A bell sounds from the monastery.

GIOLLA NA NAOMH.

The bell is ringing.

The people of the monastery come upon the green in ones and twos, the Abbot last. The boys gather a little apart. Distant sounds of battle are heard.

THE ABBOT.

My children, the King is giving battle to his foes.

FIRST MONK.

This King has lost every battle into which he has gone up to this.

THE ABBOT.

In a vision that I saw last night as I knelt before my God it was revealed to me that the battle will be broken on the King again.

SECOND MONK.

My grief!

THIRD MONK.

My grief!

FIRST MONK.

Tell us, Father, the cause of these unnumbered defeats.

THE ABBOT.

Do you think that an offering will be accepted from polluted hands? This King has shed the blood of the innocent. He has made spoils and forays. He has oppressed the poor. He has forsaken the friendship of God and made friends with evil-doers.

FIRST MONK.

That is true. Yet it is a good fight that the King fights now, for he gives battle for his people.

THE ABBOT.

It is an angel that should be sent to pour out the wine and to break the bread of this sacrifice. Not by an unholy King should the noble wine that is in the veins of good heroes be spilt; not at the behest of a guilty king should fair bodies be mangled. I say to you that the offering will not be accepted.

FIRST MONK.

And are all guilty of the sins of the King? If the King is defeated it's grief will be for all. Why must all suffer for the sins of the King? On the King the eric!

THE ABBOT.

The nation is guilty of the sins of its princes. I say to you that this

nation shall not be freed until it chooses for itself a righteous King.

SECOND MONK.

Where shall a righteous King be found?

THE ABBOT.

I do not know, unless he be found among these little boys.

The boys have drawn near and are gathered about the Abbot.

FIRST MONK.

And shall the people be in bondage until these little lads are fit for battle? It is not the King's case I pity, but the case of the people. I heard women mourning last night. Shall women be mourning in this land till doom?

THIRD MONK.

As I went out from the monastery yesterday there was a dead man on the verge of the wood. Battle is terrible.

SECOND MONK.

No, battle is glorious! While we were singing our None but now, Father, I heard, through the psalmody of the brethren, the voice of a trumpet. My heart leaped, and I would fain have risen from the place where I was and gone after that gallant music. I should not have cared though it were to my death I went.

THE ABBOT.

That is the voice of a young man. The old wait for death, but the

young go to meet it. If into this quiet place, where monks chant and children play, there were to come from yonder battlefield a bloodstained man, calling upon all to follow him into the battle-press, there is none here that would not rise and follow him, but I myself and the old brother that rings our bell. There is none of you, young brothers, no, nor any of these little lads, that would not rise from me and go into the battle. That music of the fighters makes drunk the hearts of young men.

SECOND MONK.

It is good for young men to be made drunk.

FIRST MONK.

Brother, you speak wickedness.

THE ABBOT.

There is a heady ale which all young men should drink, for he who has not been made drunk with it has not lived. It is with that ale that God makes drunk the hearts of the saints. I would not forbid you your intoxication, O young men!

FIRST MONK.

This is not plain, Father.

THE ABBOT.

Do you think if that terrible, beautiful voice for which young men strain their ears were to speak from yon place where the fighters are, and the horses, and

the music, that I would stay you, did ye rise to obey it? Do you think I would grudge any of you? Do you think I would grudge the dearest of these little Boys, to death calling with that terrible, beautiful voice? I would let you all go, though I and the old brother should be very lonely here.

SECOND BOY.

Giolla na Naomh would not go, Father.

THE ABBOT.

Why do you say that?

SECOND BOY.

He said that he would rather be a monk.

THE ABBOT.

Would you not go into the battle, Giolla na Naomh?

GIOLLA NA NAOMH.

I would. I would go as a gilly to the King, that I might serve him when all would forsake him.

THE ABBOT.

But it is to the saints you are gilly, Giolla na Naomh, and not to the King.

GIOLLA NA NAOMH.

It were not much for the poor King to have one little gilly that would not forsake him when the battle would be broken on him and all forsaking him.

THE ABBOT.

This child is right. While we think of glory he thinks of service.

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 460