_ACT I_


_The interior of Murtagh Cosgar's. It is a large flagged kitchen
with the entrance on the right. The dresser is below the entrance.
There is a large fireplace in the back, and a room door to the left
of the fireplace; the harness-rack is between room door and fireplace.
The yard door is on the left. The table is down from the room door.
There are benches around fireplace_.

_It is the afternoon of a May day. Sally Cosgar is kneeling, near
the entrance chopping up cabbage-leaves with a kitchen-knife. She is
a girl of twenty-five, dark, heavily built, with the expression of a
half-awakened creature. She is coarsely dressed, and has a sacking
apron. She is quick at work, and rapid and impetuous in speech. She
is talking to herself_.

SALLY
Oh, you may go on grunting, yourself and your litter, it won't
put me a bit past my own time. You oul' black baste of a sow, sure
I'm slaving to you all the spring. We'll be getting rid of yourself
and your litter soon enough, and may the devil get you when we lose
you.

_Cornelius comes to the door. He is a tall young man with a slight
stoop. His manners are solemn, and his expression somewhat vacant_.

CORNELIUS