Princess: Are you not satisfied to have urged
me to one man and promised me to another since
sunrise?
Queen: What way could I know there was
this match on the way, and a better match beyond
measure? This is no black stranger going the
road, but a man having a copper crown over his
gateway and a silver crown over his palace door!
I tell you he has means to hang a pearl of gold
upon every rib of your hair! There is no one
ahead of him in all Ireland, with his chain and his
ring and his suit of the dearest silk!
Princess: If it was a suit I was to wed with he
might do well enough.
Queen: Equal in blood to ourselves! Brought
up to good behaviour and courage and mannerly ways.
Princess: In my opinion he is not.
Queen: You are talking foolishness. A King
of Sorcha must be mannerly, seeing it is he himself
sets the tune for manners.
Princess: He gave out a laugh when old Michelin
slipped on the threshold. He kicked at the dog
under the table that came looking for bones.
Queen: I tell you what might be ugly behaviour
in a common man is suitable and right in a king.
But you are so hard to please and so pettish, I am
seven times tired of yourself and your ways.
Princess: If no one could force me to give in
to the man that made a claim to me to-day, according
to my father's bond, that bond is there yet to
protect me from any other one.
Queen: Leave me alone! Myself and the
Dall Glic will take means to rid you of that lad
from the oven. I'll send in now to you the King
of Sorcha. Let you show civility to him, and the
wedding day will be to-morrow.