The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats. Volume 2 of 8. William Butler Yeats

for the kindness and the softness that is in him.

[They gasp for breath.

FIRST CRIPPLE

      I’ll curse him till I drop!

[Speaking at same time as SECOND CRIPPLE and MAYOR and BRIAN, who have begun again

      The curse of the poor be upon him,

      The curse of the widows upon him,

      The curse of the children upon him,

      The curse of the bishops upon him,

      Until he be as rotten as an old mushroom!

SECOND CRIPPLE

[Speaking at same time as FIRST CRIPPLE and MAYOR and BRIAN

      The curse of wrinkles be upon him!

      Wrinkles where his eyes are,

      Wrinkles where his nose is,

      Wrinkles where his mouth is,

      And a little old devil looking out of every wrinkle!

BRIAN

[Speaking at same time with MAYOR and CRIPPLES.]

      And nobody will sing for him,

      And nobody will hunt for him,

      And nobody will fish for him,

      And nobody will pray for him,

      But ever and always curse him and abuse him.

MAYOR

[Speaking at same time with CRIPPLES and BRIAN.]

      What good is in a poet?

      Has he money in a stocking,

      Or cider in the cellar,

      Or flitches in the chimney,

      Or anything anywhere but his own idleness?

[BRIAN seizes MAYOR.

MAYOR

      Help! help! Am I not in authority?

BRIAN

      That’s how I’ll shout for the King!

MAYOR

      Help! help! Am I not in the King’s place?

BRIAN

      I’ll teach him to be kind to the poor!

MAYOR

      Help! help! Wait till we are in Kinvara!

FIRST CRIPPLE

[Beating MAYOR on the legs with crutch.]

      I’ll shake the royalty out of his legs!

SECOND CRIPPLE

[Burying his nails in MAYOR’S face.]

      I’ll scrumble the ermine out of his skin!

[The CHAMBERLAIN comes down steps shouting, ‘Silence! silence! silence!’

CHAMBERLAIN

      How dare you make this uproar at the doors,

      Deafening the very greatest in the land,

      As if the farmyards and the rookeries

      Had all been emptied!

FIRST CRIPPLE

      It is the Chamberlain.

[CRIPPLES go out.

CHAMBERLAIN

      Pick up the litter there, and get you gone!

      Be quick about it! Have you no respect

      For this worn stair, this all but sacred door,

      Where suppliants and tributary kings

      Have passed, and the world’s glory knelt in silence?

      Have you no reverence for what all other men

      Hold honourable?

BRIAN

      If I might speak my mind,

      I’d say the King would have his luck again

      If he would let my master have his rights.

CHAMBERLAIN

      Pick up your litter! Take your noise away!

      Make haste, and get the clapper from the bell!

BRIAN

[Putting last of food into basket.]

      What do the great and powerful care for rights

      That have no armies!

[CHAMBERLAIN begins shoving them out with his staff

MAYOR

      My lord, I am not to blame.

      I’m the King’s man, and they attacked me for it.

BRIAN

      We have our prayers, our curses and our prayers,

      And we can give a great name or a bad one.

[MAYOR is shoving BRIAN out before him with one hand. He keeps his face to CHAMBERLAIN, and keeps bowing. The CHAMBERLAIN shoves him with his staff

MAYOR

      We could not make the poet eat, my lord.

[CHAMBERLAIN shoves him with staff.

      Much honoured [is shoved again] – honoured to speak with you, my lord;

      But I’ll go find the girl that he’s to marry.

      She’s coming, but I’ll hurry her, my lord.

      Between ourselves, my lord [is shoved again], she is a great coaxer.

      Much honoured, my lord. O, she’s the girl to do it;

      For when the intellect is out, my lord,

      Nobody but a woman’s any good.

[Is shoved again.

      Much honoured, my lord [is shoved again], much honoured, much honoured!

[Is shoved out, shoving BRIAN out before him

[All through this scene, from the outset of the quarrel, SEANCHAN has kept his face turned away, or hidden in his cloak. While the CHAMBERLAIN has been speaking, the SOLDIER and the MONK have come out of the palace. The MONK stands on top of steps at one side, SOLDIER a little down steps at the other side. COURT LADIES are seen at opening in the palace curtain behind SOLDIER. CHAMBERLAIN is in the centre

CHAMBERLAIN

[To SEANCHAN.]

      Well, you must be contented, for your work

      Has roused the common sort against the King,

      And stolen his authority. The State

      Is like some orderly and reverend house,

      Wherein the master, being dead of a sudden,

      The servants quarrel where they have a mind to,

      And pilfer here and there.

[Pause, finding that SEANCHAN does not answer.

      How many days

      Will you keep up this quarrel with the King,

      And the King’s nobles, and myself, and all,

      Who’d gladly be your friends, if you would let them?

[Going near to MONK.

      If you would try, you might persuade him, father.

      I cannot make him answer me, and yet

      If fitting hands would offer him the food,

      He might accept it.

MONK

      Certainly I will not.

      I’ve made too many homilies, wherein

      The wanton imagination of the poets

      Has been condemned, to