Then down upon that stool, down quick, I say, And call up a whey face and a whining voice, And let your head be bowed upon your knees. MARY Had I but time to put the place to rights. (CATHLEEN, OONA, _and_ ALEEL _enter_.) CATHLEEN God save all here. There is a certain house, An old grey castle with a kitchen garden, A cider orchard and a plot for flowers, Somewhere among these woods. MARY We know it, lady. A place that's set among impassable walls As though world's trouble could not find it out. CATHLEEN It may be that we are that trouble, for we-- Although we've wandered in the wood this hour-- Have lost it too, yet I should know my way, For I lived all my childhood in that house. MARY Then you are Countess Cathleen? CATHLEEN And this woman, Oona, my nurse, should have remembered it, For we were happy for a long time there. OONA The paths are overgrown with thickets now, Or else some change has come upon my sight. CATHLEEN And this young man, that should have known the woods-- Because we met him on their border but now, Wandering and singing like a wave of the sea-- Is so wrapped up in dreams of terrors to come That he can give no help. MARY You have still some way, But I can put you on the trodden path Your servants take when they are marketing. But first sit down and rest yourself awhile, For my old fathers served your fathers, lady, Longer than books can tell--and it were strange If you and yours should not be welcome here. CATHLEEN And it were stranger still were I ungrateful For such kind welcome--but I must be gone, For the night's gathering in. SHEMUS It is a long while Since I've set eyes on bread or on what buys it. CATHLEEN So you are starving even in this wood, Where I had thought I would find nothing changed. But that's a dream, for the old worm o' the world Can eat its way into what place it pleases. (_She gives money._) TEIG Beautiful lady, give me something too; I fell but now, being weak with hunger and thirst And lay upon the threshold like a log. CATHLEEN I gave for all and that was all I had. Look, my purse is empty. I have passed By starving men and women all this day, And they have had the rest; but take the purse, The silver clasps on't may be worth a trifle. But if you'll come to-morrow to my house You shall have twice the sum. (ALEEL _begins to play_.) SHEMUS (_muttering_) What, music, music! CATHLEEN Ah, do not blame the finger on the string; The doctors bid me fly the unlucky times And find distraction for my thoughts, or else Pine to my grave. SHEMUS I have said nothing, lady. Why should the like of us complain? OONA