Three Wonder Plays by Lady I. A. Gregory

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_Conan: (With a roar.)_ Leave meddling with
my hair. I that can change the world with one
turn of my hand!

_Celia_: Wait till I'll find the scissors! That's
not the way to be going showing off in the town,
if you were all the saints and Druids of the universe!

_Conan: (Breaking free and rushing out.)_ My
seven thousand curses on the minute when I didn't
leave you as you were. _(Goes.)_

_Celia: (Looking at Mother.)_ There's meal on
your dress from the cake you're after putting in
the oven--where now did that bellows fall from?
_(Taking up bellows.)_ It comes as handy as a
gimlet. There _(blows the meal off)_, that now will
make a big difference in you.

_Rock: (Seizing bellows.)_ Leave now that down
out of your hand. Let you go looking for a
scissors!

_(Celia goes off singing "The Beautiful City
of Sligo.")_

_Mother: (Sitting down.)_ I'm thinking it's seven
years to-day, James Rock, since you took a lend
of my clock.

_Rock_: You're raving! What call would I have
to ask a lend of your clock?

_Mother_: The way you would rise in time for
the fair of Feakle in the morning.

_Rock_: Did I now?

_Mother_: You did, and that's my truth. I was
standing here, and you were standing there, and
Celia that was but ten years was sucking the sugar
off a spoon I was after putting in a bag that had
come from the shop, for to put a grain into my
tea.

_Rock: (Sneering.)_ Well now, didn't your memory
get very sharp!

_Mother_: You thought I had it forgot, but I
remember it as clear as pictures. The time it stood
at was seven minutes after four o'clock, and I
never saw it from that day till now. This very
day of the month it was, the year of the black
sheep having twins.

_Rock_: It was but an old clock anyway.

_Mother_: If it was it is seven years older since
I laid an eye on it. And it's kind father for you
robbing me, where it's often you robbed your own
mother, and you stealing away to go cardplaying
the half crowns she had hid in the churn.

_Rock_: Didn't you get very wicked and hurtful,
you that was a nice class of a woman without no
harm!

_Flannery_: Ah, Ma'am, you that was easy-minded,
it is not kind for you to be a scold.

_Mother_: And another thing, it was the same
day where Michael Flannery _(turns to him)_ came in
an' told me of you being grown so covetous you
had made away with your dog, by reason you
begrudged it its diet.

_Rock: (To Flannery.)_ You had a great deal to
say about me!

_Mother_: And more than that again, he said
you had it buried secretly, and had it personated,
creeping around the haggard in the half dark
and you barking, the way the neighbours would
think it to be living yet and as wicked as it was
before.

_Rock: (To Flannery.)_ I'll bring you into the
Courts for telling lies!

_Mother: (Coming near Rock and speaking into
his ear.)_ And there's another thing I know, and
that I made a promise to her that was your wife
not to tell, but death has that promise broke.

_Rock_: Stop, can't you!

_Mother_: I know by sure witness that it was
you found the forty pound _he (points to Flannery,
who nods)_ lost on the road, and kept it for your
own profit. Bring me now, I dare you, into the
Courts!

_Rock: (Fearfully.)_ That one would remember
the world! It is as if she went to the grinding
young!

_(Conan's voice heard. Singing: "Let me be
merry" in a melancholy voice.)_

"If sadly thinking with spirits sinking
Could more than drinking my cares compose,
A cure for to-morrow from sighs I'd borrow,
And hope to-morrow would end my woes.

But as in wailing there's nought availing,
And Death unfailing will strike the blow,
Then for that reason and for a season,
Let us be merry before we go!"

_Mother_: It is Conan will near lose his wits
with joy when he knows what is come back to me!

_Conan: (Peeping in.)_ Is Celia gone?

_Flannery_: She is, Conan.

_Conan_: It's a queer thing with women. If
you'll turn them from one road it's likely they'll
go into another that is worse again.

_Rock_: That is so indeed. There is Celia's
mother that is running telling lies, and leaving a
heavy word upon a neighbour.

_Mother_: I'll give my promise not to tell it out
in Court if he will give to poor Michael Flannery
what is due to him, and that is the whole of what
he has in his bag!

_Conan: (Laughing scornfully.)_ Sure _she_ has no
memory at all. It fails her to remember that two
and two makes four.

_Mother_: You think that? Well, listen now to
me. Two and two is it? No, nine times two that
is eighteen and nine times three twenty-seven,
nine times four thirty-six, nine times five forty-five,
nine times six fifty-four, nine times seven
sixty-three, nine times eight seventy-two, nine
times nine eighty-one.... Yes, and eleven times,
and any times that you will put before me!

_Conan_: That's enough, that's enough!

_Mother_: Ha, ha! You giving out that I can
keep no knowledge in mind and no learning, when
I should sit on the chapel roof to have enough of
slates for all I can cast up of sums! Multiplication,
Addition, subtraction, and the rule of three!

_Conan_: Whist your tongue!

_Mother_: Is it the verses of Raftery's talk into
the Bush you would wish me to give out, or the
three hundred and sixty-nine verses of the Contention
of the Bards--_(Repeats verse of "The Talk
with the Bush" in Irish.)_

"Cead agus mile roiamh am na h-Airce
Tus agus crothugadh m'aois agus mo dhata
Tha me o shoin im' shuidhe san ait so
Agus is iomdha sgeal a bhfeadain tracht air."

Or I'll English it if that will please you:

"A hundred years and a thousand before the time of the Ark
Was the beginning and creation of my age and my date;
I am from that time sitting in this place,
And it's many a story I am able to give news of."

_Conan: (Putting hands to ears and walking
away.)_ I am thinking your mind got unsettled
with the weight of years.

_Mother: (Following him.)_ No, but your own
that got scattered from the time you ran barefoot
carrying worms in a tin can for that Professor of a
Collegian that went fishing in the stream, and that
you followed after till you got to think yourself a
lamp of light for the universe!

_Conan_: Will you stop deafening the whole world
with your babble!

_Mother_: There was always a bad drop in you
that attached to you out of the grandfather. What
did your languages do for you but to sharpen
your tongue, till the scrape of it would take the
skin off, the same as a cat! My blessing on you,
Conan, but my curse upon your mouth!

_Conan_: Oh, will you stop your chat!

_Mother_: Every word you speak having in it
the sting of a bee that was made out of the curses
of a saint!

_Conan_: Stop your gibberish!

_Mother_: Are you satisfied now?

_Conan_: I'm not satisfied!

_Mother_: And never will be, for you were ever
and always a fault-finder and full of crossness
from the day that you were small suited.

_Conan_: You remember that, too?

_Mother_: I do well!

_Conan_: Where is the bellows? Was it you
_(to Flannery)_ that blew a blast on her?

_Flannery_: It was not.

_Conan_: Or you?

_Rock_: It's long sorry I'd be to do such a thing!

_Conan_: It is certain someone did it on her.
Where now is it?

_Mother: (Seizing him.)_ And I remember the
day you threw out your mug of milk into the street,
by reason, says you, you didn't like the colour of
the cow that gave it!

_Conan_: Will you stop ripping up little annoyances,
till I'll find the bellows!

_Rock_: It's what I'm thinking, her memory will
soon be back at the far side of Solomon's
Temple.

_Mother: (Repeats in Irish.)_ Agus is iomdha
sgeal a bhfeadain traacht air!

_Conan: (Shouting.)_ Is it that you'll drive the
seven senses out of me!

_Mother_: Is it that you begrudge me my recollection?
Ha! I have it in spite of you. _(Sings.)_

"Oft in the stilly night
Ere slumber's chain hath bound me
Fond memory brings the light
Of other days around me.
The smiles, the tears, of childhood's years,
The words of love then spoken--
The eyes that shone, now dimmed and gone,
The cheerful hearts now broken.

"Thus in the stilly night--ere slumber's chain
hath bound me
Fond memory brings the light
Of other days around me!"

_Celia: (Bursting in.)_ Where is Conan?

_Conan_: What do you want of me?

_Celia_: I have got the hair brush.

_Conan_: Let you not come near me!

_Celia_: And the comb!

_Conan_: Get away from me!

_Celia_: And the scissors.

_Conan_: Will you drive me out of the house or
will I drive you out of it!

_Celia_: Ah, be easy!

_Conan_: I will not be easy!

_Celia: (Pushing him back in a chair.)_ It will
delight the world to see the way I'll send you out!

_Conan_: Is the universe gone distracted mad!

_Celia_: Be quiet now!

_Conan_: Leave your hold of me!

_Celia_: One stir, and the scissors will run into
you!

_(Sings "With a snippet, a snippet, a snippet.")_

CURTAIN

ACT III

ACT III

_The two Cats are looking over the settle_.

_Music behind scene: "O Johnny, I hardly knew
you!"_

_1st Cat_: We did well leaving the bellows for
that foolish Human to see what he can do. There
is great sport before us and behind.

_2nd Cat_: The best I ever saw since the Jesters
went out from Tara.

_1st Cat_: They to be giving themselves high
notions and to be looking down on Cats!

_2nd Cat_: Ha, Ha, Ha, the folly and the craziness
of men! To see him changing them from one
thing to the next, as if they wouldn't be a two-legged
laughing stock whatever way they would
change.

_1st Cat_: There's apt to be more changes yet
till they will hardly know one another, or every
other one, to be himself! _(Sings.)_

"Where are your eyes that looked so mild,
Hurroo! Hurroo!
Where are your eyes that looked so mild
When my poor heart you first beguiled,
Why did you run from me and the child?
O Johnny, I hardly knew you!

"With drums and guns and guns and drums,
The enemy nearly slew you!
My darling dear you look so queer,
O Johnny, I hardly knew you!

"Where are the legs with which you run,
When you went to carry a gun.
Indeed your dancing days are done,
O Johnny, I hardly knew you!"

_(Timothy and Mother come in from opposite
doors. Cats disappear--music still heard
faintly.)_

_Mother: (Looking at little bellows in her hand.)_
Do you know _That_ what it is, Timothy?

_Timothy_: Is it now a hand-bellows? It's long
since I seen the like of that.

_Mother_: It is, but _what_ bellows?

_Timothy_: Not a bellows? I'd nearly say it to be one.

_Mother_: There has strange things come to pass.

_Timothy_: That's what we've all been praying
for this long time!

_Mother_: Ah, can't you give attention and strive
to listen to me. It is all coming back to my mind.
All the things I am remembering have my mind
tattered and tossed.

_Timothy: (Who has been trying to hear the music,
sings a verse.)_

"You haven't an arm and you haven't a leg,
Hurroo! Hurroo!
You're a yellow noseless chickenless egg,
You'll have to put up with a bowl to beg.
O Johnny, I hardly knew you!

_(Music ceases.)_

_Mother_: Will you give attention, I say! It
will be worth while for you to go chat with me now
I can be telling you all that happened in my years
gone by. What was it Conan was questioning me
about a while ago? What was it now....

"Aristotle in the hour
He left Ireland left a power!"...

_Timothy_: That now is a very nice sort of a
little prayer.

_Mother: (Calling out.)_ That's it! Aristotle's
Bellows! I know now what has happened. This
that is in my hand has in it the power to make
changes. Changes! Didn't great changes come in
the house to-day! _(Shouts.)_ Did you see any great
change in Celia?

_Timothy_: Why wouldn't I, and she at this
minute fighting and barging at some poor travelling
man, saying he laid a finger mark of bacon-grease upon
the lintel of the door. Driving him off with a broken-toothed
rake she is, she that was so gentle that she
wouldn't hardly pluck the feathers of a dead duck!

_Mother_: It was surely a blast of this worked
that change in her, as the blast she blew upon me
worked a change in myself. O! all the thoughts
and memories that are thronging in my mind and
in my head! Rushing up within me the same as
chaff from the flail! Songs and stories and the
newses I heard through the whole course of my
lifetime! And I having no person to tell them out
to! Do you hear me what I'm saying, Timothy?
_(Shouts in his ear.)_ What is come back to me is
what I lost so long ago, my MEMORY.

_Timothy_: So it is a very good song.

_(Sings.)_

"By Memory inspired, and love of glory fired,
The deeds of men I love to dwell upon,
And the sympathetic glow of my spirit must bestow
On the memory of Mitchell that is gone, boys, gone--
The memory of Mitchell that is gone!"

_Mother_: Thoughts crowding on one another,
mixing themselves up with one another for the
want of sifting and settling! They'll have me
distracted and I not able to speak them out to
some person! Conan as surly as a bramble bush,
and Celia wrapped up in her bucket and her broom!
And yourself not able to hear one word I say. _(Sobs,
and bellows falls from her hands.)_

_Timothy_: I'll lay it down now out of your way,
ma'am, the way you can cry your fill whatever
ails you.

_Mother: (Snatching it back.)_ Stop! I'll not
part with it! I know now what I can do! Now!
_(Points it at him.)_ I'll make a companion to be
listening to me through the long winter nights and
the long summer days, and the world to be without
any end at all, no more than the round of the
full moon! You that have no hearing, this will
bring back your hearing, the way you'll be a
listener and a benefit to myself for ever. I
wouldn't feel the weeks long that time!

_(Blows. Timothy turns away and gropes
toward wall.)_

_(She sings: Air, "Eileen Aroon.")_

"What if the days go wrong,
When you can hear!
What if the evening's long,
You being near,
I'll tell my troubles out,
Put darkness to the rout
And to the roundabout!
Having your ear!"

_(Rock at door: sneezes. Mother drops bellows
and goes. Timothy gives a cry,
claps hands to ears and rushes out as if
terrified.)_

_Rock: (Coming in seizes bellows.)_ Well now,
didn't this turn to be very lucky and very good!
The very thing I came looking for to be left there
under my hands! _(Puts it hurriedly under coat.)_

_Flannery: (Coming in.)_ What are you doing
here, James Rock?

_Rock_: What are you doing yourself?

_Flannery_: What is that in under your coat?

_Rock_: What's that to you?

_Flannery_: I'll know that when I see it.

_Rock_: What call have you to be questioning me?

_Flannery_: Open now your coat!

_Rock_: Stand out of my way!

_Flannery: (Suddenly tearing open coat and seizing
bellows.)_ Did you think it was unknownst to me
you stole the bellows?

_Rock_: Ah, what steal?

_Flannery_: Put it back in the place it was!

_Rock_: I will within three minutes.

_Flannery_: You'll put it back here and now.

_Rock: (Coaxingly.)_ Look at here now, Michael
Flannery, we'll make a league between us. Did
you ever see such folly as we're after seeing to-day?
Sitting there for an hour and a half till that one
settled the world upside down!

_Flannery_: If I did see folly, what I see now is
treachery.

_Rock_: Didn't you take notice of the way that
foolish old man is wasting and losing what was
given him for to benefit mankind? A blast he has
lost turning a pigeon to a crow, as if there wasn't
enough in it before of that tribe picking the spuds
out of the ridges. And another blast he has lost
turning poor Celia, that was harmless, to be a holy
terror of cleanness and a scold.

_Flannery_: Indeed, he'd as well have left her
as she was. There was something very pleasing
in her little sleepy ways.

_(Sings.)_

"But sad it is to see you so
And to think of you now as an object of woe;
Your Peggy'll still keep an eye on her beau.
O Johnny, I hardly knew you!"

_Rock_: Bringing back to the memory of his
mother every old grief and rancour. She that has
a right to be making her peace with the grave!

_Flannery_: Indeed it seems he doesn't mind
what he'll get so long as it's something that he
wants.

_Rock_: Three blasts gone! And the world didn't
begin to be cured.

_Flannery_: Sure enough he gave the bellows no
fair play.

_Rock_: He has us made a fool of. He using it
the way he did, he has us robbed.

_Flannery_: There's power in the four blasts
left would bring peace and piety and prosperity
and plenty to every one of the four provinces of
Ireland.

_Rock_: That's it. There's no doubt but I'll
make a better use of it than him, because I am a
better man than himself.

_Flannery_: I don't know. You might not get
so much respect in Dublin.

_Rock_: Dublin, where are you! What would
I'd do going to Dublin? Did you never hear said
the skin to be nearer than the shirt?

_Flannery_: What do you mean saying that?

_Rock_: The first one I have to do good to is
myself.

_Flannery_: Is it that you would grab the benefit
of the bellows?

_Rock_: In troth I will. I've got a hold of it, and
by cripes I'll knock a good turn out of it.

_Flannery_: To rob the country and the poor for
your own profit? You are a class of man that is
gathering all for himself.

_Rock_: It is not worth while we to fall out of
friendship. I will use but the one blast.

_Flannery_: You have no right or call to meddle
with it.

_Rock_: The first thing I will meddle with is my
own rick of turf. And I'll give you leave to go do
the same with your own umbrella, or whatever
property you may own.

_Flannery_: Sooner than be covetous like yourself
I'd live and die in a ditch, and be buried
from the Poorhouse!

_Rock_: Turf being black and light in the hand,
and gold being shiny and weighty, there will be
no delay in turning every sod into a solid brick of
gold. I give you leave to do the same thing, and
we'll be two rich men inside a half an hour!

_Flannery_: You are no less than a thief! _(Snatches
at bellows.)_

_Rock_: Thief yourself. Leave your hand off it!

_Flannery_: Give it up here for the man that
owns it!

_Rock_: You may set your coffin making for I'll
beat you to the ground.

_Flannery: (As he clutches.)_ Ah, you have given
it a shove. It has blown a blast on yourself!

_Rock_: Yourself that blew it on me! Bad cess
to you! But I'll do the same bad turn upon you!
_(Blows.)_

_Flannery_: There is some footstep without.
Heave it in under the ashes.

_Rock_: Whist your tongue! _(Flings bellows
behind hearth.)_

_(Conan comes in.)_

_Conan_: With all the chattering of women I
have the train near lost. The car is coming for
me and I'll make no delay now but to set out.

_(Sings.)_

"Oh the French are on the sea,
Says the Sean Van Vocht,
Oh the French are on the sea,
Says the Sean Van Vocht,

Oh the French are in the bay,
They'll be here without delay,
And the Orange will decay,
Says the Sean Van Vocht!"

Here now is my little pack. You were saying,
Thomas Flannery, you would be lending me the
loan of your umbrella.

_Flannery_: Ah, what umbrella? There's no fear
of rain.

_Conan: (Taking it.)_ You to have proffered it
I would not refuse it.

_Flannery: (Seizing it.)_ I don't know. I have
to mind my own property. It might not serve
it to be loaning it to this one and that. It might
leave the ribs of it bare.

_Conan_: That's the way with the whole of ye. I
to give you my heart's blood you'd turn me upside
down for a pint of porter!

_Flannery_: I see no sense or charity in lending to
another anything that might be of profit to myself.

_Conan_: Let you keep it so! That your ribs may
be as bare as its own ribs that are bursting out
through the cloth!

_Rock_: Do not give heed to him, Conan. There
is in this bag _(takes it out)_ what will bring you every
whole thing you might be wanting in the town.
_(Takes out notes and gold and gives them.)_

_Conan_: It is only a small share I'll ask the lend of.

_Rock_: The lend of! No, but a free gift!

_Conan_: Well now, aren't you turned to be very
kind? _(Takes notes.)_

_Rock_: Put that back in the bag. Here it is, the
whole of it. Five and fifty pounds. Take it and
welcome! It is yourself will make a good use of
it laying it out upon the needy and the poor.
Changing all for their benefit and their good! Oh,
since St. Bridget spread her cloak upon the Curragh
this is the most day and the happiest day ever
came to Ireland.

_Conan: (Giving bag to Flannery.)_ Take it you,
as is your due by what the mother said a while ago
about the robbery he did on you in the time past.

_Flannery_: Give it here to me. I'll engage I'll
keep a good grip on it from this out. It's long
before any other one will get a one look at it!

_Conan_: There would seem to be a great change--and
a sudden change come upon the two of ye.
..._(With a roar.)_ Where now is the bellows?

_Flannery: (Sulkily.)_ What way would I know?

_Conan: (Shaking him.)_ I know well what
happened! It is _ye_ have stolen two of my blasts!
Putting changes on yourselves ye would--much
good may it do ye--. Thieving with your covetousness
the last two nearly I had left!

_Rock: (Sulkily.)_ Leave your hand off me! I
never stole no blast!

_Conan_: There's a bad class going through the
world. The most people you will give to will be
the first to cry you down. This was a wrong out
of measure! Thieves ye are and pickpockets!
Ye that were not worth changing from one to
another, no more than you'd change a pinch of
dust off the road into a puff of ashes. Stealing
away my lovely blasts, bad luck to ye, the same as
Prometheus stole the makings of a fire from the
ancient gods!

_Flannery_: That is enough of keening and
lamenting after a few blasts of barren wind--I'll
be going where I have my own business to attend.

_Conan_: Where, so, is the bellows?

_Flannery_: How would I know?

_Conan_: The two of ye won't quit this till I'll
find it! There is another two blasts in it that
will bring sense and knowledge into Ireland yet!

_Rock_: Indeed they might bring comfort yet
to many a sore heart!

_Conan: (Searching.)_ Where now is it? I
couldn't find it if the earth rose up and swallowed
it. Where now did I lay it down?

_Rock_: There's too much changes in this place
for me to know where anything is gone.

_Conan: (At door.)_ Where are you, Maryanne!
Celia! Timothy! Let ye come hither and search
out my little bellows!

_(Timothy comes in, followed by Mother.)_

_Conan_: Hearken now, Timothy!

_Timothy: (Stopping his ears.)_ Speak easy, speak easy!

_Conan_: Take down now your fingers from your
ears the way you will hear my voice!

_Timothy_: Have a care now with your screeching
would you split the drum of my ear?

_Conan_: Is it that you have got your hearing?

_Timothy_: My hearing is it? As good as that I
can hear a lie, and it forming in the mind.

_Conan_: Is that the truth you're saying?

_Timothy_: Hear, is it! I can hear every whisper
in this parish and the seven parishes are nearest.
And the little midges roaring in the air.--Let ye
whist now with your sneezing in the draught!

_Conan_: This is surely the work of the bellows.
Another blast gone!

_Rock_: So it would be too. Mostly the whole
of them gone and spent. It's hard know in the
morning what way will it be with you at night.
_(Sings.)_

"I saw from the beach when the morning was
shining
A bark o'er the waters move gloriously on--
came when the sun o'er the beach was declining,
The bark was still there, but the waters were gone."

_Timothy_: It is yourself brought the misfortune
on me, calling your Druid spells into the house.

_Conan_: It is not upon you I ever turned it.

_Timothy_: You have a great wrong done to me!

_Mother_: It is glad you should be and happy.

_Timothy_; Happy, is it? Give me a hareskin cap
for to put over my ears, having wool in it very thick!
_(Sings.)_

"Silent, O Moyle, be the roar of thy water,
Break not ye breezes your chain of repose,
While murmuring mournfully Lir's lonely daughter
Tells to the night-star her tale of woes.

"When shall the swan, her death-note singing,
Sleep with wings in darkness furl'd?
When will heaven its sweet bells ringing
Call my spirit from this stormy world?"

_Mother_: Come with me now and I'll be chatting
to you.

_Timothy_: Why would I be listening to your
blather when I have the voices of the four winds to
be listening to? The night wind, the east wind,
the black wind and the wind from the south!

_Conan_: Such a thing I never saw before in all
my natural life.

_Timothy_: To be hearing, without understanding
it, the language of the tribes of the birds! (_Puts
hands over ears again_.) There's too many sounds
in the world! The sounds of the earth are terrible!
The roots squeezing and jostling one another
through the clefts, and the crashing of the acorn
from the oak. The cry of the little birdeen in
under the silence of the hawk!

_Conan:_ (_To Mother_.) As it you let it loose
upon him, let you bring him away to some hole or
cave of the earth.

_Timothy_: It is my desire to go cast myself in
the ocean where there'll be but one sound of its
waves, the fishes in its meadows being dumb!
(_Goes to corner and hides his head in a sack_.)

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