hange of tempo ...
A change of atmosphere ... The _Bois Dormant_, the Sleeping Wood of the
French fairy-tale?... Not that, for the Sleeping Wood should be a gray
wood, a wood of twilight, with the birds a-drowse in their nests ... And
here were clipped rich yew-trees, and turf firm as a putting-green's,
and rows of dignified flowers, like pretty gracious ladies; and a little
lake where a swan moved, as to music; and the sunshine was rich as wine
here ... all golden and green ... But the atmosphere? He thought of the
cave of Gearod Oge, the Wizard Earl in the Rath of Mullaghmast, and the
story of it ... A farmer man had noticed a light from the old fort, and
creeping in he had seen men in armor sleeping with their horses beside
them ... And he examined the armor and the saddlery, and cautiously half
drew a sword from its sheath ... And the soldier's head rose and:
"_Bhfuil an trath ann?_" his voice cried ... "Has the time come?" "It is
not, your Honor," the farmer said in terror, and shoved the sword back
and fled ... An old man said for a surety that had the farmer drawn the
blade from the scabbard, the Wizard Earl would have awakened, and
Ireland been free ... There was great beauty and great Irishness to that
story, but there was terror to it, and there was no terror on this sweet
place ...
He said: It is a trick of my head, an illusion that this is different.
Some shading that comes from the yews, some phenomenon of cliff and
water ... But even that did not circumscribe the rich grave look of
grounds and house. A song from "The Tempest" came to him:
Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange ...
That was it, something rich and strange, like some old cloister into
which one might turn from an inquiet and hubbubby street ... A knock at
an oaken wicket; a peering shy brother, and one was on green lawns and
the shadows of a gabled monastery. Cowled, meditative friars, and the
quiet of Christ like spread wings ... But there was a reason for the
cloister's glamour: cool thoughts and the rhythm of quiet praying, and
the ringing of the little bell of mass, and the cadenced sacramental.
All these were sympathetic magic ... But whence came the glamour of Tusa
hErin?
Section 7
And she said: "I am glad you came. I knew somehow you would."
"I am glad,
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