by W. B. Yeats
THE BIG COUNTRYMAN. He is most monstrously drunk.
SEPTIMUS. No longer drunk but inspired.
SECOND CITIZEN. GO on, go on, we’ll never hear the like again.
THE BIG COUNTRYMAN. Come away. I’ve enough of this — we have work to do.
SEPTIMUS. Go away, did- you say, and my breast feathers thrust out and my white wings buoyed up with divinity? Ah! but I can see it now — you are bent upon going to some lonely place where uninterrupted you can speak against the character of the unicorn, but you shall not, I tell you that you shall not.
[He comes down off the stone and squares up at the crowd which tries to pass him.] In the midst of this uncharitable town I will protect that noble, milk-white, flighty beast.
THE BIG COUNTRYMAN. Let me pass.
SEPTIMUS. No, I will not let you pass.
FIRST COUNTRYMAN. Leave him alone.
SECOND COUNTRYMAN. No violence — it might bring ill-luck upon us.
[They try to hold back the BIG COUNTRYMAN, SEPTIMUS. I will oppose your passing to the death. For I will not have it said that there is a smirch, or a blot, upon the most milky whiteness of an heroic brute that bathes by the sound of tabors at the rising of the sun and the rising of the moon, and the rising of the Great Bear, and above all, it shall not be said, whispered, or in any wise published abroad by you that stand there, so to speak, between two washings; for you were doubtless washed when you were born, and, it may be, shall be washed again after you are dead.
[The BIG COUNTRYMAN knocks him down.
FIRST CITIZEN. You have killed him.
THE BIG COUNTRYMAN. Maybe I have, maybe I have not — let him lie there. A witch I strangled last Candlemas twelvemonth, a witch I will strangle to-day. What do I care for the likes of him?
THIRD CITIZEN. Come round to the east quarter of the town. The basket-makers and the sieve-makers will be out by this.
FOURTH CITIZEN. It is a short march from there to the Castle gate.
[They go up one of the side streets, but return quickly in confusion and fear.
FIRST CITIZEN. Are you sure that you saw him?
SECOND CITIZEN. Who could mistake that horrible old man?
THIRD CITIZEN. I was standing by him when the ghost spoke out of him seven years ago.
FIRST COUNTRYMAN. I never saw him before. He has never been in my district.
I don’t rightly know what sort he is, but I have heard of him, many a time I have heard of him.
FIRST CITIZEN. His eyes become glassy, and that is the trance growing upon him, and when he is in the trance his soul slips away and a ghost takes its place and speaks out of him — a strange ghost.
THIRD CITIZEN. I was standing by him the last time. ‘Get me straw,’ said that old man, ‘my back itches.’ Then all of a sudden he lay down, with his eyes wide open and glassy, and he brayed like a donkey. At that moment the King died and the King’s daughter was Queen.
FIRST COUNTRYMAN. They say it is the donkey that carried Christ into Jerusalem and that is why it knows its rightful sovereign.
He goes begging about the country and there is no man dare refuse him what he asks.
THE BIG COUNTRYMAN. Then it is certain nobody will take my hand off her throat. I will make my grip tighter. He will be lying down on the straw and he will bray, and when he brays she will be dead.
FIRST COUNTRYMAN. Look! There he is coming over the top of the hill, and the mad look upon him.
SECOND COUNTRYMAN. I wouldn’t face him for the world this night. Come round to the market-place, we’ll be less afraid in a big place.
THE BIG COUNTRYMAN. I’m not afraid, but I’ll go with you till I get my hand on her throat.
[They all go out but SEPTIMUS. Presently SEPTIMUS sits up; his head is bleeding. He rubs with his fingers his broken head and looks at the blood on his fingers.
SEPTIMUS. Unchristian town! First I am, so to speak, thrown out into the street, and then I am all but murdered; and I drunk, and therefore in need of protection. All creatures are in need of protection at some time or other. Even my wife was once a frail child in need of milk, of smiles, of love, as if in the midst of a flood, in danger of drowning, so to speak.
[An OLD BEGGAR with long matted hair and beard and in ragged clothes comes in.
THE OLD BEGGAR. I want straw.
SEPTIMUS. Happy Tom and Peter of the Purple Pelican have done it all. They are bad, popular poets, and being jealous of my fame, they have stirred up the people.
[He catches sight of the OLD BEGGAR.] There is a certain medicine which is made by distilling camphor, peruvian bark, spurge and mandrake, and mixing all with twelve ounces of dissolved pearls and four ounces of the oil of gold; and this medicine is infallible to stop the flow of blood. Have you any of it, old man?
THE OLD BEGGAR. I want straw.
SEPTIMUS. I can see that you have not got it, but no matter, we shall be friends.
THE OLD BEGGAR. I want straw to lie down on.
SEPTIMUS. It is no doubt better that I should bleed to death. For that way, my friend, I shall disgrace Happy Tom and Peter of the Purple Pelican, but it is necessary that I shall die somewhere where my last words can be taken down. I am therefore in need of your support.
[Having got up he now staggers over to the OLD MAN and leans upon him.
THE OLD BEGGAR. Don’t you know who I am — aren’t you afraid? When something comes inside me, my back itches. Then I must lie down and roll, and then I bray and the crown changes.
SEPTIMUS. Ah! you are inspired. Then we are indeed brothers. Come, I will rest upon your shoulder and we will mount the hill side by side. I will sleep in the Castle of the Queen.
THE OLD BEGGAR. You will give me straw to lie upon?
SEPTIMUS. Asphodels! Yet, indeed, the asphodel is a flower much overrated by the classic authors. Still, if a man has a preference, I say for the asphodel —
[They go out and one hears the voice of SEPTIMUS murmuring in the distance about asphodels.
[The FIRST OLD MAN opens his window and taps with his crutch at the opposite window. The SECOND OLD MAN opens his window.
FIRST OLD MAN. It is all right now. They are all gone. We can have our talk out.
SECOND OLD MAN. The whole Castle is lit by the dawn now, and it will soon begin to grow brighter in the street.
FIRST OLD MAN. It’s time for the Tapster’s old dog to come down the street.
SECOND OLD MAN. Yesterday he had a bone in his mouth.
CURTAIN
SCENE II.
The throne-room in the Castle. Between pillars are gilded openwork doors, except at one side, where there is a large window. The morning light is slanting through the window, making dark shadows among the pillars. As the scene goes on, the light, at first feeble, becomes strong and suffused and the shadows disappear. Through the openwork doors one can see down long passages, and one of these passages plainly leads into the open air. — see daylight at the end of it. There is a throne in the centre of the room and a flight of steps that leads to it.
The PRIME MINISTER, an elderly man with an impatient manner and voice, is talking to a group of players, among whom is Nona, a fair, comely, comfortable-looking young woman of perhaps thirty-five; she seems to take the lead.
PRIME MINISTER. I will not be trifled with. I chose the play myself; I chose “The Tragical History of Noah’s Deluge.” because when Noah beats his wife to make her go into the Ark everybody understands, everybody is pleased, everybody recognises the mulish obstinacy of their own wives, sweethearts, sisters. And now, when it is of the greatest importance to the State that everybody should be pleased, the play cannot be given. The leading lady is lost, you say, and there is some unintelligible reason why nobody can take her place; but I know what you are all driving at — you object to the play I have chosen. You want some dull, poetical thing, full of long speeches. I will have that play and no other. The rehearsal must begin at once and the performance take place at noon punctually.
NONA. We
have searched all night, sir, and we cannot find her anywhere. She was heard to say that she would drown rather than play a woman older than thirty. Seeing that Noah’s wife is a very old woman, we are afraid that she has drowned herself indeed.
[DECIMA, a very pretty woman, puts her head out from under the throne where she has been lying hidden.
PRIME MINISTER. Nonsense! It is all a conspiracy. Your manager should be here. He is responsible. You can tell him when he does come that if the play is not performed, I will clap him into jail for a year and pitch the rest of you over the border.
NONA. Oh, sir, he couldn’t help it. She does whatever she likes.
PRIME MINISTER. Does whatever she likes — I know her sort; would pull the world to pieces to spite her husband or her lover. I know her — a bladder full of dried peas for a brain, a brazen, bragging baggage. Of course he couldn’t help it, but what do I care.
[DECIMA -pulls in her head.] To jail he goes — somebody has got to go to jail. Go and cry her name everywhere. Away with you! Let me hear you cry it out. Call the baggage. Louder. Louder. [The players go out crying, ‘Where are you, Decima?’]
Oh, Adam! why did you fall asleep in the garden? You might have known that while you were lying there helpless, the Old Man in the Sky would play some prank upon you.
[The QUEEN, who is young, with an ascetic timid face, enters in a badly fitting state dress.
Ah!
QUEEN. I will show myself to the angry people as you have bidden me. I am almost certain that I am ready for martyrdom. I have prayed all night. Yes, I am almost certain.
PRIME MINISTER. Ah!
QUEEN. I have now attained to the age of my patroness, Holy Saint Octema, when she was martyred at Antioch. You will remember that her unicorn was so pleased at the spectacle of her austerity that he caracoled in his excitement. Thereupon she dropped out of the saddle and was trampled to death under the feet of the mob. Indeed, but for the unicorn, the mob would have killed her long before.
PRIME MINISTER. No, you will not be martyred. I have a plan to settle that. I will stop their anger with a word. Who made that dress?
QUEEN. It was my mother’s dress. She wore it at her coronation. I would not have a new one made. I do not deserve new clothes. I am always committing sin.
PRIME MINISTER. IS there sin in an egg that has never been hatched, that has never been warmed, in a chalk egg?
QUEEN. I wish I could resemble Holy Saint Octema in everything.
PRIME MINISTER. What a dress! It is too late now. Nothing can be done. It may appear right to those on the edge of the crowd. The others must be conquered by charm, dignity, royal manner. As for the dress, I must think of some excuse, some explanation. Remember that they have never seen your face, and you will put them in a bad humour if you hang your head in that dumbfounded way.
QUEEN. I wish I could return to my prayers.
PRIME MINISTER. Walk! Permit me to see your Majesty walk. No, no, no. Be more majestic. Ah! If you had known the Queens I have known — they had a way with them. Morals of a dragoon, but a way, a way. Give the people some plain image or they will invent one. Put on a kind of eagle look, a vulture look.
QUEEN. There are cobble-stones — if I might go barefoot it would be a blessed penance. It was especially the bleeding feet of Saint Octema that gave pleasure to the unicorn.
PRIME MINISTER. Sleep of Adam! Barefoot — barefoot, did you say? [A pause.]
There is not time to take off your shoes and stockings. If you were to look out of the window there, you would see the crowd becoming wickeder every minute. Come!
[He gives his arm to the QUEEN.]
QUEEN. You have a plan to stop their anger so that I shall not be martyred?
PRIME MINISTER. My plan will be disclosed before the face of the people and there alone. — [They go out.
[NONA comes in with a bottle of wine and a boiled lobster and lays them on the middle of the floor. She puts her finger on her lip and stands in the doorway towards the back of the stage.
DECIMA [comes cautiously out of her hiding place singing].
‘He went away,’ my mother sang,
‘When I was brought to bed.’
And all the while her needle pulled
The gold and silver thread.
She pulled the thread and bit the thread
And made a golden gown,
She wept because she had dreamt that I
Was born to wear a crown.
[She is just reaching her hand for the lobster when NONA comes forward holding out towards her the dress and mask of Noah’s wife which she had been carrying over her left arm.
NONA. Thank God you are found! [Getting between her and the lobster.] No, not” ntil you have put on this dress and mask. I have caught you now and you are not going to hide again.
DECIMA. Very well, when I have had my breakfast.
NONA. Not a mouthful till you are dressed ready for the rehearsal.
DECIMA. Do you know what song I was singing just now?
NONA. It is that song you’re always singing. Septimus made it up.
DECIMA. It is the song of the mad singing daughter of a harlot. The only song she had. Her father was a drunken sailor waiting for the full tide, and yet she thought her mother had foretold that she would marry a prince and become a great queen. [Singing
‘When she was got,’ my mother sang,
‘I heard a seamew cry, I saw a flake of yellow foam
That dropped upon my thigh.’
How therefore could she help but braid
The gold upon my hair,
And dream that I should carry
The golden top of care.
The moment ago as I lay here I thought I could play a Queen’s part, a great Queen’s part; the only part in the world I can play is a great Queen’s part.
NONA. You play a Queen’s part? You that were born in a ditch between two towns and wrapped in a sheet that was stolen from a hedge.
DECIMA. The Queen cannot play at all, but I could play so well. I could bow with my whole body down to my ankles and could be stern when hard looks were in season. Oh, I would know how to put all summer in a look and after that all winter in a voice.
NONA. Low comedy is what you are fit for.
DECIMA. I understood all this in a wink of the eye, and then just when I am saying to myself that I was born to sit up there with soldiers and courtiers, you come shaking in front of me that mask and that dress. I am not to eat my breakfast unless I play an old peaky-chinned, drop-nosed harridan that a foul husband beats with a stick because she won’t clamber among the other brutes into his cattle boat. [She makes a dart at the lobster.]
NONA. No, no, not a drop, not a mouthful till you have put these on. Remember that if there is no play Septimus must go to prison.
DECIMA. Would they give him dry bread to eat?
NONA. They would.
DECIMA. And water to drink and nothing in the water?
NONA. They would.
DECIMA. And a straw bed?
NONA. They would, and only a little straw maybe.
DECIMA. And iron chains that clanked.
NONA. They would.
DECIMA. And keep him there for a whole week?
NONA. A month maybe.
DECIMA. And he would say to the turnkey, ‘I am here because of my beautiful cruel wife, my beautiful flighty wife.’
NONA. He might not, he’d be sober.
DECIMA. But he’d think it and every time he was hungry, every time he was thirsty, every time he felt the hardness of the stone floor, every time he heard the chains clank, he would think it, and every time he thought it I would become more beautiful in his eyes, NONA. No, he would hate you.
DECIMA. Little do you know what the love of man is. If that Holy Image of the Church where you put all those candles at Easter was pleasant and affable, why did you come home with the skin worn off your two knees?
NONA [in tears], I understand — you cruel, bad woman — you won�
��t play the part at all, and all that Septimus may go to prison, and he a great genius that can’t take care of himself.
[Seeing NONA distracted with tears DECIMA makes a dart and almost gets the lobster.
NONA. No, no! Not a mouthful, not a drop. I will break the bottle if you go near it. There is not another woman in the world would treat a man like that and you were sworn to him in Church — yes, you were, there is no good denying it. [DECIMA makes another dart, but NONA, who is still in tears, puts the lobster in her pocket.] Leave the food alone; not one mouthful will you get. I have never sworn to a man in Church, but if I did swear I would not treat him like a tinker’s donkey — before God I would not — I was properly brought up; my mother always told me it was no light thing to take a man in Church.
