FOOTNOTE:
[E] To be spoken an octave lower than it would be sung.—F.F.
THE SONG OF THE OLD MOTHER.
W.B.Y.
I rise in the dawn, and I kneel and blow
Till the seed of the fire flicker and glow;
And then I must scrub and bake and sweep
Till stars are beginning to blink and peep;
And the young lie long and dream in their bed
Of the matching of ribbons for bosom and head,
And their day goes over in idleness,
And they sigh if the wind but lift a tress;
While I must work because I am old,
And the seed of the fire gets feeble and cold.
Printed by A. H. Bullen, at The Shakespeare Head Press, Stratford-on-Avon.
Transcriber’s Notes:
Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
Page 25, stage direction, mixed case “TEIg” was changed to “TEIG” (TEIG and SHEMUS go out)
Page 70, “marhsalled” changed to “marshalled” (marshalled into rude order)
Page 112, “The CHILD” changed to “THE CHILD” to match rest of usage in text (THE CHILD makes a)
Page 214, “Les Matinées de Timothé Trimm” was retained as printed as it appears spelled this way in more than one text. More common is “Les Matinées de Timothée Trimm.”
Page 216, “apre” changed to “après” (Deux jours après)
Page 217, “Des” changed to “Dès” (Dès qu’elle fut)
Page 218, “enchainés” changed to “enchaînés” (enchaînés dans une prison)
Music Transcriber’s Notes:
Rhythms have been added to all songs where words are to be spoken on a single note, to match the rhythm of speech.
Shadowy Waters—Although Yeats states in his notes on the music (pp. 223-24) that this piece was played on a violin in actual performance, he states that it is meant to be “Forgael’s magic harp.” For that reason, and reasons of improved sound in midi, a harp sound has been used.
The Airy Bachelor—in bar 3, the second and fourth quarter notes have been corrected to eighths. In “Johnnie Gibbons,” bar 1, the first note should be a dotted quarter. In “The Lion shall lose his strength,” bar 3, the first note should be a dotted quarter.
I—The rests should be quarter rests. II and III—The key and time signature are missing in the original, so the transcriber has guessed at them and adjusted the rhythm to the words.
The Song of Wandering Aengus—a sixteenth rest and fermata have been added to bar 7 to match the rhythm of the other lines in the song.
The Song of the Old Mother—In bars 3 and 19, the first note should be sharp. In the line “And they sigh if the wind but lift a tress,” the eighth note for “but” should be in the next bar.