We’d have better sport to-day
  If he got his will and way,

  Found the spell that lies unknown
  Underneath his own hearthstone.

(They disappear saying together:)

  Men and mortals what are ye
  Matched against the mighty Sidhe?

Conan:  (Looking out timidly.) Are they gone?  Here, Puss, puss!  Come hither now poor Puss!  They’re not in it....  Here now! here’s milk for ye.  And a drop of cream.... (Gets up, peeps under settle and around.) They are gone!  And that they may never come back!  I wouldn’t wish to be brought riding a thorny bush in the night time into the cold that is behind the sun!  What now did they say?  Or is it dreaming I was?  Oh, it was not!  They spoke clear and plain.  The hidden spell that I was seeking, they said it to be in the hiding hole under the hearth. (Pokes, sneezes.) Bad cess to Celia leaving that much ashes to be choking me.  Well, the luck has come to me at last!

(Sings as he searches.)

  “Proudly the note of the trumpet is sounding,
  Loudly the war cries rise on the gale;
  Fleetly the steed by Lough Swilly is bounding
  To join the thick squadrons in Saimear’s green vale. 
  On every mountaineer, strangers to flight and fear;
  Rush to the standard of dauntless Red Hugh
  Bonnaught and gallowglass, throng from each mountain pass. 
  On for old Erin, O’Donnall Abu.”

(Pokes at hearthstone.) Sure enough, it’s loose!  It’s moving!  Wait till I’ll get a wedge under it!

(Takes fork from table.) It’s coming!

(Door suddenly opens and he drops fork and springs back.)

Mother:  (Coming in with Rock and Flannery.) Here now, come in the two of ye.  Here now, Conan, is two of the neighbours, James Rock of Lis Crohan and Fardy Flannery the rambling herd, that are come to get a light for the pipe and they walking the road from the Fair.

Conan:  That’s the way you make a fool of me promising me peace and quiet for to sleep!

Mother:  Ah, so I believe I did.  But it slipped away from me, and I listening to the blackbird on the bush.

Conan:  (To Rock.) I wonder, James Rock, that you wouldn’t have on you so much as a halfpenny box of matches!

Rock:  (Trying to get to hearth.) So I have matches.  But why would I spend one when I can get for nothing a light from a sod?

Flannery:  Sure, I could give you a match I have this long time, waiting till I’ll get as much tobacco as will fill a pipe.

Mother:  It’s the poor man does be generous.  It’s gone from my mind, Fardy, what was it brought you to be a servant of poverty?

Flannery:  Since the day I lost on the road my forty pound that I had to stock my little farm of land, all has wore away from me and left me bare owning nothing unless daylight and the run of water.  It was that put me on the Shaughrann.