A wood with perhaps distant view of turreted house at one side, but all in flat colour,
without light and shade and against a diafiered old background.
TESS CATHLEEN es in leaning UpOn ALEELs arm. OONA follows them.
CATHLEEN. (Stopping) Surely this leafy er, where one smells The wild bees honey, has a story too?
OONA. There is the house at last.
ALEEL. A man, they say,
Loved Maeve the Queen of all the invisible host,
And died of his love niuries ago.
And now, when the moons riding at the full,
She leaves her dancers lonely and lies there
Upon that level place, and for three days
Stretches and sighs as her long pale cheeks.
CATHLEEN. So she loves truly.
ALEEL. No, but wets her cheeks,
Lady, because she has fot his name.
CATHLEEN. Shed sleep that trouble away??though it must be
A heavy trouble tet his name??
If she had better sense.
OONA. Your own house, lady.
ALEEL. She sleeps high up on wintry Knoa?rea
In an old of stones; while her poor women
Must lie and jog in the wave if they would sleep
Being water bor if she cry their names
They run up on the land and dan the moon
Till they are giddy and would love as men do,
And be as patient and as pitiful.
But there is nothing that will stop in their heads,
Theyve suemories, though they weep for it.
Oh, yes, they weep; thats when the moon is full.
CATHLEEN. is it because they have short memories
They live so long?
ALEEL. Whats memory but the ash
That chokes our fires that have begun to sink?
And theyve a dizzy, everlasting fire.
OONA. There is your own house, lady.
CATHLEEN. Why, thats true,
And wed have passed it without notig.
ALEEL. A curse upon it for a meddlesome house!
Had it but stayed away I would have known
What Queehinks ohe moon is pinched;
And whether now??as in the old days??the dancers
Set their brief love on men.
OONA. Rest on my arm.
These are no thoughts for any Christian ear.
ALEEL. I am younger, she would be too heavy for you.
(He begins taking his lute out of the bag, CATHLEEN, Who has turowards OONA, turns ba.)
This hollow box remembers every foot
That danced upon the level grass of the world,
And will tell secrets if I whisper to it.
(Sings.) Lift up the white knee;
Thats what they sing,
Those young dancers
That in a ring
Raved but now
Of the hearts that break
Long, long ago
For their sake.
OONA. New friends are sweet.
ALEEL. "But the dance ges.
Lift up the gown,
All that sorrow
Is trodden down."
OONA. The empty rattle?pate! Lean on this arm,
That I tell you is a christened arm,
And not like some, if we are to judge by speech.
But as you please. It is time I was fot.
Maybe it is not on this arm you slumbered
When you were as helpless as a worm.
ALEEL. Stay with me till we e to your own house.
CATHLEEN (Sitting down) When I am rested I will need no help.
ALEEL. I thought to have kept her from remembering
The evil of the times for full ten minutes;
But now when seve you e between.
OONA. Talk on; what does it matter what you say,
For you have not been christened?
ALEEL. Old woman, old woman,
You robbed her of three minutes