When he read it to us in the evening, we were all left with a feeling as if some beautiful white blossom had suddenly fallen at our feet.

It was acted the other day at Ballaghaderreen; and, at the end, a very little girl, who wanted to let the author know how much she had liked his play, put out her hand, and put a piece of toffee into his.

The 'Nativity' did not appear in time for Christmas acting; but Ireland, which now and then finds herself possessed of some accidental freedom, has no censor; and a play so beautiful and reverent, and so much in the tradition of the people, is sure to be acted and received reverently.

_An Craoibhin_ has written other plays besides these--a pastoral play which has been acted in Dublin and Belfast, a match-making comedy, a satire on Trinity College.

Other Irish plays have been acted here and there through the country during the last year or two, some written by priests; the last I saw in ma.n.u.script was by a workhouse schoolmaster; and all have had their share of success. But it is to the poet-scholar who has become actor-dramatist that we must still, as Raftery would put it, 'give the branch.

THE TWISTING OF THE ROPE

HANRAHAN. _A wandering poet._

SHEAMUS O'HERAN. _Engaged to_ OONA.

MAURYA. _The woman of the house._

SHEELA. _A neighbour._

OONA. _Maurya's daughter._

_Neighbours and a piper who have come to Maurya's house for a dance_.

SCENE. _A farmer's house in Munster a hundred years ago. Men and women moving about and standing round the walls as if they had just finished a dance._ HANRAHAN, _in the foreground, talking to_ OONA.

_The piper is beginning a preparatory drone for another dance, but_ SHEAMUS _brings him a drink and he stops. A man has come and holds out his hand to_ OONA, _as if to lead her out, but she pushes him away._

OONA. Don't be bothering me now; don't you see I'm listening to what he is saying? (_To_ HANRAHAN) Go on with what you were saying just now.

HANRAHAN. What did that fellow want of you?

OONA. He wanted the next dance with me, but I wouldn't give it to him.

HANRAHAN. And why would you give it to him? Do you think I'd let you dance with anyone but myself, and I here? I had no comfort or satisfaction this long time until I came here to-night, and till I saw yourself.

OONA. What comfort am I to you?

HANRAHAN. When a stick is half burned in the fire, does it not get comfort when water is poured on it?

OONA. But, sure, you are not half burned.

HANRAHAN. I am; and three-quarters of my heart is burned, and scorched and consumed, struggling with the world, and the world struggling with me.

OONA. You don't look that bad.

HANRAHAN. O, Oona ni Regaun, you have not knowledge of the life of a poor bard, without house or home or havings, but he going and ever going a drifting through the wide world, without a person with him but himself. There is not a morning in the week when I rise up that I do not say to myself that it would be better to be in the grave than to be wandering. There is nothing standing to me but the gift I got from G.o.d, my share of songs; when I begin upon them, my grief and my trouble go from me; I forget my persecution and my ill luck; and now since I saw you, Oona, I see there is something that is better even than the songs.

OONA. Poetry is a wonderful gift from G.o.d; and as long as you have that, you are richer than the people of stock and store, the people of cows and cattle.

HANRAHAN. Ah, Oona, it is a great blessing, but it is a great curse as well for a man, he to be a poet. Look at me: have I a friend in this world? Is there a man alive that has a wish for me? is there the love of anyone at all on me? I am going like a poor lonely barnacle goose throughout the world; like Oisin after the Fenians; every person hates me: you do not hate me, Oona?

OONA. Do not say a thing like that; it is impossible that anyone would hate you.

HANRAHAN. Come and we will sit in the corner of the room together; and I will tell you the little song I made for you; it is for you I made it. (_They go to a corner and sit down together._ SHEELA _comes in at the door._)

SHEELA. I came to you as quick as I could.

MAURYA. And a hundred welcomes to you.

SHEELA. What have you going on now?

MAURYA. Beginning we are; we had one jig, and now the piper is drinking a gla.s.s. They'll begin dancing again in a minute when the piper is ready.

SHEELA. There are a good many people gathering in to you to-night. We will have a fine dance.

MAURYA. Maybe so, Sheela; but there's a man of them there, and I'd sooner him out than in.

SHEELA. It's about the long red man you are talking, isn't it--the man that is in close talk with Oona in the corner? Where is he from, and who is he himself?

MAURYA. That's the greatest vagabond ever came into Ireland; Tumaus Hanrahan they call him; but it's Hanrahan the rogue he ought to have been christened by right. Aurah, wasn't there the misfortune on me, him to come in to us at all to-night?

SHEELA. What sort of a person is he? Isn't he a man that makes songs, out of Connacht? I heard talk of him before; and they say there is not another dancer in Ireland so good as him. I would like to see him dance.

MAURYA. Bad luck to the vagabond! It is well I know what sort he is; because there was a kind of friendship between himself and the first husband I had; and it is often I heard from poor Diarmuid--the Lord have mercy on him!--what sort of person he was. He was a schoolmaster down in Connacht; but he used to have every trick worse than another; ever making songs he used to be, and drinking whiskey and setting quarrels afoot among the neighbours with his share of talk. They say there isn't a woman in the five provinces that he wouldn't deceive.

He is worse than Donal na Greina long ago. But the end of the story is that the priest routed him out of the parish altogether; he got another place then, and followed on at the same tricks until he was routed out again, and another again with it. Now he has neither place nor house nor anything, but he to be going the country, making songs and getting a night's lodging from the people; n.o.body will refuse him, because they are afraid of him. He's a great poet, and maybe he'd make a rann on you that would stick to you for ever, if you were to anger him.

SHEELA. G.o.d preserve us; but what brought him in to-night?

MAURYA. He was travelling the country and he heard there was to be a dance here, and he came in because he knew us; he was rather great with my first husband. It is wonderful how he is making out his way of life at all, and he with nothing but his share of songs. They say there is no place that he'll go to, that the women don't love him, and that the men don't hate him.

SHEELA (_catching_ MAURYA _by the shoulder_). Turn your head, Maurya; look at him now, himself and your daughter, and their heads together; he's whispering in her ear; he's after making a poem for her and he's whispering it in her ear. Oh, the villain, he'll be putting his spells on her now.

MAURYA. Ohone, go deo! isn't it a misfortune that he came? He's talking every moment with Oona since he came in three hours ago. I did my best to separate them from one another, but it failed me. Poor Oona is given up to every sort of old songs and old made-up stories; and she thinks it sweet to be listening to him. The marriage is settled between herself and Sheamus O'Herin there, a quarter from to-day. Look at poor Sheamus at the door, and he watching them. There is grief and hanging of the head on him; it's easy to see that he'd like to choke the vagabond this minute. I am greatly afraid that the head will be turned on Oona with his share of blathering. As sure as I am alive there will come evil out of this night.

SHEELA. And couldn't you put him out?

MAURYA. I could. There's no person here to help him unless there would be a woman or two; but he is a great poet, and he has a curse that would split the trees, and that would burst the stones. They say the seed will rot in the ground and the milk go from the cows when a poet like him makes a curse, if a person routed him out of the house; but if he was once out, I'll go bail I wouldn't let him in again.

SHEELA. If himself were to go out willingly, there would be no virtue in his curse then.

MAURYA. There would not, but he will not go out willingly, and I cannot rout him out myself for fear of his curse.