The Curse of the Fires and of the Shadows by W.B. Yeats

One summer night, when there was peace, a score of Puritan troopers / under the pious Sir Frederick Hamilton, broke through the door of the / Abbey of the White Friars which stood over the Gara Lough at Sligo. As / the door fell with a crash they saw a little knot of friars, gathered / about the altar, their white habits glimmering in the steady light of / the holy candles. All the monks were kneeling except the abbot, who / stood upon the altar steps with a great brazen crucifix in his hand. / 'Shoot them! ' cried Sir Frederick Hamilton, but none stirred, for all / were new converts, and feared the crucifix and the holy candles. The / white lights from the altar threw the shadows of the troopers up on / to roof and wall. As the troopers moved about, the shadows began a / fantastic dance among the corbels and the memorial tablets. For a little / while all was silent, and then five troopers who were the body-guard of / Sir Frederick Hamilton lifted their muskets, and shot down five of the / friars. The noise and the smoke drove away the mystery of the pale altar / lights, and the other troopers took courage and began to strike. In a / moment the friars lay about the altar steps, their white habits stained / with blood. 'Set fire to the house! ' cried Sir Frederick Hamilton, / and at his word one went out, and came in again carrying a heap of dry / straw, and piled it against the western wall, and, having done this, / fell back, for the fear of the crucifix and of the holy candles / was still in his heart. Seeing this, the five troopers who were Sir / Frederick Hamilton's body-guard darted forward, and taking each a holy / candle set the straw in a blaze. The red tongues of fire rushed up and / flickered from corbel to corbel and from tablet to tablet, and crept / along the floor, setting in a blaze the seats and benches. The dance of / the shadows passed away, and the dance of the fires began. The troopers / fell back towards the door in the southern wall, and watched those / yellow dancers springing hither and thither.

For a time the altar stood safe and apart in the midst of its white / light; the eyes of the troopers turned upon it. The abbot whom they / had thought dead had risen to his feet and now stood before it with the / crucifix lifted in both hands high above his head. Suddenly he cried / with a loud voice, 'Woe unto all who smite those who dwell within the / Light of the Lord, for they shall wander among the ungovernable shadows, / and follow the ungovernable fires! ' And having so cried he fell on his / face dead, and the brazen crucifix rolled down the steps of the altar. / The smoke had now grown very thick, so that it drove the troopers out / into the open air. Before them were burning houses. Behind them shone / the painted windows of the Abbey filled with saints and martyrs, / awakened, as from a sacred trance, into an angry and animated life. The / eyes of the troopers were dazzled, and for a while could see nothing but / the flaming faces of saints and martyrs. Presently, however, they saw a / man covered with dust who came running towards them. 'Two messengers,' / he cried, 'have been sent by the defeated Irish to raise against you the / whole country about Manor Hamilton, and if you do not stop them you / will be overpowered in the woods before you reach home again! They ride / north-east between Ben Bulben and Cashel-na-Gael.'

Sir Frederick Hamilton called to him the five troopers who had first / fired upon the monks and said, 'Mount quickly, and ride through the / woods towards the mountain, and get before these men, and kill them.'

In a moment the troopers were gone, and before many moments they had / splashed across the river at what is now called Buckley's Ford, and / plunged into the woods. They followed a beaten track that wound along / the northern bank of the river. The boughs of the birch and quicken / trees mingled above, and hid the cloudy moonlight, leaving the pathway / in almost complete darkness. They rode at a rapid trot, now chatting / together, now watching some stray weasel or rabbit scuttling away in / the darkness. Gradually, as the gloom and silence of the woods oppressed / them, they drew closer together, and began to talk rapidly; they were / old comrades and knew each other's lives. One was married, and told / how glad his wife would be to see him return safe from this harebrained / expedition against the White Friars, and to hear how fortune had made / amends for rashness. The oldest of the five, whose wife was dead, spoke / of a flagon of wine which awaited him upon an upper shelf; while a / third, who was the youngest, had a sweetheart watching for his return, / and he rode a little way before the others, not talking at all. Suddenly / the young man stopped, and they saw that his horse was trembling. 'I saw / something,' he said, 'and yet I do not know but it may have been one of / the shadows. It looked like a great worm with a silver crown upon his / head. ' One of the five put his hand up to his forehead as if about to / cross himself, but remembering that he had changed his religion he put / it down, and said: 'I am certain it was but a shadow, for there are a / great many about us, and of very strange kinds. ' Then they rode on in / silence.

It had been raining in the earlier part of the day, and the / drops fell from the branches, wetting their hair and their shoulders. In / a little they began to talk again. They had been in many battles against / many a rebel together, and now told each other over again the story / of their wounds, and so awakened in their hearts the strongest of all / fellowships, the fellowship of the sword, and half forgot the terrible / solitude of the woods.