No More Learning

FIRST MERCHANT.

Aleel, her lover.

SECOND MERCHANT.

It may be that he has turned her thought from us
And we can gather our merchandise in peace.

FIRST MERCHANT.

No, no, for she is kneeling.

SECOND MERCHANT.

Shut the door.
Are all our drudges here?

FIRST MERCHANT.

[_Closing the chapel door. _]

I bid them follow.
Can you not hear them breathing upon the stairs?
I have sat this hour under the elder-tree.

SECOND MERCHANT.
I had bid you rob her treasury, and yet
I found you sitting drowsed and motionless,
Your chin bowed to your knees, while on all sides,
Bat-like from bough and roof and window-ledge,
Clung evil souls of men, and in the woods,
Like streaming flames, floated upon the winds
The elemental creatures.

FIRST MERCHANT.

I have fared ill;
She prayed so hard I could not cross the threshold
Till this young man had turned her prayer to dreams.
You have had a man to kill: how have you fared?

SECOND MERCHANT.

I lay in the image of a nine-monthed bonyeen,
By Tubber-vanach cross-roads: Father John
Came, sad and moody, murmuring many prayers;
I seemed as though I came from his own sty;
He saw the one brown ear; the breviary dropped;
He ran; I ran, I ran into the quarry;
He fell a score of yards.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Now that he is dead
We shall be too much thronged with souls to-morrow.
Did his soul escape you?

SECOND MERCHANT.

I thrust it in the bag.
But the hand that blessed the poor and raised the Host
Tore through the leather with sharp piety.

FIRST MERCHANT.

Well, well, to labour--here is the treasury door.

[_They go out by the left-hand door, and enter again
in a little while, carrying full bags upon their
shoulders. _

FIRST MERCHANT.