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William Butler Yeats The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats, Vol. 4 (of 8) / The Hour-glass. Cathleen ni Houlihan. The Golden Helmet. / The Irish Dramatic Movement
THE HOUR-GLASS: A MORALITY
PERSONS IN THE PLAY
A Fool
Some Pupils
An Angel
The Wise Mans Wife and two Children
THE HOUR-GLASS: A MORALITY
A large room with a door at the back and another at the side, or else a curtained place where persons can enter by parting the curtains. A desk and a chair at one side. An hour-glass on a bracket or stand near the door. A creepy stool near it. Some benches. A WISE MAN sitting at his desk.
wild creatures let me sleep near their nests and their holes. It is lucky even to look at me or to touch me, but it is much more lucky to give me a penny. [Holds out his hand. ] If I wasnt lucky, Id starve.
[He points upward.
[He goes out shaking the bag.
where birds sang the hours, and about angels that came and stood upon mens thresholds. But I have locked the visions into heaven and turned the key upon them. Well, I must consider this passage about the two countries. My mother used to say something of the kind. She would say that when our bodies sleep our souls awake, and that whatever withers here ripens yonder, and that harvests are snatched from us that they may feed invisible people. But the meaning of the book may be different, for only fools and women have thoughts like that; their thoughts were never written upon the walls of Babylon. I must ring the bell for my pupils. [He sees the ANGEL.] What are you? Who are you? I think I saw some that were like you in my dreams when I was a child that bright thing, that dress that is the colour of embers! But I have done with dreams, I have done with dreams.
[She turns the hour-glass.
desk. I will speak quietly, as if nothing had happened.
[He stands at the desk with a fixed look in his eyes. The voices of THE PUPILS are heard singing these words :
[They throw pennies into his hat. He is standing close to the door, that he may hold out his hat to each newcomer.
[A moments pause. They all stand round in their places. TEIG still stands at the door.
truth. You have had your last disputation.
[TEIG, through all this, is sitting on a stool by the door, reckoning on his fingers what he will buy with his money.
[The Young Men laugh.
[They begin to hurry out.
[BRIDGET enters, followed by the FOOL, who is holding out his hat to her.
[The two CHILDREN come in. They stand together a little way from the threshold of the kitchen door, looking timidly at their father.
What are you doing?