_Mayor._ [_Who carries an Ogham stick._] No, I must get through my speech or I’ll forget it; Besides, there is no reason why he’d eat Till he has heard my reasons. _Cian._ It were better To show what we have brought him in the basket, For we have nothing that he has not liked From boyhood. _Brian._ For we have not brought kings’ food That’s cooked for everybody and nobody. _Mayor._ You are not showing right respect to me, Or to the people of Kinvara, when you wish That something else should come before my message. _Seanchan._ What brings you here? I never sent for you. _Cian._ He must be famishing, he looks so pale. We had better get the food out first. I tell you, That we have brought the things he likes the best. _Mayor._ No, no; I lost a word at every cross road And maybe if I do not speak it now I’ll have forgot it. _Cian._ Well, out with it quickly. _Seanchan._ Why, what’s this foolery? _Mayor._ No foolery; A message from the richest, best born townsman Of your own town, and from your aged father. _Cian._ Run through it while I am getting out the food. _Mayor._ How was I to begin? What was the word That was to keep it in my memory? Wait, I have notched it on this Ogham stick. “Chief poet,” “Ireland,” “Townsman”; that is it. Chief poet of Ireland, when we heard that trouble Had come between you and the King of Ireland It plunged us in deep sorrow, part for you, Our honoured townsman, part for our good town. The King was said to be most friendly to us, And we had reasons, as you’ll recollect, For thinking that he was about to give Those grazing lands inland we so much need, Being pinched between the water and the rocks. But now his friendliness being ill repaid Will be turned from us and our town get nothing. But there was something else--I’ll find the word That was to keep it in my memory. “Pride”--that’s the word,--we would not have you think, Weighty as these considerations are, That they have been as weighty in our minds As our desire that one we take much pride in, A man who has been an honour to our town, Should live and prosper, therefore we beseech you To give way in a matter of no moment, A matter of mere sentiment, a trifle, That we may always keep our pride in you. _Seanchan._ Their pride, their pride, what do they know of pride? My pupils do not know it, for they beg From the King’s favour what is theirs by right, And how can men, that God has made so weak They need a rich man’s favour every day, Know anything of pride? _Cian._ [_To MAYOR._] You have spoken it wrongly. You have forgotten something out of it about the cattle dying.