ands whispering to_
BRIDGET.]

MICHAEL. Have you no one to care you in your age, ma'am?

OLD WOMAN. I have not. With all the lovers that brought me their love,
I never set out the bed for any.

MICHAEL. Are you lonely going the roads, ma'am?

OLD WOMAN. I have my thoughts and I have my hopes.

MICHAEL. What hopes have you to hold to?

OLD WOMAN. The hope of getting my beautiful fields back again; the hope
of putting the strangers out of my house.

MICHAEL. What way will you do that, ma'am?

OLD WOMAN. I have good friends that will help me. They are gathering to
help me now. I am not afraid. If they are put down to-day, they will
get the upper hand to-morrow. [_She gets up._] I must be going to meet
my friends. They are coming to help me, and I must be there to welcome
them. I must call the neighbours together to welcome them.

MICHAEL. I will go with you.

BRIDGET. It is not her friends you have to go and welcome, Michael; it
is the girl coming into the house you have to welcome. You have plenty
to do, it is food and drink you have to bring to the house. The woman
that is coming home is not coming with empty hands; you would not have
an empty house before her. [_To the_ OLD WOMAN.] Maybe you don't know,
ma'am, that my son is going to be married to-morrow.

OLD WOMAN. It is not a man going to his marriage that I look to for
help.

PETER [_to_ BRIDGET]. Who is she, do you think, at all?

BRIDGET. You did not tell us your name yet, ma'am.

OLD WOMAN. Some call me the Poor Old Woman, and there are some that
call me Cathleen, the daughter of Houlihan.

PETER. I think I knew someone of that name once. Who was it, I wonder?
It must have been someone I knew when I was a boy. No, no, I remember,
I heard it in a song.

OLD WOMAN [_who is standing in the doorway_]. They are wondering that
there were songs made for me; there have been many songs made for me. I
heard one on the wind this morning. [_She sings._]

Do not make a great keening
When the graves have been dug to-morrow.
Do not call the white-scarfed riders
To the burying that shall be to-morrow.

Do not spread food to call strangers
To the wakes that shall be to-morrow;
Do not give money for prayers
For the dead that shall die to-morrow ...

they will have no need of prayers, they will have no need of prayers.

MICHAEL. I do not know what that song means, but tell me something I
can do for you.

PETER.