THE SIXTH CHAPTER
1
All through the summer, Henry and John Marsh worked together, making Irishry, as Marsh called it. They studied the conventional subjects in preparation for T. C. D. but their chief studies were of the Irish tongue and Irish history. Marsh was a Gaelic scholar, and he had made many translations of Gaelic poems and stories, some of which seemed to Henry to be of extraordinary beauty, but most of which seemed to him to be so thoughtless that they were merely lengths of words. There appeared to be no connexion between these poems and tales and the life he himself led—and Marsh's point was that the connexion was vital. One evening, Henry, who had been reading "The Trojan Women" of Euripides, turned to Marsh and said that the Greek tragedy seemed nearer to him than any of the Gaelic stories and poems. He expressed his meaning badly, but what it came to was this, that the continuity of life was not broken in the Euripidean plays: the life of which Henry was part flowed directly from the life of which Euripides was part; he had not got the sensation that he was a stranger looking on at alien things when he had read "The Trojan Women," "I can imagine all that happening now," he said, "but I can't imagine any of that Gaelic life recurring. I don't feel any life in it. It's like something ... something odd suddenly butting into things ... and then suddenly butting out again ... and leaving no explanation behind it!"
He tried again, with greater success, to explain what he meant. "It's like reading topical references in old books," he said. "They mean nothing to us even when there are footnotes to explain them!"
Marsh had listened patiently to him, though there was anger in his heart. "You think that all that life is over!" he said, and Henry nodded his head.
"Listen," said Marsh, taking a letter from his pocket, "here is a poem, translated from Irish, that was sent to me by a friend of mine in Dublin. His name is Galway, and I'd like you to know him. Listen! It's called 'A Song for Mary Magdalene.'"
He read the poem in a slow, crooning voice that seemed always on the point of becoming ridiculous, but never did become so.
O woman of the gleaming hair
(Wild hair that won men's gaze to thee),
Weary thou turnest from the common stare,
For the Shuiler[2] Christ is calling thee.
O woman with the wild thing's heart,
Old sin hath set a snare for thee:
In the forest ways forespent thou art,
But the hunter Christ shall pity thee.
O woman spendthrift of thyself,
Spendthrift of all the love in thee,
Sold unto sin for little pelf,
The captain Christ shall ransom thee.
O woman that no lover's kiss
(Tho' many a kiss was given thee)
Could slake thy love, is it not for this
The hero Christ shall die for thee?
They were quiet for a while, and then Marsh turned to Henry and said, "Is that alien to you?"