Stories of Red Hanrahan by W. B. (William Butler) Yeats
page 17 of 46 (36%)
page 17 of 46 (36%)
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fiddle stopped, and there was nothing heard but his voice that had in
it the sound of the wind. And what he sang was a song he had heard or had made one time in his wanderings on Slieve Echtge, and the words of it as they can be put into English were like this: O Death's old bony finger Will never find us there In the high hollow townland Where love's to give and to spare; Where boughs have fruit and blossom At all times of the year; Where rivers are running over With red beer and brown beer. An old man plays the bagpipes In a gold and silver wood; Queens, their eyes blue like the ice, Are dancing in a crowd. And while he was singing it Oona moved nearer to him, and the colour had gone from her cheek, and her eyes were not blue now, but grey with the tears that were in them, and anyone that saw her would have thought she was ready to follow him there and then from the west to the east of the world. But one of the young men called out: 'Where is that country he is singing about? Mind yourself, Oona, it is a long way off, you might be a long time on the road before you would reach to it.' And another said: 'It is not to the Country of the Young you will be going if you go with him, but to Mayo of the bogs.' Oona looked at him then as if she would question him, but he raised her hand in his hand, and |
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