Читать книгу The Complete Works - William Butler Yeats - Страница 159

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

SERVANT.

Here is yet another would see your ladyship.

CATHLEEN [within].

Who calls me?

SERVANT.

There is a man would speak with you,

And by his face he has some pressing news,

Some moving tale.

CATHLEEN [coming to chapel door].

I cannot rest or pray,

For all day long the messengers run hither

On one another’s heels, and every message

More evil than the one that had gone before.

Who is the messenger?

SERVANT.

Aleel, the poet.

CATHLEEN.

There is no hour he is not welcome to me,

Because I know of nothing but a harp-string

That can remember happiness.

[SERVANT goes out and ALEEL comes in.

And now

I grow forgetful of evil for awhile.

ALEEL.

I have come to bid you leave this castle, and fly

Out of these woods.

CATHLEEN.

What evil is there here,

That is not everywhere from this to the sea?

ALEEL.

They who have sent me walk invisible.

CATHLEEN.

Men say that the wise people of the raths

Have given you wisdom.

ALEEL.

I lay in the dusk

Upon the grassy margin of a lake

Among the hills, where none of mortal creatures

But the swan comes—my sleep became a fire.

One walked in the fire with birds about his head.

CATHLEEN.

Ay, Aengus of the birds.

ALEEL.

He may be Aengus,

But it may be he bears an angelical name.

Lady, he bid me call you from these woods;

He bids you bring Oona, your foster-mother,

And some few serving-men and live in the hills

Among the sounds of music and the light

Of waters till the evil days are gone.

[He kneels.]

For here some terrible death is waiting you;

Some unimaginable evil, some great darkness

That fable has not dreamt of, nor sun nor moon

Scattered.

CATHLEEN.

And he had birds about his head?

ALEEL.

Yes, yes, white birds. He bids you leave this house

With some old trusty serving-man, who will feed

All that are starving and shelter all that wander

While there is food and house-room.

CATHLEEN.

He bids me go

Where none of mortal creatures but the swan

Dabbles, and there you would pluck the harp when the trees

Had made a heavy shadow about our door,

And talk among the rustling of the reeds

When night hunted the foolish sun away,

With stillness and pale tapers. No—no—no.

I cannot. Although I weep, I do not weep

Because that life would be most happy, and here

I find no way, no end. Nor do I weep

Because I had longed to look upon your face,

But that a night of prayer has made me weary.

ALEEL.

[Throwing his arms about her feet.]

Let Him that made mankind, the angels and devils

And death and plenty mend what He has made,

For when we labour in vain and eye still sees

Heart breaks in vain.

CATHLEEN.

How would that quiet end?

ALEEL.

How but in healing?

CATHLEEN.

You have seen my tears.

And I can see your hand shake on the floor.

ALEEL [faltering].

I thought but of healing. He was angelical.

CATHLEEN.

[Turning away from him.]

No, not angelical, but of the old gods,

Who wander about the world to waken the heart—

The passionate, proud heart that all the angels

Leaving nine heavens empty would rock to sleep.

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

Do not hold out to me beseeching hands.

This heart shall never waken on earth. I have sworn

By her whose heart the seven sorrows have pierced

To pray before this altar until my heart

Has grown to Heaven like a tree, and there

Rustled its leaves till Heaven has saved my people.

ALEEL [who has risen].

When one so great has spoken of love to one

So little as I, although to deny him love,

What can he but hold out beseeching hands,

Then let them fall beside him, knowing how greatly

They have overdared?

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

CATHLEEN.

If the old tales are true,

Queens have wed shepherds and kings beggar-maids;

God’s procreant waters flowing about your mind

Have made you more than kings or queens; and not you

But I am the empty pitcher.

ALEEL.

Being silent,

I have said all—farewell, farewell; and yet no,

Give me your hand to kiss.

CATHLEEN.

I kiss your brow,

But will not say farewell. I am often weary,

And I would hear the harp-string.

ALEEL.

I cannot stay,

For I would hide my sorrow among the hills—

Listen, listen, the hills are calling me.

[They listen for a moment.

CATHLEEN.

I hear the cry of curlew.

ALEEL.

Then I will out

Where I can hear wind cry and water cry

And curlew cry: how does the saying go

That calls them the three oldest cries in the world?

Farewell, farewell, I will go wander among them,

Because there is no comfort under a roof-tree.

[He goes out.

CATHLEEN.

[Looking through the door after him.]

I cannot see him. He has come to the great door.

I must go pray. Would that my heart and mind

Were as little shaken as this candle-light.

[She goes into the chapel. The TWO MERCHANTS enter.

SECOND MERCHANT.

Who was the man that came from the great door

While we were still in the shadow?

FIRST MERCHANT.

Aleel, her lover.

SECOND MERCHANT.

It may be that he has turned her thought from us

And we can gather our merchandise in peace.

FIRST MERCHANT.

No, no, for she is kneeling.

SECOND MERCHANT.

Shut the door.

Are all our drudges here?

FIRST MERCHANT.

[Closing the chapel door.]

I bid them follow.

Can you not hear them breathing upon the stairs?

I have sat this hour under the elder-tree.

SECOND MERCHANT.

I had bid you rob her treasury, and yet

I found you sitting drowsed and motionless,

Your chin bowed to your knees, while on all sides,

Bat-like from bough and roof and window-ledge,

Clung evil souls of men, and in the woods,

Like streaming flames, floated upon the winds

The elemental creatures.

FIRST MERCHANT.

I have fared ill;

She prayed so hard I could not cross the threshold

Till this young man had turned her prayer to dreams.

You have had a man to kill: how have you fared?

SECOND MERCHANT.

I lay in the image of a nine-monthed bonyeen,

By Tubber-vanach cross-roads: Father John

Came, sad and moody, murmuring many prayers;

I seemed as though I came from his own sty;

He saw the one brown ear; the breviary dropped;

He ran; I ran, I ran into the quarry;

He fell a score of yards.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Now that he is dead

We shall be too much thronged with souls to-morrow.

Did his soul escape you?

SECOND MERCHANT.

I thrust it in the bag.

But the hand that blessed the poor and raised the Host

Tore through the leather with sharp piety.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Well, well, to labour—here is the treasury door.

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

FIRST MERCHANT.

Brave thought, brave thought—a shining thought of mine!

She now no more may bribe the poor—no more

Cheat our great master of his merchandise,

While our heels dangle at the house in the woods,

And grass grows on the threshold, and snails crawl

Along the window-pane and the mud floor.

Brother, where wander all these dwarfish folk,

Hostile to men, the people of the tides?

SECOND MERCHANT.

[Going to the door.]

They are gone. They have already wandered away,

Unwilling labourers.

FIRST MERCHANT.

I will call them hither.

[He opens the window.

Come hither, hither, hither, water-folk:

Come, all you elemental populace;

Leave lonely the long-hoarding surges: leave

The cymbals of the waves to clash alone,

And, shaking the sea-tangles from your hair,

Gather about us. [After a pause.

I can hear a sound

As from waves beating upon distant strands;

And the sea-creatures, like a surf of light,

Pour eddying through the pathways of the oaks;

And as they come, the sentient grass and leaves

Bow towards them, and the tall, drouth-jaded oaks

Fondle the murmur of their flying feet.

SECOND MERCHANT.

The green things love unknotted hearts and minds;

And neither one with angels or with us,

Nor risen in arms with evil nor with good,

In laughter roves the litter of the waves.

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

THE SPIRIT.

We come unwillingly, for she whose gold

We must now carry to the house in the woods

Is dear to all our race. On the green plain,

Beside the sea, a hundred shepherds live

To mind her sheep; and when the nightfall comes

They leave a hundred pans of white ewes’ milk

Outside their doors, to feed us when the dawn

Has driven us out of Finbar’s ancient house,

And broken the long dance under the hill.

FIRST MERCHANT.

[Making a sign upon the air.]

Obey! I make a sign upon your hearts.

THE SPIRIT.

The sign of evil burns upon our hearts,

And we obey.

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

FIRST MERCHANT.

And now begone—begone! [They go.

I bid them go, for, being garrulous

And flighty creatures, they had soon begun

To deafen us with their sea-gossip. Now

We must go bring more money. Brother, brother,

I long to see my master’s face again,

For I turn homesick.

SECOND MERCHANT.

I too tire of toil.

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

SECOND MERCHANT.

[Pointing to the oratory.]

How may we gain this woman for our lord?

This pearl, this turquoise fastened in his crown

Would make it shine like His we dare not name.

Now that the winds are heavy with our kind,

Might we not kill her, and bear off her spirit

Before the mob of angels were astir?

[A diadem and a heap of jewels fall from the bag.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Who tore the bag?

SECOND MERCHANT.

The finger of Priest John

When he fled through the leather. I had thought

Because his was an old and little spirit

The tear would hardly matter.

FIRST MERCHANT.

This comes, brother,

Of stealing souls that are not rightly ours.

If we would win this turquoise for our lord,

It must go dropping down of its freewill.

She will have heard the noise. She will stifle us

With holy names.

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

No, she has fallen asleep.

SECOND MERCHANT.

The noise wakened the household. While you spoke

I heard chairs moved, and heard folk’s shuffling feet.

And now they are coming hither.

A VOICE [within].

It was here.

ANOTHER VOICE.

No, further away.

ANOTHER VOICE.

It was in the western tower.

ANOTHER VOICE.

Come quickly; we will search the western tower.

FIRST MERCHANT.

We still have time—they search the distant rooms.

Call hither the fading and the unfading fires.

SECOND MERCHANT.

[Going to the window.]

There are none here. They tired and strayed from hence—

Unwilling labourers.

FIRST MERCHANT.

I will draw them in.

[He cries through the window.

Come hither, you lost souls of men, who died

In drunken sleep, and by each other’s hands

When they had bartered you—come hither all

Who mourn among the scenery of your sins,

Turning to animal and reptile forms,

The visages of passions; hither, hither—

Leave marshes and the reed-encumbered pools,

You shapeless fires, that were the souls of men,

And are a fading wretchedness.

SECOND MERCHANT.

They come not.

FIRST MERCHANT.

[Making a sign upon the air.]

Come hither, hither, hither.

SECOND MERCHANT.

I can hear

A crying as of storm-distempered reeds.

The fading and the unfading fires rise up

Like steam out of the earth; the grass and leaves

Shiver and shrink away and sway about,

Blown by unnatural gusts of ice-cold air.

FIRST MERCHANT.

They are one with all the beings of decay,

Ill longings, madness, lightning, famine, drouth.

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

Come you—and you—and you, and lift these bags.

A SPIRIT.

We are too violent; mere shapes of storm.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Come you—and you—and you, and lift these bags.

A SPIRIT.

We are too feeble, fading out of life.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Come you, and you, who are the latest dead,

And still wear human shape: the shape of power.

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

Now, brawlers, lift the bags of gold.

FIRST PEASANT.

Yes, yes!

Unwillingly, unwillingly; for she,

Whose gold we bear upon our shoulders thus,

Has endless pity even for lost souls

In her good heart. At moments, now and then,

When plunged in horror, brooding each alone,

A memory of her face floats in on us.

It brings a crowned misery, half repose,

And we wail one to other; we obey,

For heaven’s many-angled star reversed,

Now sign of evil, burns into our hearts.

FIRST MERCHANT.

When these pale sapphires and these diadems

And these small bags of money are in our house,

The burning shall give over—now begone.

SECOND MERCHANT.

[Lifting the diadem to put it upon his head.]

No—no—no. I will carry the diadem.

FIRST MERCHANT.

No, brother, not yet.

For none can carry her treasures wholly away

But spirits that are too light for good and evil,

Or, being evil, can remember good.

Begone! [The spirits vanish.] I bade them go, for they are lonely,

And when they see aught living love to sigh.

[Pointing to the oratory.] Brother, I heard a sound in there—a sound

That troubles me.

SECOND MERCHANT.

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

Upon the altar steps

The Countess tosses, murmuring in her sleep

A broken Paternoster.

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

She is grown still.

FIRST MERCHANT.

A great plan floats into my mind—no wonder,

For I come from the ninth and mightiest Hell,

Where all are kings. I will wake her from her sleep,

And mix with all her thoughts a thought to serve.

[He calls through the door.

May we be well remembered in your prayers!

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

CATHLEEN.

What would you, sirs?

FIRST MERCHANT.

We are two merchant men,

New come from foreign lands. We bring you news.

Forgive our sudden entry: the great door

Was open, we came in to seek a face.

CATHLEEN.

The door stands always open to receive,

With kindly welcome, starved and sickly folk,

Or any who would fly the woful times.

Merchants, you bring me news?

FIRST MERCHANT.

We saw a man

Heavy with sickness in the Bog of Allan,

Whom you had bid buy cattle. Near Fair Head

We saw your grain ships lying all becalmed

In the dark night, and not less still than they

Burned all their mirrored lanthorns in the sea.

CATHLEEN.

My thanks to God, to Mary, and the angels,

I still have bags of money, and can buy

Meal from the merchants who have stored it up,

To prosper on the hunger of the poor.

You have been far, and know the signs of things:

When will this yellow vapour no more hang

And creep about the fields, and this great heat

Vanish away—and grass show its green shoots?

FIRST MERCHANT.

There is no sign of change—day copies day,

Green things are dead—the cattle too are dead,

Or dying—and on all the vapour hangs

And fattens with disease and glows with heat.

In you is all the hope of all the land.

CATHLEEN.

And heard you of the demons who buy souls?

FIRST MERCHANT.

There are some men who hold they have wolves’ heads,

And say their limbs, dried by the infinite flame,

Have all the speed of storms; others again

Say they are gross and little; while a few

Will have it they seem much as mortals are,

But tall and brown and travelled, like us, lady.

Yet all agree a power is in their looks

That makes men bow, and flings a casting-net

About their souls, and that all men would go

And barter those poor flames—their spirits—only

You bribe them with the safety of your gold.

CATHLEEN.

Praise be to God, to Mary, and the angels,

That I am wealthy. Wherefore do they sell?

FIRST MERCHANT.

The demons give a hundred crowns and more

For a poor soul like his who lies asleep

By your great door under the porter’s niche;

A little soul not worth a hundred pence.

But, for a soul like yours, I heard them say,

They would give five hundred thousand crowns and more.

CATHLEEN.

How can a heap of crowns pay for a soul?

Is the green grave so terrible a thing?

FIRST MERCHANT.

Some sell because the money gleams, and some

Because they are in terror of the grave,

And some because their neighbours sold before,

And some because there is a kind of joy

In casting hope away, in losing joy,

In ceasing all resistance, in at last

Opening one’s arms to the eternal flames,

In casting all sails out upon the wind:

To this—full of the gaiety of the lost—

Would all folk hurry if your gold were gone.

CATHLEEN.

There is a something, merchant, in your voice

That makes me fear. When you were telling how

A man may lose his soul and lose his God,

Your eyes lighted, and the strange weariness

That hangs about you vanished. When you told

How my poor money serves the people—both—

Merchants, forgive me—seemed to smile.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Man’s sins

Move us to laughter only, we have seen

So many lands and seen so many men.

How strange that all these people should be swung

As on a lady’s shoe-string—under them

The glowing leagues of never-ending flame!

CATHLEEN.

There is a something in you that I fear:

A something not of us. Were you not born

In some most distant corner of the world?

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

SECOND MERCHANT [aside to FIRST MERCHANT].

Away now—they are in the passage—hurry,

For they will know us, and freeze up our hearts

With Ave Marys, and burn all our skin

With holy water.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Farewell: we must ride

Many a mile before the morning come;

Our horses beat the ground impatiently.

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

CATHLEEN.

What would you?

A PEASANT.

As we nodded by the fire,

Telling old histories, we heard a noise

Of falling money. We have searched in vain.

CATHLEEN.

You are too timid. I heard naught at all.

THE OLD PEASANT.

Ay, we are timid, for a rich man’s word

Can shake our houses, and a moon of drouth

Shrivel our seedlings in the barren earth;

We are the slaves of wind, and hail, and flood;

Fear jogs our elbow in the market-place,

And nods beside us on the chimney-seat.

Ill-bodings are as native unto our hearts

As are their spots unto the woodpeckers.

CATHLEEN.

You need not shake with bodings in this house.

[Oona enters from the door to L.

OONA.

The treasure-room is broken in—mavrone—mavrone;

The door stands open and the gold is gone.

[The peasants raise a lamenting cry.

CATHLEEN.

Be silent. [The cry ceases.

Saw you any one?

OONA.

Mavrone,

That my good mistress should lose all this money.

CATHLEEN.

You three upon my right hand, ride and ride;

I will give a farm to him who finds the thieves.

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

A PEASANT.

The porter trembles.

THE PORTER.

It is all no use;

Demons were here. I sat beside the door

In my stone niche, and two owls passed me by,

Whispering with human voices.

THE OLD PEASANT.

God forsakes us.

CATHLEEN.

Old man, old man, He never closed a door

Unless one opened. I am desolate,

For a most sad resolve wakes in my heart:

But always I have faith. Old men and women,

Be silent; He does not forsake the world,

But stands before it modelling in the clay

And moulding there His image. Age by age

The clay wars with His fingers and pleads hard

For its old, heavy, dull, and shapeless ease;

At times it crumbles and a nation falls,

Now moves awry and demon hordes are born.

[The peasants cross themselves.

But leave me now, for I am desolate,

I hear a whisper from beyond the thunder.

[She steps down from the oratory door.

Yet stay an instant. When we meet again

I may have grown forgetful. Oona, take

These two—the larder and the dairy keys.

[To THE OLD PEASANT.] But take you this. It opens the small room

Of herbs for medicine, of hellebore,

Of vervain, monkshood, plantain, and self-heal

And all the others; and the book of cures

Is on the upper shelf. You understand,

Because you doctored goats and cattle once.

THE OLD PEASANT.

Why do you do this, lady—did you see

Your coffin in a dream?

CATHLEEN.

Ah, no, not that,

A sad resolve wakes in me. I have heard

A sound of wailing in unnumbered hovels,

And I must go down, down, I know not where.

Pray for the poor folk who are crazed with famine;

Pray, you good neighbours.

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

Mary, queen of angels,

And all you clouds on clouds of saints, farewell!