



Produced by Brian Foley, Jennifer Linklater and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries)






_BY THE SAME AUTHOR._

  THE SECRET ROSE.
  THE CELTIC TWILIGHT.
  POEMS.
  THE WIND AMONG THE REEDS.
  THE SHADOWY WATERS.
  IDEAS OF GOOD AND EVIL.




PLAYS FOR AN IRISH THEATRE

VOLUME III.




  THE KING'S THRESHOLD:
  AND
  ON BAILE'S STRAND:

  BEING VOLUME THREE OF PLAYS
  FOR AN IRISH THEATRE:

  BY W. B. YEATS


  LONDON: A. H. BULLEN,
  47, GREAT RUSSELL STREET, W.C.
  1904

  CHISWICK PRESS: CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO.
  TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON.




NOTE


Both these plays have been written for Mr. Fay's "Irish National
Theatre." "The King's Threshold" was played in October, 1903, and "On
Baile's Strand" will be played in February or March, 1904. Both are
founded on Old Irish Prose Romances, but I have borrowed some ideas for
the arrangement of my subject in "The King's Threshold" from "Sancan the
Bard," a play published by Mr. Edwin Ellis some ten years ago.

                                                      W. B. Y.




CONTENTS


                               PAGE

  THE KING'S THRESHOLD            1

  ON BAILE'S STRAND              67




THE KING'S THRESHOLD




LIST OF CHARACTERS

  KING GUAIRE.
  THE CHAMBERLAIN OF KING GUAIRE.
  A Soldier.
  A Monk.
  THE MAYOR OF KINVARA.
  A <DW36>.
  Another <DW36>.
  AILEEN,   } Ladies of the Court.
  ESSA,     }
  PRINCESS BUAN.
  PRINCESS FINNHUA, her Sister.
  FEDELM, Seanchan's Sweetheart.
  CIAN,     } Servants of Seanchan.
  BRIAN,    }
  SENIAS,   } Pupils of Seanchan.
  ARIAS,    }
  SEANCHAN (pronounced Shanahan), Chief Poet of Ireland.

  Pupils, Courtiers.




A PROLOGUE.[1]

  Footnote 1: Written for the first production of "The King's
    Threshold" in Dublin, but not used, as, owing to the smallness
    of the company, nobody could be spared to speak it.


    _An OLD MAN with a red dressing-gown, red slippers and red
    nightcap, holding a brass candlestick with a guttering candle in it,
    comes on from side of stage and goes in front of the dull green
    curtain._

_Old Man._ I've got to speak the prologue. [_He shuffles on a few
steps._] My nephew, who is one of the play actors, came to me, and I in
my bed, and my prayers said, and the candle put out, and he told me
there were so many characters in this new play, that all the company
were in it, whether they had been long or short at the business, and
that there wasn't one left to speak the prologue. Wait a bit, there's a
draught here. [_He pulls the curtain closer together._] That's better.
And that's why I'm here, and maybe I'm a fool for my pains.

And my nephew said, there are a good many plays to be played for you,
some to-night and some on other nights through the winter, and the most
of them are simple enough, and tell out their story to the end. But as
to the big play you are to see to-night, my nephew taught me to say what
the poet had taught him to say about it. [_Puts down candlestick and
puts right finger on left thumb._] First, he who told the story of
Seanchan on King Guaire's threshold long ago in the old books told it
wrongly, for he was a friend of the king, or maybe afraid of the king,
and so he put the king in the right. But he that tells the story now,
being a poet, has put the poet in the right.

And then [_touches other finger_] I am to say: Some think it would be a
finer tale if Seanchan had died at the end of it, and the