and listens to the Song shall become like\nthe Immortal Powers themselves; I came back to Ireland and asked the\nfairy men, and the cow-doctors, if they knew when this moment was; but\nthough all had heard of it, there was none could find the moment upon\nthe hour-glass. So I gave myself to magic, and spent my life in fasting\nand in labour that I might bring the Gods and the Fairies to my side;\nand now at last one of the Fairies has told me that the moment is at\nhand. One, who wore a red cap and whose lips were white with the froth\nof the new milk, whispered it into my ear. Tomorrow, a little before the\nclose of the first hour after dawn, I shall find the moment, and then\nI will go away to a southern land and build myself a palace of white\nmarble amid orange trees, and gather the brave and the beautiful about\nme, and enter into the eternal kingdom of my youth. But, that I may hear\nthe whole Song, I was told by the little fellow with the froth of the\nnew milk on his lips, that you must bring great masses of green boughs\nand pile them about the door and the window of my room; and you must put\nfresh green rushes upon the floor, and cover the table and the rushes\nwith the roses and the lilies of the monks. You must do this to-night,\nand in the morning at the end of the first hour after dawn, you must\ncome and find me.'\n\n'Will you be quite young then?' said the boy.\n\n'I will be as young then as you are, but now I am still old and tired,\nand you must help me to my chair and to my books.'\n\nWhen the boy had left Aengus son of Forbis in his room, and had lighted\nthe lamp which, by some contrivance of the wizard's, gave forth a sweet\nodour as of strange flowers, he went into the wood and began cutting\ngreen boughs from the hazels, and great bundles of rushes from the\nwestern border of the isle, where the small rocks gave place to gently\nsloping sand and clay. It was nightfall before he had cut enough for his\npurpose, and well-nigh midnight before he had carried the last bundle\nto its place, and gone back for the roses and the lilies. It was one of\nthose warm, beautiful nights when everything seems carved of precious\nstones. Sleuth Wood away to the south looked as though cut out of green\nberyl, and the waters that mirrored them shone like pale opal. The roses\nhe was gathering were like glowing rubies, and the lilies had the dull\nlustre of pearl. Everything had taken upon itself the look of something\nimperishable, except a glow-worm, whose faint flame burnt on steadily\namong the shadows, moving slowly hither and thither, the only thing that\nseemed alive, the only thing that seemed perishable as mortal hope.\nThe boy gathered a great armful of roses and lilies, and thrusting the\nglow-worm among their pearl and ruby, carried them into the room, where\nthe old man sat in a half-slumber. He laid armful after armful upon\nthe floor and above the table, and then, gently closing the door, threw\nhimself upon his bed of rushes, to dream of a peaceful manhood with his\nchosen wife at his side, and the laughter of children in his ears.\nAt dawn he rose, and went down to the edge of the lake, taking the\nhour-glass with him. He put some bread and a flask of wine in the boat,\nthat his master might not lack food at the outset of his journey, and\nthen sat down to wait until the hour from dawn had gone by. Gradually\nthe birds began to sing, and when the last grains of sand were falling,\neverything suddenly seemed to overflow with their music. It was the\nmost beautiful and living moment of the year; one could listen to the\nspring's heart beating in it. He got up and went to find his master.\nThe green boughs filled the door, and he had to make a way through them.\nWhen he entered the room the sunlight was falling in flickering circles\non floor and walls and table, and everything was full of soft green\nshadows. But the old man sat clasping a mass of roses and lilies in his\narms, and with his head sunk upon his breast. On the table, at his left\nhand, was a leathern wallet full of gold and silver pieces, as for a\njourney, and at his right hand was a long staff. The boy touched him and\nhe did not move. He lifted the hands but they were quite cold, and they\nfell heavily.\n\n'It were better for him,' said the lad, 'to have told his beads and\nsaid his prayers like another, and not to have spent his days in seeking\namongst the Immortal Powers what he could have found in his own deeds\nand days had he willed. Ah, yes, it were better to have said his prayers\nand kissed his beads!' He looked at the threadbare blue velvet, and\nhe saw it was covered with the pollen of the flowers, and while he was\nlooking at it a thrush, who had alighted among the boughs that were\npiled against the window, began to sing.\n\n\n\n\nTHE CURSE OF THE FIRES AND OF THE SHADOWS.\n\n\nOne summer night, when there was peace, a score of Puritan troopers\nunder the pious Sir Frederick Hamilton, broke through the door of the\nAbbey of the White Friars which stood over the Gara Lough at Sligo. As\nthe door fell with a crash they saw a little knot of friars, gathered\nabout the altar, their white habits glimmering in the steady light of\nthe holy candles. All the monks were kneeling except the abbot, who\nstood upon the altar steps with a great brazen crucifix in his hand.\n'Shoot them!' cried Sir Frederick Hamilton, but none stirred, for all\nwere new converts, and feared the crucifix and the holy candles. The\nwhite lights from the altar threw the shadows of the troopers up on\nto roof and wall. As the troopers moved about, the shadows began a\nfantastic dance among the corbels and the memorial tablets. For a little\nwhile all was silent, and then five troopers who were the body-guard of\nSir Frederick Hamilton lifted their muskets, and shot down five of the\nfriars. The noise and the smoke drove away the mystery of the pale altar\nlights, and the other troopers took courage and began to strike. In a\nmoment the friars lay about the altar steps, their white habits stained\nwith blood. 'Set fire to the house!' cried Sir Frederick Hamilton,\nand at his word one went out, and came in again carrying a heap of dry\nstraw, and piled it against the western wall, and, having done this,\nfell back, for the fear of the crucifix and of the holy candles\nwas still in his heart. Seeing this, the five troopers who were Sir\nFrederick Hamilton's body-guard darted forward, and taking each a holy\ncandle set the straw in a blaze. The red tongues of fire rushed up and\nflickered from corbel to corbel and from tablet to tablet, and crept\nalong the floor, setting in a blaze the seats and benches. The dance of\nthe shadows passed away, and the dance of the fires began. The troopers\nfell back towards the door in the southern wall, and watched those\nyellow dancers springing hither and thither.\n\nFor a time the altar stood safe and apart in the midst of its white\nlight; the eyes of the troopers turned upon it. The abbot whom they\nhad thought dead had risen to his feet and now stood before it with the\ncrucifix lifted in both hands high above his head. Suddenly he cried\nwith a loud voice, 'Woe unto all who smite those who dwell within the\nLight of the Lord, for they shall wander among the ungovernable shadows,\nand follow the ungovernable fires!' And having so cried he fell on his\nface dead, and the brazen crucifix rolled down the steps of the altar.\nThe smoke had now grown very thick, so that it drove the troopers out\ninto the open air. Before them were burning houses. Behind them shone\nthe painted windows of the Abbey filled with saints and martyrs,\nawakened, as from a sacred trance, into an angry and animated life. The\neyes of the troopers were dazzled, and for a while could see nothing but\nthe flaming faces of saints and martyrs. Presently, however, they saw a\nman covered with dust who came running towards them. 'Two messengers,'\nhe cried, 'have been sent by the defeated Irish to raise against you the\nwhole country about Manor Hamilton, and if you do not stop them you\nwill be overpowered in the woods before you reach home again! They ride\nnorth-east between Ben Bulben and Cashel-na-Gael.'\n\nSir Frederick Hamilton called to him the five troopers who had first\nfired upon the monks and said, 'Mount quickly, and ride through the\nwoods towards the mountain, and get before these men, and kill them.'\n\nIn a moment the troopers were gone, and before many moments they had\nsplashed across the river at what is now called Buckley's Ford, and\nplunged into the woods. They followed a beaten track that wound along\nthe northern bank of the river. The boughs of the birch and quicken\ntrees mingled above, and hid the cloudy moonlight, leaving the pathway\nin almost complete darkness. They rode at a rapid trot, now chatting\ntogether, now watching some stray weasel or rabbit scuttling away in\nthe darkness. Gradually, as the gloom and silence of the woods oppressed\nthem, they drew closer together, and began to talk rapidly; they were\nold comrades and knew each other's lives. One was married, and told\nhow glad his wife would be to see him return safe from this harebrained\nexpedition against the White Friars, and to hear how fortune had made\namends for rashness. The oldest of the five, whose wife was dead, spoke\nof a flagon of wine which awaited him upon an upper shelf; while a\nthird, who was the youngest, had a sweetheart watching for his return,\nand he rode a little way before the others, not talking at all. Suddenly\nthe young man stopped, and they saw that his horse was trembling. 'I saw\nsomething,' he said, 'and yet I do not know but it may have been one of\nthe shadows. It looked like a great worm with a silver crown upon his\nhead.' One of the five put his hand up to his forehead as if about to\ncross himself, but remembering that he had changed his religion he put\nit down, and said: 'I am certain it was but a shadow, for there are a\ngreat many about us, and of very strange kinds.' Then they rode on in\nsilence. It had been raining in the earlier part of the day, and the\ndrops fell from the branches, wetting their hair and their shoulders. In\na little they began to talk again. They had been in many battles against\nmany a rebel together, and now told each other over again the story\nof their wounds, and so awakened in their hearts the strongest of all\nfellowships, the fellowship of the sword, and half forgot the terrible\nsolitude of the woods.\n\nSuddenly the first two horses neighed, and then stood still, and would\ngo no further. Before them was a glint of water, and they knew by the\nrushing sound that it was a river. They dismounted, and after much\ntugging and coaxing brought the horses to the river-side. In the midst\nof the water stood a tall old woman with grey hair flowing over a grey\ndress. She stood up to her knees in the water, and stooped from time to\ntime as though washing. Presently they could see that she was washing\nsomething that half floated. The moon cast a flickering light upon it,\nand they saw that it was the dead body of a man, and, while they were\nlooking at it, an eddy of the river turned the face towards them, and\neach of the five troopers recognised at the same moment his own face.\nWhile they stood dumb and motionless with horror, the woman began to\nspeak, saying slowly and loudly: 'Did you see my son? He has a crown of\nsilver on his head, and there are rubies in the crown.' Then the oldest\nof the troopers, he who had been most often wounded, drew his sword and\ncried: 'I have fought for the truth of my God, and need not fear the\nshadows of Satan,' and with that rushed into the water. In a moment he\nreturned. The woman had vanished, and though he had thrust his sword\ninto air and water he had found nothing.\n\nThe five troopers remounted, and set their horses at the ford, but all\nto no purpose. They tried again and again, and went plunging hither and\nthither, the horses foaming and rearing. 'Let us,' said the old trooper,\n'ride back a little into the wood, and strike the river higher up.' They\nrode in under the boughs, the ground-ivy crackling under the hoofs,\nand the branches striking against their steel caps. After about twenty\nminutes' riding they came out again upon the river, and after another\nten minutes found a place where it was possible to cross without sinking\nbelow the stirrups. The wood upon the other side was very thin, and\nbroke the moonlight into long streams. The wind had arisen, and had\nbegun to drive the clouds rapidly across the face of the moon, so that\nthin streams of light seemed to be dancing a grotesque dance among the\nscattered bushes and small fir-trees. The tops of the trees began also\nto moan, and the sound of it was like the voice of the dead in the\nwind; and the troopers remembered the belief that tells how the dead in\npurgatory are spitted upon the points of the trees and upon the points\nof the rocks. They turned a little to the south, in the hope that they\nmight strike the beaten path again, but they could find no trace of it.\n\nMeanwhile, the moaning grew louder and louder, and the dance of the\nwhite moon-fires more and more rapid. Gradually they began to be aware\nof a sound of distant music. It was the sound of a bagpipe, and they\nrode towards it with great joy. It came from the bottom of a deep,\ncup-like hollow. In the midst of the hollow was an old man with a red\ncap and withered face. He sat beside a fire of sticks, and had a burning\ntorch thrust into the earth at his feet, and played an old bagpipe\nfuriously. His red hair dripped over his face like the iron rust upon\na rock. 'Did you see my wife?' he cried, looking up a moment; 'she was\nwashing! she was washing!' 'I am afraid of him,' said the young trooper,\n'I fear he is one of the Sidhe.' 'No,' said the old trooper, 'he is a\nman, for I can see the sun-freckles upon his face. We will compel him\nto be our guide'; and at that he drew his sword, and the others did the\nsame. They stood in a ring round the piper, and pointed their swords at\nhim, and the old trooper then told him that they must kill two rebels,\nwho had taken the road between Ben Bulben and the great mountain spur\nthat is called Cashel-na-Gael, and that he must get up before one of\nthem and be their guide, for they had lost their way. The piper turned,\nand pointed to a neighbouring tree, and they saw an old white horse\nready bitted, bridled, and saddled. He slung the pipe across his back,\nand, taking the torch in his hand, got upon the horse, and started off\nbefore them, as hard as he could go.\n\nThe wood grew thinner and thinner, and the ground began to slope up\ntoward the mountain. The moon had already set, and the little white\nflames of the stars had come out everywhere. The ground sloped more and\nmore until at last they rode far above the woods upon the wide top of\nthe mountain. The woods lay spread out mile after mile below, and away\nto the south shot up the red glare of the burning town. But before and\nabove them were the little white flames. The guide drew rein suddenly,\nand pointing upwards with the hand that did not hold the torch, shrieked\nout, 'Look; look at the holy candles!' and then plunged forward at a\ngallop, waving the torch hither and thither. 'Do you hear the hoofs of\nthe messengers?' cried the guide. 'Quick, quick! or they will be gone\nout of your hands!' and he laughed as with delight of the chase. The\ntroopers thought they could hear far off, and as if below them, rattle\nof hoofs; but now the ground began to slope more and more, and the speed\ngrew more headlong moment by moment. They tried to pull up, but in vain,\nfor the horses seemed to have gone mad. The guide had thrown the reins\non to the neck of the old white horse, and was waving his arms and\nsinging a wild Gaelic song. Suddenly they saw the thin gleam of a river,\nat an immense distance below, and knew that they were upon the brink of\nthe abyss that is now called Lug-na-Gael, or in English the Stranger's\nLeap. The six horses sprang forward, and five screams went up into the\nair, a moment later five men and horses fell with a dull crash upon the\ngreen slopes at the foot of the rocks.\n\n\n\n\nTHE OLD MEN OF THE TWILIGHT.\n\n\nAt the place, close to the Dead Man's Point, at the Rosses, where the\ndisused pilot-house looks out to sea through two round windows like\neyes, a mud cottage stood in the last century. It also was a watchhouse,\nfor a certain old Michael Bruen, who had been a smuggler in his day,\nand was still the father and grandfather of smugglers, lived there, and\nwhen, after nightfall, a tall schooner crept over the bay from Roughley,\nit was his business to hang a horn lanthorn in the southern window, that\nthe news might travel to Dorren's Island, and from thence, by another\nhorn lanthorn, to the village of the Rosses. But for this glimmering of\nmessages, he had little communion with mankind, for he was very old, and\nhad no thought for anything but for the making of his soul, at the foot\nof the Spanish crucifix of carved oak that hung by his chimney, or bent\ndouble over the rosary of stone beads brought to him a cargo of silks\nand laces out of France. One night he had watched hour after hour,\nbecause a gentle and favourable wind was blowing, and _La Mere de\nMisericorde_ was much overdue; and he was about to lie down upon his\nheap of straw, seeing that the dawn was whitening the east, and that the\nschooner would not dare to round Roughley and come to an anchor after\ndaybreak; when he saw a long line of herons flying slowly from Dorren's\nIsland and towards the pools which lie, half choked with reeds, behind\nwhat is called the Second Rosses. He had never before seen herons flying\nover the sea, for they are shore-keeping birds, and partly because this\nhad startled him out of his drowsiness, and more because the long\ndelay of the schooner kept his cupboard empty, he took down his rusty\nshot-gun, of which the barrel was tied on with a piece of string, and\nfollowed them towards the pools.\n\nWhen he came close enough to hear the sighing of the rushes in the\noutermost pool, the morning was grey over the world, so that the tall\nrushes, the still waters, the vague clouds, the thin mists lying among\nthe sand-heaps, seemed carved out of an enormous pearl. In a little he\ncame upon the herons, of whom there were a great number, standing with\nlifted legs in the shallow water; and crouching down behind a bank of\nrushes, looked to the priming of his gun, and bent for a moment over his\nrosary to murmur: 'Patron Patrick, let me shoot a heron; made into a pie\nit will support me for nearly four days, for I no longer eat as in my\nyouth. If you keep me from missing I will say a rosary to you every\nnight until the pie is eaten.' Then he lay down, and, resting his gun\nupon a large stone, turned towards a heron which stood upon a bank of\nsmooth grass over a little stream that flowed into the pool; for he\nfeared to take the rheumatism by wading, as he would have to do if he\nshot one of those which stood in the water. But when he looked along\nthe barrel the heron was gone, and, to his wonder and terror, a man of\ninfinitely great age and infirmity stood in its place. He lowered the\ngun, and the heron stood there with bent head and motionless feathers,\nas though it had slept from the beginning of the world. He raised the\ngun, and no sooner did he look along the iron than that enemy of all\nenchantment brought the old man again before him, only to vanish when he\nlowered the gun for the second time. He laid the gun down, and crossed\nhimself three times, and said a _Paternoster_ and an _Ave Maria_, and\nmuttered half aloud: 'Some enemy of God and of my patron is standing\nupon the smooth place and fishing in the blessed water,' and then aimed\nvery carefully and slowly. He fired, and when the smoke had gone saw an\nold man, huddled upon the grass and a long line of herons flying with\nclamour towards the sea. He went round a bend of the pool, and coming\nto the little stream looked down on a figure wrapped in faded clothes of\nblack and green of an ancient pattern and spotted with blood. He shook\nhis head at the sight of so great a wickedness. Suddenly the clothes\nmoved and an arm was stretched upwards towards the rosary which hung\nabout his neck, and long wasted fingers almost touched the cross. He\nstarted back, crying: 'Wizard, I will let no wicked thing touch my\nblessed beads'; and the sense of a The Old great danger just escaped\nmade him tremble.\n\n'If you listen to me,' replied a voice so faint that it was like a sigh,\n'you will know that I am not a wizard, and you will let me kiss the\ncross before I die.'\n\n'I will listen to you,' he answered, 'but I will not let you touch my\nblessed beads,' and sitting on the grass a little way from the dying\nman, he reloaded his gun and laid it across his knees and composed\nhimself to listen.\n\n'I know not how many generations ago we, who are now herons, were the\nmen of learning of the King Leaghaire; we neither hunted, nor went to\nbattle, nor listened to the Druids preaching, and even love, if it came\nto us at all, was but a passing fire. The Druids and the poets told us,\nmany and many a time, of a new Druid Patrick; and most among them were\nfierce against him, while a few thought his doctrine merely the doctrine\nof the gods set out in new symbols, and were for giving him welcome; but\nwe yawned in the midst of their tale. At last they came crying that he\nwas coming to the king's house, and fell to their dispute, but we would\nlisten to neither party, for we were busy with a dispute about the\nmerits of the Great and of the Little Metre; nor were we disturbed\nwhen they passed our door with sticks of enchantment under their arms,\ntravelling towards the forest to contend against his coming, nor when\nthey returned after nightfall with torn robes and despairing cries; for\nthe click of our knives writing our thoughts in Ogham filled us with\npeace and our dispute filled us with joy; nor even when in the morning\ncrowds passed us to hear the strange Druid preaching the commandments of\nhis god. The crowds passed, and one, who had laid down his knife to yawn\nand stretch himself, heard a voice speaking far off, and knew that the\nDruid Patrick was preaching within the king's house; but our hearts were\ndeaf, and we carved and disputed and read, and laughed a thin laughter\ntogether. In a little we heard many feet coming towards the house, and\npresently two tall figures stood in the door, the one in white, the\nother in a crimson robe; like a great lily and a heavy poppy; and we\nknew the Druid Patrick and our King Leaghaire. We laid down the slender\nknives and bowed before the king, but when the black and green robes had\nceased to rustle, it was not the loud rough voice of King Leaghaire that\nspoke to us, but a strange voice in which there was a rapture as of\none speaking from behind a battlement of Druid flame: \"I preached the\ncommandments of the Maker of the world,\" it said; \"within the king's\nhouse and from the centre of the earth to the windows of Heaven there\nwas a great silence, so that the eagle floated with unmoving wings in\nthe white air, and the fish with unmoving fins in the dim water, while\nthe linnets and the wrens and the sparrows stilled there ever-trembling\ntongues in the heavy boughs, and the clouds were like white marble,\nand the rivers became their motionless mirrors, and the shrimps in the\nfar-off sea-pools were still enduring eternity in patience, although it\nwas hard.\" And as he named these things, it was like a king numbering\nhis people. \"But your slender knives went click, click! upon the oaken\nstaves, and, all else being silent, the sound shook the angels with\nanger. O, little roots, nipped by the winter, who do not awake although\nthe summer pass above you with innumerable feet. O, men who have no part\nin love, who have no part in song, who have no part in wisdom, but dwell\nwith the shadows of memory where the feet of angels cannot touch you as\nthey pass over your heads, where the hair of demons cannot sweep about\nyou as they pass under your feet, I lay upon you a curse, and change you\nto an example for ever and ever; you shall become grey herons and stand\npondering in grey pools and flit over the world in that hour when it is\nmost full of sighs, having forgotten the flame of the stars and not yet\nfound the flame of the sun; and you shall preach to the other herons\nuntil they also are like you, and are an example for ever and ever; and\nyour deaths shall come to you by chance and unforeseen, that no fire of\ncertainty may visit your hearts.\"'\n\nThe voice of the old man of learning became still, but the voteen bent\nover his gun with his eyes upon the ground, trying in vain to understand\nsomething of this tale; and he had so bent, it may be for a long time,\nhad not a tug at his rosary made him start out of his dream. The old man\nof learning had crawled along the grass, and was now trying to draw the\ncross down low enough for his lips to reach it.\n\n'You must not touch my blessed beads, cried the voteen, and struck\nthe long withered fingers with the barrel of his gun. He need not have\ntrembled, for the old man fell back upon the grass with a sigh and was\nstill. He bent down and began to consider the black and green clothes,\nfor his fear had begun to pass away when he came to understand that he\nhad something the man of learning wanted and pleaded for, and now that\nthe blessed beads were safe, his fear had nearly all gone; and surely,\nhe thought, if that big cloak, and that little tight-fitting cloak\nunder it, were warm and without holes, Saint Patrick would take the\nenchantment out of them and leave them fit for human use. But the black\nand green clothes fell away wherever his fingers touched them, and while\nthis was a new wonder, a slight wind blew over the pool and crumbled the\nold man of learning and all his ancient gear into a little heap of dust,\nand then made the little heap less and less until there was nothing but\nthe smooth green grass.\n\n\n\n\nWHERE THERE IS NOTHING, THERE IS GOD.\n\n\nThe little wicker houses at Tullagh, where the Brothers were accustomed\nto pray, or bend over many handicrafts, when twilight had driven them\nfrom the fields, were empty, for the hardness of the winter had brought\nthe brotherhood together in the little wooden house under the shadow of\nthe wooden chapel; and Abbot Malathgeneus, Brother Dove, Brother\nBald Fox, Brother Peter, Brother Patrick, Brother Bittern, Brother\nFair-Brows, and many too young to have won names in the great battle,\nsat about the fire with ruddy faces, one mending lines to lay in the\nriver for eels, one fashioning a snare for birds, one mending the\nbroken handle of a spade, one writing in a large book, and one shaping\na jewelled box to hold the book; and among the rushes at their feet lay\nthe scholars, who would one day be Brothers, and whose school-house\nit was, and for the succour of whose tender years the great fire was\nsupposed to leap and flicker. One of these, a child of eight or nine\nyears, called Olioll, lay upon his back looking up through the hole in\nthe roof, through which the smoke went, and watching the stars appearing\nand disappearing in the smoke with mild eyes, like the eyes of a beast\nof the field. He turned presently to the Brother who wrote in the big\nbook, and whose duty was to teach the children, and said, 'Brother Dove,\nto what are the stars fastened?' The Brother, rejoicing to see so much\ncuriosity in the stupidest of his scholars, laid down the pen and\nsaid, 'There are nine crystalline spheres, and on the first the Moon\nis fastened, on the second the planet Mercury, on the third the planet\nVenus, on the fourth the Sun, on the fifth the planet Mars, on the sixth\nthe planet Jupiter, on the seventh the planet Saturn; these are the\nwandering stars; and on the eighth are fastened the fixed stars; but\nthe ninth sphere is a sphere of the substance on which the breath of God\nmoved in the beginning.'\n\n'What is beyond that?' said the child. 'There is nothing beyond that;\nthere is God.'\n\nAnd then the child's eyes strayed to the jewelled box, where one great\nruby was gleaming in the light of the fire, and he said, 'Why has\nBrother Peter put a great ruby on the side of the box?'\n\n'The ruby is a symbol of the love of God.'\n\n'Why is the ruby a symbol of the love of God?'\n\n'Because it is red, like fire, and fire burns up everything, and where\nthere is nothing, there is God.'\n\nThe child sank into silence, but presently sat up and said, 'There is\nsomebody outside.'\n\n'No,' replied the Brother. 'It is only the wolves; I have heard them\nmoving about in the snow for some time. They are growing very wild, now\nthat the winter drives them from the mountains. They broke into a fold\nlast night and carried off many sheep, and if we are not careful they\nwill devour everything.'\n\n'No, it is the footstep of a man, for it is heavy; but I can hear the\nfootsteps of the wolves also.'\n\nHe had no sooner done speaking than somebody rapped three times, but\nwith no great loudness.\n\n'I will go and open, for he must be very cold.'\n\n'Do not open, for it may be a man-wolf, and he may devour us all.'\n\nBut the boy had already drawn back the heavy wooden bolt, and all the\nfaces, most of them a little pale, turned towards the slowly-opening\ndoor.\n\n'He has beads and a cross, he cannot be a man-wolf,' said the child, as\na man with the snow heavy on his long, ragged beard, and on the matted\nhair, that fell over his shoulders and nearly to his waist, and dropping\nfrom the tattered cloak that but half-covered his withered brown body,\ncame in and looked from face to face with mild, ecstatic eyes. Standing\nsome way from the fire, and with eyes that had rested at last upon the\nAbbot Malathgeneus, he cried out, 'O blessed abbot, let me come to the\nfire and warm myself and dry the snow from my beard and my hair and my\ncloak; that I may not die of the cold of the mountains, and anger the\nLord with a wilful martyrdom.'\n\n'Come to the fire,' said the abbot, 'and warm yourself, and eat the food\nthe boy Olioll will bring you. It is sad indeed that any for whom Christ\nhas died should be as poor as you.'\n\nThe man sat over the fire, and Olioll took away his now dripping cloak\nand laid meat and bread and wine before him; but he would eat only of\nthe bread, and he put away the wine, asking for water. When his beard\nand hair had begun to dry a little and his limbs had ceased to shiver\nwith the cold, he spoke again.\n\n'O blessed abbot, have pity on the poor, have pity on a beggar who has\ntrodden the bare world this many a year, and give me some labour to do,\nthe hardest there is, for I am the poorest of God's poor.'\n\nThen the Brothers discussed together what work they could put him to,\nand at first to little purpose, for there was no labour that had not\nfound its labourer in that busy community; but at last one remembered\nthat Brother Bald Fox, whose business it was to turn the great quern in\nthe quern-house, for he was too stupid for anything else, was getting\nold for so heavy a labour; and so the beggar was put to the quern from\nthe morrow.\n\nThe cold passed away, and the spring grew to summer, and the quern was\nnever idle, nor was it turned with grudging labour, for when any passed\nthe beggar was heard singing as he drove the handle round. The last\ngloom, too, had passed from that happy community, for Olioll, who had\nalways been stupid and unteachable, grew clever, and this was the more\nmiraculous because it had come of a sudden. One day he had been even\nduller than usual, and was beaten and told to know his lesson better\non the morrow or be sent into a lower class among little boys who would\nmake a joke of him. He had gone out in tears, and when he came the next\nday, although his stupidity, born of a mind that would listen to every\nwandering sound and brood upon every wandering light, had so long been\nthe byword of the school, he knew his lesson so well that he passed to\nthe head of the class, and from that day was the best of scholars. At\nfirst Brother Dove thought this was an answer to his own prayers to the\nVirgin, and took it for a great proof of the love she bore him; but when\nmany far more fervid prayers had failed to add a single wheatsheaf\nto the harvest, he began to think that the child was trafficking with\nbards, or druids, or witches, and resolved to follow and watch. He had\ntold his thought to the abbot, who bid him come to him the moment he hit\nthe truth; and the next day, which was a Sunday, he stood in the path\nwhen the abbot and the Brothers were coming from vespers, with their\nwhite habits upon them, and took the abbot by the habit and said, 'The\nbeggar is of the greatest of saints and of the workers of miracle. I\nfollowed Olioll but now, and by his slow steps and his bent head I saw\nthat the weariness of his stupidity was over him, and when he came to\nthe little wood by the quern-house I knew by the path broken in the\nunder-wood and by the footmarks in the muddy places that he had gone\nthat way many times. I hid behind a bush where the path doubled upon\nitself at a sloping place, and understood by the tears in his eyes that\nhis stupidity was too old and his wisdom too new to save him from terror\nof the rod. When he was in the quern-house I went to the window and\nlooked in, and the birds came down and perched upon my head and my\nshoulders, for they are not timid in that holy place; and a wolf passed\nby, his right side shaking my habit, his left the leaves of a bush.\nOlioll opened his book and turned to the page I had told him to learn,\nand began to cry, and the beggar sat beside him and comforted him until\nhe fell asleep. When his sleep was of the deepest the beggar knelt down\nand prayed aloud, and said, \"O Thou Who dwellest beyond the stars, show\nforth Thy power as at the beginning, and let knowledge sent from Thee\nawaken in his mind, wherein is nothing from the world, that the nine\norders of angels may glorify Thy name;\" and then a light broke out of\nthe air and wrapped Aodh, and I smelt the breath of roses. I stirred a\nlittle in my wonder, and the beggar turned and saw me, and, bending low,\nsaid, \"O Brother Dove, if I have done wrong, forgive me, and I will do\npenance. It was my pity moved me;\" but I was afraid and I ran away, and\ndid not stop running until I came here.' Then all the Brothers began\ntalking together, one saying it was such and such a saint, and one that\nit was not he but another; and one that it was none of these, for they\nwere still in their brotherhoods, but that it was such and such a\none; and the talk was as near to quarreling as might be in that\ngentle community, for each would claim so great a saint for his native\nprovince. At last the abbot said, 'He is none that you have named, for\nat Easter I had greeting from all, and each was in his brotherhood; but\nhe is Aengus the Lover of God, and the first of those who have gone to\nlive in the wild places and among the wild beasts. Ten years ago he felt\nthe burden of many labours in a brotherhood under the Hill of Patrick\nand went into the forest that he might labour only with song to the\nLord; but the fame of his holiness brought many thousands to his cell,\nso that a little pride clung to a soul from which all else had been\ndriven. Nine years ago he dressed himself in rags, and from that day\nnone has seen him, unless, indeed, it be true that he has been seen\nliving among the wolves on the mountains and eating the grass of the\nfields. Let us go to him and bow down before him; for at last, after\nlong seeking, he has found the nothing that is God; and bid him lead us\nin the pathway he has trodden.'\n\nThey passed in their white habits along the beaten path in the wood,\nthe acolytes swinging their censers before them, and the abbot, with his\ncrozier studded with precious stones, in the midst of the incense; and\ncame before the quern-house and knelt down and began to pray, awaiting\nthe moment when the child would wake, and the Saint cease from his watch\nand come to look at the sun going down into the unknown darkness, as his\nway was.\n\n\n\n\nOF COSTELLO THE PROUD, OF OONA THE DAUGHTER OF DERMOTT, AND OF THE BITTER TONGUE.\n\n\nCostello had come up from the fields and lay upon the ground before the\ndoor of his square tower, resting his head upon his hands and looking\nat the sunset, and considering the chances of the weather. Though the\ncustoms of Elizabeth and James, now going out of fashion in England, had\nbegun to prevail among the gentry, he still wore the great cloak of the\nnative Irish; and the sensitive outlines of his face and the greatness\nof his indolent body had a commingling of pride and strength which\nbelonged to a simpler age. His eyes wandered from the sunset to where\nthe long white road lost itself over the south-western horizon and to\na horseman who toiled slowly up the hill. A few more minutes and the\nhorseman was near enough for his little and shapeless body, his long\nIrish cloak, and the dilapidated bagpipes hanging from his shoulders,\nand the rough-haired garron under him, to be seen distinctly in the grey\ndusk. So soon as he had come within earshot, he began crying: 'Is it\nsleeping you are, Tumaus Costello, when better men break their hearts\non the great white roads? Get up out of that, proud Tumaus, for I have\nnews! Get up out of that, you great omadhaun! Shake yourself out of the\nearth, you great weed of a man!'\n\nCostello had risen to his feet, and as the piper came up to him seized\nhim by the neck of his jacket, and lifting him out of his saddle threw\nhim on to the ground.\n\n'Let me alone, let me alone,' said the other, but Costello still shook\nhim.\n\n'I have news from Dermott's daughter, Winny,' The great fingers were\nloosened, and the piper rose gasping.\n\n'Why did you not tell me,' said Costello, that you came from her? You\nmight have railed your fill.'\n\n'I have come from her, but I will not speak unless I am paid for my\nshaking.'\n\nCostello fumbled at the bag in which he carried his money, and it was\nsome time before it would open, for the hand that had overcome many men\nshook with fear and hope. 'Here is all the money in my bag,' he said,\ndropping a stream of French and Spanish money into the hand of the\npiper, who bit the coins before he would answer.\n\n'That is right, that is a fair price, but I will not speak till I have\ngood protection, for if the Dermotts lay their hands upon me in any\nboreen after sundown, or in Cool-a-vin by day, I will be left to rot\namong the nettles of a ditch, or hung on the great sycamore, where they\nhung the horse-thieves last Beltaine four years.' And while he spoke he\ntied the reins of his garron to a bar of rusty iron that was mortared\ninto the wall.\n\n'I will make you my piper and my bodyservant,' said Costello, 'and no\nman dare lay hands upon the man, or the goat, or the horse, or the dog\nthat is Tumaus Costello's.'\n\n'And I will only tell my message,' said the other, flinging the saddle\non the ground, 'in the corner of the chimney with a noggin in my hand,\nand a jug of the Brew of the Little Pot beside me, for though I am\nragged and empty, my forbears were well clothed and full until their\nhouse was burnt and their cattle harried seven centuries ago by the\nDillons, whom I shall yet see on the hob of hell, and they screeching';\nand while he spoke the little eyes gleamed and the thin hands clenched.\n\nCostello led him into the great rush-strewn hall, where were none of the\ncomforts which had begun to grow common among the gentry, but a feudal\ngauntness and bareness, and pointed to the bench in the great chimney;\nand when he had sat down, filled up a horn noggin and set it on the\nbench beside him, and set a great black jack of leather beside the\nnoggin, and lit a torch that slanted out from a ring in the wall, his\nhands trembling the while; and then turned towards him and said: 'Will\nDermott's daughter come to me, Duallach, son of Daly?'\n\n'Dermott's daughter will not come to you, for her father has set women\nto watch her, but she bid me tell you that this day sennight will be the\neve of St. John and the night of her betrothal to Namara of the Lake,\nand she would have you there that, when they bid her drink to him she\nloves best, as the way is, she may drink to you, Tumaus Costello, and\nlet all know where her heart is, and how little of gladness is in her\nmarriage; and I myself bid you go with good men about you, for I saw the\nhorse-thieves with my own eyes, and they dancing the \"Blue Pigeon\" in\nthe air.' And then he held the now empty noggin towards Costello, his\nhand closing round it like the claw of a bird, and cried: 'Fill my\nnoggin again, for I would the day had come when all the water in the\nworld is to shrink into a periwinkle-shell, that I might drink nothing\nbut Poteen.'\n\nFinding that Costello made no reply, but sat in a dream, he burst out:\n'Fill my noggin, I tell you, for no Costello is so great in the world\nthat he should not wait upon a Daly, even though the Daly travel the\nroad with his pipes and the Costello have a bare hill, an empty house, a\nhorse, a herd of goats, and a handful of cows.' 'Praise the Dalys if you\nwill,' said Costello as he filled the noggin, 'for you have brought me a\nkind word from my love.'\n\nFor the next few days Duallach went hither and thither trying to raise\na bodyguard, and every man he met had some story of Costello, how he\nkilled the wrestler when but a boy by so straining at the belt that went\nabout them both that he broke the big wrestler's back; how when somewhat\nolder he dragged fierce horses through a ford in the Unchion for a\nwager; how when he came to manhood he broke the steel horseshoe in Mayo;\nhow he drove many men before him through Rushy Meadow at Drum-an-air\nbecause of a malevolent song they had about his poverty; and of many\nanother deed of his strength and pride; but he could find none who\nwould trust themselves with any so passionate and poor in a quarrel with\ncareful and wealthy persons like Dermott of the Sheep and Namara of the\nLake.\n\nThen Costello went out himself, and after listening to many excuses and\nin many places, brought in a big half-witted fellow, who followed him\nlike a dog, a farm-labourer who worshipped him for his strength, a fat\nfarmer whose forefathers had served his family, and a couple of lads who\nlooked after his goats and cows; and marshalled them before the fire\nin the empty hall. They had brought with them their stout cudgels,\nand Costello gave them an old pistol apiece, and kept them all night\ndrinking Spanish ale and shooting at a white turnip which he pinned\nagainst the wall with a skewer. Duallach of the pipes sat on the\nbench in the chimney playing 'The Green Bunch of Rushes', 'The Unchion\nStream,' and 'The Princes of Breffeny' on his old pipes, and railing now\nat the appearance of the shooters, now at their clumsy shooting, and\nnow at Costello because he had no better servants. The labourer, the\nhalf-witted fellow, the farmer and the lads were all well accustomed to\nDuallach's railing, for it was as inseparable from wake or wedding as\nthe squealing of his pipes, but they wondered at the forbearance of\nCostello, who seldom came either to wake or wedding, and if he had would\nscarce have been patient with a scolding piper.\n\nOn the next evening they set out for Cool-a-vin, Costello riding a\ntolerable horse and carrying a sword, the others upon rough-haired\ngarrons, and with their stout cudgels under their arms. As they rode\nover the bogs and in the boreens among the hills they could see\nfire answering fire from hill to hill, from horizon to horizon, and\neverywhere groups who danced in the red light on the turf, celebrating\nthe bridal of life and fire. When they came to Dermott's house they saw\nbefore the door an unusually large group of the very poor, dancing about\na fire, in the midst of which was a blazing cartwheel, that circular\ndance which is so ancient that the gods, long dwindled to be but\nfairies, dance no other in their secret places. From the door and\nthrough the long loop-holes on either side came the pale light of\ncandles and the sound of many feet dancing a dance of Elizabeth and\nJames.\n\nThey tied their horses to bushes, for the number so tied already showed\nthat the stables were full, and shoved their way through a crowd of\npeasants who stood about the door, and went into the great hall where\nthe dance was. The labourer, the half-witted fellow, the farmer and\nthe two lads mixed with a group of servants who were looking on from an\nalcove, and Duallach sat with the pipers on their bench, but Costello\nmade his way through the dancers to where Dermott of the Sheep stood\nwith Namara of the Lake pouring Poteen out of a porcelain jug into horn\nnoggins with silver rims.\n\n'Tumaus Costello,' said the old man, 'you have done a good deed to\nforget what has been, and to fling away enmity and come to the betrothal\nof my daughter to Namara of the Lake.'\n\n'I come,' answered Costello, 'because when in the time of Costello De\nAngalo my forbears overcame your forbears and afterwards made peace, a\ncompact was made that a Costello might go with his body-servants and his\npiper to every feast given by a Dermott for ever, and a Dermott with\nhis body-servants and his piper to every feast given by a Costello for\never.'\n\n'If you come with evil thoughts and armed men,' said the son of Dermott\nflushing,' no matter how strong your hands to wrestle and to swing the\nsword, it shall go badly with you, for some of my wife's clan have come\nout of Mayo, and my three brothers and their servants have come down\nfrom the Ox Mountains'; and while he spoke he kept his hand inside his\ncoat as though upon the handle of a weapon.\n\n'No,' answered Costello, 'I but come to dance a farewell dance with your\ndaughter.'\n\nDermott drew his hand out of his coat and went over to a tall pale girl\nwho was now standing but a little way off with her mild eyes fixed upon\nthe ground.\n\n'Costello has come to dance a farewell dance, for he knows that you will\nnever see one another again.'\n\nThe girl lifted her eyes and gazed at Costello, and in her gaze was that\ntrust of the humble in the proud, the gentle in the violent, which has\nbeen the tragedy of woman from the beginning. Costello led her among the\ndancers, and they were soon drawn into the rhythm of the Pavane, that\nstately dance which, with the Saraband, the Gallead, and the Morrice\ndances, had driven out, among all but the most Irish of the gentry, the\nquicker rhythms of the verse-interwoven, pantomimic dances of earlier\ndays; and while they danced there came over them the unutterable\nmelancholy, the weariness with the world, the poignant and bitter pity\nfor one another, the vague anger against common hopes and fears, which\nis the exultation of love. And when a dance ended and the pipers laid\ndown their pipes and lifted their horn noggins, they stood a little from\nthe others waiting pensively and silently for the dance to begin again\nand the fire in their hearts to leap up and to wrap them anew; and\nso they danced and danced Pavane and Saraband and Gallead and Morrice\nthrough the night long, and many stood still to watch them, and the\npeasants came about the door and peered in, as though they understood\nthat they would gather their children's children about them long hence,\nand tell how they had seen Costello dance with Dermott's daughter Oona,\nand become by the telling themselves a portion of ancient romance; but\nthrough all the dancing and piping Namara of the Lake went hither and\nthither talking loudly and making foolish jokes that all might seem\nwell with him, and old Dermott of the Sheep grew redder and redder, and\nlooked oftener and oftener at the doorway to see if the candles there\ngrew yellow in the dawn.\n\nAt last he saw that the moment to end had come, and, in a pause after\na dance, cried out from where the horn noggins stood that his daughter\nwould now drink the cup of betrothal; then Oona came over to where he\nwas, and the guests stood round in a half-circle, Costello close to\nthe wall to the right, and the piper, the labourer, the farmer, the\nhalf-witted man and the two farm lads close behind him. The old man took\nout of a niche in the wall the silver cup from which her mother and her\nmother's mother had drunk the toasts of their betrothals, and poured\nPoteen out of a porcelain jug and handed the cup to his daughter with\nthe customary words, 'Drink to him whom you love the best.'\n\nShe held the cup to her lips for a moment, and then said in a clear soft\nvoice: 'I drink to my true love, Tumaus Costello.'\n\nAnd then the cup rolled over and over on the ground, ringing like a\nbell, for the old man had struck her in the face and the cup had fallen,\nand there was a deep silence.\n\nThere were many of Namara's people among the servants now come out of\nthe alcove, and one of them, a story-teller and poet, a last remnant\nof the bardic order, who had a chair and a platter in Namara's kitchen,\ndrew a French knife out of his girdle and made as though he would strike\nat Costello, but in a moment a blow had hurled him to the ground, his\nshoulder sending the cup rolling and ringing again. The click of steel\nhad followed quickly, had not there come a muttering and shouting from\nthe peasants about the door and from those crowding up behind them;\nand all knew that these were no children of Queen's Irish or friendly\nNamaras and Dermotts, but of the wild Irish about Lough Gara and Lough\nCara, who rowed their skin coracles, and had masses of hair over their\neyes, and left the right arms of their children unchristened that they\nmight give the stouter blows, and swore only by St. Atty and sun and\nmoon, and worshipped beauty and strength more than St. Atty or sun and\nmoon.\n\nCostello's hand had rested upon the handle of his sword and his knuckles\nhad grown white, but now he drew it away, and, followed by those who\nwere with him, strode towards the door, the dancers giving way before\nhim, the most angrily and slowly, and with glances at the muttering and\nshouting peasants, but some gladly and quickly, because the glory of\nhis fame was over him. He passed through the fierce and friendly peasant\nfaces, and came where his good horse and the rough-haired garrons were\ntied to bushes; and mounted and bade his ungainly bodyguard mount\nalso and ride into the narrow boreen. When they had gone a little way,\nDuallach, who rode last, turned towards the house where a little\ngroup of Dermotts and Namaras stood next to a more numerous group of\ncountrymen, and cried: 'Dermott, you deserve to be as you are this hour,\na lantern without a candle, a purse without a penny, a sheep without\nwool, for your hand was ever niggardly to piper and fiddler and\nstory-teller and to poor travelling people.' He had not done before the\nthree old Dermotts from the Ox Mountains had run towards their horses,\nand old Dermott himself had caught the bridle of a garron of the Namaras\nand was calling to the others to follow him; and many blows and many\ndeaths had been had not the countrymen caught up still glowing sticks\nfrom the ashes of the fires and hurled them among the horses with loud\ncries, making all plunge and rear, and some break from those who held\nthem, the whites of their eyes gleaming in the dawn.\n\nFor the next few weeks Costello had no lack of news of Oona, for now a\nwoman selling eggs or fowls, and now a man or a woman on pilgrimage to\nthe Well of the Rocks, would tell him how his love had fallen ill the\nday after St. John's Eve, and how she was a little better or a little\nworse, as it might be; and though he looked to his horses and his cows\nand goats as usual, the common and uncomely, the dust upon the roads,\nthe songs of men returning from fairs and wakes, men playing cards\nin the corners of fields on Sundays and Saints' Days, the rumours of\nbattles and changes in the great world, the deliberate purposes of those\nabout him, troubled him with an inexplicable trouble; and the country\npeople still remember how when night had fallen he would bid Duallach\nof the Pipes tell, to the chirping of the crickets, 'The Son of Apple,'\n'The Beauty of the World,' 'The King of Ireland's Son,' or some other\nof those traditional tales which were as much a piper's business as\n'The Green Bunch of Rushes,' 'The Unchion Stream,' or 'The Chiefs of\nBreffeny'; and while the boundless and phantasmal world of the legends\nwas a-building, would abandon himself to the dreams of his sorrow.\n\nDuallach would often pause to tell how some clan of the wild Irish had\ndescended from an incomparable King of the Blue Belt, or Warrior of the\nOzier Wattle, or to tell with many curses how all the strangers and most\nof the Queen's Irish were the seed of the misshapen and horned People\nfrom Under the Sea or of the servile and creeping Ferbolg; but Costello\ncared only for the love sorrows, and no matter whither the stories\nwandered, whether to the Isle of the Red Lough, where the blessed are,\nor to the malign country of the Hag of the East, Oona alone endured\ntheir shadowy hardships; for it was she and no king's daughter of old\nwho was hidden in the steel tower under the water with the folds of the\nWorm of Nine Eyes round and about her prison; and it was she who won\nby seven years of service the right to deliver from hell all she could\ncarry, and carried away multitudes clinging with worn fingers to the hem\nof her dress; and it was she who endured dumbness for a year because of\nthe little thorn of enchantment the fairies had thrust into her tongue;\nand it was a lock of her hair, coiled in a little carved box, which gave\nso great a light that men threshed by it from sundown to sunrise, and\nawoke so great a wonder that kings spent years in wandering or fell\nbefore unknown armies in seeking to discover her hiding-place; for there\nwas no beauty in the world but hers, no tragedy in the world but hers:\nand when at last the voice of the piper, grown gentle with the wisdom of\nold romance, was silent, and his rheumatic steps had toiled upstairs and\nto bed, and Costello had dipped his fingers into the little delf font of\nholy water and begun to pray to Mary of the Seven Sorrows, the blue\neyes and star-covered dress of the painting in the chapel faded from his\nimagination, and the brown eyes and homespun dress of Dermott's daughter\nWinny came in their stead; for there was no tenderness in the passion\nwho keep their hearts pure for love or for hatred as other men for God,\nfor Mary and for the Saints, and who, when the hour of their visitation\narrives, come to the Divine Essence by the bitter tumult, the Garden\nof Gethsemane, and the desolate Rood ordained for immortal passions in\nmortal hearts.\n\nOne day a serving-man rode up to Costello, who was helping his two lads\nto reap a meadow, and gave him a letter, and rode away without a word;\nand the letter contained these words in English: 'Tumaus Costello, my\ndaughter is very ill. The wise woman from Knock-na-Sidhe has seen her,\nand says she will die unless you come to her. I therefore bid you come\nto her whose peace you stole by treachery.-DERMOTT, THE SON OF DERMOTT.'\n\nCostello threw down his scythe, and sent one of the lads for Duallach,\nwho had become woven into his mind with Oona, and himself saddled his\ngreat horse and Duallach's garron.\n\nWhen they came to Dermott's house it was late afternoon, and Lough Gara\nlay down below them, blue, mirror-like, and deserted; and though they\nhad seen, when at a distance, dark figures moving about the door, the\nhouse appeared not less deserted than the Lough. The door stood half\nopen, and Costello knocked upon it again and again, so that a number of\nlake gulls flew up out of the grass and circled screaming over his head,\nbut there was no answer.\n\n'There is no one here,' said Duallach, 'for Dermott of the Sheep is too\nproud to welcome Costello the Proud,' and he threw the door open, and\nthey saw a ragged, dirty, very old woman, who sat upon the floor leaning\nagainst the wall. Costello knew that it was Bridget Delaney, a deaf and\ndumb beggar; and she, when she saw him, stood up and made a sign to\nhim to follow, and led him and his companion up a stair and down a long\ncorridor to a closed door. She pushed the door open and went a little\nway off and sat down as before; Duallach sat upon the ground also, but\nclose to the door, and Costello went and gazed upon Winny sleeping upon\na bed. He sat upon a chair beside her and waited, and a long time passed\nand still she slept on, and then Duallach motioned to him through the\ndoor to wake her, but he hushed his very breath, that she might sleep\non, for his heart was full of that ungovernable pity which makes the\nfading heart of the lover a shadow of the divine heart. Presently he\nturned to Duallach and said: 'It is not right that I stay here where\nthere are none of her kindred, for the common people are always ready to\nblame the beautiful.' And then they went down and stood at the door of\nthe house and waited, but the evening wore on and no one came.\n\n'It was a foolish man that called you Proud Costello,' Duallach cried\nat last; 'had he seen you waiting and waiting where they left none but a\nbeggar to welcome you, it is Humble Costello he would have called you.'\n\nThen Costello mounted and Duallach mounted, but when they had ridden a\nlittle way Costello tightened the reins and made his horse stand still.\nMany minutes passed, and then Duallach cried: 'It is no wonder that\nyou fear to offend Dermott of the Sheep, for he has many brothers and\nfriends, and though he is old, he is a strong man and ready with his\nhands, and he is of the Queen's Irish, and the enemies of the Gael are\nupon his side.'\n\nAnd Costello answered flushing and looking towards the house: 'I swear\nby the Mother of God that I will never return there again if they do not\nsend after me before I pass the ford in the Brown River,' and he rode\non, but so very slowly that the sun went down and the bats began to fly\nover the bogs. When he came to the river he lingered awhile upon the\nbank among the flowers of the flag, but presently rode out into the\nmiddle and stopped his horse in a foaming shallow. Duallach, however,\ncrossed over and waited on a further bank above a deeper place. After\na good while Duallach cried out again, and this time very bitterly: 'It\nwas a fool who begot you and a fool who bore you, and they are fools of\nall fools who say you come of an old and noble stock, for you come of\nwhey-faced beggars who travelled from door to door, bowing to gentles\nand to serving-men.\n\nWith bent head, Costello rode through the river and stood beside him,\nand would have spoken had not hoofs clattered on the further bank and a\nhorseman splashed towards them. It was a serving-man of Dermott's, and\nhe said, speaking breathlessly like one who had ridden hard: 'Tumaus\nCostello, I come to bid you again to Dermott's house. When you had gone,\nhis daughter Winny awoke and called your name, for you had been in her\ndreams. Bridget Delaney the Dummy saw her lips move and the trouble upon\nher, and came where we were hiding in the wood above the house and took\nDermott of the Sheep by the coat and brought him to his daughter. He\nsaw the trouble upon her, and bid me ride his own horse to bring you the\nquicker.'\n\nThen Costello turned towards the piper Duallach Daly, and taking him\nabout the waist lifted him out of the saddle and hurled him against a\ngrey rock that rose up out of the river, so that he fell lifeless into\nthe deep place, and the waters swept over the tongue which God had made\nbitter, that there might be a story in men's ears in after time. Then\nplunging his spurs into the horse, he rode away furiously toward the\nnorth-west, along the edge of the river, and did not pause until he came\nto another and smoother ford, and saw the rising moon mirrored in the\nwater. He paused for a moment irresolute, and then rode into the ford\nand on over the Ox Mountains, and down towards the sea; his eyes almost\ncontinually resting upon the moon which glimmered in the dimness like\na great white rose hung on the lattice of some boundless and phantasmal\nworld. But now his horse, long dark with sweat and breathing hard, for\nhe kept spurring it to an extreme speed, fell heavily, hurling him into\nthe grass at the roadside. He tried to make it stand up, and failing in\nthis, went on alone towards the moonlight; and came to the sea and saw a\nschooner lying there at anchor. Now that he could go no further because\nof the sea, he found that he was very tired and the night very cold,\nand went into a shebeen close to the shore and threw himself down upon\na bench. The room was full of Spanish and Irish sailors who had just\nsmuggled a cargo of wine and ale, and were waiting a favourable wind to\nset out again. A Spaniard offered him a drink in bad Gaelic. He drank it\ngreedily and began talking wildly and rapidly.\n\nFor some three weeks the wind blew inshore or with too great violence,\nand the sailors stayed drinking and talking and playing cards, and\nCostello stayed with them, sleeping upon a bench in the shebeen, and\ndrinking and talking and playing more than any. He soon lost what little\nmoney he had, and then his horse, which some one had brought from\nthe mountain boreen, to a Spaniard, who sold it to a farmer from the\nmountains, and then his long cloak and his spurs and his boots of soft\nleather. At last a gentle wind blew towards Spain, and the crew rowed\nout to their schooner, singing Gaelic and Spanish songs, and lifted\nthe anchor, and in a little while the white sails had dropped under the\nhorizon. Then Costello turned homeward, his life gaping before him, and\nwalked all day, coming in the early evening to the road that went from\nnear Lough Gara to the southern edge of Lough Cay. Here he overtook a\ngreat crowd of peasants and farmers, who were walking very slowly after\ntwo priests and a group of well-dressed persons, certain of whom were\ncarrying a coffin. He stopped an old man and asked whose burying it was\nand whose people they were, and the old man answered: 'It is the burying\nof Oona, Dermott's daughter, and we are the Namaras and the Dermotts and\ntheir following, and you are Tumaus Costello who murdered her.'\n\nCostello went on towards the head of the procession, passing men who\nlooked at him with fierce eyes and only vaguely understanding what he\nhad heard, for now that he had lost the understanding that belongs to\ngood health, it seemed impossible that a gentleness and a beauty which\nhad been so long the world's heart could pass away. Presently he stopped\nand asked again whose burying it was, and a man answered: 'We are\ncarrying Dermott's daughter Winny whom you murdered, to be buried in the\nisland of the Holy Trinity,' and the man stooped and picked up a stone\nand cast it at Costello, striking him on the cheek and making the blood\nflow out over his face. Costello went on scarcely feeling the blow, and\ncoming to those about the coffin, shouldered his way into the midst of\nthem, and laying his hand upon the coffin, asked in a loud voice: 'Who\nis in this coffin?'\n\nThe three Old Dermotts from the Ox Mountains caught up stones and bid\nthose about them do the same; and he was driven from the road, covered\nwith wounds, and but for the priests would surely have been killed.\n\nWhen the procession had passed on, Costello began to follow again, and\nsaw from a distance the coffin laid upon a large boat, and those about\nit get into other boats, and the boats move slowly over the water to\nInsula Trinitatis; and after a time he saw the boats return and their\npassengers mingle with the crowd upon the bank, and all disperse by\nmany roads and boreens. It seemed to him that Winny was somewhere on the\nisland smiling gently as of old, and when all had gone he swam in the\nway the boats had been rowed and found the new-made grave beside the\nruined Abbey of the Holy Trinity, and threw himself upon it, calling to\nOona to come to him. Above him the square ivy leaves trembled, and all\nabout him white moths moved over white flowers, and sweet odours drifted\nthrough the dim air.\n\nHe lay there all that night and through the day after, from time to\ntime calling her to come to him, but when the third night came he had\nforgotten, worn out with hunger and sorrow, that her body lay in the\nearth beneath; but only knew she was somewhere near and would not come\nto him.\n\nJust before dawn, the hour when the peasants hear his ghostly voice\ncrying out, his pride awoke and he called loudly: 'Winny, daughter\nof Dermott of the Sheep, if you do not come to me I will go and never\nreturn to the island of the Holy Trinity,' and before his voice had died\naway a cold and whirling wind had swept over the island and he saw many\nfigures rushing past, women of the Sidhe with crowns of silver and dim\nfloating drapery; and then Oona, but no longer smiling gently, for she\npassed him swiftly and angrily, and as she passed struck him upon the\nface crying: 'Then go and never return.'\n\nHe would have followed, and was calling out her name, when the whole\nglimmering company rose up into the air, and, rushing together in the\nshape of a great silvery rose, faded into the ashen dawn.\n\nCostello got up from the grave, understanding nothing but that he had\nmade his beloved angry and that she wished him to go, and wading out\ninto the lake, began to swim. He swam on and on, but his limbs were too\nweary to keep him afloat, and her anger was heavy about him, and when\nhe had gone a little way he sank without a struggle, like a man passing\ninto sleep and dreams.\n\nThe next day a poor fisherman found him among the reeds upon the lake\nshore, lying upon the white lake sand with his arms flung out as though\nhe lay upon a rood, and carried him to his own house. And the very poor\nlamented over him and sang the keen, and when the time had come, laid\nhim in the Abbey on Insula Trinitatis with only the ruined altar between\nhim and Dermott's daughter, and planted above them two ash-trees that\nin after days wove their branches together and mingled their trembling\nleaves.","title":"The Secret Rose","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":22212}