First Merchant Monologue from The Countess Cathleen

From The Countess Cathleen by W. B. (William Butler) Yeats

male · dark · 1:06 min

There is no sign of change--day copies day, Green things are dead--the cattle too are dead Or dying--and on all the vapour hangs, And fattens with disease and glows with heat. In you is all the hope of all the land. (CATHLEEN: And heard you of the demons who buy souls?) There are some men who hold they have wolves' heads, And say their limbs--dried by the infinite flame-- Have all the speed of storms; others, again, Say they are gross and little; while a few Will have it they seem much as mortals are, But tall and brown and travelled--like us--lady, Yet all agree a power is in their looks That makes men bow, and flings a casting-net About their souls, and that all men would go And barter those poor vapours, were it not You bribe them with the safety of your gold.

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