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 9 
 
A STORY-TELLER'S HOLIDAY 
 
A STORY-TELLER'S 
 HOLIDAY 
 
 BY 
 
 GEORGE MOORE 
 
 LONDON 
 
 PRIVATELY PRINTED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY BY 
 
 1918 
 
A LEAVE-TAKING 
 
 A LEAVE-TAKING this certainly is of a great many 
 readers, but I have faith in the good sense of all my 
 readers, for they are not a heterogeneous crowd, but a 
 family, and every one of the family knows how steadfast 
 the persecution of my writings has been since the publica- 
 tion, forty years ago, of a little volume of poems entitled 
 Flowers of Passion. 
 
 As I write I can hear a reader saying to himself as he 
 paces his room : it is not two years since somebody sub- 
 mitted to the Court at Bow Street that The Brook Kerith 
 should be interdicted but the magistrate refused to issue 
 a warrant ; and last November in the Law Courts the jury, 
 after having listened a whole day to a libel action, returned 
 a verdict of no libel and no damages. But the fact that 
 the magistrate refused to grant a warrant and the jury to 
 convict is not sufficient compensation for the proffered 
 insults, and our author has done well to retire into a 
 literary aicanum where he will be able to practise his 
 art in dignified privacy. 
 
 Another reader crosses his legs and meditates : George 
 Moore was never welcome in Grub Street for he wished to 
 write for men and women of letters, and this class is not 
 recognised by the libraries as readers of books ; strange 
 that it should be so, but it is so, for whilst there are books 
 for astronomers, for scientists, for doctors, for lawyers, for 
 golfers, for cricketers, for chess players, for yachtsmen, 
 and as for young girls in their teens, voluminous literature 
 awaits them every year, there are no books written for 
 men and women of letters exclusively. By private print- 
 ing our author has cut himself off from many readers, but 
 the alternative was for him to cease writing. 
 
 ▼ 
 
A STORY-TELLER'S 
 HOLIDAY 
 
 This edition consists of 1000 copies^ 
 numbered and signed. 
 
 This is iVb..M5 
 
 ft^^^ 4]/C cv 
 
 7 
 
aHa.Ki:iT-Yfl()T« / 
 
 ♦ 
 
 
A STORY-TELLER'S 
 HOLIDAY 
 
 CHAP. I. 
 
 THE Irish mail passes out of Euston Station with the 
 easy movement of a deep, smooth river, or of a reptile 
 gliding over soft grass, and the feeling of contentment and 
 M^ell-being, almost of happiness, produced by the vague 
 rhythm of the train is augmented by the beauty of the 
 fields and their hedgerows unfolding mile after mile 
 under the languor of a June sunset. And all this while 
 the traveller perceives the elms showing fine design on 
 the fading day, rising out of the may with noble gesture, 
 almost like sculpture, he murmurs, as he yields himself to 
 admiration of the trees advancing and retiring, forming 
 into groups at the corners of the fields and collecting into 
 woods on the hill-sides. And no sooner have they collected 
 themselves into woods, he says, than they disperse to 
 gather themselves again into thickets, shaws and copses. 
 Going to Ireland, he continues, is like travelling through 
 a forest with clearings in it. The word forest, however, 
 does not satisfy him ; it is too evocative of wild and un- 
 couth nature such as we have not here, he adds. A chase, 
 perhaps, but even a chase conveys an idea of almost wild 
 landscape, and this one is deliberately wooded ; it is a 
 well-ordered domain through which the train carries us 
 like a smooth river. And the feeling of contentment 
 and well-being, almost of happiness, that began to take 
 possession of him soon after the train left London returns 
 A 1 
 
now exalted by what remains of the sunset ; a faint flush 
 seen through grey clouds ; a bygone sunset, the traveller 
 remarks, taking pleasure in the words. We pursue the 
 sunset, he mutters to himself, and, amused by the thought 
 that himself and his fellow-travellers are raiders in pursuit 
 of the sunset's gold, he begins to dream a romantic fable, 
 and the paragraphs end so prettily in his dream that he 
 thinks he has written the story, and experiences on arriving 
 at Rugby some faint surprise when the newspaper boy 
 does not offer to sell him a book entitled Sunset's Gold, 
 with his name upon it — ^just published, sir. 
 
 The dreaming traveller is none other, O reader, than 
 thy friend George Moore, come to entertain thee once 
 more ; and having robbed the sunset's gold, reader, we 
 are now flying through the night, pursued by the Dawn, 
 who would recover the gold robbed of her sister. Thou' It 
 forgive this attempt to entertain thee with a literary 
 sequel as false as such things usually are, and thou shalt 
 not be imposed upon. Between London and Rugby we did 
 seem like travellers in pursuit of the sunset, but when 
 the train rolled out of Rugby we became commonplace 
 travellers on our way to Dublin, myself ashamed of my 
 fable, at least of the second part of it, and glad to know 
 that nobody need ever hear anything about it, not even 
 my publisher. 
 
 The evening paper was opened, but it proved itself to be 
 so eventless that I was compelled into a deep scrutiny 
 of the man sitting opposite to me, but despite my study 
 of him, he has passed out of my mind I fear for ever. 
 All I can recall in present time is a tall man of rather 
 common appearance, who spoke with a brogue and 
 
 told me that he travelled for Again my memory 
 
 is at fault, I cannot remember if he was in the dry 
 goods or the whisky line, but am persuaded that our con- 
 versation began with : I hope, sir, we shall have a fine 
 crossing. 
 
Of course, I answered, we shall have a fine crossing, 
 how can you doubt it? At which my fellow-traveller's 
 face became overcast, and after a pause he said : may I 
 ask, sir, why you're sure we shall have a fine crossing? 
 Because I am I, an alarm-provoking remark that I sought 
 to quieten later, saying that having crossed the Irish 
 Sea so many times without seeing anything like a 
 wave I had come to regard the Irish Sea as waveless. 
 Elsewhere there are waves, no doubt ; we read of waves 
 in the newspapers and in books, and my friends have 
 spoken to me about waves, but so far as my own experi- 
 ence goes waves do not exist. And after all, I added, one 
 must be guided by one's own experience rather than by 
 what one reads and hears ; isn't that so ? 
 
 My fellow-traveller looked at me inquiringly, and as if 
 dissatisfied with his examination of my face returned to 
 his newspaper. But soon after I began to notice that he 
 was watching me again over the rims of his spectacles, 
 and like one who is unable to conquer his curiosity he 
 said : I believe you when you say that the Irish Sea is 
 always calm when you cross it, and that you have crossed 
 it some hundreds of times, but will you tell me what 
 conclusion you draw from the uninterrupted good luck 
 which has attended you ? I answered that I submitted 
 the facts to him and that it was for him to draw con- 
 clusions, and he asked me if he would have my approval 
 if he concluded from the facts before him that the sea 
 did not wish to destroy me. On the contrary, I answered. 
 The sea is kind to those whom it has selected to destroy. 
 My life will end in the sea, but not necessarily in the 
 Irish Sea. It is a relief, however, in a way to know what 
 one's end will be. Have you never received tidings } 
 
 My fellow-traveller returned to his newspaper and it 
 was some time before he made another remark. You 
 believe then, sir, that life and death is determined at 
 birth and that none can escape his fate.^ Before I can 
 
answer you I must ask if you're a Protestant or a Catholic. 
 But it doesn't matter which, in either case you believe 
 that not a sparrow falls to the ground without it is his 
 will. Isn't that so ? He answered that he believed God 
 to be all-knowing, and again returned to his paper. At 
 Crewe, however, he laid it aside and poked his head out 
 of the window. I think you're right, sir, we shall have 
 a fine crossing. Didn't I tell you, sir, that there are no 
 waves when I cross the Irish Channel .'' You're unbelieving 
 and incredulous, yet you wear the credulous Catholic face. 
 
 As my fellow-traveller admitted himself to be a Catholic 
 it seemed to me pleasing to relate that Protestantism and 
 Catholicism were founded the same day at Antioch, and 
 till the Menai Bridge interrupted my narrative, I made 
 plain the differences that existed between Peter and Paul. 
 But as no trace of the objections he raised to my theology 
 between the Menai Tunnel and Holyhead is discover- 
 able, however diligently I search my memory, I presume 
 that we wearied a little of each other during the journey 
 across Anglesea: or else we became so absorbed by the\ 
 beauty of the twilight that we forgot Peter and Paul, as 
 excellent a thing to do as it is to remember them, for had 
 it not been for Peter and Paul I might not have been able 
 to abandon myself wholeheartedly to the beauty of the 
 almost transparent veil that falls across the sky in June, 
 dividing night from day by not more than two or three 
 hours, and to the almost equal beauty of the twilit sea. 
 
 In another hour the first gulls will be flying round us, 
 I said to myself, and sat with my eyes fixed on the east 
 till I beheld bars of silver and a great phantom ship 
 looming through the dusk. The night, I said, has 
 begun to evaporate like a pale curl of blue smoke ; it 
 was not much more, I added, and dropped into dreams 
 of the romance of sails rising, yard after yard, the top- 
 gallant yard melting into clouds and the sails drawing 
 the great ship charged with many destinies away, whither } 
 
Perhaps to end by the firing of a German torpedo. At 
 these words I felt for the tube whereby my hfe-belt 
 was inflated^ saying, and saying well : if we be torpedoed 
 I have as good a chance to be saved as another, for as 
 soon as the torpedo crashes into us I shall blow out the 
 life-belt and shall be picked up in not less than an hour 
 or two of immersion in the cool sea, somewhat exhausted 
 but alive. 
 
 CHAP. II. 
 
 IT must have been soon after this pleasing thought 
 that the gentleman in the dry goods or the whisky line 
 who had travelled with me from Rugby took the seat 
 beside me, and began : well, sir, as is usual the sea is 
 waveless, and I answered him that if he wished it to be 
 waveless when he returned he had better return with me. 
 The suggestion seemed to appeal to him, but from a 
 certain embarrassment in his manner I judged that he 
 was minded to put a question. 
 
 Have you ever been for a long sea voyage ? he asked, 
 and I answered him that I had never been across the 
 Atlantic, but that I had been six days out to sea from 
 Marseilles to Port Said. And never seen a wave ? he 
 inquired. At most a slight swell, a wave implies a white 
 crest, I replied, and seeing that he was not averse from hear- 
 ing an account of my voyage I began to tell a dream that 
 has murmured in me ever since my father took me on his 
 knee to tell me his travels. As far back as I can remember, 
 I said, the Mediterranean has appeared always in my 
 imagination as the bluest of seas and as the birthplace 
 of all beautiful legends and stories. The bluest and 
 beautifullest of seas, I said, hoping to cow my fellow- 
 traveller with alliteration. But he was eager for some 
 information regarding Marseilles, and I told him briefly 
 
of the strange white shore that we sailed past, chalk cliff 
 or salt, ghostly shores, I said, on which nothing grows. 
 A rabbit could not pick up a living, I interjected. But 
 weren't you curious to know if it was a promontory or an 
 island that you sailed past.'' I had no mind for geo- 
 graphical details, I was thinking of Sicily, for it was in 
 Sicily that rugged Polyphemus peering over some cliffs 
 discerned Galatea in the foam, and it was on the Plain of 
 Enna that Proserpine was raped while gathering flowers 
 with her maidens ; but none of my fellow-travellers could 
 be persuaded to listen to these stories, and I swore that 
 when I descended to the dusky halls where she sat 
 beside Pluto I should not forget to bring her a bunch of 
 asphodels to remind her of this world's beauty, almost 
 forgotten by her. None, I continued, had a thought for 
 these beautiful legends ; they were interested to see a 
 vulgar volcano eruptive on the horizon. I begged of 
 them to remember that we should soon be passing the 
 very place where Jupiter disguised in the form of a bull 
 carried away Europa for his pleasure and for hers. But 
 you, sir, are perhaps as indifferent to these stories as 
 they, yet the garlanded bull, stemming the waves, Europa 
 keeping her seat on one shoulder by the help of a horn, 
 the sea nymphs singing hymns and throwing their tresses 
 for joy in the air while Tritons blew conch shells, was a 
 finer sight than a volcano. But, said my companion, you 
 don't believe in these legends } Nobody knows what 
 he believes, I replied, and nothing is certain but our 
 attachment to the legends that represent our ideas and 
 help us to live. Moreover do not all mythologies rely 
 upon the union of divinity with the mortal ; and does not 
 Deity in all the mythologies take the form of s©me beast 
 or bird ? In one story the Deity is a bull, in another an 
 eagle, in a third a dove, two women at least were trodden 
 by birds. I looked into my companion's eyes and waited 
 for an outburst. But he sat unmoved. Have I said 
 
anything that seems unreasonable to you ? I asked. I'm 
 thinking, he rejoined, that you'll not find many in Ireland 
 that will appreciate the stories you've been telling me. 
 You're not going there preaching, are you ? for if you are 
 be advised by me and turn back. No, I answ^ered, I'm 
 not going to preach anything. Then you're going to 
 Ireland to see the ruins ? And I answered that I always 
 took an interest in ruins wherever I might find them and 
 that it was for its ruins that we all loved Ireland. And 
 this remark led us straight into the Ulster question. 
 
 Without Ulster, my companion said, there can be no 
 Home Rule, and I asked him if he could tell me why the 
 Catholics were so anxious to get Ulster, and if he could 
 explain how Ireland could be free if Ulster was to be 
 coerced. My fellow-traveller stiffly repudiated any desire 
 on the part of the Nationalist Party for help to coerce 
 Ulster, and begged me to believe that the National Party 
 only desired Ulster because Home Rule would be 
 impossible without Ulster. Neither coercion nor cajolery, 
 he cried ; let them come in like men and help us to build 
 a new Ireland. We became strenuous, and continued 
 strenuous till I began to perceive we were missing the 
 sunrise. The dawn is breaking, I said ; tell me if you 
 think there are tones as beautiful as those flower-like 
 blues on any painter's palette, or a rose as pure as 
 those little puffy clouds like Cupids. I agree with you, 
 he replied; but without Ulster there can be no Home 
 Rule ; we must have a business head. 
 
 Let us not talk of Home Rule, but admire the morning 
 sun. And now a word of advice : if Roman Catholics 
 could think more of the sunrise and less about Ulster there 
 might be a sunrise in Ireland. Look, I said, how the sun 
 flashes above the horizon. You don't believe then, he 
 asked, that through a rising tide of discontent Mr Asquith 
 will bring about a settlement ? You'll have to define the 
 word settlement before I can answer you, I said. Nothing 
 
is ever settled in this world. Everything is becoming. 
 We can have no knowledge of anything, for nothing in 
 this world is permanent, unless talk. In Ireland talk is 
 
 permanent and yet But I have no wish to criticise, 
 
 I withdraw that last remark. And you'll do well to 
 withdraw the remark you made about Mr Asquith who 
 visited a hospital and addressing himself to a wounded 
 Sinn Feiner said : what do you think now of the re- 
 bellion } The wounded boy's answer was : well, I think 
 it was a grand success. And why do you think that ? 
 was the unabashed Minister's next question. Well, sir, 
 because you're here. You must admit that the Irish 
 have not lost their wit? But are you sure that the 
 boy's answer did not come out of an innocent heart? 
 I inquired, and my fellow-traveller no doubt gave an 
 answer, but it must have been a flat one else I should 
 have remembered it, and bidding my fellow-traveller 
 good-bye I said to myself: I'll consult the jarvey that 
 drives me from the station. 
 
 What will content you ? I asked. 
 
 Sure we don't want to be contented, he replied, and 
 it seemed to me that he had, unwittingly, expressed a 
 human feeling. 
 
 CHAP. III. 
 
 A FEW hours later the young doctor who supplies Dublin 
 with jokes entertained me on the steps of the Shelboume 
 Inn with his views, telling me that it was the rebellion in 
 Dublin that had given the English array a chance of 
 redeeming its credit. In every other encounter it has 
 come off second-best, he said, but in Dublin it can claim 
 a victory, a plausible set-off for the defeat of Kut. He, 
 too, represents another phase of the Irish mind, the one 
 that sees a joke or an epigram in all circumstances. 
 
thereby contriving to survive an habitual discontent. But 
 are there no ruins in Stephen's Green ? I asked, and he 
 told me the finest were to be seen in Sackville Street, 
 adding, that the oven changes many an ugly carcass into 
 a sweet-smelling roast. The oven improves us all — 
 houses as well as men and beasts, fishes and birds, and 
 potatoes are better baked than boiled. Good-bye till 
 dinner-time. And after dinner.^ I said, I will go to 
 see the ruins; they will be looking their best after 
 sunset, I interjected, catching something of my host's 
 flippancy. > ^ 
 
 But dinner was prolonged with conversation until the 
 moon rose, and then, remembering a phrase of Balzac's, 
 " In the moonlight the Place de la Bourse is a dream of 
 old Greece," I said to myself: ruins are best by moon- 
 light. But my host continued to talk on many subjects 
 till long after midnight, and the moon was waning and 
 The Irish Times was printing when I reached the Liffey 
 and saw the great skeleton fa9ades lifting themselves up 
 in the night. 
 
 Many of the buildings, the Imperial Hotel and the 
 Post Office, appeared at first sight uninjured, but at 
 second sight it was plain that they were but empty shells. 
 I shall have, I said, to wait for the sunrise to see these 
 ruins. At present they are but phantoms, a city that 
 has passed away — shapeless mounds that might be of 
 Babylon. I shall have to wait for another hour for some 
 traces of Dublin to appear, ruined portico or broken 
 column, which ? But martial law still prevails, I con- 
 tinued, and arrest, though it lasts but a minute, is un- 
 pleasant. I will adjourn to the office of The Irish Times 
 and write paragraphs till dawn ; and though rubble heaps 
 afford but slight pasture for the picturesque pen, it may 
 be that I shall discover something. Nature is so various 
 that I cannot fail to find something unexpected and 
 significant if I search long enough. Even if the space in 
 
10 
 
 to-morrow's paper be filled he might like an article — on 
 what ? I asked myself. And in the hope that a subject 
 would come into my mind while talking I went upstairs 
 unabashed (the editors of Irish papers receive visitors 
 while waiting for proofs), and it was not till one o'clock 
 that I began to notice that the editor began to weary of 
 conversation. My proofs are late to-night, he said, but 
 they cannot be long delayed ; and the finest ruins are be- 
 yond Rutland Square. You might walk round that way ; 
 and his last advice to me was to look out for a building 
 that had been shelled near Amiens Street Station. 
 
 Ten minutes' walk took me there. But how am I to 
 describe picturesquely a wall twenty feet high by forty 
 feet long with a hole in it ? I asked myself, and returned 
 to Henry Street wondering what the descriptive reporters 
 attached to the newspapers had written about the ruins. 
 They can describe anything, even a boat race, 1 said ; 
 it's their business. And it was while thinking about 
 their art and Marius among the ruins of Carthage that 
 I escaped as by a miracle from falling into a cellar 
 in which I should certainly have died, discovered by my 
 stench at the end of a week, and whoever found me 
 would go back to the office of the Times with excellent 
 copy. A lugubrious story truly of a reporter who died 
 in a cellar in Henry Street, and one that soon changed 
 to a story of a reporter who committed suicide amid 
 the ruins because he could not describe them. Not 
 being able to produce copy he became copy, I said, 
 and I'm minded to follow his example, for have I not 
 promised to write an article and up to the present have 
 discovered only a strip of wall-paper hanging from a ruined 
 wall which I could have seen in London any day : pathetic, 
 no doubt, but poor pasturage for the picturesque pen. 
 All the same, the mantelpiece up above is a fine specimen ; 
 and with much literary sympathy I fell to examining a 
 broken mantelpiece over which hung an overmantel, its 
 
11 
 
 mirror still intact and a piece of ornamental crockery 
 and a little French clock still upon its shelves. Here 
 is my symbol, I said, somewhat commonplace, but the 
 best I shall find. A pleasant home, no doubt it once was, 
 and in my imagination I saw a family collected round the 
 fender after the evening meal, mother reading a tale 
 from a popular magazine to the children, the cat purring 
 upon her knees. A somewhat commonplace subject for 
 an article, I said, but one that will please the readers 
 of The Irish Times. A plaintive "Miaw" reached me, 
 and a beautiful black Persian cat appeared by the fire- 
 place. A cat is almost articulate, and Tom asked me 
 to explain to him the meaning of all this ruin. He has 
 found his old fireplace, I said, and tried to entice him ; 
 but, though pleased to see me, he would not be persuaded 
 to leave what remained of the hearth on which he had 
 spent so many pleasant hours, and pondering on his faith- 
 fulness and his beauty I continued my search among the 
 ruins, meeting cats everywhere, all seeking their lost 
 homes among the ashes and all unable to comprehend 
 the misfortune that had befallen them. It is true that 
 the cats suffer vaguely, but suffering is not less because 
 it is vague, and it seemed to me that in the early ages 
 of the world, shall we say twenty thousand years before 
 Pompeii and Herculaneum,men groped and suffered blindly 
 amid incomprehensible earthquakes seeking their lost 
 homes, just like the cats in Henry Street. We are part 
 and parcel of the same original substance, I said, and 
 then my thoughts breaking off suddenly, I began to 
 rejoice in Nature's unexpectedness and fecundity. She 
 is never commonplace in her stories, we have only to go 
 to her to be original, I muttered, as I returned through 
 the silent streets. I could have imagined everything else, 
 the wall-paper, the overmantel, and the French clock, 
 but not the cats seeking for their lost hearths, nor is 
 it likely that Turgenieff could, Balzac still less. 
 
12 
 
 CHAP. IV. 
 
 A WEEK goes by easily amid renewals of friendship, and 
 verifications of the people of "Hail and Farewell," one 
 after the other — a roll-call in fact, all answering their 
 names except Bailey and Yeats ; Bailey died a few months 
 ago of a gun-shot wound, and already Dublin society has 
 forgotten him. His gift was atmosphere. He brought 
 an atmosphere of happiness into the room; a precious 
 gift truly for the conduct of life, but one so easily ap- 
 preciated that it is forgotten as easily as the passage of a 
 pleasant breeze coming and going in and out of a garden. 
 Yeats now lives, or is going to live, in a ruined castle in 
 Galway, for the sake of the spectres — such is the report, 
 which, however untrue, is an acceptable explanation of his 
 strange choice of dwelling — himself having become a myth 
 from too long brooding on myths, and myths being, if not 
 spectres, at least of the same kin. Another report avers 
 that his retirement may be attributed to his belief that 
 the poet should apply himself as soon as his poetry is 
 written to the weaving of a " Poetic Personality." And 
 at once the ruined castle rises before our eyes, for has it 
 not been said that a poet must live in a cabin or a castle, 
 these two dwellings representing the poles of humanity } 
 Yeats' belief in his relationship to the Duke of Ormond 
 precludes the cabin, and piecing the two reports, or shall 
 we say the two myths, together, we seem to be justified in 
 imagining him in the vaulted hall of the castle of Ballylee 
 — weaving the myths that will preserve his works when all 
 life has departed from them, passing the shuttle to and 
 fro, weaving industriously. Lady Gregory standing by him, 
 distaff in hand. 
 
 And these twain visionaries recall my old friend, the 
 Comte Villiers de L'Isle Adam, for Villiers believed himself 
 to be the heir to the great name, and the conviction strikes 
 
18 
 
 root immediately that he would have welcomed Yeats as 
 a dream for himself or as a subject of a story for others, 
 summarising our poet in some melancholy and ornate 
 phrase spoken by Yeats as he rises from the loom of poetic 
 personality one sultry summer afternoon before going 
 down to Coole. Though my heart be empty of all else, 
 he would say, his eyes wandering over the escutcheoned 
 walls (escutcheoned in his imagination), though my heart 
 be empty of all else, I bear in it at least the sterile glory 
 of many forgotten dukes. 
 
 CHAP. V. 
 
 YOU are going by the Limited Mail, sir? the porter 
 asked overnight, and I answered that I hoped there would 
 be in me the needful strength of will to turn out of bed 
 before six ; but it was doubtful. No fear of that, sir, the 
 porter replied ; I'll get you up, and if you leave here at 
 twenty minutes to seven you'll be in time: But it will be 
 as well to order the car for half-past six; these carmen 
 are always late and the horses on the night shift are a 
 sorry lot, hardly able to pull the cars behind them. 
 
 There'll be neither breakfast nor bath, I murmured, 
 and went to my room dreading the mental struggle that 
 would befall me in the morning. 
 
 Nor was it a less tough one than I had imagined it, and 
 had not the porter stood over my bed I should have slept 
 for hours. My father was the same before me, one to 
 whom an early rise was intolerable, only to see a horse 
 gallop could he manage it. 
 
 At last I threw my legs out of bed and began to seek 
 my clothes. The worst moment is over, I said, and at 
 seven minutes past the half-hour a car arrived drawn by a 
 horse that only a goat-herd could distinguish from a goat ; 
 and seeing that his horse, for it was one, did not inspire 
 
14 
 
 belief in his power to reach the station in time, the driver 
 began to condone his appearance, saying it was the worst 
 part of him, and amid many assurances we drove away, 
 leaving the last glimpse of the flowering green behind us 
 when we turned into Grafton Street, a desert as all streets 
 are at seven in the morning. But the emptiness of Grafton 
 Street surprises us more than the emptiness of any other 
 street, so accustomed are we to see it filled with thronging 
 passengers. Its faint descent tried the power of the horse 
 to keep back the car, and so feeble were his totterings 
 that I began to fear we should miss the train, but forgot 
 my fears as soon as we emerged from its narrowness, for 
 the beauty of the day appeared in a delightful blueness 
 overhead and in shadows falling westward from the 
 pillared porticoes of the noble bank. How delightful it 
 will be in Kildare, I said to myself, if we catch the train, 
 and to the jarvey, that no more than a dozen minutes 
 remained before the train started. 
 
 We'll be there in time, he said, and I contemplated 
 once more the destruction of many a back -yard. A more 
 than usually foolish revolution, I muttered ; truly Catholic, 
 I added, and was about to beg the jarvey not to whip his 
 horse so cruelly, but before the words could be spoken 
 the thought crossed my mind that if he did not urge his 
 heavily laden horse up the hill-side I should be confronted 
 to-morrow with the necessity of rising at six. It behoves 
 him to suffer, I said. We suffer differently, but we all 
 suffer. It is my suffering to witness his ; he will forget 
 but I shall remember ; and as soon as we arrived at the 
 station I applied myself to the elucidation of many 
 irrelevant matters connected with my journey westward, 
 and helped by the almost impenetrable dullness of the 
 railway porter succeeded in ridding myself of all memory 
 of the scarecrow horse. But no sooner had I comfortably 
 settled myself in a seat than his pitiful ness reappeared, 
 and remained with me till the train had rolled some little 
 
15 
 
 distance into the country, and it might have remained 
 with me all the way to Mullingar if a sudden memory 
 of the beautiful flowering country we should soon be 
 passing through had not blotted out his unwelcome 
 image. After all, I said, we arrived, and by getting me to 
 the station he achieved his destiny ; and with the same 
 industry that he applied himself to his, let me apply 
 myself to mine, which is clearly to recall the city as it 
 was all last week engarlanded with chestnut, laburnum 
 and lilac bloom ; yes, and with hawthorn trees leaning 
 over every railing. White, pink and rose hawthorn, one 
 as beautiful as the other, I continued, and fell to thinking 
 how last year travelling through the same country it had 
 pleased me to imagine myself in the part of Paris ! with 
 this difference, that my trouble was not to discriminate 
 between three beautiful women, but three beautiful trees 
 — a more difficult task than the one accomplished on 
 Mount Ida. . . . The white may be the beautifullest, but 
 which smells the sweeter, the pink or the rose ? I asked 
 myself. And mile after mile of hawthorn bloom passed 
 by unobserved, the reality blotted out by the potent re- 
 membrance of the hawthorns that had bloomed ten years 
 ago in my garden in Ely Place. The blooms in memory 
 are always sweeter than the blooms on the bough, I said ; 
 and on awaking fully from my meditation, I saw. 
 
 A country passing by me and in such incomparable 
 bloom that it seemed like madness. The madness of 
 May, I said, for the 6th of June is as much May as June, 
 and on this remark or aphorism, whichever it may be, my 
 thoughts fled away like the cuckoo at the end of June. 
 Whither they went I know not, nor do I know whither 
 the cuckoo goes or the salmon, only that bird and fish 
 return, and that our thoughts return too, sometimes bear- 
 ing in their beaks new thoughts, if thoughts have beaks, 
 and who will say they have not, and sharp claws. 
 
 And presently my thought of May returned, bearing 
 
16 
 
 in its beak a memory of Rossetti : one from the Blessed 
 Damozel, the lady who leaned out of heaven with three 
 lilies lying asleep along her bended arm — a gift for the 
 Virgin. A better gift for the Virgin would have been a 
 wreath of hawthorn, one that would have reminded her 
 more intimately of the beauty of earth than the lilies. 
 An oversight on the part of Rossetti. . . . But, no, there 
 are no hawthorns in ruined Galilee, and as likely as 
 not that is why everybody was so discontented with his 
 life in Galilee and failed to understand that our life is 
 beautiful because it is transitory, and that the joys of 
 heaven would weary us before we had been listening to 
 sonatas for ten thousand years. But if there had 
 been hawthorn in Galilee all might have been different, 
 March in Galilee is May in England and had there been 
 hawthorn in Galilee I should have noticed it at once. 
 
 And then, a little cross with myself for thinking of 
 Galilee, a country that is responsible for more wasted 
 time than any other, I said : the white, no doubt, is more 
 beautiful than the pink, and yet the pink tree that has 
 just fled past is extraordinarily beautiful. I remember 
 it from last year, and in my memory it exhales a more 
 subtle scent than perhaps the white. But am I sure that 
 this preference is not a prejudice sprung from the fact 
 that a large tree of pink grew in my garden when I lived 
 in Upper Ely Place ? And once again I fell to thinking of 
 the hawthorns that had bloomed for me ten years ago in 
 my garden. The blooms of yester year haunt us, I cried, 
 and awaking suddenly I saw a country passing, beautiful as 
 antiquity. And my thoughts turning to Thessaly I said : 
 
 Thessaly is too hot in June. Its nymphs and fauns, and 
 Silenus, should migrate here at the end of April and tempt 
 the druids of Maynooth out of their celibacy ; and then, 
 imagination taking the place of reason once again, I 
 began to believe that a nymph would reveal herself to me 
 if I were to keep my thoughts fixed on those dim sunny 
 
17 
 
 fields passing by, and sure enough 1 very soon espied one 
 reclining in a drift of haze that curled and went out 
 along the edge of a pond. 
 
 Goddess or cloud, God knows which, I cried, and asked 
 myself if I should allow the occasion to pass without stop- 
 ing the train to inquire, for to let such an occasion pass 
 without inquiry, I meditated, would be folly surely. But, 
 alas, at the moment of starting to my feet to pull the cord 
 of communication I foresaw the guard's face and the faces 
 of many passengers agleam with various anger at the 
 only worthy reason ever given by a passenger for the 
 stopping of an express train — that he had been vouchsafed 
 a glimpse of a goddess in a garment of drifting haze. And 
 almost as distinctly as the altercation between me and 
 the guard, the scene in the police court appeared to me, 
 with myself in the dock pleading justification for my 
 action, saying, and saying well, if a man may not stop 
 the Limited Mail to see goddesses in drifting haze, for 
 what may he stop the train ? A belief in goddesses being 
 essential for the maintenance of the world. If that were 
 so the world would have ended long ago, his Worship raps 
 out. But your Worship saw a goddess in the haze. Never 
 saw such a thing in my life, his Worship answers. But I 
 thought that your Worship married beautiful Miss Lynch 
 from Partry. At which remark a cloud gathers in his 
 Worship's face, and he declares that I am wasting the 
 time of the Court, but not before I succeed in interject- 
 ing : your vision vanished like mine, and am I to under- 
 stand that because yours endured a little longer than 
 mine I am to be condemned to the cells while you go 
 scot free ? 
 
 Forty shillings or a month, the magistrate cries, inwardly 
 pleased but unable to escape from the toils of the law. 
 
 And in such characteristic Irish fashion the adventure 
 would have ended : forty shillings or a month ! But forty 
 shillings have often been wasted on things as unimportant 
 
18 
 
 as the stopping of a train to see a goddess. My thought 
 melted into a dream of the subsequent assemblage of the 
 passengers, many of whom have been prone to search the 
 hedge-rows. Too late, too late, I cried ; my goddess is 
 now many hundred yards behind me . . . drunken up 
 perchance by the sun. 
 
 As if to console me, a poem arose out of my very legitimate 
 despondency, and in it Pan as he went down the Vale of 
 Maenalus singing pursues a maiden and discovers a flute 
 in one of the reeds into which he could pour his grief; 
 and then I fell to thinking of the name Maenalus, but 
 Maenalus is not a more beautiful name than Avoca; Greece 
 lacks our incomparable haze — the only fitting garment 
 for a goddess if she be not wholly ungarmented. Ah ! 
 if it were not for our incurable love of druids, Ireland 
 would be teeming with nymphs and dryads. The last 
 one was Etain, and we are told that the sweetness of 
 her legs pierced one of our elder poets to the heart, and 
 Mary whom we received in exchange has no legs, being 
 a virgin, or if she had any, nobody saw them, not even 
 her husband, so does a majority in this county aver, 
 whereas the majority in the county I have come from 
 says he did. An important question truly and one not 
 less difficult to decide than the hawthorn. 
 
 CHAP. VI. 
 
 I SUPPOSE the climate is answerable for the virginity 
 of our goddess, I said to myself, and the words might 
 have given rise to some pleasant fancies if my eyes had 
 not caught sight of a man in gaiters following a path 
 through a field in which a long herd stood up to their 
 knees in buttercups : one of our immemorial herdsmen, 
 I said, and some thought concerning him expressed in 
 Salve came upon me suddenly, and for a long time I sat 
 
19 
 
 chewing the cud of it, that the Irish herdsman divined 
 the steak in the bullock's rump with the same intuitive 
 perception as the Greek did the statue in the marble. 
 A long passage followed, one of my best, the point of it 
 being that the Irish should be content with having pro- 
 duced the finest herdsmen in the world. And the witticism 
 was continued into the sauce, for though the Irish had 
 discovered the steak the sauce Bernaise was beyond the 
 genius of the race. 
 
 A truly admirable appreciation of one's own country 
 and countrymen, and after having enjoyed it I cannot do 
 else than lose myself in admiration of the man's measured 
 gait, and approve his project, which doubtless was to 
 change the pasture of his herds. And having chosen the 
 field in which his cattle are to graze, I said, he will 
 stand leaning over a gate till dinner-time, an unending 
 exemplar of Ireland. He was in the beginning and ever 
 shall be, world without end. A race, I continued, that 
 does not change ; and at that moment an indolent priest 
 was being driven swiftly along a pleasant road bending 
 round a hill-side, and I added : he, too, is an exemplar 
 of the Irish race as it always was and always will be, 
 world without end. And whither goes he ? To a con- 
 vent to shrive some helpless nuns, or is he on his way 
 to Maynooth, where the meals are in accordance with 
 long ecclesiastical usage ; or to some rich farmer's house 
 chosen by him for stations ? 
 
 The priest to his nuns and I to my reveries in a train 
 that jolts and hurtles along at a fine rate by the side of 
 an old canal full of reeds and rushes. We passed a lock- 
 house seemingly in ruins. MacCan, I said, believed in 
 the revival of the waterways, but since his death the 
 canals have fallen into idleness, which is a pity, for the 
 life of the canal is in keeping with our unaccentuated 
 climate. But the ruin of the canal is not complete, I 
 cried ; for yonder comes a horse urged forward by a 
 
20 
 
 sapling freshly torn from the hedge. In Ireland nothing 
 disappears, all is that ever was ; and pleased with the 
 raciness of my thoughts, my eyes return to the landscape. 
 England, I said, does not fade out of Ireland until we 
 reach Mullingar, and after leaving Mullingar behind us 
 we pass many spots almost undistinguishable from English 
 scenery, for wherever the land rises out of bog rich fields 
 begin and the trees emerge like vapours. Corot should 
 have painted an Ireland. But why should his name have 
 come into my mind, for I am weary of spinnage and vapour. 
 A lonely country, sir. The words startled me, and I 
 could only answer my fellow-traveller : yes, sir, a lonely 
 country. But gathering from his face that he seemed to 
 expect something more from me than a mere repetition 
 of the words he used, I roused into some sort of mental 
 activity. The cattle aren't lonely ; they're always in 
 company like the monks and the nuns, I said, for in 
 Ireland the first thought in a railway carriage is — am I 
 travelling with a Protestant or a Catholic .'* His smile 
 told me he was a Protestant, and from his speech and 
 appearance I began to guess a landlord's agent, a man 
 between fifty and sixty, tall and lean, reminding me of 
 Don Quixote, and the Don's appearance is but the symbol 
 of the Don's credulous soul ; whosoever has been given 
 the body has received the soul, or some part of it ; and 
 I was therefore grateful to hear before we reached 
 Mullingar that he, too, had projects for the advancement 
 of Ireland, all of which I had heard before, but which he 
 seemed to exalt a little in the telling. And giving my 
 ear to him I heard again the project for the establishment 
 of factories for the compression of peat, which when com- 
 pressed would yield as much heat as coal ; with compressed 
 fuel Ireland will become a great industrial nation, he said, 
 and I answered that Ireland is so winning among her ruins 
 that it would be a pity to reform her. She has rejected so 
 many reformations that it would be a pity if she now — I 
 
21 
 
 was going to say if she put off her Catholic rags and 
 appeared in clean Pauline linen ; but a cloud seemed to 
 gather in my fellow-traveller's face, and instead of con- 
 tinuing my native protestantism, with a deft turn of words 
 I whisked the conversation back to economic difficulties 
 and professed sympathy with the building of piers, the 
 laying down of oyster beds and a tunnel under the sea 
 uniting Scotland with Ireland. Portpatrick and Galway, 
 I said, could be connected by a line of railway and the 
 bay thereby turned into a great Transatlantic port. A 
 big job, he said. True, quite true, I answered, but realis- 
 able in the end. It might, however, be better to begin 
 by setting up a bacon factory in Castlebar. 
 
 Every pig breeder, he said, could take a ten-pound 
 share, and in Mayo, he continued, every cottager owns a 
 pig. But can cottagers afford a ten-pound share .'' I 
 interjected ; and will you guarantee a minimum price for 
 the pigs ? and of all is the Mayo pig the kind of pig that 
 produces the London rasher } 
 
 My questions seemed to vex him, and we might not 
 have spoken again during the journey had it not been for 
 the rashers. It was their succulence that prompted him 
 to address me again on the advantage a bacon factory 
 would be to Castlebar and to Mayo generally, and wishing 
 to hear his views I assumed so pleasant an air of acqui- 
 escence that before long the bacon factory was lost sight 
 of and we were talking of the great changes that had 
 come over the country since we were young men. 
 
 In former times, my traveller said, there was the big 
 house, and the villagers always coming and going on some 
 errand or another ; the women coming up at midday with 
 their husbands' and sons' dinners. A poor one, it is true, 
 five or six potatoes tied up in a cloth, and a noggin of 
 buttermilk which they would get from the dairy-maid. 
 But in those days the people were contented with very 
 little, they never tasted meat but once a year and that 
 
22 
 
 at Christmas time, which they boiled in a pot, the 
 only knowledge of cooking they knew. When the 
 potatoes rotted in the famine years, the people had 
 nothing, there never having been any factories for the 
 making of cheese in Ireland. For some reason or another 
 the Irish are not cheese eaters. The Welsh, I believe, 
 are, and work all day nourishing themselves from time to 
 time with a bite of cheese and a sup of beer. And then 
 the Welsh are dissenters and radicals, whereas the villagers 
 here are Catholic and like the big house for the hum of 
 life always going on : the smithy with its clanging anvil 
 and snoring bellows; the carpenter's shop, its threshold 
 heaped with shavings — Micky Murphy in the background 
 making a door or a window sash, and more ready than the 
 smith himself to pass the time of day with whosoever 
 might have a moment to spare. And I mustn't forget 
 the sawyers, one of them in the pit and the other above 
 him, sawing some balks of timber for Micky Murphy, who 
 wanted timber for gates and door-posts. Always some- 
 thing going on, you see. And as likely as not some of the 
 house servants had come up from the village : their 
 fathers and mothers and their sisters and brothers were 
 all welcome. And then there was the landlord hanging 
 about the stable-yard with a couple of setters at his heels, 
 and he always willing to speak to the tenants on Saturdays, 
 hearing all their complaints, and when they had no 
 complaints, which very often happened, they came up 
 just for the sake of a talk. You see with all those things 
 going on the country was never lonely, but now all I am 
 telling you about has passed away and the people are 
 beginning to feel the loneliness of the country very sore 
 upon them. 
 
 But it was the tenants who wished to get rid of the 
 landlords, I interjected. Yes, that is so, my friend replied, 
 but you see the rents in former times were too high and 
 they couldn't pay them. But they'd like to have their 
 
23 
 
 landlords back again^ with smaller rents, mind you. Yes, 
 they would and leppin'. They'd sooner be bringing up 
 their notes as in old times to the big house than sending 
 them to the Board, which is a harder task-master than 
 ever Clanricarde was, and altogether without considera- 
 tion of special cases and circumstances. The way it is 
 now is that the tenant just pays and if he fails to pay he 
 goes, eviction in Ireland being easier than ever it was, 
 without police and sub-sheriiF. For you see if the Bishops 
 agree, and there are a dozen on the Board, that a man 
 must be put out, out he is put, for there isn't a man in 
 Ireland that would dare to raise his voice against a 
 Bishop. Out he goes and there's an end of it. Well, 
 all that is contrary to the spirit of the Irish people, who 
 have no taste for offices and clerks and routine work, and 
 who like to know with whom they are dealing, as they 
 have always done, and as their fathers before them : a 
 clannish people, sir, who have not yet forgotten the 
 chieftain they have gone to battle for. As I was saying to 
 you, sir, the people miss the hum of life that was always 
 going on around the old country houses. In exchange 
 they've got the land. 
 
 Well, a very fair exchange, I interjected. But how 
 long will they keep the land ? Isn't it always passing 
 from them again and again, for the Irish are a religious 
 people and every man will leave a sum of money to the 
 priest to say masses for his soul to keep it out of purgatory, 
 though this much must be said, it isn't the peasant class 
 that gives away to the priest but the small shopkeeping 
 class ; and the land it has gotten from the peasant goes 
 in masses for the repose of souls. 
 
 The news that the land of Ireland had been wrenched 
 from the landlords with so much trouble and was passing 
 into the hands of the clergy interested me deeply, putting 
 into my mind the thought that a third of the land of 
 England was Church property in Reformation times. It 
 
24 
 
 was, I said; the riches of the clergy that had set the 
 people saying — the kingdom of heaven may be for us, 
 but the kingdom of earth is for them. On that they 
 began reading the Gospels, and it would be a wonderful 
 thing surely if the avarice of the clergy turned the Irish 
 into Protestants, the same as it did the English. Be this 
 as it may, what Ireland needs is a new religion, and I pray 
 that she may get one. Which ? It matters not, but let 
 her get one quickly, I muttered, and almost immediately 
 after my traveller's voice awoke me from my reverie, and 
 the truth became apparent that all the while I had been 
 dreaming he had been telling a story. 
 
 It behoved me to reconstruct the first half from the 
 beginning, for it was beyond my courage to say ; what you 
 told me about the passing away of the Irish land from the 
 tenants to the clergy interested me so profoundly that I 
 missed a good deal of the story you are telling : would you 
 be kind enough to repeat it all over again .^ He might 
 very well answer my request : if you didn't care to listen 
 you must go without, and return to his paper, leaving me 
 looking out of the window at the landscape regretting I 
 had entered into conversation with him. All the same, I 
 said, it was stupid of me to miss the beginning of his 
 story ; and it will be more stupid still if I do not give my 
 ears at once to what he is telling about Joseph Appley. 
 
 CHAP. VII. 
 
 FM sure I heard him say that Joseph Appley was from 
 Wiltshire, my fellow-traveller repeated, and I tried to look 
 as if the evidence pointed to Wiltshire. I have often 
 heard Sir Hugh say that he picked him up in Wiltshire. 
 Joseph was a boy at the time, he said, and a boy is picked 
 very much like a berry from a hedge, like a berry ; I've 
 often heard Sir Hugh say that he picked him from the 
 
25 
 
 hedge and that he became immediately after the best cab- 
 boy in London. No matter what time Sir Hugh came out 
 of a theatre his cab drove up, Joseph on the box ready to 
 hop off it on the instant to open the door for Sir Hugh. 
 I have heard Sir Hugh say that he couldn't understand by 
 what process of thought Joseph divined his movements. 
 He seems to know them instinctively, were Sir Hugh's 
 very words to me. 
 
 But not having heard the beginning of the story I did 
 not know who Sir Hugh was ; an Irish landlord, I judged 
 him to be by inference, but could not tell in what county 
 till my fellow-traveller mentioned that Sir Hugh had won 
 the Chester Cup with Tomboy, and the Cambridgeshire 
 with Makebelieve. You must have heard of these horses, 
 he said, and I answered that the names recalled a past 
 time to me. A few moments after I remembered that 
 Makebelieve had won the race carrying nine stone, which 
 was considered in those days an extraordinary performance 
 for a three-year-old. In those days, my fellow-traveller 
 continued, Sir Hugh was coining money on the race-course. 
 There was Chimney Sweep, another great horse of his, and 
 Bayleaf was a fast mare, that won a great deal of money, 
 and would have won a great deal more if she had been 
 able to get the mile, but she always began to stop at the 
 three-quarters. Joseph Appley was doing pretty well too, 
 not a long way behind his master, not farther than a valet 
 should be ; a great pair surely in the old days, looked out 
 for at the cock-pit, the prize-ring and the race-course. 
 Sir Hugh thought the world and all of Joseph Appley, 
 who began, as I have told you, as a cab-boy and afterwards 
 became the best valet Sir Hugh ever had in his life. A 
 little extravagant. Sir Hugh would say, Joseph's maxim 
 always being that the best was good enough for me. Nor 
 was Joseph quite satisfied even with the best ; he'd always 
 tell the tradesman ; now if you do this extra well, I'll 
 give you a little more. But, said my fellow-traveller, at 
 
26 
 
 the time I am telling of, a little extravagance more or 
 less didn't matter ; a few pounds one way or the other 
 make no difference when you're winning big handicaps. 
 But the day came when Sir Hugh's horses were not so 
 fast as they used to be, and perhaps that was the reason 
 he took to himself a wife ; her fortune paid some of his 
 debts and allowed him to run horses again, for at the time 
 of his marriage he hadn't paid off his forfeits ; he owed 
 money to Weatherby ; and after his marriage — well, there 
 were politics, and in those days elections cost a lot of 
 money ; Sir Hugh's politics were not very popular, and he 
 had to spend a great deal in making himself popular : 
 the stud was expensive, and his lady wasn't content to 
 live at Muchloon alone while her husband was away in 
 England. She had people staying in the house all the 
 time, and with Joseph running the house on the principle 
 that the best of everything was good enough for Muchloon, 
 it is easy to imagine the great hump of debt that began to 
 rise up on Sir Hugh's shoulders. At last the day came. 
 I'm going back to London, Appley, to economise. Joseph 
 muttered (he always muttered a little) that he had 
 never heard of anyone going to London to economise 
 before. But wouldn't you like to come to London with 
 me .'* he asked. Joseph said he was too old. But I 
 should have thought that he would have liked to return 
 to his own country, I interjected. My fellow-traveller 
 rapped out that England was far behind Joseph by this 
 time and Ireland as far as ever ahead of him, though he 
 had married the lady's maid, a Catholic, who, of course, 
 couldn't marry him unless he promised to bring up his 
 children Catholics, which he did ; and when the family 
 left him alone in charge of Muchloon he made the last 
 effort to become an Irishman that an Englishman can 
 make : he became a Catholic ; but this change didn't alter 
 matters, for I think he was more English after the change 
 than before it. 
 
27 
 
 What sort of woman was his wife? I asked^ for 
 Joseph's unfortunate life began to interest me. A long, 
 melancholy woman, my fellow-traveller answered, and her 
 daughter as lank and melancholy as herself. The son 
 was a bit podgy like his father — well-meaning but good- 
 for-nothing. I think Joseph was always ashamed of his 
 family, the females especially : for I remember it always 
 seemed to irritate him if his wife and daughter were met 
 on the kitchen stairs on their way to the pantry. A pair 
 of long-faced, cringing women were the two of them ; 
 and the wife couldn't have been different from the 
 daughter; yet Joseph was mad to get her. A strange 
 infatuation that refusals couldn't cool. Propinquity I 
 suppose it was, she being the lady's maid at Ardath 
 
 and Sir Hugh always going to Ardath Master after 
 
 mistress and valet after maid, I jerked in. Something 
 like that, my travelling companion answered. I don't 
 want to revive old scandals, but there was a story going 
 that one of the ladies there loved Sir Hugh in his 
 bachelor days, and this I know for certain, that she was 
 the only untitled lady at the great dinner he gave after 
 winning the Cambridgeshire. 
 
 A curious piece of evidence to adduce, and altogether 
 insufficient it seemed to me to be ; I should have liked to 
 put a few questions, but withheld them, afraid to lose the 
 tale of Joseph Appley's misfortunes. 
 
 Well, one of his misfortunes was this : you see when Sir 
 Hugh died, the heir was a minor and wanted money to 
 spend on his pleasure in London, and to get this money 
 he applied to Joseph, who negotiated a loan from one of 
 the tenants, and when her ladyship heard that Joseph 
 had done this, she sent him packing into the village, and 
 Joseph in an Irish village was a sad spectacle. Every- 
 body liked Joseph, but an alien he was, never was there 
 such an alien before as Joseph, and to this day I'm 
 wondering how he endured the two years he spent in 
 
28 
 
 the village, and he was fully two years in Ballyholly 
 before the heir, who was then the owner of Muchloon, 
 restored him to his pantry. It was pleasant to see him 
 back in it; he put him back into his pantry, paid him 
 his wages, and these were spent on the farm, which was 
 a failure, for his two sons were, as I have said, helpless 
 boys, wastrels I suppose you'd call them. Some sort of 
 misfortune was always falling upon them, and it was 
 always some new misfortune they had to tell. The Irish 
 are very fond of sad stories, and the Appleys could tell 
 how the mare and foal had died on them, but they always 
 forgot to tell they were leaving their old father to starve in 
 the great Georgian mansion. Poor boys, they were starv- 
 ing themselves ; and it was fortunate that I went there one 
 day else Joseph might have died of hunger. What's the 
 matter, Joseph } says I. You're looking thin and pale. I'm 
 starving, sir, was all he answered. What could I do but 
 put my hand into my pocket and give him five pounds ? 
 But, on looking closer, his face told me he needed food at 
 once, and remembering I had brought some luncheon with 
 me I sent down to the stables for it and shared it with him 
 in his pantry, on the table on which he used to brush his 
 old master's clothes and clean his boots. He wanted to 
 open up the dining-room, but I wouldn't let him. We'll 
 just have a snack together, said I, and a talk about the 
 horses and the spring handicaps. Have you seen the 
 weights for the City and Suburban.^ Joseph said he 
 hadn't seen a newspaper for a long time, and I took one 
 out of my pocket, a copy of The Sportsmaii, a paper he 
 knew nothing about. Joseph's paper was Bell's Life. If 
 I came into the pantry unexpectedly he'd put the paper 
 into his press, into his wonderful press, out of which 
 everything seemed to come. You couldn't ask Joseph 
 for anything he couldn't produce from that press. His 
 press was a great wonder to me when I was a boy ; I used 
 to try to peep over his shoulder when he opened it. But 
 
29 
 
 Joseph was careful never to allow anybody to look into 
 his press. He'd just give what he was asked for and lock 
 the press abruptly. But one day I espied a packet of 
 newspapers, not one packet but many, and all tied up 
 with string very carefully. So you keep the file, Joseph, 
 if not all of it of the time when you and Sir Hugh were 
 about together and when you very nearly challenged the 
 Game Chicken to a fight you not knowing who he was ? 
 You see I remember everything you tell me. Even 
 Joseph could be flattered, but it required a little pressure 
 to get him to admit that he had a complete Bell's Life ; 
 why he kept it God knows. I've often imagined him 
 reading the prize-fights and the race-meetings and the 
 cock-fights all over again in the long evenings at Muchloon. 
 I supposed that was it, but he never told me that was 
 why he kept them, the most secretive little man ever 
 known: you might tell him anything and be sure that 
 he would not repeat it. 
 
 A little man ? I said. I imagined him as a tall, lean 
 hungry man. You got that idea, my fellow-traveller 
 replied, from what I told you of his wife : a tall, 
 melancholy woman. No, he married the very opposite 
 to himself Joseph was a short-necked, full-bodied, white- 
 faced little man, rotund in later life. Don't I remember, 
 my fellow-traveller continued, the short fleshy nose and 
 his running walk ? And did he live all alone in Muchloon ? 
 Did all the servants go away with Sir Hugh to London ? 
 I asked. Not all, my fellow-traveller answered. The 
 old cook and housemaid remained with him, but they 
 were very old and died a few years afterwards, blessing 
 the master because he left them on board wages. 
 Servants were very grateful in former times and thought 
 a great deal was being done for them if they were not 
 left to starve. And there were no complaints about the 
 dinners they were given, nor the rooms they were put to 
 sleep in. The servants always slept in large roomy 
 
so 
 
 subterranean dwellings in Muchloon, at the end of the 
 kitchen passage ; the eighteenth century in Ireland^ and 
 perhaps elsewhere, did not look after their servants as 
 well as the nineteenth. 
 
 Is Joseph still alive ? I asked, for my imagination was 
 now filled with the personality of the old servant, whom 
 I could see in my mind's eye taking the air on the weed- 
 grown terrace, and in my mind's ear was the peacock, the 
 last of a hundred, uttering doleful cries from the branches 
 of a great cedar. 
 
 No, said my companion, Joseph is dead ; he died in his 
 pantry five years ago. I saw him three weeks before 
 his death ; he was then eighty but still thinking of the 
 autumn handicaps, and as he fancied a horse for Cesare- 
 witch I said : Joseph, I'll put you on ten shillings. The 
 horse won, but Joseph was not here to receive it. I'm 
 sorry, for I'd have liked him to have won his last bet, I 
 said. It didn't matter. The ten shillings that I put him 
 on at twenty-five to one illuminated the last day of his 
 life, and perhaps he died seeing in a vision his horse 
 passing first beyond the post. An honest death-bed 
 vision *that would be. A man's death should be part and 
 parcel of his life. So Joseph died English to the last ? 
 Yes, my companion answered, Ireland failed to assimilate 
 him, and then, anxious to make amends at the end of the 
 story for my inattention at the beginning, I asked for 
 news of Joseph's sons, and learned that they had sold 
 their interest in the farm and purchased some cars and 
 horses. They were now car-drivers in Athenry, and 
 Muchloon stands empty on its green hill top, the 
 present owner not being rich enough to live there. The 
 most he can do, continued my fellow-traveller, is to keep 
 a caretaker in the house. When he goes the next man 
 will sell the lead off the roof, and Muchloon will be added 
 to the ruins of all sorts that encumber Ireland. The 
 finest assortment of ruins the world can show. From the 
 
31 
 
 fifth century onwards every century is represented ; 
 English and Irish ruins, ruined houses and ruined lives. 
 
 At the next station I was bidden good-bye, and lay back 
 in my seat with a very vivid impression in my heart of a 
 man that lived in the world unhappily. 
 
 CHAP. VIII. 
 
 ATHLONE was the destination of my travelling com- 
 panions, and when they were gone I had the carriage to 
 myself, but only for a few minutes. Just before starting 
 a man entered, and he came in so quietly that I did not 
 raise my eyes but continued my meditations. Neither 
 cough nor sneeze nor shuffle of feet nor rustle of news- 
 paper nor match was struck to disturb me : it was the 
 silence that awakened me from my dream of the old 
 English servant who had always remained a stranger, an 
 alien in the country whither chance had carried him. 
 
 My new travelling companion was a frail old man of 
 seventy: a priest> I said, grown old in his craft, and I 
 began to scrutinise his face, reading in it only obedience 
 to rule : like one asleep in his instinct, I added ; and asked 
 myself if he were ordered by his Church to commit some 
 act that raised his conscience in revolt would he accept 
 his conscience as his guide or would he place his Church 
 above his conscience ? The answer my reason returned 
 to this question was that the dilemma I had formulated 
 could not arise, for it was plain from the man's face that 
 he had long ago accepted the Church as his conscience. 
 
 He sat at the further end of the railway carriage, his 
 face bent upon his breviary and almost hidden in the 
 shadow of a large-brimmed hat. It was this partial view 
 of his face, a silhouette in which little appeared but a long, 
 finely cut nose, that reminded me of a face I had seen 
 many years ago ; and in the shadow of a hat, I said. I 
 
32 
 
 never knew more of the face that I am trying to re- 
 member, only the pointed oval and the long, finely cut 
 nose. The eyes I never saw, they were always averted 
 from me, just like the priest's eyes are now. If it should 
 be the same priest ! The word " priest " stirred my 
 memory, and of a sudden it became certain that the old 
 man reading his breviary at the further end of the railway 
 carriage was none other than Cunningham's spiritual 
 director; the priest who used to wait on Cunningham's 
 doorstep when I lived in Upper Ely Place — a tiny cul de 
 sac — five little eighteenth-century houses built on a sort 
 of terrace overlooking a garden, a square, about a rood of 
 ground belonging to No. 4, the house I lived in. A quiet 
 little old-world spot shut off from the grand houses of Ely 
 Place by tall iron gates ; marked off, I should have said, 
 for the gates were always open, and the rare sight-seer 
 led by chance into this forgotten corner of the city must 
 have often wondered why the gates were ever put there, 
 for what purpose — to defend Ely Place against the robbers 
 that used to descend from the Dublin mountains to raid 
 the city as late as the eighteenth century } The sight- 
 seer's fancy may have wandered into this explanation of 
 the gates and out of it into another equally absurd, but 
 it could not have occurred to anybody in the twentieth 
 century that the gates were merely ornamental, designed 
 with no other view than beauty ; he may, however, have 
 failed to notice that they added to the seclusion, and were 
 never shut for the reason that it were vain to shut gates 
 on a forgotten corner. 
 
 Often from my windows have I watched the vagrant 
 sight-seer pace the little pavement the length of my 
 garden and seen him stop perplexed by the old-world 
 beauty of the place, by the little alley of lilac bushes, 
 the laburnums, hawthorns and the great apple-trees ; the 
 flower walk filled with old-fashioned flowers, and the 
 pump by the elder bush under the fig-trees, could not fail 
 
33 
 
 to stir even the most sluggish imagination. Myself, too, 
 pacing the sward, my hands behind my back composing, 
 or idly at work in the flower beds on either side of the 
 gravel walk, or listening to the sparrows quarrelling in the 
 hawthorns or flying from the bees that often pursued me^ 
 or thinking of my neighbours whilst sitting under the great 
 apple-tree, must have added to the romance. .>», 
 
 At No. 5, a household of elderly women with a bo^ 
 destined for the Church, already morose. At No. 4, 
 myself. At No. 3, Cunningham, the man whose story I 
 am about to relate ; at No. 2, a couple of noisy girls with 
 a taste for brogue, dogs, bicycles and whistling. At 
 No. 1, a celebrated lawyer of retiring presence, without 
 a story, if that be possible. We all no doubt have stories, 
 and death is a tragedy which finds its way into every life 
 sooner or later, slowly or swiftly, and I know of no more 
 moving tragedy than the death of my next-door neighbour. 
 
 I often guessed him to be a retired tradesman, without 
 however being able to fit him into any trade. He would 
 not do for a grocer — grocers are men of serious mien, and 
 Cunningham, to put it bluntly, was a comic little fellow, 
 suited to the music hall stage, one whose turn could be 
 relied upon to revive the drooping spirits of an audience 
 after a sentimental song with harp accompaniment. A 
 butt of a man, as we say in Ireland ; thick-set, with a large 
 head and the rolling gait of a dwarf when he fared forth 
 after his dinner about three o'clock, always dressed the 
 same, in a yellow overcoat and wide grey trousers, a 
 corpulent cigar always in his mouth and a white flower in 
 his button-hole, a jolly little fellow to the casual observer, 
 but to me, who saw him every day, his humour seemed 
 superficial and to overlie a deep-set melancholy — the 
 melancholy of the dwarf, somebody once said, and the 
 words put a thought of Velasquez's dwarfs into my mind. 
 In earlier centuries he would have drifted into the palace, 
 but how did he escape the music hall, I often murmured, 
 c 
 
S4 
 
 and set to snail hunting while considering the little man 
 whose life was as strange as his appearance, for he seemed 
 to be without any friends, nobody ever crossed his thres- 
 hold except his servant, an old woman who always bade 
 me the hour of the day ; and it was from her I learnt that 
 when Cunningham went forth in the afternoon he would 
 not return until seven in the evening : and all that while 
 he'll be walking round Phoenix Park, she said, talking to 
 the many people he meets with on the way, for the 
 master is well known to everybody in the city of Dublin. 
 But he never asks anybody to his house, I said. No, she 
 answered ; no one comes here. But he's well known and 
 respected in the city of Dublin. 
 
 When we passed each other in the street he always 
 averted his eyes, and if I had been polite I should have 
 imitated him, but I could not keep myself from looking 
 into his comical eyes turned up at the corners, and 
 wondering at the great roll of flesh from ear to ear, and 
 at the chins descending step by step into his bosom. But 
 my knowledge of Cunningham did not exceed the facts 
 observed by myself and related by his housekeeper : till 
 one day, some months later, I was kept waiting at Sir 
 Thornley Stoker's, my presence causing the doctor some 
 embarrassment, for there was some shutting of doors and 
 a hurried exit through the hall that set me wondering 
 who the man or woman could be that Sir Thornley Stoker 
 did not wish me to see. The faint surprise this caused 
 was increased by the doctor's hilarity when I was admitted 
 into his study. He lay back in his Chippendale arm-chair 
 overcome by some uncontrollable mirth. At last in reply 
 to my demands of an explanation he blurted out : you've 
 just missed seeing Cunningham. I asked him to stay to 
 meet you but at the moment your name was mentioned 
 he snatched up his hat. It's a pity you don't know 
 Cunningham. Cunningham is Dublin in essence. You 
 see, read and understand Dublin in Cunningham. An 
 
35 
 
 epitome, an abridgment, a compendium of Dublin. But 
 why won't he know me ? The doctor seemed unwilling 
 to answer my question, and this made me very curious to 
 hear the reason, but I soon began to perceive that the 
 doctor did not know exactly the reason of Cunningham's 
 aversion. Very likely because we're next-door neighbours, 
 I said. There may be something of that in it, the doctor 
 answered, and all the while his lips trembled with 
 laughter. At last he could control his hilarity no longer, 
 and I watched him roll over in his wonderful Chippendale 
 chair. Now what is it ? I asked, and he began to tell me 
 that Cunningham was possessed of all the drollery of the 
 world and could control any meeting, do what he liked 
 with it, and then the doctor began to repeat himself, 
 telling me that Cunningham knew everybody and was 
 always overflowing with comicality, and seized by a sudden 
 memory the doctor exploded with laughter. If you had 
 
 only heard him just now telling But do tell me. I 
 
 can't tell you. It's the Dublin accent and the Dublin 
 idiom. It was all about Evelyn Innes. You don't know 
 what you've missed, and he turned over in his chair 
 to laugh again. No, there's no use my trying to tell 
 it ; you should hear Cunningham. But I can't hear 
 Cunningham; he won't know me. At last, apologising 
 for spoiling the story. Sir Thomley told me that I must 
 take for granted the racy description of two workmen 
 who had come to Upper Ely Place to mend the drains 
 in front of my house. 
 
 After having dug a hole, they took a seat at either end, 
 and sat spitting into it from time to time in solemn silence, 
 until at last one said to the other : do you know the fellow 
 that lives in the house forninst us? You don't .^ Well, 
 I'll tell you who he is ; he's the fellow that wrote Evelyn 
 Innes. And who was she } She was a great opera singer. 
 And the story is all about the ould hat. She was lying 
 on a crimson sofa with mother-of-pearl legs when the 
 
baronet came into the room, his eyes jumping out of his 
 head and he as hot as be damned. Without as much as 
 a good-morrow, he jumped down on his knees alongside 
 of her, and the next chapter's in Italy. 
 
 The crimson sofa, I said, with the mother-of-pearl legs, 
 and the baronet *' as hot as be damned " would be about 
 as much of the story as a Dublin workman would be likely 
 to gather from the book. 
 
 But if you had heard himself tell it, the doctor chortled. 
 He always speaks of you as " George," the doctor added, 
 and he again became speechless. Thompson, he said at 
 last, knows Cunningham better than I ; he pulled him 
 through a long and serious illness when he was landlord 
 of the Blue Anchor in Abbey Street. So he's a retired 
 publican, I answered. I always saw a retired tradesman in 
 
 him but But what } the doctor said. Only this, that 
 
 he reminded me more often of the chairman in a music 
 hall ; he can troll out a song, I hear him sometimes of a 
 Sunday morning through the wall; and behind the bar 
 he would be as popular as in front of the footlights. A 
 dangerous trade his for an Irishman, the doctor said, for 
 the host must drink with his customers, a sort of assurance 
 that the quality of the whisky is all right. So he's a 
 retired publican, I continued. And a very successful 
 publican, Stoker interjected. He brought seventeen 
 thousand pounds out of the business. But Thompson 
 will tell you more about him than I can. 
 
 Sir William Thompson was Sir Thornley Stoker's brother- 
 in-law, and on my next visit to 54 Stephen's Green I 
 heard that there was nobody like Cunningham to raise 
 a laugh against the clergy. Our clergy.^ I said. His 
 own clergy, Thompson answered, and he recalled some 
 of Cunningham's sallies. 
 
 But if he knows Catholicism to be so unworthy, 
 how is it that he has not discovered himself to be a 
 Protestai^t f 
 
37 
 
 Ah ! Sir William answered, you ask that question 
 because you haven't yet learnt to understand Ireland. 
 Cunningham was sent to confession when he was seven 
 years of age, and his confessor so kneaded hell into his 
 mind that neither drink nor women could enable him to 
 forget it afterwards. There's too much punishment in 
 our theology, and it is even more prominent in Catholic 
 religious education, for the Catholics have purgatory. I 
 don't know where they get it from, but purgatory is the 
 boy that robs the widow and the orphan for them, and 
 purgatory and hell work together in Catholic picture 
 books and prayers — red-hot devils stoking the fire, lakes 
 of boiling pitch, and with the excellent result, from the 
 priest's point of view, that the Catholic mind is paralysed. 
 With the front of his mind Cunningham sees that his 
 clergy think more of possessing themselves of the 
 property of their parishioners than of anything else ; that 
 they haunt death-beds and despoil widows and orphans 
 without mercy. Every month a will in which a man 
 leaves all his money for masses for the repose of his soul 
 is contested in the Law Courts. Cunningham knows all 
 this; he's a shrewd man, he would not have brought 
 seventeen thousand pounds out of the Blue Anchor if he 
 hadn't been a shrewd man, but at the back of his mind 
 there is fear of hell and purgatory. The doctor stopped 
 speaking, his face becoming grave and thoughtful. A 
 moment after he broke into a smile. To appreciate 
 Cunningham, he said, you must hear him talk ; a spring 
 of natural humour which you say you have never met 
 with in Ireland and which you deny exists. I'd like you 
 to meet Cunningham, but he's afraid of you, I think. But 
 why, I asked, should he be afraid of me ? He's a little 
 queer, but nothing serious, the doctor answered. 
 
 A little later Stoker returned to Cunningham's humour 
 and tried to explain it, telling that it flowed along Uke a 
 brook, as spontaneous and as natural, rising up out of 
 
S8 
 
 himself without artifice. Yes, I think I understand ; with 
 the smack of spring water on it, I answered, and the 
 doctor told of Cunningham's power over an audience ; how 
 he captivated it and held it by the raciness of his wit. I 
 should like you to meet him, he repeated. Bat if he 
 won't meet me there's no help for it, I answered. And 
 bidding the doctor good-bye I returned home, remembering 
 more distinctly than anything else what the doctor had 
 said about Cunningham's fear of hell. 
 
 Yes, I said to myself, that is the characteristic of Ireland, 
 fear of hell, and I fell to thinking of the Irish publican, 
 saying to myself, his seventeen thousand pounds may 
 develop easily into scruples of conscience, I wonder ! 
 
 CHAP. IX. 
 
 THE days melted into weeks, as their wont is, and the 
 weeks accumulated, and from my doorstep this year as 
 last year I saw Cunningham start forth every afternoon, 
 rolling down the pavement as one of Velasquez's dwarfs 
 might, a white flower in his button-hole, a corpulent cigar 
 in his mouth. He returned after having accomplished 
 several miles to a lonely dinner and a long evening by 
 himself. Sometimes, I said, he has the old woman up 
 in the drawing-room and chats with her. And little by 
 little the desire to discover a theme in which Cunningham 
 would display himself began to fidget me, and when the 
 sanitary inspector condemned my drains I sent his report 
 to Cunningham, who returned the report just as if he were 
 able to see into my mind and had read there that I could 
 not do else than look upon him as a type. If we met in 
 the street coming from different directions he avoided my 
 look, and he never stopped to gaze into my pretty garden, 
 and there were times when my garden was a very pretty 
 one, especially in early spring when the apple-trees were 
 
S9 
 
 in bloom, and later the hawthorns, and afterwards in late 
 summer, when the sweet-pea was in flower. But he never 
 looked at my flowers, and nobody ever came to see him, 
 until one day I saw the grey stony face of the priest sitting 
 opposite to me in the train on Cunningham's doorstep, 
 and fell to wondering what his errand might be. A few 
 days after I caught sight of the priest again, and hence- 
 forth not many days passed without my seeing him ; 
 every week he appeared on the doorstep, and the stony 
 face put thoughts into my mind of the terrors it was the 
 duty of the priest to foster : however much he might 
 deprecate as a man the despoiling of widows and orphans 
 he must not impugn the advantage it is to the sinner to 
 leave money for masses for the salvation of his soul. 
 
 The priest's face never changed expression, nor did he 
 look up at me; and though I often passed by him and 
 strove to attract his eyes, they remained fixed on the door- 
 step whilst he waited for the servant to open the door for 
 him. And the grey, stony face of the priest on the doorstep 
 pursued me during my walks, setting me thinking of the 
 drama in progress, only a wall, I said, separating me from 
 it: a poor little man of unbalanced mind rapidly losing 
 his wits at the thought of the almost endless ages he will 
 have to spend in purgatory, expiating the sins of his youth, 
 unless he leaves the money he acquired in the Blue Anchor 
 to the Church for masses for the repose of his soul. Sad 
 alternatives : to despoil one's relations or remain in purga- 
 tory, and in imagination I could see the twain sitting 
 opposite each other ; a look of horror on the publican's 
 face, the priest's gr^y and immovable. 
 
 CHAP. X. 
 
 ONE day as I came down to breakfast I heard a woman 
 talking to my servants and there was from time to time a 
 
40 
 
 great wail of grief in her voice, and in grave apprehension 
 I asked myself : what strange and doleful story can she 
 be telling, and my heart beat faster as I descended the 
 kitchen stairs. 
 
 What is this, what is this ? I cried, and a moment after 
 I recognised in our visitor the woman who looked after 
 poor Cunningham. 
 
 Oh, sir, she exclaimed ; O Jesus, Mary and Joseph, the 
 master is after hanging himself this morning out of the 
 banisters, and she continued her story, sobbing and wail- 
 ing from time to time, and by degrees I learnt that on not 
 finding him in his bedroom when she took up his cup of 
 tea in the morning, she waited, expecting that he was in 
 the closet, but as he did not return, and not hearing him 
 about she began to be alarmed and started looking for 
 him, and it was from the banisters of the top storey that 
 she found him hanging. 
 
 You don't sleep in the top storey } 
 
 No, sir, I sleep in the basement. 
 
 Was he dead when you found him ? 
 
 Maybe he wasn't; he must have gone up the stairs to 
 hang himself only a minute or so before I brought him up 
 his tea. 
 
 And he was dead before you could get a knife to cut 
 him down } 
 
 There was a knife on the tray, sir ; but I didn't like to 
 cut him down for fear that he would hurt himself in the 
 fall, and I ran out without my cap or anything to fetch 
 the police. 
 
 But for what reason did he hang himself.'* I asked. 
 He wasn't in want of money ? 
 
 No, sir, that wasn't it. He left the money a while back 
 to the Church for masses to be said for his soul. But you 
 see, sir, the priest used to be telling him that he couldn't 
 keep himself from the drink. Maybe you saw the priest 
 standing on our doorstep, sir ? 
 
41 
 
 Yes, yes, I answered. 
 
 The poor master often fancied himself a bit queer in 
 his mind, though, indeed, he was not, sir. He was not, 
 indeed ; he was as sane as you or I. It was easy to twist 
 him so that he'd go out of his wits, and he afraid that he 
 might lose the wits when there wasn't a priest next or 
 near him to hear his confession ; it was that was troubling 
 his mind. And that's what they would be talking about 
 upstairs, the priest urging him to go into John-o'-God's 
 and be looked after there. 
 
 John-o'-God's, I repeated ; what a strange name. 
 
 Yes, sir, but you must know it, the asylum up in 
 the woods by the Scalp. And it was fear of going there 
 that drove him to the hanging, I'm sure of that. For 
 only the night before, when I was sitting in the drawing- 
 room with him, he said to me : they'll never get me 
 as long as I have this hand, and they'll never get me 
 there. 
 
 It was at that moment that the front door bell rang. 
 My secretary, I said. She came down to the kitchen 
 and heard the story over again from the old woman, and 
 going upstairs together she said to me : I saw Mr 
 Cunningham last night returning home, carrying some- 
 thing under his coat, and his face frightened me. He 
 must have been planning it then. 
 
 Carrying something under his coat ? 
 
 Yes, one end of it was showing ; a rope it seemed to 
 me to be. 
 
 No, it wasn't a rope, a strap, I said. He must have 
 gone down to buy it and returned home as you were 
 leaving, about seven o'clock. Afraid of John-o'-God's he 
 hanged himself — only in John-o'-God's could he escape 
 from temptation, and only there could he be sure of 
 having a priest to shrive him at the last moment, and only 
 in death could he escape John-o'-God's. And once in 
 John-o'-God's he could not unmake his will. It's neat, I 
 
42 
 
 said, and the girl's eyes returned to me as we stood looking 
 at each other. 
 
 A moment after my eyes returned to the priest sitting 
 in the railway carriage, to the thin, refined face in which 
 there was neither cruelty nor kindness, only an impersonal 
 will, the will of the tooth in the cog wheel of the machine, 
 no more than that ; and I watched it till pity of Cunningham 
 turned to pity of the priest and a dream began to unwind 
 of the intimate horror that possesses a man when he begins 
 to realise that he is no better than a priest. 
 
 The train was stopping and the priest left the train at 
 Castlebar to continue his ministrations where and how I 
 have no knowledge. 
 
 CHAP. XI. 
 
 NO passenger for Westport entered the carriage at Castle- 
 bar to distract my thoughts from Cunningham's last days, 
 and for some time, how long I cannot say, I was con- 
 sidering how the idea of hanging himself had grown in 
 his mind, taking possession of it till nothing else seemed 
 real, or true, or worth thinking about. At times, I said, 
 he must have been attracted by the idea of escape, as a 
 hunted animal might be, and there must have been other 
 times when he remembered that to take one's life is a 
 mortal sin for which there is punishment. Yet despite 
 all the descriptions of hell that his mind had been 
 terrorised with, the fear of John-o'-God's was greater. 
 But how can one know what passed in that failing brain ? 
 He must have suffered vaguely and intensely, as a lost 
 dog suffers who knows not whither his master has gone 
 or if he will ever return, or like the bee that has gotten 
 into this carriage and strives to escape through the sunlit 
 pane. A poor bumble bee, a silly insect compared with 
 the bees that used to work in my garden forming combs 
 with such economy of space that the mathematician is 
 
4>8 
 
 obliged to say it could not be done better. But the silly 
 bumble bee merely makes a round hole, and therefore is 
 not able to lay up sufficient store of honey for the winter. 
 My knowledge of bee life here ended, and my thoughts 
 went to the poor bumble anxious to escape 'from the train. 
 It has been carried long past its hive, I said, if the bumbles 
 have hives, and will not find its way back. It will 
 wander among the furze of yon hill and die at season's 
 close, but that is better than to be slashed down by 
 the porter's towel at Westport; and forthright I began 
 a chase of the bee, handkerchief in hand, catching 
 the insect at last and throwing it from the window. A 
 moment after it seemed to be back again, or another bee 
 had come in, and overcoming some reluctance to continue 
 the chase, I began it again and the insect was put out to 
 seek sufficient honey for its life among the low rocky 
 hills; if it could not gather honey, to die as bees die, 
 very much as we do, I said, and in the enjoyment of my 
 satisfied conscience fell to wondering at the natural pity 
 that had compelled me to risk being stung for so faint 
 a result as the prolongation of a bee's life — a week at 
 most, I said, in some fragile bloom. By some odd connec- 
 tion of ideas the bee recalled to my mind a nun that I had 
 not dared to set free, and to help the time away I sum- 
 moned the circumstances of the happy sunny morning 
 that I started from Paris to meet a lady who was coming 
 from Etretat. We were to spend the day together at 
 Rouen ; and, being an adept in the mystery of time-tables, 
 she had informed me of the departure of a certain train 
 from the Gare St Lazare which would arrive at Rouen at 
 a few minutes past midday and she hoped to find me 
 waiting for her on the platform. 
 
 It had been arranged that we were to breakfast 
 together and visit the Cathedral afterwards, and to this 
 happiness I had been looking forward, and not less 
 eagerly to the hours between the Cathedral and dinner : 
 
44 
 
 for our courtship had lasted a long while, delayed by the 
 lady's sense of sin and its consequences, but of late it had 
 seemed to me that her sense of sin had weakened, and 
 so seriously that there was no saying what might not 
 befall her between Cathedral and dinner unless clerestory, 
 nave, aisle or ambulatory should cast her back again 
 into past and present perplexities of conscience. And 
 with the danger of the Cathedral well in my mind, 
 which could not be avoided, but would have to be faced, 
 I repaired to the railway station and waited in a dusty 
 station, enlivened only by the cackling of peasant women 
 and several crates of ducks and geese. The fowls, being 
 packed too tightly for comfort, cackled in terrified accents, 
 thrusting their heads forth, withdrawing them quickly to 
 avoid the caresses of a small boy ; and the same pity that 
 had compelled me to release the bee afflicted me again. I 
 should have liked to have given the fowls their freedom, 
 but this was impossible, and I walked perturbed and 
 wearied by the monotonous cackle of peasant women and 
 fowls, till at last a nun lifted her eyes to mine as she 
 passed me by : a strange glance of inquiry it was, a look 
 that I could not do else than to interpret as the appeal 
 of one human being to another for help. That her look 
 was one of appeal I am certain now, after many years, but 
 in the railway station it was different. I remembered as 
 I walked back and forth that I had heard of prostitutes 
 disguising themselves as nuns, but I did not believe the 
 nun who had raised her eyes to mine was a prostitute. If 
 I had, her image would have worn away like the image 
 on a coin, whereas her image is as clear in my mind as 
 the image on a coin just come from the mint ; a long thin 
 pointed oval face, well-shapen grey eyes illuminating a 
 white formal pallor, a long thin nose and a small chin; 
 a plain woman it is true, but her plainness was an 
 interesting plainness. The habit she wore was black, 
 without white forehead band ; and I remember the well- 
 
45 
 
 wrought cross hanging on her breast ; she was a young 
 woman who might be twenty, and was not more certainly 
 than twenty-three or four. She passed without loitering, 
 her eyes inviting speech, with a view, I said, to obtaining 
 my help. It cannot be else. But I shall know for certain 
 the next time she passes, and when we crossed each other 
 again as before her eyes threw out the same inquiry. 
 
 There were only a few peasant women in the railway 
 station when I arrived. She must have come in a few 
 minutes after me, I said, and if she looks again I'll speak, 
 and, on a resolve to offer help to the nun if she should ask 
 for help, my eyes went to the clock : the hands pointed 
 to three minutes to twelve and I said : if my lady were 
 to find me engaged in conversation with a nun, my 
 chances of getting her will be prejudiced maybe. 
 
 The nun passed out of the station, and I hesitated 
 whether I should follow her. She can't deceive me, I 
 said ; half-a-dozen words and I shall know all about her. 
 Moreover, it isn't likely that a Rouenaise would rely 
 on such a romantic deception pour faire un komme, an 
 expression that Balzac appreciates as le sublime argot des 
 Jilles. Moreover, were she a punk she would not come 
 to an empty railway station to ply her trade ; and if she 
 did she'd wait for the express from Etretat to come in. 
 It may be that I did not think quite so clearly at the time 
 as I am thinking now, but I'm certain the woman wasn't 
 a punk disguised as a nun. The moment was an anxious 
 one, so anxious that I remember the wide rough open 
 thoroughfare rising slightly, with trees on either side, 
 and at the head of the road the bridge which she crossed 
 on her way back to the convent — she left it after long 
 resistance, for she could not believe else than that the 
 impulse compelling her to return to life was but a tempta- 
 tion of the devil. She looked back once and the moment 
 remains on my mind in as clear outline as the face of the nun. 
 The instinct of life, I said, at last broke the chains of 
 
46 
 
 prejudice and convention, the door stood invitingly open ; 
 she passed out ; her courage carried her to the railway, 
 and what is more likely than that in her soul crisis she 
 forgot she had no money for her journey. Nuns have 
 no money ! At sight of me hope blossomed again in her 
 heart. I looked like one who would sympathise, who 
 would understand, and who could lend her the sum of 
 money she needed. 
 
 She would have said : as soon as I reach home my 
 relations, my friends, will return you the money you so 
 kindly lent me, and my answer would have been : a letter 
 from you telling me how you fare will be preferable. 
 The debt, if you will let it remain one, will be a gift 
 inestimable. 
 
 These words we might have exchanged in the few 
 minutes before the train arrived from Etretat; they 
 would have been treasured like jewels and would have 
 cheered me when myself seemed to myself no more than 
 a shameful incident in the stream of life. The words 
 we would have exchanged would have helped me to 
 remember that I was worth at least one good action, but 
 the good action drifted by me as the saving plank 
 drifts by a swimmer. Nor is it too much to say that her 
 words would have brightened my death-bed. But I missed 
 my adventure, remaining hypnotised by an imaginary fear ; 
 my lady would have loved me better for my action when 
 she heard the story, and it would have rendered her 
 immune from the influence of the Cathedral. But why 
 think of her, she is no part of the story that filled my 
 heart to overflowing on the way to Westport. 
 
 Her chance gone by for ever, I said, she will return to 
 her convent to weep till her heart becomes dry; the 
 piercing will at first seem unendurable, but it will die 
 down till she feels nothing of the old desire, no faintest 
 echo of it, and she'll be glad and believe the peace she 
 is enjoying comes from God, unsuspicious that it is 
 
47 
 
 the absorption of the individual will in the will of the 
 community. 
 
 CHAP. XII. 
 
 WE were now within three miles of Westport, its hills 
 unveiling crest after crest to eyes that rejoice in outline. 
 How is itj I asked myself, that we can always tell if an 
 artist has drawn a hill badly ? — a hill may be of any shape, 
 yet we can say always if a hill in a picture is well drawn. 
 It would not be true to say that the Dublin mountains 
 are ill drawn, though they are as shapeless as pillows and 
 bolsters, in a bad light, and no better than waves in a good. 
 
 Now if Monet had drawn them But would he draw 
 
 what was not laid out for drawing ? As there is a great deal 
 in nature that is not laid out for drawing, the first business 
 of the artist is to select ; a head, badly placed in the canvas 
 and badly lighted, demands all the skill of a great artist, 
 and even he may not be able to do what Nature has set 
 her face against his doing. We must not, I continued, 
 enter into competition with nature, and all the lack-lustre 
 pictures painted in the eighties rose up before my eyes : 
 the strips of grey sky and the sage-green foregrounds we 
 used to admire. We used to admire Watts, who entered 
 into competition with Titian ; but all competition is to be 
 deplored, I qried out, somewhere between Castlebar and 
 Westport, aesthetic reverie after aesthetic reverie helping 
 the time away till a beautiful bridge came in sight of ten 
 or a dozen tall arches spanning a deep valley, the tallest 
 arch rising to at least a hundred feet. 
 
 The straight parapet reminded me of Waterloo Bridge. 
 Waterloo Bridge passes into slums, I said, but on the thither 
 side this bridge is engulfed in woods — an admirable bridge, 
 a delightful contribution to a beautiful town, declining, it is 
 true, but are not all neighbourhoods declining ? Piccadilly 
 
48 
 
 is now a mart consisting principally of tobacco and jewellery 
 shops, interspersed with clubs — the clubs were once the 
 dwellings of the aristocracy of England — Lord Palmer- 
 ston's house only ceased to be his house in my boyhood ; 
 and for long afterwards Piccadilly was a great residential 
 quarter. Park Lane, once so dandy, has fallen into a 
 vulgar thoroughfare through which many hundreds of 
 buses pass daily. And if we cross the Channel we find 
 the same decadence. The Champs Elysees is a mere show 
 of motor cars, and the Place Vendome a market for 
 picture bonnets, gowns and jewellery. And let us not 
 think of the great Palais Royal and who lived there, lest 
 we burst into tears at the thought of its ruin. And our caf^, 
 the flBliHHHIHV has become the haunt of panders 
 and punks. As all the world declines visibly it would be 
 vain to expect Westport to be exempt from the general 
 declension. But this may be said : Westport declines 
 beautifully ; abandoned mills may be a sad spectacle in 
 the eyes of the merchant, but in the artist's eyes these 
 warehouses rise up "like palaces in the dusk," and no 
 ugly one, though the sun be shining and an east wind 
 blowing, for saplings have grown up and birds have 
 discovered a paradise amid the ruins, 
 
 A river, spanned in the principal street by stone bridges, 
 flows through Westport, and the stream is lined with 
 noble elms, with seats between the trees for the vagrant, 
 and some beautiful houses for his regalement. The bank 
 was once the house to which the Dowager Lady Sligo was 
 wont to retire on the marriage of her son, and to this day 
 it is known as the Dower House. Her journey, no doubt 
 accomplished in a coach and four, was not a long one, for 
 the gates of the domain faced the little river that proceeds 
 through the domain out into the sea. It is sad that the 
 beautiful house. With as noble a sweep of staircase as any 
 in Merrion Square, should have been turned into a prosaic 
 bank, and we seek consolation and find it in the domain 
 
49 
 
 wall, a great piece of feudal masonry that ascends hills 
 and drops into valleys mile after mile. 
 
 Westport strikes off to the right and left sporadically, 
 with here and there a house, telling that in former times 
 Westport had some culture ; a quiet life of sedate em- 
 broideries no doubt flourished behind finely propor- 
 tioned windows of which only a few remain. About 
 four beautiful houses remain, I said, and the car turned 
 up a street that put the eighteenth century clean out 
 of my mind : here at least, I said, there can have been 
 no declension, for what I see is Ireland in essence — 
 broken pavements with a desolating tide of children 
 pouring over the thresholds of almost underground 
 dwellings. And the street ends characteristically, I 
 added, in some shards and splinters of cottages. 
 
 We passed some school buildings where a pastor was 
 engaged in admonishing the little flock before the lambs 
 returned to the ewes for dinner, and the sight of him 
 reminded me of another pastor, a few hundred yards 
 away, in the street leading up the hill to the rectory. 
 He, too, is anxious, I said, that there shall be no stray- 
 ings ; that the flock shall depart in good order and keep 
 to the straight road. 
 
 And this opposition of Catholics and Protestants puts 
 into my mind thoughts of Stevenson in the Cevennes and 
 the aphorism that he so often heard on the lips of the 
 mountaineers — it is a bad thing for a man to change. 
 And so convinced is he of the truth of this aphorism that 
 he repeats it in his narrative two or three times, saying 
 that a man's religion is the poetry of the man's experi- 
 ence, the philosophy of the history of his life, and that 
 a man may not vary from his faith unless he can eradicate 
 all memory of the past, and in a strict and not conventional 
 meaning change his mind. The glitter of the words and 
 the sentimentality captivate the reader till he lays aside 
 the book and begins to remember that the Cevennians 
 
 D 
 
50 
 
 were Catholics before they were Protestants, and that 
 before they were Catholics they were heathen — facts that 
 disturb his enjoyment of Stevenson's style, for it would 
 seem impossible to admire words, however prettily they 
 may flourish, if they put forth an untruth. 
 
 In his pursuit of style Stevenson seems to have for- 
 gotten that for the enjoyment of the religious stagnation 
 he recommends we must wait for the next world ; it has 
 never existed in this and would seem to be contrary to 
 the conditions of our mortal life. " We cannot bathe 
 twice in the same river," a philosopher said long ago, and 
 his disciples added afterwards : " we cannot bathe once 
 in the same river." Scotsmen are almost proverbially 
 metaphysical, but a great man is an exception in his own 
 country ; were it not so Stevenson could not have failed to 
 perceive that Protestantism and Catholicism are states 
 of soul, the possessions of mankind rather than of any 
 particular race or family, rising up in the same country 
 and in the same family spontaneously and without apparent 
 cause. Peter was a Catholic and Paul was a Protestant, 
 and a thousand years before Peter and Paul were born 
 there were Protestants and Catholics. So in the strict 
 sense there is no conversion ; we merely discover in our 
 hearts what we brought into the world with us, a dis- 
 position leading us to pious practices or an inly sense 
 of divinity. 
 
 A striking illustration of a man becoming possessed of a 
 sudden sense of divinity is given by Stevenson in the very 
 pages that I am criticising. Stevenson had cast his camp 
 under some chestnut- trees where he had slept ill, the 
 ground being full of ants ; and there being no water in 
 the garden he made his toilet in the waters of the tarn 
 before continuing his journey through a valley, overtaking 
 an old man, who walked beside him talking about the 
 morning and the valley. Connaissez vous le Seigneur } 
 the old man asked. And as if averse from giving a 
 
51 
 
 direct answer Stevenson asked him what Seigneur. The 
 peasant only repeated the question and Stevenson 
 answered : now I understand you. Yes, I know him. 
 He is the best of acquaintances ; and delighted at this 
 answer the old Plymouth Brother cried, striking his 
 bosom : it makes me happy here. A truly Protestant 
 state of feeling, so much so that the words bring a 
 responsive thrill into the heart of every Protestant that 
 reads them. Of this Stevenson seems to have been aware, 
 but he does not seem to have understood that this peasant 
 might have a son who would be more moved by the motion 
 of a priest's finger giving him a blessing than by the 
 spectacle of the sun-rise. 
 
 The old Plymouth Brother follows Stevenson to the 
 inn and listens to him in admiration and delight, feeling 
 for the first time the spiritual intimacy of which he has 
 been long deprived, his lot having been cast in the 
 Catholic village. There are many of us up yonder, he 
 said, none here. Stevenson draws a comparison between 
 his own feelings regarding this man and the feelings of 
 the excellent friar whom he met road-making on the 
 summits leading to the monastery, "Our Lady of the 
 Snows." I have not got the passage before me, but I 
 think that my memory does not betray me. Stevenson 
 admits that with some reservations he can make common 
 cause with the Plymouth Brother ; but he finds himself 
 aloof in the company of the friar, though he is con- 
 strained to allow that the friar is as worthy a man as the 
 Plymouth Brother. This seems to me to be true. If a 
 man be of a Protestant kin he is at home and at spiritual 
 communion with all Protestant sects — Congregationalists, 
 Quakers, Wesleyans and Methodists and Unitarians. He 
 is not separated from them as he is from Papists. An 
 Agnostic, too, is at home with all Protestant sects. 
 Whether a man stays away from church or goes to church 
 is a matter of no importance. He may be an atheist and 
 
52 
 
 still feel himself to be of the same communion as 
 Protestants, for atheism and Protestantism rest on the 
 same foundation — the right of private judgment. Nor 
 can theological differences concern us Protestants very 
 acutely, for no man knows what he believes, moral 
 differences are more important, and it follows that if we 
 surrender our right of private judgment we become if not 
 immoral at least unmoral ; and that is why Protestants 
 feel themselves so strangely aloof among Catholics. 
 Any curtailment of the body operates on the mind, and 
 the stinted mind soon begins to put on a different com- 
 plexion, as none can have failed to notice that keep cats. 
 The Tom from next door is manifestly ill at ease in the 
 company of my Blackie, who has been to the butcher, 
 and I have often thought that the embarrassment he feels 
 is not unlike mine when I happen to drift into the com- 
 pany of Papists. 
 
 The falsetto scream that comes out of Ireland and a 
 certain untrustworthiness in the national character may 
 be traced back to the relinquishment of the right to 
 private judgment ; without it a man is not wholly a man, 
 I said, and striving immediately afterwards to mitigate 
 the thought that had come into my mind, I continued : 
 but all is not black or white ; grey is the primal colour. 
 There are Protestant Catholics, and there are Catholic 
 Protestants. But are there.'' I asked. And is grey as 
 interesting in live animals as it is on the painter's palette ? 
 And are the all-buts more interesting than the pure 
 neutrals ? 
 
 CHAP. XIII. 
 
 THE house stands at the foot of the hill between the 
 end of the street and the high wood, hidden behind walls, 
 only its long low roof showing, the passenger along the 
 
5S 
 
 foot-path getting no more than a glimpse of it through 
 the tall gates, open only for carriages and motors, our- 
 selves coming and going by the wicket. A somewhat 
 gloomy residence it must seem to him who stops before 
 the gates, the charm and life of the house being on the 
 other side, about a lawn shelving steeply, and rising up 
 as steeply to the high wood. A river is heard muttering 
 in the valley, and its banks come into view presently 
 describing a curve so formal that our thoughts are carried 
 back into the eighteenth century, when labour could be 
 obtained for sixpence a day. It was then, we say, the 
 river was deviated from its natural course to make a 
 beautiful little domain. 
 
 A foison of briers and ash saplings has grown out of 
 the river's walls and is pitching them stone by stone 
 into the river, adding to its picturesqueness. And for a 
 week, I say to myself, as I hand the carman his fare, I 
 shall listen to the brown river bubbling past a great 
 cedar ; and when I go to the tennis ground I shall cross 
 it by a plank bridge. 
 
 From the tennis ground the lawn slants upwards, 
 pleasantly diversified by bunched hawthorns, casting, I 
 say to myself as I wait on the doorstep, having rung the 
 bell, round beautiful shadows about five o'clock in the 
 afternoon. 
 
 About the house are tall ash-trees and beeches, and these 
 are filled in June with young rooks trying their wings 
 from branch to branch. If the breeze shakes the branch 
 too violently they fall into the shrubberies, where the 
 parent bird, who would feed them, may seek them and 
 find them. One of the girls shoots the young rooks with 
 a pea rifle as they swing ; and this always seems to me 
 a cruelty ; for rooks are not eaten in Ireland. It may 
 matter little to the dead birds whether they are thrown 
 to cats or dogs, or whether they are baked in pies ; but 
 the same might be said of ourselves, that it matters little 
 
54 
 
 to a man whether he lies in a vault or is thrown on a 
 dung-hill; yet we cannot detach our hopes from vaults, 
 wherefore then should not young rooks be prejudiced in 
 favour of interment in pies, for it were surely more 
 honourable to lie with hard-boiled eggs and bacon, under 
 a dome of well-kneaded pastry, than to be dragged about 
 a greensward by a dog — too often the fate of thoughtless 
 young rooks, I said last year, and shall say the same this 
 year as I sit on the shelving lawn convinced that there 
 is nothing in this world more beautiful than the round 
 shadows of hawthorn-trees dropping down a grassy hill- 
 side, and of all when the grassy hill-side ascends towards 
 a high wood. 
 
 Only in this house and on this lawn and during the 
 June weather do I escape from literature, from secretaries, 
 from manuscripts, from proofs, and surrender myself to an 
 almost thoughtless idleness, and to snatches of conversa- 
 tions with my friends, who have too many projects of their 
 own to attend to one who has no project outside of his 
 dreams. 
 
 A girl rises from the breakfast-table saying she has a 
 bicycle ride of many miles in front of her ; another speaks 
 of a fishing-party, and when the family collects about the 
 dinner-table, one narrating the adventures of her ride, 
 another telling how a fortnight hence she and another 
 girl will be camping out on one of the islands in the bay, 
 I begin to think that I should be a different George 
 Moore if I were married. There would be a difference 
 certainly, and a very real difference, and in this house 
 the difference appeals to me as a subject of a story ; the 
 invention of my married self would be a real flight of 
 the imagination, and the struggle between myself and 
 circumstance a piece of literature. The wife I should 
 choose for aesthetical reasons may be revealed to me in a 
 sudden flash as I sit on the sunny lawn if the day be fine, 
 or if it be wet, as I read in the billiard-room looking 
 
55 
 
 forward to my walk through the most musical wood in 
 the worldj a river tumbling round and over the boulders, 
 a sort of ground- base accompaniment to the songs of 
 blackbirds and thrushes. 
 
 A river flowing through a high wood awakens our child- 
 hood, not dead but sleeping; our primal imaginations 
 return to us — dragons, giants and elves ; and so eager are 
 we to escape from the present back into the past that we 
 begin to feel an annoyance creep up in us as we descend 
 the shelving lawn. The old-fashioned flowers whose 
 names are familiar do not let us from the past, but the 
 flowering bushes — certain pink flowers whose name is 
 perhaps begonia — impede us, and a strange word " calceo- 
 laria," a plant or bush, bearing some ugly yellow flower 
 or berry, we know not which, bars our way, and imprisons 
 us in the present. But the wood will give back our 
 childhood to us ; in this moment of crisis we remember 
 at the bend of the river some dark spiky foliage favoured 
 with a name so beautiful that our memory should have 
 retained it without difficulty from one year to the next ; 
 but again it has passed out of our mind. But as soon as 
 this dense growth is behind me, I say to myself, I shall 
 be among forest trees, the humble cow-parsley and 
 lowly blue-bells and the winning speedwell running in 
 and out between the tall grasses will set me thinking 
 once again that there is no flower that speaks as plainly 
 as the speedwell, not even the wild geranium which I 
 shall find higher up in the wood overhanging the stream. 
 
 As I approach the woodland I continue to enumerate 
 the flowers I shall meet there : the speedwell will 
 brighten my way, and I shall catch sight of rocket here 
 and there amid the tall grasses, and peonies white and 
 pink and purple. Rhododendrons are all through the 
 high wood. I shall see again a tall spray of rhododendron 
 flowering in the lonely twilight of a wooded island, maybe, 
 and for sure I shall walk under pale green foliage filled 
 
56 
 
 with noisy rooks, talking of course, but of what ? Ah ! if 
 we knew. 
 
 CHAP. XIV. 
 
 MY every step produces a clamour of wings in the 
 greenery above me : the jackdaws have nests in the boles 
 in the elm and their caw is softer than the rook's, and as 
 I walk I regret not being able to take back a jackdaw 
 to London for a pet, for no bird is more inclined to 
 domesticity than he is, quitting his kind for our kind if he 
 receive any slight encouragement to do so. 
 
 In a moment, and without my being conscious of the 
 departure of rooks and jackdaws, two birds that the 
 gardener told me last year were dippers engage my 
 attention, and I remember that the name he put upon 
 them did not satisfy me, and how pleasurable it was to 
 seek them out in an illustrated book and to discover the 
 almost tailless birds shapen like wrens, with white waist- 
 coats, to be water-ousels — birds that had merely a Words- 
 worthian reality for me till I saw them in Westport. 
 
 It is delightful to meet in life what one is a little 
 weary of meeting in poetry ; to watch the rapid beat of 
 their wings as they fly, resting every twenty or thirty 
 yards upon a boulder, now and then plunging into the 
 water, to run along the bottom in search of worms, so the 
 book informed me, and it became a passion in me to try 
 to verify the fact. 
 
 The birds go under water in search of food, there 
 could be no doubt of that, since they did not seek their 
 food on land ; but the nature of the food they sought 
 could hardly be worms ; for worms do not live under 
 water; and standing like a stock I apply myself to the 
 observation of the birds without, however, gathering a 
 single fact except that their flight is short and rapid like 
 
57 
 
 the kingfisher's; and I say to myself: to note anything 
 new about them I shall have to discover their nest ; for 
 they have a nest here surely, though the season is late. 
 One only meets them on the island, if I may call it such. 
 An island it was certainly in the mind of the eighteenth- 
 century designer, but the channel he dug has filled up 
 with mud, but with mud still sufficiently liquid to justify 
 the appellation of island to a very beautiful and romantic 
 spot protected by mud on one side and a river on 
 the other from sight-seers beguiled to trespass by the 
 tranquillity of these woods, and the high ruin hanging 
 over the crest of the hill. None knows that island except 
 the water-ousels, I say to myself as I walk thither ; and 
 birds who do not frequent trees nest in old walls. 
 
 But how beautiful are the trees in their island seclusion ; 
 and with unwearying fondness my eyes wander among 
 the tall stems and out upon the branches, admiring the 
 anatomy and the architecture, convinced, and my conviction 
 is ecstatic, that in this world there is nothing so admirable 
 as a tree, or so mysterious. Small wonder, I say, that 
 men have worshipped them ; would that I too might 
 worship, and upon the wings of a perfervid desire of 
 worship my thoughts melt into a thoughtless contemplation 
 of an overhanging tree that a boy would have liked to 
 use as a bridge, but being no longer a boy I meditate on 
 the noble gesture, saying to myself: a fallen or falling 
 tree humanises a wood. 
 
 The ousels have disappeared into the nest that I shall 
 never find ; and I move up the path that I may get a 
 better view of the great white wall of an ancient mill 
 pierced with many windows, through which the sunset 
 will pour as the last train rattles over the viaduct on its 
 way to Achill, emphasising the solitude of the wood as 
 it ascends amid high rock. 
 
 It could not have been else than here, I say, that my 
 infantile eyes would have espied dragons, giants and elves 
 
58 
 
 in the twilight of overhanging clefts ; and who can say 
 they are not here still ? 'Tis our former selves that have 
 vanished ; we are always losing and winning something ; 
 nothing is permanent within or without. In childhood 
 I saw dragons, giants and elves, and now I see high trees, 
 ivy clad, lifting themselves with lovely gesture out of a 
 tangle of hawthorn, with the pale pink rhododendron 
 blossom resting atop of its tall stem in the solitude of a 
 wooded island — the same as last year. Of what have I 
 to complain ? — we only change our visions ; and my 
 philosophy is confirmed a few yards farther on by a group 
 of laburnums venturing into the river for all the world like 
 a group of golden-haired nymphs. 
 
 The hart's tongue and the Royal Osmunda should do 
 well here, I say, and my eyes begin a search for the tall, 
 pale, reed-like fern of which there is not one about, and I 
 pause, for at that moment an otter slides into the river 
 noiselessly ; and seeing the dark animal come up with a 
 fish in its mouth and disappear into the bank, I begin to 
 think of the hungry cubs at the end of a hole about three 
 feet deep, of all I had read about tame otters, and of the 
 stiffness of the ascent up the hill-side — an ascent that a 
 few years hence I shall undertake with some little difficulty, 
 but which to-day is pleasant exercise. 
 
 The path leads through tall boles rising like spears, a 
 beech wood ; and soon after I find myself beset as of yore 
 by thoughts regarding a wall some twenty feet high 
 descending steeply into a lovely hollow and rising up 
 again as steeply, saying to myself: a strange thought it 
 was surely to build a wall twenty feet high through a 
 wood : but it adds to the mystery of this little domain 
 designed so finely by Nature, one that, Le Notre would 
 have said, I can neither add to nor curtail. 
 
 And on coming out of the wood I find myself on a sort 
 of terrace or terraced walk overlooking the deer park — a 
 deer park of twenty acres ! In the eighteenth century a 
 
59 
 
 deer park was a necessary adjunct to every gentleman's 
 residence, and in Ireland the eighteenth century did not 
 end till 1870, therefore, in my boyhood, almost every 
 residence of distinction in Mayo had a deer park — that 
 Moore Hall should be without one was a source of shame 
 and regret to me ; and it was not infrequent for me to 
 drop into meditations regarding a possible extension of the 
 Stone Park. As late as the sixties there were deer in 
 Castle Carra ; and the great mass of brushwood (through 
 which we used to wend our way with our luncheons — a 
 picnic in the ruined castle was a pleasure looked forward 
 to eagerly) might be purchased from Sir Robert Blosse 
 if one of our race-horses would win a big race. And 
 these dreams of long ago were revived by the miniature 
 deer park of, Westport Lodge — a deer park of twenty 
 acres, in which the last stag was shot some years ago 
 on account of his refusal to share his paddock or park 
 with a jackass ; the jackass was required for the children, 
 and the stag was an old friend that lived on excellent 
 terms with everybody but the jackass, what was to be 
 done? And the perplexity the stag caused in his life 
 did not end with his death ; nobody would eat this 
 noble and affable friend. He was given to the dogs, 
 I believe. But away with such memories. 
 
 Above me rises a wall of great height covered with a 
 thick green creeper, heart-shapen papery leaves forming 
 an obscure growth at the foot of the wall, and filled with 
 a blue flower so uninteresting that it is called periwinkle ; 
 nor does it deserve a nobler name, and only a man lacking 
 in the finer instincts would stop to consider it on a terrace 
 commanding so admirable a view — the wooded park 
 descending in many beautiful shapes, and beyond its 
 trees the roofs of the town showing against the dark 
 sides of the Westport hills; hill after hill rising up in 
 rugged outlines like bastions designed as if to support 
 the almost too perfect symmetry of St Patrick's Hill. A 
 
60 
 
 peak as regular as the famous volcano that the Japanese 
 painters spent their lives in the eighteenth century 
 drawing and redrawing, and saying to each other : if we 
 live for another fifty years we may produce a drawing 
 that will satisfy us. But in Ireland nobody draws, and 
 popular imagination was satisfied by the building of a 
 tiresome church on the top of it, whither pilgrims go 
 wearing their shoe leather away and emptying their 
 pockets. A whilom volcano, so it is said, in the back end 
 of time, some five hundred thousand years maybe before 
 the birth of man. I had once thought that with five 
 hundred tons of dynamite the regularity of the peak 
 might be undone, but to-day it seems to me that the 
 peak is all right in its landscape. I would change 
 nothing, not even the church that has been built atop 
 of St Patrick. In God's good time the people will weary 
 of prayers and turn to drawing, and what a vision of 
 outlines for their pencils. On looking into the gap 
 between the trees and the Westport hills, we see a faint 
 blue line of dentilated hills almost lost to view in about 
 five and twenty or thirty miles of distance, the first chain 
 of the Connemara mountains. 
 
 CHAP. XV. 
 
 AT this moment Jim comes panting to heel, having failed 
 to get on the trail of a rabbit. 
 
 Jim is May's dog ; and I may have been guilty of an 
 error in composition in not having introduced the reader 
 to the lean, long-legged fox terrier who finds it at first 
 difficult to remember me over the long interval of eleven 
 months. He sniffs and sniffs again, his memory returning 
 with every sniff*, and at the fifth or sixth he barks, and 
 there is no mistaking the bark ; it says as plainly as 
 words : you're the gentleman who takes me out rabbiting. 
 
61 
 
 And from that moment he waits and watches, and when 
 I raise my eyes from the book I catch his eye, and after 
 a time I say : Jim, you've been waiting a long time, the 
 book that I'm reading must seem very tiresome to you, 
 let us go. At these words he utters a most joyful bark, 
 and scampers round the billiard-table. If I put on my 
 hat he is nearly sure he is going to be taken out, if I take 
 the stick he is certain, and away we go in the hope of a 
 rabbit. 
 
 There is a record, or at least a legend, of Jim having 
 succeeded in catching a rabbit on the hill-side, but within 
 my knowledge the triumph has always been missed, the 
 rabbit succeeding in escaping down the gullet out of 
 which he came from Lord Sligo's domain. 
 
 The first time that I witnessed the escape of the rabbit 
 was about three years ago. Jim, who had brought a fine 
 scent into the world with him, got on the trail of the 
 rabbit at the beginning of the wood, and went away, his 
 nose to the ground, at full gallop without posting me, 
 as he should have done, to cut off the retreat, and being 
 ignorant of the nature of the ground, it fell out that I 
 stopped unhappily at some ten or a dozen yards from the 
 gullet, instead of at the entrance of the gullet itself : ten 
 yards higher up the hill, ten yards nearer to the gullet, 
 I should have been able to turn a rabbit back who seemed 
 no wise in a hurry, the dog having lost the scent, and the 
 rabbit seemingly aware of the loss stopped, meditated a 
 moment, and before I could intervene hopped leisurely 
 into the little drain and passed up the gullet. The dog 
 arrived a few seconds afterwards and began the fruitless 
 digging. Poor Jim was disappointed, and it was with 
 difficulty he was persuaded to renounce the task, which in 
 his heart he must have known to be hopeless, of digging 
 out the rabbit. On many other occasions I bade Jim to 
 heel till I was fairly stationed at the gullet and then bade 
 him hunt, but on all these occasions there was no rabbit. 
 
It was not till last year that a rabbit bounded out of the 
 undergrowth with Jim after him yelping like a Red Indian 
 on the war-path, and I following down into the dell and 
 up again striving to reach the gullet before the rabbit. 
 It may be that 1 arrived too late and it may be that the 
 rabbit bounded back and escaped by another gullet, all 
 that can be said definitely is that the rabbit escaped. 
 More than that would be surmise, conjecture. 
 
 This year as last year Jim will accompany me, but I 
 shall not lend him my aid to catch the rabbit by standing 
 myself at the gullet, I shall entertain the hope that the 
 rabbit will continue to escape, for were the rabbit taken 
 the hill-side would lose some of its wonder, some of its 
 mystery, some of its adventure. But no such misfortune 
 as the taking of the rabbit will befall us ; the rabbit is 
 never taken in Ireland, and let us hope that the future 
 will be like the past, and that the history of Ireland will 
 continue to be marked by the escape of the rabbit ; for 
 were the rabbit taken the country would sink into such 
 stupor and lethargy as would frighten God in His high 
 throne in Heaven. 
 
 CHAP. XVI. 
 
 ONE day in my walks in the high wood I spied a man 
 standing on a boulder in the midst of the river, seemingly 
 undecided whether he should jump to the next one ; and 
 knowing the pool to be deep between the boulders I tried 
 to dissuade him. 
 
 There's no chance of drowning, he cried to me, but if I 
 miss my step I'll be up to my belt. I called out that to 
 cross the river he would be trespassing on private rights, 
 but he did not heed my warning. He jumped again ; 
 and, laying hold of a protruding root, began to climb the 
 bank, telling me as he made his way up that the master 
 
63 
 
 (the gentleman in whose house I was staying) would have 
 nothing to say against the gathering of a few ferns along 
 the river's bank. 
 
 A fern - gatherer, I said, and followed him asking 
 questions, not so much for the answers he gave as for 
 the pleasure it was to listen to his low, musical voice, 
 a tenor voice, in keeping, it seemed to me, with his pale, 
 almost affectionate eyes, shining like jewels in a pointed 
 oval face ; a young man who had just passed out of his 
 first youth ; an Irish peasant, but far from the typical, I 
 said, when I left him to his search and continued my 
 walk through the beech wood, not able to forget his 
 spare chestnut beard, his moustache and his comely, 
 well-knit figure. These, so it seemed to me, I had seen 
 before and many times, but where I had seen them I 
 could not remember, and it was not till after long soul 
 searching it occurred to me that 1 had seen him in 
 pictures. Yes, I murmured to myself, he is the Jesus 
 that has come down to us from the fifteenth century, 
 imagined first perhaps by Fra Angelico, and repeated 
 ever since by many thousands of painters, inclining more 
 and more to the feminine and epicene type, becoming a 
 woman in Holman Hunt's picture. The Light of the 
 World, Miss Christina Rossetti, with a blonde beard and 
 moustache. But, I continued, my fern-gatherer does not 
 reproduce the fond emptiness of Jesus's face ; he is with 
 it all a man ; and there can be no doubt that I am doing 
 him an injustice by associating him with Holman Hunt's 
 version of Christina Rossetti in a blonde beard. My fern- 
 gatherer is a man and altogether himself in the life he 
 has chosen for himself. A romantic figure, I added, one 
 which does honour to the town of Westport. 
 
 He had already captured my imagination by dinner-time, 
 and at the first pause in the converation, when the girls' 
 narratives of the day's doings had ceased, I related our 
 meeting, and learnt that legends had already begun to 
 
64 
 
 collect about him. His name ? I asked anxiously, feeling 
 I should be disappointed if his name were among those 
 that one wearies of in Ireland — Higgins, Walsh, O'Connor, 
 Murphy. That it might not be Murphy I prayed inly. Alec 
 Trusselby ! It would be strange, indeed, I exclaimed, if 
 legends had not begun to collect about a name like that, 
 and begged that all that was known about him should 
 be told to me at once. Everybody was willing to tell, 
 and the biographical scraps uttered from different ends 
 and sides of the dinner-table were in keeping with his 
 name. 
 
 I learnt from one member of the family that Alec had 
 been to America and had suffered from sunstroke, from 
 another that he lived in the woods all the summer-time, 
 bringing back beech and oak ferns to Westport and getting 
 for them a fair share of money ; and from another that 
 his voice and manner were so winning that it was difficult 
 not to be his customer, and as every customer became a 
 patron. Alec had no cause for complaint. Even if he 
 had he is not the kind of man that would complain, a 
 girl suddenly interjected, and turning to her I asked : 
 how is that? She replied that he was a very shy man 
 who would remain silent for long intervals to break 
 into speech suddenly like a bird. This seemed to me a 
 good description, but I had not seen enough of Alec at 
 that time to be able to vouch for ifs accuracy. A girl told 
 me the report was that Alec had built himself a summer 
 dwelling in a great tree, and I answered that what she 
 said did not surprise me. Lying in his bed under the 
 boughs, I said, he caught his style from the moody black- 
 bird who fills the wood at dawn with his exalted lay ; 
 more likely still from the meditative thrush. But how 
 does Alec live through the winter.? I asked, and it was 
 delightful to hear that in the winter he related stories 
 about the firesides in the cottages, and that no one refused 
 Alec bed and board if he could help it ; Alec's company 
 
65 
 
 was sought for by everybody ; and a suspicion was abroad 
 that to treat him ill was to bring ill luck upon oneself. 
 Gathering ferns in the summer and telling stories in the 
 winter, I repeated, becoming possessed in a moment of 
 an absorbing interest in Alec Trusselby. Is he an Irish 
 speaker ? I asked, and heard that he was one of the best 
 in the county of Mayo. But, a girl cried across the table, 
 mind, if he suspects you of laughing at him he will run 
 away at once, and don't tell him you're a Protestant, 
 he might refuse to go into the woods with you. With a 
 heretic ? I added. 
 
 A custard pudding interrupted the conversation about 
 Alec, but as soon as everybody had been helped it returned 
 to him, and I learnt that the gentle winning personality 
 that had awakened fellow-feeling in me was only one side 
 of Alec Trusselby ; there was another, and one well known 
 to the Westport police — staunch friends of his, always 
 ready to take his part when Alec's less reputable associates 
 mocked him in the street after drinking his money away 
 in the public-house, their joke being to try to grab the 
 Murrigan, not an easy thing to do, for it never left his 
 hand, and where the Murrigan was concerned Alec was 
 resolute and strong. 
 
 The Murrigan ? I interjected. He calls his blackthorn 
 the Murrigan, one of the girls answered ; but we don't 
 know what the word means, whether it's an Irish word 
 or a word invented by himself. I wonder if the police 
 could tell me ? I said. Now why should the police be 
 bothering their heads with what Alec means when he 
 calls his stick the Murrigan ? my friend, the girls' father, 
 blurted out ; and he laughed the short, quick, intelligent 
 laugh whereby I remember him. Haven't they enough 
 to do to keep him out of jail } And he told a story how, 
 returning home late one night, he had come upon 
 Trusselby and the police — the sergeant and the constable 
 engaged in trying to persuade Alec to return to his 
 I 
 
66 
 
 lodging. You see. Alec, you're free to follow them if you 
 like : the constable has let go your arm, the sergeant 
 was saying. But if you take my advice you'll be taking 
 yourself and the Murrigan home like the quiet, good man 
 that you are, the divil a better. If they insult you again 
 we'll let yourself and the Murrigan at them, but this time 
 we'll be asking you to let them pass on, for to break their 
 skulls with the Murrigan would be conferring too much 
 honour upon them. You see, said mine host, we have all 
 a kindly feeling for Trusselby, myself as well as the police ; 
 to keep him out of jail takes us all our time, and we 
 haven't that much over to be ferreting out the meaning 
 of all the talk that goes on between himself and his stick 
 as he walks the roads. But he's not half-witted ? I 
 asked, looking round the dinner-table, preferring a general 
 to an individual opinion, and the company was agreed 
 that Alec could not be held to be a loon. And his stories ? 
 I asked ; but none at the table had felt sufficient curiosity 
 to ask him to tell them one. I'd give a great deal, I said, 
 to hear Trusselby tell a story, and was warned not to offer 
 him a great deal of money, but to wait an occasion to 
 win his confidence. If you offer him a sovereign to tell 
 you a story you'll frighten him ; he'll begin to suspect 
 some evil and you'll get nothing out of him. But I may 
 not meet Trusselby again, and if I did, to the end of my 
 visit is not a long time to win his confidence — I shall be 
 leaving in a few days. You can stay as long as you like, 
 my host and my hostess interjected, we would like to see 
 you friends with Trusselby before you leave. 
 
 The next day one of the girls rushed into the room in 
 which I was writing : Trusselby is coming down the hill, 
 she said, and I bolted out after him. You sell ferns, 
 don't you } I asked ; he answered that he did, and I 
 asked him to get me some. He said he would and passed 
 on, and I returned to the house disappointed. But luck 
 yras with me, and two evenings later, returning home 
 
67 
 
 after dining with a friend, I met Trusselby at the river- 
 side, whirling the Murrigan and apparently in a convivial 
 mood. Well, Alec, I said, have you come upon the 
 royal or the hart's tongue in your walks ? You're the 
 gentleman I met the other day up at the old mill, aren't 
 you ? he asked. I answered that I was, and we walked 
 on together, myself making conversation, afraid every 
 moment that Trusselby would say : I must be wishing 
 you good-night, sir, or I'll be locked out. But it was 
 unlikely that Trusselby had a latchkey, it was more 
 probable that he contemplated spending the night out, 
 which would be no great hardship, for the night was 
 warm and still, and were it not that a bench is a hard 
 bed, the most home-loving and respectable man in West- 
 port might have liked to have lain out of doors, sooner 
 or later to be hushed to sleep by the almost inaudible 
 sound of water rippling past and the soft cawing of sleepy 
 rooks. A night it was that would keep anybody out of 
 his bed till midnight at least, except, perhaps, a dry old 
 curmudgeon. A breathless night, full of stars, and per- 
 chance stories, I said to myself, and then aloud to Alec : 
 yes, we met up at the old mill, but you didn't find the 
 ferns you were looking for .'' Is it the royal you're after ? 
 Alec asked, and I answered that that was what I had in 
 mind, and having listened to Trusselby for some time on 
 the rarity of the fern, I broke in with the remark that I'd 
 never seen a finer blackthorn than the one he was carrying. 
 He had come upon it in a brake, he said, in a thicket 
 that often served him as a bedroom in a summer's night 
 when his quest for ferns had led him far from Westport. 
 And it was one morning at sunrise that I spied her ; she 
 was no thicker that morning than one of my fingers, and 
 I said to myself: in about three years' time that stem will 
 be the finest in Ireland if the top be cut at once so that 
 it may be throwing out little knots and spikes. The 
 knots begin almost at the top, sir, and at every knot there 
 
is three spikes. You would be lost if you started counting 
 them, just as you might be if you were to start on the 
 stars in the skies. It was the blessing of God that I 
 saw the Murrigan that morning, for a year later it would 
 have been too late to cut the top. I was only in time, 
 and there it stayed for its three years sprouting, with 
 three spikes coming out on every knot. You can see 
 them, sir, all the way up. Faith, there isn't half-an-inch 
 of the stick without its three spikes. But if somebody 
 had gone into the brake and seen the stick before you ? 
 I asked. I had to risk that, sir, for it takes three full 
 years for the stick to furnish, and often I didn't like 
 going to the brake for fear a person might spy me and 
 be wondering what I was after and perhaps be coming 
 in behind me and find out the stick ; but sure I had the 
 luck all the time and nobody came. In three years to 
 the day, your honour, I was down in the dingle cutting 
 my stick, my heart filled with joy so furnished was it. 
 Mind you, sir, the seasoning of a blackthorn isn't under- 
 stood by every man, for when you've cut your stick you 
 must season it, and the place I was living in then had a 
 fine old chimney with a flue inside of it on which you 
 could rest a stick, and there the Murrigan rested 
 seasoning. After six good months I took it down and 
 gave it a rub with an oil rag, and I'll tell you, mister, 
 it was good for sore eyes to see the way it was coming 
 up. Take a look at it yourself now and tell me, is there 
 a bit of Spanish mahogany in the country is its equal for 
 colour. To this I agreed, and asked : is that the reason 
 you call it the Murrigan.^ Well, it isn't, your honour. 
 Do you see, Murrigan means " great queen " in the Irish, 
 and my stick here is the queen of the fair this many a day. 
 The stick knows it too, for if I'm not at the fair off goes 
 the Murrigan without me ; I look round in the morning, 
 but not a stick can I see, so I say : the Murrigan's gone, 
 ^nd she'll be breaking the head of some poor chap out of 
 
69 
 
 sheer light-heartedness and divilment. That's the way it 
 does be, sir, for after she's gone there's somebody has a 
 cracked head somewhere. No one knows who breaks it, 
 barring the Murrigan, and she tells nobody, but just flies 
 back unbeknownst to anybody, and finds her old place 
 in the corner just as any creature would. And there I 
 find her, waiting for me. Have a look at the Murrigan, 
 sir, for you'll never see another like her. She's as 
 beautifully ornamented as the Brooch of Tara itself, and 
 she has the finest colour in Ireland or out of Ireland. 
 
 Faith and troth I never did. So the Murrigan goes to 
 the fair by herself.'* 
 
 She does so, your honour, and she flies round the heads 
 of the people, urging them on the way the old Murrigan 
 used to do when Brian Boru was in it, waking up the 
 spirit of fight in them. The Murrigan whirls like an 
 eagle over the heads of the people, prodding them here 
 and poking them there, and putting them at each other. 
 When I'm there, and the Murrigan with me, I feel my 
 hand rise up and my head is that elated I don't know 
 whether it's me or the Murrigan is doing the deeds, and 
 I don't know if the stars that are in my head aren't 
 thicker and twice as thick than they are in the sky. All 
 I can see is the Murrigan about me and she whirling like 
 a bird, but never leaving me five fingers ; a faithful thing 
 the Murrigan, bless her soul, and she saved my life many 
 a time, good luck to her ! 
 
 Trusselby kissed his blackthorn and we leaned our 
 backs against the parapet of the bridge, looking up into 
 the sky, the town asleep, nothing to be heard about us 
 but the ripple of the river. Trusselby seemed to have 
 forgotten me, and I wondered of what he could be 
 thinking, of some battle long ago, I thought, in which 
 doubtless the Murrigan played a great part, and seeing 
 a smile playing over his bland, almost holy face, I said : 
 there used to be great fighting long ago ? It was about 
 
70 
 
 fightiag I was thinking, your honour, a great fair at 
 Castlebar, when there were more two-year-olds than three- 
 year-olds about. 
 
 To check the story that was on his lips with a question 
 would have been fatal, so I held my peace, hoping 
 to learn whether the fair was lacking in two-year-old 
 bullocks or two-year-old colts and fillies. 
 
 He began again after a pause. You see, sir, in the 
 old times when your ancestors were in it, God rest their 
 souls, in the days of your grandfather, there was an 
 O'Brien sold a heifer to a Fitzgerald for a two-year-old, 
 but the heifer itself was a three-year-old ; and the next 
 fair day there was a fight between Fitzgerald and O'Brien ; 
 and at the next fair the Fitzgerald brothers and the 
 O'Brien brothers were fighting ; and the fair day after 
 that the cousins were in the fight, and after the cousins 
 the friends came in on one side and the other, until it 
 was a dangerous thing to hold any fair in the country at 
 all, so great was the fighting ; after whacking with all 
 the blackthorns in the country over all the skulls in the 
 country for more than fifty years the war finished, and it 
 was only at the heel of the hunt that I strolled in one 
 fair day to Castlebar. There was a man there, and some- 
 body made a cake of his skull with a tap of a stick. 
 Nobody knew who did it. He said it was the policeman, 
 and he took out a summons against the policeman. Well, 
 I was a witness in the case, your honour, and I couldn't 
 see an innocent man condemned even if he was a peeler 
 itself. When I came before the magistrate he asked if I 
 was standing by at the time. I was, your Worship, says 
 I ; and he says : was it the policeman broke the man's 
 head ? and I said : it was not, your Worship ; the policeman 
 didn't hit the man that tap. A tap, you call it, said the 
 man, Michael Joyce was his name, and he lifted up the 
 bloody bandage that was upon his brow. 'Tis more than 
 a tap, your Worship, says I, it's a clout ; but tap or clout, 
 
71 
 
 it wasn't the policeman gave it to him. You're on your 
 oath, Alec Trusselby, he said. And I said : before God ?, 
 and I gave a swear that it wasn't the policeman. Now 
 what do you think but the magistrate was looking into 
 Joyce's face, and he saw three little weeney holes around 
 his eye, and he took notice of them three little holes, and 
 when I picked up the Murrigan and was going out of the 
 box he said : let me have a look at your stick, Trusselby, 
 so I gave it to him, and he said : wasn't it you gave the 
 man the tap ? And I said : it was so, your Worship. Tell 
 me, says he, why did you strike that blow ? So I ups 
 and I told him the story of the two-year-olds and the 
 three-year-olds. Which was he, said the magistrate, was 
 he a two-year-old or a three-year-old.'* Your Worship, 
 says I, he was like myself, he was a two-year-old. And 
 why did you assault and batter the man ? Well, you see, 
 your Worship, says I, there was only a few of us in that 
 fair. We was outnumbered altogether by the three-year- 
 olds, and Joyce yonder was saying he'd like well to see 
 the man who'd tread on the tail of his coat, and seeing 
 that there would be a fight in which we might be worsted 
 I just gave him a tap to make him quiet like, and to keep 
 him out of harm's way. 
 
 So that's the story of the Murrigan ? It is, your honour, 
 I've told you the whole of it. A wonderful stick she is ; 
 look at her ; every knob with three little spikes like the 
 blessed shamrock that St Patrick picked so that he would 
 be able to explain the Holy Trinity to the pagans. A 
 beautiful stick, I said, and a very interesting story. 
 You know many stories. Alec, and can tell them better 
 than any man now living. It's puffing me up with pride 
 and goster you'd be, your honour, and after reminding 
 him that he had promised to bring me some beech and 
 oak ferns we parted, myself regretting that my shyness 
 had prevented me from asking Alec to tell me a story. 
 The night is fine, I said, and he was in the humour ; he 
 
72 
 
 wouldn't have refused, but I've missed my chance unless 
 I fortune to meet him again before leaving Westport. 
 
 It was two days afterwards that I met Trusselby speed- 
 ing down the road from the woods, his hands full of ferns, 
 and accosting him with a pleasant good-morning and a 
 reference to our talk by the bridge under the elm-trees I 
 invited him to come up to the high wood with me. You 
 may have overlooked some ferns, I said. He did not 
 answer, but his eyes said plainly enough that he didn't 
 believe he had overlooked any. Well, come with me, I 
 said. If we find some ferns so much the better, if we 
 don't I'll reward you for your afternoon all the same. 
 Well, if it will please your honour, I'll come up with you. 
 We found no ferns, but, as if to compensate me for my 
 factitious disappointment. Alec proposed to go to Ilanaidi 
 to search for the royal, and, after visiting all the moist 
 banks and hollows of the town-land, we returned with 
 some fine specimens of beech and oak ferns, some 
 specimens of the hart's tongue — a beautiful tall fern 
 flowing out like a ribbon. Alec's own description of it — 
 and in our hearts the hope that on another day we might 
 be more fortunate and come upon the royal. And to the 
 gate of my friend's house Alec continued to assure me 
 that it had been heard of between Ilanaidi and Castlebar. 
 At the wicket I gave him to understand that I was ready 
 when he was for a day in the woods and fields. Till 
 to-morrow, were my last words to him, and as soon as 
 they were spoken my face changed expression, for Ilanaidi 
 was four or five miles from Westport, and there and back 
 would be a long way for a man of letters. 
 
 CHAP. XVII. 
 
 DID Alec tell you any stories.^ my friend asked, and 
 his short, ironical laugh jarred a little. No ; I heard no 
 
73 
 
 stories, but patience is the virtue of the folk-lorist. You 
 don't mean that you're going for another tramp with Alec ? 
 Yes, we start to-morrow at nine. Well, you're an extra- 
 ordinary fellow, my host said. Every man is extraordinary 
 to his fellow, I answered ; our quests are different ; and the 
 next day I went forth again, to return with an increased 
 knowledge of ferns but without any stories. Indeed, I 
 had almost begun to believe that a joke was being put 
 upon me. It was often on my tongue to say : in the 
 winter evenings I suppose you tell stories in the cottages, 
 but I had restrained myself, and it is not unlikely that it 
 was to break through my studied reserve that he began to 
 speak, some days later, of Liadin and Curithir, saying they 
 used to meet by the druid stone under which we were now 
 sitting eating the food we had brought with us. And 
 who may they be ? I asked. You don't read their names 
 in the stories that are going round about old Ireland, 
 he answered, but 'tis many and many's the time I've 
 heard my father say that there wasn't the like of that 
 pair for the making of poems. 
 
 The names seemed to kindle a new personality in him. 
 The lantern is lighted, I said ; we shall see whither it 
 leads us. 
 
 In the years back, he continued, it was a favourite story 
 with the people, but they don't care much about it here. 
 It is out of their minds now like the rest of the old 
 shanachies, and all they have a taste for is the yarns they 
 do be reading in the newspapers and the like ; stuff with- 
 out any diet in them. They are not like the story I'm 
 talking of, the story of Liadin aud Curithir. But I 
 would be wearying your honour with it. You might not 
 be caring for old stories. There's nothing to my mind 
 better than an old story, I answered. The birds are 
 singing overhead ; the time is for story-telling ; go on. 
 Alec. 
 
74 
 
 CHAP. XVIII. 
 
 WELL, since your honour is so pleasant I'll tell it. At 
 the first going off, let you know that Liadin and Curithir 
 were two great poets, as great as any that ever went the 
 round in Ireland, though there has been more talk about 
 others than about them. Usheen was the biggest of the 
 lot, and I'm not comparing Liadin and Curithir to himself. 
 All the same Curithir was a fine poet and Liadin wasn't 
 far behind him for the telling of stories and the singing 
 of songs in the courts of the kings, and the like, where 
 they'd all be clamouring and shouting for her at the end 
 of their feasts. She was from Corkaguiney, or, as they call 
 it now, the County Cork, and she was on her way there 
 when she met Curithir, who was on his rounds to the west 
 and would be going north shortly with his thousand stories, 
 for he had a stiffer memory than Liadin's, although his 
 songs weren't as soothing to men after drinking a gallon 
 or more of ale. A gallon was nothing to people in those 
 days ! And so it was with these two that I am telling 
 your honour about, and they sharing the glory of Ireland 
 between them. 
 
 Every spring of the year they would be passing this 
 stone, beside which your honour is lying, as they were 
 bound to, it being the mereing. And every time they 
 passed it Liadin said to herself: Curithir knows more 
 poems than I do but my own songs are sweeter than 
 Curithir's. And every time Curithir passed it he said : 
 many's the time I've gone by here thinking to meet 
 Liadin, whose songs make game men of all men, though 
 what they be at is love or war, strutting and striving 
 to outdo one and t'other, trailing their coats like a 
 cock his wing. She passes this way every year like I 
 do myself, Curithir said ; and we always missing each 
 other as if it was the will of God. And while he was 
 
75 
 
 thinking away like I'm telling you, a feeling came over 
 him that it would be well for him to bide his time, it 
 being about the season that she would be on her way 
 to the south. Nor had he long to wait, for before the 
 light was gone he saw two women coming through the 
 dusk, and he knew them to be Liadin and her tiring 
 woman, for no one else would be wandering through 
 a lonesome place at nightfall, unless it was herdsmen 
 that were come to bring the cows home for the milk 
 to be drawn out of them. Isn't it true, says Curithir, to 
 himself, she is coming to touch this stone like everybody 
 that travels north or south ? but though he said to himself 
 — it is she — he wasn't sure that it was, and his heart was 
 fluttering as if it would burst his breast open and lay 
 him stiff before her. With every step she took the cold 
 sweat was starting on his forehead, and his face was 
 gone as pale as the grass beyond will be in the heel of 
 the year; and then, as she came nearer, and the sight 
 of her face became plain, a great swimming came behind 
 his eyes and he might have fallen, she was that beautiful. 
 He said: her body is like a first night's snow, her hair 
 is curly as the wool on a ram's head, her lips are red 
 as the rowan berry, and her voice is sweet and low like 
 the wind whispering among the reeds when the summer 
 is coming in. 
 
 At last I am looking at yourself, Curithir, and it is not 
 too soon that I set my eyes on you, for every spring-time, 
 a day, or at the most a week, has been coming between 
 our two bodies and our two souls. Faith, Liadin of the 
 songs, I've been thinking that myself, and it was a good 
 thought bade me a while back to wait here where I am 
 lest you might be passing. Do you hear that, Lomna 
 Druth ? Curithir asked, turning from Liadin to his dwarf 
 who was cocked up on the druid stone with the poet's 
 singing robe in a purple bag lying beside him. I've half 
 a mind to leave you cocked up there, so that you may be 
 
76 
 
 breaking one of your little legs trying to climb down, or 
 if there be no heart in you to dare to climb down, to 
 die up there, and you howling for a bite or a sup and none 
 coming. But my happiness is so great now that I'll even 
 forgive you for urging me to my journey and making me 
 miss her whom I've been waiting for this long time, and 
 who is before us now. He would have said more than 
 that to Lomna Druth, for he was angry at the thought 
 that he had been near to missing Liadin again. But at 
 the sight of her there was no more thought in him for 
 Lomna Druth, and turning from the ugly little fellow he 
 stood gazing and gaping at the beautiful woman before 
 him without a word to say to her, for his throat was like 
 a lime-kiln and hers was hardly better. A spell seemed 
 to be on the two of them, caused by the long waiting and 
 by the spring of the year. At last she got out the words : 
 Brigit, my tiring woman, was to sleep here by this stone. 
 But if you and the Lomna Druth have chosen this place 
 
 for your bed we would not be Faith, said Curithir, 
 
 wouldn't it be the poor thing if we could not spend one 
 night listening to the stories that every person in Ireland 
 has heard but our two selves alone. 
 
 But not a story, nor the beginning of a story, could 
 either tell the other, so great was the longing and the un- 
 easiness and the torment that was in them. While they 
 were that way the Lomna Druth was snoring away like a 
 stuck pig, with his mouth wide open, and the moon staring 
 down his gullet ; nor was Brigit far behind him, and the 
 noise them two were making with their snores and their 
 snorts put all the stories out of Curithir's head so that he 
 could not remember one of them at all and was stumbling 
 and forgetting himself until Liadin took pity on him. So 
 she said : let us leave these people where they are and 
 we will go and look out for a quiet place in the wood 
 where we can talk. He knew what was in her mind, 
 and got on his feet, and she came after him saying : I 
 
» 
 
 77 
 
 cannot go with you, and he answering : you can, you can, 
 indeed, overcoming her with the story of a place where 
 the grass was thick under the larches : where, he said, we 
 shall be missing the droppings of the rooks, for they have 
 their nests higher up on the hill-side. So cosening was 
 his talk she could not say no to him, and that night they 
 lay with their lips seeking each other's lips always, his 
 hand never wearying of the shape of her body, nor his 
 eyes wearying either, for the moon shining through the 
 tasselled branches gave light enough for him to enjoy 
 her with his eyes. So he not wearying and she nothing 
 loth spent the night together, taking their joy of each 
 other until the rooks began to clatter out of the high 
 wood and went away one by one and two by two down 
 the valley filled with mist for all the world like a lake. 
 No person, he said, looking from her, would know the 
 mist from a lake that had come in the night to divide us, 
 and she said : a lake come to divide us ! And he answered 
 her reproof : no, we're together for as long as this flesh 
 lasts. On speaking these words there came a piercing 
 in him with the knowledge that he would lose Liadin. 
 How he would lose her he did not know ; but there was 
 fear in him that he would lose her surely. It was in her 
 too, but being a woman she kept the thought to herself. 
 
 My Brigit and your Lomna Druth, she said, will come 
 this way searching for us ; it would be as well that we 
 should go to them instead. It would be as well indeed, he 
 replied angrily, but I wish all the same that the warning 
 had not come from you, and without saying any more 
 they went back in search of their servants. Curithir, 
 guessing Liadin' s thoughts, said : from this day our life 
 will be lonesome for us two, and not one of us knows how 
 we lived our lives up to this day, and we not seeing each 
 other every day and every night ; so hazy is it all that I 
 do believe it was but a dream that a reality broke last 
 night. I'm feeling like that myself, she said, but I would 
 
7S 
 
 have you make your meaning plainer to me. Says he : 
 is it not plain enough what I say that you are the greatest 
 poetess Ireland has ever known and I am the greatest 
 poet ; let us go off together for good and all, and we will 
 have a son to our name who'll be greater than the two 
 of us. I like well, she answered, that you should be 
 thinking such things, but if I said yes to that all my trysts 
 would be broken and your trysts too, and you have many 
 of them in the north and I elsewhere. We have to keep 
 our bonds with the people in whose houses we've eaten 
 and whose presents we've taken. And this seeming to 
 Curithir well spoken, he kicked his dwarf out of slumber 
 and said : come, follow me ; the day has begun and our 
 way is northward. With the same words but without the 
 kick Liadin awoke Brigit : put the harp on your back and 
 sling the bag with my singing robes over your arm and 
 be after me quickly, for there's a long road in front of us. 
 Brigit did as she was bid and was soon ahead of her 
 mistress, whose thoughts were not on the road before her 
 but back in the pleasant covert where so much delight 
 had come to her. And every step she took away from 
 the place the nearer it was to her, so that to get rid of 
 the languish that was interfering with her journey she 
 began a cronan and a singing to herself, and it was the 
 way that the words and the tune came unknown to her, 
 word for word and note by note, so that she wondered. 
 The like of this never happened to me before, she 
 murmured, though the verses usually came easily to me ; 
 nor was the first stretch of the road they were going 
 done with when lo ! and behold you ! a second and a 
 third song came to her and she not looking for them or 
 thinking about them at all ! Other things she was think- 
 ing of. Mistress, you'll be making the king wait for 
 the new songs you promised last year. But to Brigit' s 
 screechings Liadin gave no heed. She continued in her 
 thoughts until they arrived at the Court, where there was 
 
79 
 
 a great gathering to meet her. It was proud she was 
 that time, and when she took the harp from Brigit she 
 made a song about love under the larches the way that 
 everyone who heard her that night were troubled under 
 their robes and stood gaping and gazing, every man 
 looking at every other man's wife and every woman with 
 her eyes at another woman's husband. Wherever she 
 went it was the same story, from king to serving boy, 
 men were stabbing each other in the streets, and women 
 tearing each other's hair in the parlours, with Liadin 
 standing by unconcerned about the mischief she was 
 making ; rejoicing maybe in the bottom of her heart, 
 for she was wild and raging wild that she hadn't had 
 a second night with Curithir under the larches. A year 
 is a long time, said she, but if I kissed another man that 
 would spoil it all, and as soon as any man tried to put a 
 hand on her she out with a knife on him. Let you be 
 listening to my songs, she would say, and let you be off 
 and do the same thing underneath the larches, but let 
 me be, for in this world everyone keeps to their own 
 people, the kings with the queens, the poets with the 
 poetesses, and so on that way. 
 
 The kissing and the strife continued until the priest 
 hearing that bad work was being done in the courts said : 
 Ireland will go back to the devil and the druids if we 
 don't put a stop to that one, and from that day out they 
 gave her neither peace nor ease, but kept on talking to 
 her, and preaching to her and barging at her about her 
 soul that would be lasting always, and about the wasting 
 of the flesh and the wasting of all things in the world. It 
 was the truth they were telling her, and she did well to 
 listen to them, for who have we but the clergy to come 
 to us when we're on the broad of our back, on the last 
 day, with oil to rub on our feet, and strong prayers for the 
 resting of our souls ? The time will come to you, Liadin, 
 said the priests, when your voice will be no better than 
 
80 
 
 the screeching of gravel under a door, and your fine hair 
 will be no better than seaweed, and it lank and stinking ; 
 and your teeth, if they are little itself and like the snow- 
 drops this day, will one day be lengthy and yellow, and 
 after that maybe there won't be a tooth in your head at all. 
 And not a day but will see the vanishing of a bit of your 
 beauty until there is none left, said the priest. It's that 
 way and with them arguments they talked to her, and there 
 was no stopping them once they began ; and then you will 
 be thinking, Liadin of the fair hair, about the mischief you 
 did in Erie and in the world, and about your wantoning in 
 the dry ditches in the summer nights, and the fighting 
 and battling you set going up and down the streets of 
 the five provinces. Repent while you've got the chance, 
 said they, or it'll be the worse for you. What would you 
 have me do } said she. Is it to be hanging up my harp on 
 a nail at the back of a door, and leaving it there ? she 
 asked them. And they said : it wasn't that, but to put 
 a good tune on the harp and to make songs about the love 
 of God and the glory of the holy saints and angels : that, 
 said themselves, is what we'd have you do. But if the sort 
 of songs you like do not come into my mind, what way 
 will I be singing them and I thinking of other things } 
 she asked. And that was her gait all the time, till one 
 day a great man, Fergus by name, took his death-blow 
 with a bill-hook in a dispute and a quarrel with another 
 man about her singing. 
 
 It was after that she began to listen to the priest : 
 it's a filthy, bad, black passion is in yourself, and all 
 for another singer, a wanderer and a story-teller of your 
 own kidney. The children you'll get that way wouldn't 
 be saints at all but little devils, and the sins they 
 commit will be added to your own ones for the punish- 
 ment. And so they kept at her until they got the girl 
 frightened. What would I be doing to escape the punish- 
 ment ? she asked, and the words warmed the priest's heart, 
 
81 
 
 for he knew that he'd got her tight. There is only the 
 one, he said, and that's the vow. And she, being shook 
 in her mind and tormented, took a vow to break with 
 Curithir, but not content with that, the priest would have 
 had a promise from her not to as much as see him. But 
 she stood up to the priest at that, saying : if I have 
 pledged a vow to meet him at the druid's stone I must 
 keep my vow to him, and no amount of talking out of the 
 priest could get it into her head that one vow wasn't as 
 good as another. The priest promised that grace would 
 come to her in a convent. But who will be getting me 
 out of the convent when once I am inside of it } she asked, 
 and the priest wasn't able to answer that question, so she 
 said : no ; I'll not go into a convent until I have seen 
 Curithir, and she stuck to that. The priest in his turn 
 answered her stiff enough that if she didn't take the pledge 
 to see Curithir no more she would be clapt into a convent 
 with her will or without her will ; so she took the pledge 
 of the priest with a " bad cess to you " in her heart all the 
 while she was pledging herself not to keep her tryst, saying 
 to herself: a vow that is put on a person by force is no vow 
 at all, which is true enough, God knows. But a vow is for 
 ever getting its grip on you like a growing disease and 
 you're tied up well before it's done with. 
 
 Not long after that Liadin hung her harp up on the nail. 
 And the king himself couldn't get a song out of her, no 
 matter how much he gave. As silent as them old rocks 
 she was in the king's hall, but when she was alone she 
 could be heard crooning away to herself at one of the old 
 songs. She never got to the end of any one of them, for 
 she would start a prayer in the middle of the song, and 
 not being able to go on with the prayer either, the tears 
 would come rolling down her cheeks. That's the way it 
 was with Liadin, and it was no better with Curithir. His 
 mind was wrapped up and lost in the whiteness of Liadin's 
 body, and that was, as I've just told you, as white and 
 
whiter than a first night's snow, and a smile would come 
 to his lips when he remembered the red of her lips that 
 put him in mind of the rowan berry he had seen hanging 
 over Cummins' cell. Cummins, I must tell you, was a 
 hermit, and he lived that time in an island on Lake 
 Carra, no distance from Ballintubber. You know it well, 
 your honour. As if these thoughts of Liadin were not 
 enough, there was the track of her teeth in his neck, for 
 she had bitten him and drew blood from him the way he 
 would never forget her in his wanderings. The wound 
 was sore enough, and many's the time his hand went to 
 it, and the thought was never far away that she had 
 rubbed some colour into it that could not be taken out 
 no matter how many times he might wash himself in the 
 River Shannon or any other river. He was glad of the 
 track of her teeth in his neck, and whenever he came to a 
 pool he stopped to admire it, saying : for all the money in 
 the world I would not give up these tracks of her love for 
 me. But misfortune often goes foot by foot with fortune, 
 and while he was thinking so much about Liadin he forgot 
 about his stories, and as he walked the road he was always 
 striving to catch up with them and they always fleeing 
 before him the way the clouds fly before the wind ; some- 
 times he thought he had gotten them again, but when 
 he stood up to tell them there was nothing in his head 
 but herself and nothing before his eyes, neither the king 
 nor his court, but Liadin' s face only. 
 
 The king in whose court he was, knowing nothing of 
 these things, cried to his servants to put Curithir out of 
 the gate, and Curithir let them do this just as a child 
 might, often enough not knowing what they were doing 
 to him, so taken up was he with his memories of Liadin. 
 And when the gate was shut behind him he didn't look 
 back but kept on walking the road, not minding what the 
 world was saying ; the great poet, Curithir, is without a 
 story in his head, and the Lomna Druth, his dwarf, tells 
 
83 
 
 tales for him. He travelled ahead^ wrapped up in his 
 dreams, to the next king's court ; but when he stood up in 
 the hall before the people it was the same thing as before, 
 he could only gaze and gape about him, and when the 
 king said : we're tired of waiting for your story, Curithir 
 answered : I cannot remember any story. If you've no 
 stories to tell us, you've no business here. Put him out of 
 the gates. As the servants were catching hold of him 
 Curithir said : I could tell a story to you and it would be 
 better than all the stories I've told you before this. Tell 
 your tale, said the king. By my faith and my troth I cannot 
 do that until I've seen Liadin. Liadin of the songs ! the 
 king answered, and Curithir said it could be no one else, 
 and that he was waiting for the springtime to see her 
 again. 
 
 The man is a fool, said the servants ; there isn't a story 
 in his head. What was it that happened to you, Curithir, 
 tell us that now ? The greatest luck, said he, that ever 
 happened to a man. And he went his way cheerfully, 
 though he had nothing in the wide world, barring the 
 memory of a night he had spent with Liadin under the 
 boughs, and the hope in his heart that he might spend 
 another one with her in the same place, which was a 
 poor enough life for any man living on alms and what- 
 ever he could find. It was fairly easy while the summer 
 lasted ; it wasn't so easy when the summer wasted into 
 autumn ; and it was hard enough when the autumn 
 dwindled into the cold weather. But Curithir knew 
 neither time nor season until the season of love came 
 round again, and he could say to himself: here is the 
 month coming when I'll see again Liadin of the beauties. 
 And down he knelt, and he prayed that God would put 
 the stories that he had forgotten back into his head so 
 that he might earn enough to dress himself and be decent 
 when he would meet her. But sure God took no notice 
 of him ; why would he indeed ? and he could remember 
 
nothing but Liadin, and he kept on walking ahead, not 
 seeing a thing in the world but springtime only. There 
 wasn't a green branch he passed but it put him in mind 
 of the love night that awaited him, and every bird 
 reminded him of the same thing. He crossed from 
 Sligo into Mayo, praying that his waiting for Liadin at 
 the druid stone might not be long, and in Mayo his 
 heart gave a jump and a lep, for there she was at the 
 druid stone, and by herself, without even the servant 
 Brigit. 
 
 She got there before me, so much does she love me, 
 he said, stretching out his arms towards her, and he 
 thinking, the poor man, that she would run into them. 
 Great was his grief indeed when, instead of running to 
 meet him, she put the druid stone between them, and 
 kept it there while she told him, across it, all that had 
 befallen her and how things were. Is it a dream I'm 
 dreaming, or am I hag-ridden ? he said, and will you 
 awaken me now, unless, indeed, I'm to die where I am and 
 as I am ? God help me, Curithir, she said, I've taken a 
 pledge to break with you entirely. I was hard put to it 
 to come here this day at all, and me badgered and 
 tormented and cross-hackled the way I was. Will you 
 hear the story of my escape from the priests ? From the 
 priests! he said, and with that he bent his face down 
 into his hands, with nothing coming from him but now 
 and then a moan or a groan, or a hard curse belike, while 
 Liadin told her own story and all about the way she 
 escaped from the priests of Corkaguiney. All that, he 
 said, doesn't matter, and nothing matters since we are 
 to be parted, bad luck to the ones that hate the poets, 
 said he, and it only hardened his heart against the priests 
 to hear her tell that Mary's own son had suffered on a 
 cross to save the souls of men and women. All he could 
 do was to moan out : the only soul I have is my love of 
 you, Liadin, and the only soul you have is your love of me. 
 
85 
 
 Wicked words, indeed, your honour ; but the man wasn't 
 in his mind at the time, so that he could only think of 
 the minute he had and couldn't think at all about the 
 eternity that was ahead of him. If you tell me any 
 more, he said, I shall be like a tree knocked down by 
 a big wind. Aren't all my roots snapping under me? 
 And such is my torment that I cannot listen any longer 
 to that kind of talk. Hold your tongue, Liadin, I tell 
 you now, and let you be saying that you'll come after 
 me into the forest, and stay with me there, where neither 
 priest nor Protestant can find us, but only the squirrels 
 and the forest cats and the small kind birds. Let you 
 hear me out, Curithir, she replied. Didn't they take the 
 pledge from you under a threat.'' he asked, and she 
 answered : They did, indeed, and they said they would 
 put me into a nunnery, and lock me in it unless I took 
 the pledge ; and God knows it was hard to get away from 
 them to meet you here. But a pledge is a pledge. What 
 are you telling me .'* he interrupted. Is it that we're not 
 going to lie together under the boughs of that larch-tree } 
 Is it to me, with the mark of your bite, and the track of 
 your teeth on my shoulder, that you're telling these things.^ 
 And with that he commenced to cry, the creature. All 
 that we done under the larches is done, said Liadin, for 
 it would be flying in God's face to break a vow we have 
 given to him. At this Curithir burst out again, and the 
 tears dropped down on to his cloak until it was as wet 
 as if it had been dragged in the river. Wringing wet 
 I am with the tears you've drawn out of my eyes, but 
 no matter the tears, and he continued like that until 
 she came around the other side of the druid's stone to 
 try and comfort him, and she took his hand, saying they 
 might be marching a bit of the road together. The time 
 hasn't come for parting yet, were her words, and it was 
 hand in hand like that they marched on, till Curithir 
 said: we are leaving the larch-tree behind us. Let the 
 
m 
 
 pair of us turn now, and go back to the larch-tree. I'll 
 not do that, said she ; and, tell me now, said she, is there 
 a man on the top of the earth would break a vow was 
 made to God? Said he, if I take you to a holy man, 
 and a very holy man, will you be minded by him, and 
 will you do as he bids you ? I will, in troth. Well, then, 
 there's a man on an island in Lough Carra, a holy man 
 surely, for he has lived on that island by himself these 
 fifty years. Cummins, son of Fiachna, is his name. Let 
 us go to him now, for what better thing could the young 
 people do than go to the old people in their trouble ? Fine, 
 the island that man lives on, not a prettier one in Ireland, 
 with birds and beasts flying and skipping in the glades, 
 waiting for the holy man, and they following him from 
 his cell to his chapel as if they were his children ; which 
 they may be, for as everything that lives, the flying and 
 the crawling and those that walk on four legs, and those 
 that walk on two, are children of the God that made them. 
 Coriie, do not delay any longer, Liadin, for our trouble 
 is a bad trouble, and if there's a man in Ireland can 
 cure us and help us that man is Cummins Mac Fiachna. 
 Let us be off now. The walk will not be long passing by, 
 for it's but seven miles from here to the Abbey of Ballin- 
 tubber, which was built by Roderick of Connaught, as 
 you know well. And Cummins' island is opposite the 
 shore of Carn, the great wood ; you must have heard tell 
 of it, for the same place had a bad name for wolves. Come 
 now with me and we'll be beside the lake, calling for 
 Cummins to fetch us in his boat, before the sun goes 
 down behind the Partry mountains. And so sweet was 
 Curithir's talk that Liadin could do no less than follow 
 him, although in her heart she knew all the time she 
 was doing wrong. Sooner than she expected, they were 
 passing by the skirts of the great wood and going 
 down the hill-side and hollowing across the lake for 
 Cummins. He didn't keep them waiting. Only three 
 
87 
 
 times had they to shout before a boat was put out 
 from the island, and Cummins, though he was then past 
 seventy, could pull a good stroke as well as another, and 
 in five minutes or less he was taking Liadin and Curithir 
 into his boat and reading in their faces that theirs was a 
 bad case of love. He was not minded to ask them any 
 questions yet, but rowed on steadily till his boat was by 
 the little quay that he had built for it. You seem in 
 great trouble, my poor friends, he said ; and they 
 answered that that was their case, and sitting by the door 
 of his cabin, the two of them began talking together. 
 
 Let one of you tell the story. And which shall it be ? the 
 hermit asked. Let Liadin tell it, Curithir answered, and 
 Cummins said : I would sooner hear it from her, though I 
 wouldn't be doubting your word either, Curithir. All 
 the same Curithir was not pleased with Liadin' s telling 
 of the story ; he thought he could have done it better 
 himself, but he let her go on with it right to the heel, and 
 then he went on his knees before Cummins, saying : is 
 there no power on earth to take away the vow she entered 
 into against her own free . will ? I say there is and that 
 you are the man to do it. Rise to your feet, my son, 
 Cummins said, and listen to what I'm going to tell you, 
 and if you search your own heart you will find that I am 
 not telling a lie nor making a mistake. We have no 
 thought that you would be lying to us. Well, my son, 
 not lying, perhaps, but making more of the thing than 
 it really is. Well, I will not be doing that either, 
 but just telling you the simple truth, which is, that 
 from our childhood all things are passing away from us. 
 The thoughts of our childhood die, and thoughts of 
 boyhood enter into us; these die themselves and the 
 thoughts of manhood get their grip ; and these die after 
 having their time. Our possessions and our health pass 
 away from us ; all things pass away from us except one 
 thing only, for everything goes away except the love of 
 
as 
 
 God. Everyone comes back to the love of God just as 
 you yourselves have done. You have come back to God 
 with tears, with sighs, and laments about things that 
 would leave you if you did not leave them. This leave- 
 taking is a harder thing for the man than it is for the 
 woman, Mac Fiachna said, for he was great at reading 
 faces. And another word to yourself, Curithir : the bond 
 she has entered into may lie sore upon her this day, but 
 it will be easier on her to-morrow. Curithir looked to 
 Liadin, thinking that she would say no to the hermit; 
 but she stood saying nothing, her eyes cast down as if 
 she was ashamed. You see, my son, how she stands, her 
 eyes turned away from you and she in fear of temptation. 
 No, Liadin cried. All you have spoken may be the 
 truth, but that is not the truth. I do not fear temptation. 
 
 Let that be as it will be, said Cummins, I'm going to 
 put you to the test this day, and you will see by morning 
 that the love you think is part of yourself, and is going to 
 last for ever and ever, and beyond this world and through 
 all eternity, is held to your senses the way a tree is tied 
 to its roots, and as the tree's roots loosen so your senses 
 will loosen ; take one of these senses away and some part 
 of your love goes off with it. You think this is not so ; 
 well, we shall see. Which of our senses will you take 
 from us ? said Curithir, and the hermit answered : I will 
 put that question to you — which will you choose now : to 
 see each other and not to speak, or to speak and not see 
 each other ? 
 
 Liadin and Curithir were of the one mind about that, 
 and they said it was better to see each other and not to 
 speak than to speak and not to see each other. The 
 choice being that way, the hermit brought them to a hut 
 that was cut into two rooms with a window in the middle, 
 so that they could look in at each other. He hung a 
 lamp in each room the way they would have light to 
 see by, and he left his altar-boy with them to see they 
 
89 
 
 did not talk. Inside of five minutes they had feasted 
 their eyes enough, and turning away from the window 
 each cried : it is a tiresome thing and a silly thing to be 
 gazing and not saying a word. Five minutes, am I saying } 
 Three was more like the time that they took pleasure in 
 each other's shapes. In three minutes they were as 
 weary as a fish taken out of the lake might be, and he 
 waggling at the bottom of a boat. And looking at each 
 other, their eyes said plainly : eyes are no good unless we 
 may be telling what our eyes see. But they could not do 
 this, for they had given a pledge and a vow to Cummins 
 that they would not speak, and the altar-boy was there 
 into the bargain. The last words they heard before the 
 door was shut on them was the hermit telling the boy 
 that if he closed as much as one eye he would know about 
 it, and be made to feel his fault with a cudgel cut from 
 the hazel copse in front of Cummins' cell. Out of fear 
 of the stick, not an eye did that boy close for the livelong 
 night, and in the morning the three of them were worn out 
 with watching ; and when the hermit came to unlock the 
 door the words he heard were : father, our choice was 
 a bad one; we should have chosen to speak and not to 
 see. Now is that so .'' said the hermit. You will have that 
 test to-night, and as the pair of you have such a wish to be 
 talking together, I'll give you, Curithir, this side of the 
 island to regale your eyes with, and Liadin she shall have 
 the other, and you must pledge your word to me that 
 you will keep the trees between you both, and that 
 there shall be no whispering through the branches. 
 You'll have plenty of that to-night ; keep your talk 
 for the dark hours and your eyes for the light. You 
 see, your honour, Church Island, the name it is known 
 by to-day, is the largest island on Lake Carra, and 
 it has about ten acres, maybe a dozen, and among the 
 trees are tall rowans and ash and some beeches. I know 
 the island from my boyhood, I interrupted; but go on 
 
90 
 
 with your story. Well, your honour, I have come to the 
 most interesting part of it. I wouldn't be too hard upon 
 you, Cummins said ; you won't be the whole day without 
 seeing one another. At Mass you may meet again, for 
 I'll offer up prayers to preserve you from temptation this 
 night that is to come, and all other nights, if you like it. 
 My Mass will be in two hours from now, and, until then, I 
 shall be praying for you both, and praying for myself and for 
 the rest of the world, for it is the world needs our prayers to 
 save it from God's anger, he being distressed at the wicked- 
 ness that is going on among you from year's end to year's end. 
 
 Listen, both of you, now, to what I am saying. For 
 the next two hours I'll be saying my prayers, and after 
 that I'll be reading the Mass that you are to hear in the 
 chapel, and after that I'll be in my cell, beautifying 
 the scrolls, the missal I am painting, my present to the 
 Abbot of Ballintubber, to whose kindness I am indebted 
 for this comfortable island. I cannot be away from my 
 work an afternoon if I would finish it this year ; and while 
 I am at work, weaving garlands and finding nooks and 
 corners for the birds and the weasels and the squirrels 
 and badgers and the foxes of my little domain, my cat 
 will be watching for mice as patient as myself. I am 
 telling you this, for I wish you both to imitate me and 
 my cat, each on different sides of the island. 
 
 It's a hard test and a cruel one you're putting us to this 
 day, said Curithir, for we are two young people and you are 
 an old man. That is true, Cummins answered him. The 
 old forget a great deal of youth's needs and feelings, and it 
 is truer still that the young know nothing at all of what the 
 old people are thinking. You see, Curithir, Liadin makes 
 no complaint, and he asked Curithir why he didn't take 
 example by her, but the tears were flowing down Curithir's 
 cheeks one after the other as rain falls from the eaves, 
 and there was no voice in him, so thick were his sighs. 
 Away with you now, the hermit cried, and let each keep 
 
91 
 
 to his and to her side of the island, and any transgressions 
 will be reported to me by my little altar-boys. As he 
 said these words Cummins fixed his eyes upon them, and 
 the sight of Liadin's calm and contrite looks satisfied him 
 that the bond would not be broken by her ; and he pitied 
 Curithir, for he knew what was passing in Curithir's heart 
 better than he did what was passing in the woman's, being 
 a man himself, and he said : life is bitter to him now but 
 the bitterness will pass and what was once bitter will 
 become sweet, but if I let them go their gait what was 
 once sweet will turn to worse bitterness. And Curithir, 
 who understood the hermit's mind, kept saying to himself, 
 as he walked by the lake shore : 'tis the old that make life 
 bitter for the young, and they make it betimes so bitter 
 that the young would escape from them through death's 
 door. But there was no courage in him to divide himself 
 from Liadin, which wasn't the same with Liadin, whom 
 Curithir could see between the trees betimes sitting on a 
 rock, looking across the lake. Thinking of what ? he asked 
 himself, but he dared not call out to her for fear the little 
 boys might hear and tell on him. Will she have the 
 courage to drown herself, which I haven't to-day, though 
 talking with Liadin without seeing her may be no better 
 enjoyment than feasting my eyes on her without speak- 
 ing ; and he wished the lake to rise up and carry them 
 away, for living, he said, is bitter as a sloe, and he cast one 
 out of his mouth. Will this day never end ? he asked ; 
 and, moaning, walked the shore, till at last the hermit's 
 bell summoned them to his cell. 
 
 So, the hermit said, you have chosen to speak but not 
 to see each other .^ And he drew a curtain across the 
 window and left them with the altar-boy, who was told to 
 report if either peeped from behind the curtain. But 
 without sight of each other they wearied of talking 
 almost as soon, but not quite as soon, as they had wearied 
 of gazing at each other. They wearied all the same, 
 
92 
 
 and though now and again they woke up from a doze 
 and began talking again they were as unhappy the second 
 day as they were the first. 
 
 Lad, the hermit said, have you waked or slept ? And 
 the lad answered : I may have dozed a bit, Father, but 
 should have heard them, and the hermit looked at the 
 curtain, and seeing it as he had left it, said: now, my 
 children, tell me, isn't human love, as I said it was, 
 different in this from the love of God, that we can 
 love God without sight of his face or the sound of 
 his voice ? And Curithir, answering Cummins, said he 
 would not endure another night of talking without 
 sight or sight without talking. And is it the same 
 with you, my daughter.^ the hermit asked. But Liadin 
 did not answer him, and he said : praise be to the great 
 God, she has passed beyond temptation already. She 
 has thrown the tempter out of herself, and you must 
 strive, my son, to do likewise. Tell me, the hermit 
 continued, turning to the woman, is it the way I've 
 said.^ and she answered: it is just as you have said. 
 I could bear a harder test than the one you gave us ; 
 I could indeed, and I could lie without sin beside 
 Curithir there from dusk to dusk. Without temptation 
 rising up within you.-* the hermit asked. Without any 
 temptation that I could not throw out easily. Liadin, 
 Liadin, that such words should have come from you, 
 Curithir cried, turning his face aside, and her cruel 
 talk brought such tears to his eyes that the hermit 
 was sorry for him. You would be putting a great test 
 upon yourself, my daughter, for the flesh is strong in 
 the night-time and the spirit weakens towards morning. 
 But to know if you speak truly, and have put temptation 
 well away, I'll let you lie with Curithir, Curithir covered 
 his face with his hands to keep the hermit from seeing 
 his joy. The hermit's eyes were upon Liadin, and he 
 said: I wouldn't put you in doubt or danger, my child, 
 
93 
 
 but ril do this to give you a chance of earning greater 
 glory by holding out, and for that reason, and to give you 
 good help, I'll make my altar-boy sleep between you. 
 On hearing these words Curithir's happiness turned to as 
 great sorrow, and he was near running to the lake to 
 drown himself, but, catching sight of Liadin's face, he held 
 his breath. Was this a trick of hers ? he asked himself. 
 Had she a spell to put on the boy so that he would sleep 
 like a top, and would neither see nor hear them, and they 
 crossing over each other in the night ? And feeling that it 
 would be better to have a little patience, for he would 
 know all these things later on, he said no word but 
 followed Cummins to the hut. 
 
 What happened to them, your honour ? You may guess 
 that when I tell you that in the morning they were waked 
 by the little boy crying to them, saying : look now at the 
 trouble you've shoved me into, for yonder is our father 
 cutting a stick in the hazel copse to beat me if I refuse to 
 tell him the truth. But you'll be helping me out of this 
 trouble, for the one that gets the pleasure should get the 
 pain. Before Curithir could answer him, the door was 
 opened by the hermit, who began to read their faces, and 
 being almost sure he had read them truly, he turned to 
 the boy, saying : you see this stick ? This stick is for you, 
 and not a whole inch of hide will I leave on your back 
 unless you tell me the truth, the whole truth and nothing 
 but the truth, for I think there was bad work done in this 
 place last night. Cummins was, as I've said, seventy at 
 this time, and the boy could have cast him to the ground, 
 but there isn't a boy in Ireland, God be praised, that would 
 raise his hand to a priest, for one is never sure that he 
 mayn't have the sacred elements about him somewhere. 
 It matters little to him if he tells you the truth, Curithir 
 said, for if he opens his lips to tell lie or truth I will have 
 his life. At this the boy began to weep, and Cummins 
 answered that he should not have put this great trial upon 
 
94 
 
 them, but what has happened cannot be undone, he said, 
 and the fault is with the man ; so come with me, Curithir, 
 and I'll put you on the shore with a letter in your pocket 
 that you'll take to the holy father in Rome ; he may be 
 able to shrive you for the sins you've committed last night, 
 which is more than I can do for you. Go to him at once 
 with all speed, make your way to Rome lest God take you 
 in your sin and plunge you into hell for the entertainment 
 of the big devils that dwell below. And while you're 
 walking to him I will be praying for your soul and for the 
 soul of the poor woman beside us the way she won't be 
 lost for ever if she repents and if you repent of your 
 deceiving ways. Sorra deceiving, said Curithir, and you 
 might have known what would happen. We won't 
 argue that, said Cummins : get you into the boat. And 
 you, he said to the altar-boy, stay here with the woman 
 until I return. Get you into the boat, he said again, for 
 Curithir was loth to leave Liadin. But he dare not 
 disobey the hermit, and Cummins laying himself to the 
 oars like a young man, God putting a strength into 
 him that wasn't natural, so that in a few minutes the 
 keel was grating on the sand beyond. Out of my boat 
 with you now, and do penance for your sins and pray 
 that the holy father may shrive you, but never let me 
 see your face on this island again, not till your beard 
 be whitened and all the wickedness gone out of your 
 heart. 
 
 Cummins took up his oars again and in a few minutes 
 he was back to the island, and what do you think was 
 the first thing he saw } Liadin lying in the lake, dead 
 and drowned, where she had fallen from a rock, she 
 having climbed it to try to see the last of Curithir. This 
 is a bad day for all of us, the hermit murmured to 
 himself, and taking the boy by the scruflP of the neck 
 he beat him severely, saying : take this and take that, 
 for it's through your fault the woman is dead and 
 
95 
 
 drowned and maybe in hell at this moment, unless 
 the great God in his mercy knows that she repented 
 before she tumbled into the water. Now be off with 
 you, you limb, he said, and all the rest of the day he 
 was busy digging a grave. .* 
 
 And it is in that grave that Liadin is lying to this day, 
 with the rowan-tree growing over her, for all that man 
 could say to the differ. And for the hind end of the 
 story I've to tell that long after Cummins was dead 
 Curithir came back, old and broken with travelling the 
 world. As he came through the great woods to the lake 
 the people didn't know him, and nobody in all Ireland 
 knew him to be the great poet Curithir who had gained 
 such glory for himself in the courts of kings. He was 
 white and ragged, for age and wolves had hunted him, 
 and he had barely escaped with his life, and would not 
 have done that if maybe the God above him had not 
 wished him to stand at Liadin' s grave. Is there no 
 hermit at all on the island ? he asked. Not a one at all, 
 they told him ; that island is as empty as a tin can with 
 a hole in it, but the hermit's boat is beyond still. He 
 got into the boat and laid to the oars, and he found the 
 grave after much searching for it, and when he did find 
 it he lay down beside it, saying : well, I've come to my 
 meering. There he breathed his soul away, and the 
 hermit, looking down, prayed such a prayer for him that 
 God could not choose but hear. As he did not come 
 back the villagers sought him out on the island, and they 
 dug a grave and stretched him in it, and not many years 
 afterwards the rowan-trees planted above the grave 
 reached across one to the other, their branches getting 
 together and intertwining as a token of the great love 
 that was lying under their berries, that were red as 
 Liadin's lips. Her lips were like that, as red as the 
 rowan berry. That is the end of my story, maybe it 
 wasn't too long, your honour. Your story. Alec, I said, 
 
96 
 
 is to my mind a beautiful relic of the Middle Ages, as 
 lovely as the Tara Brooch, and like the brooch it brings 
 back Ireland to me, the vanished Ireland, the Ireland 
 of my dreams. How long ago do you think it was that 
 Liadin met Curithir by this stone? I've often asked 
 myself that question, your honour, but from what I 
 remember, and from what my father used to be saying 
 that his father said, it was long ago indeed. It might 
 be a thousand years ago. 
 
 And then in the pleasant, resinous odour of the larch- 
 trees, that a random breeze flying in and out of the 
 wood carried towards us, and in the hum of the bees 
 making for their hive, and in a consciousness of the 
 beauty of the long grass waving in the wind, Trusselby 
 and I talked of ancient Ireland as well as we knew how, 
 myself prompting him with memories of what I had picked 
 up in conversation with Kuno Meyer and Trusselby falling 
 back on what he heard from his father and his grandfather 
 of what Ireland had been. 
 
 A country of great loneliness ; of monks who had 
 monasteries everywhere, and who sat in their cells 
 beautifying the gospels with ornamented scrolls, filling 
 them in with strange, wonderfully drawn patterns, garlands 
 of leaves and wreaths, with nooks and corners for the 
 birds and the squirrels. That part of the story, Trusselby, 
 in which the hermit tells Liadin and Curithir how he 
 will sit in his cell continuing the illumination of the 
 gospels, as patiently as his cat waits for the mice, is 
 delightful. May God rest his soul, father used to tell it 
 the same as I am after telling it to you, and he got it 
 from his father, Trusselby answered. 
 
 It may have been the perfumed shade of the larches 
 and the murmur of the long grass that won my thoughts 
 out of the present till I looked into the Ireland that was 
 before the Danes came — a quiet, sunny land, with trees 
 emerging like vapours, with long herds wandering through 
 
97 
 
 the haze, watched over by herdsmen. In that land all 
 was a dream for beast and herdsman ; for the monks 
 in their cells patiently illuminated the gospels with 
 strange device while their cats waited patiently for the 
 mice behind the wainscoting. A brooding, sacred peace 
 reigned over the land that I looked into ; and I under- 
 stood that in those halcyon days Ireland lay immersed in a 
 religious dream that the world never knew before or since, 
 without stirs or sign of danger except when a galley's 
 prow showed in the estuaries. And for a long time the 
 Danish pirates ravaged only the coast-lands. A land of 
 forests and of marshes with green uplands, I said aloud, 
 and Trusselby, as though he had been dreaming my dream, 
 answered : one half of this land must have been no 
 better than a big bog, and worse than a bog, sir, a marsh 
 full of reeds and bitterns with ducks by the million. And 
 snipe, I said. And we fell to talking of the great snipe- 
 shooting in Ireland at the beginning of the nineteenth 
 century. Trusselby could tell of many great shots. The 
 best was a Mr Keyes, the same gentleman that had two 
 thoroughbred stallions snorting round the country in 
 your own time, your honour. It was a bad day he didn't 
 bring home his forty or fifty brace. My father, Trusselby, 
 was a good snipe shot, and he told me that many a time 
 he brought home fifty-nine and a half birds, but he could 
 never get the thirty brace. I wouldn't be saying a word 
 against your own father, God be his rest, Mr Moore, but 
 I've heard from my father that Mr Keyes often brought 
 back fifty. There isn't much left of our forests now, and 
 one time they covering all the Burren mountains. It was 
 Cromwell, bad cess to him, that downed the timber, for 
 it gave shelter to the ones that would be rising and strik- 
 ing a blow for Ireland. I don't know, Trusselby, when 
 the last wolf was shot in Ireland; somewhere in the 
 seventeenth century, wasn't it ? Aye, the wolves went 
 off when the trees went off. In those days Ireland was 
 
 G 
 
98 
 
 the land of trees, I've heard my father say, and his father 
 before him told the same story. There was many a strip 
 left here and there of the old forests in his time, but 
 there's not much left of them now. 
 
 We fell to talking of the wolves, and how hard it must 
 have been for the ancient folk to protect their flocks. 
 Sure they hadn't that trouble : hadn't we the finest wolf- 
 hounds in the world, your honour, and plenty of them 
 too? 
 
 The Irish wolf-hound is a subject on which we were 
 both eager to talk, myself having heard that the last of 
 the true breed were seen at Westport House about 1 825 
 or 1830. After that the breed was allowed to die out, 
 and what they have been doing since to revive it is 
 but a mockery. Great Danes crossed with Russian deer- 
 hounds ; there might be a touch of the mastiff too, and 
 very like in appearance to the old wolf-hound they be, 
 your honour, but I wouldn't trust them to go against 
 a wolf — no, nor against a good strong fox. How did 
 we get the wolf-hound ? Did we breed him ourselves ? 
 We did that, but I'm not saying that we didn't help 
 the strain by blood from beyond in the Pyrenees, where 
 wolves are as plentiful as nuts. For another thing, my 
 father used to be saying that the monks that lived at 
 Bregen were fair destroyed by the wolves. I mean their 
 flocks, your honour, not themselves, for the wolf is a 
 cowardly creature, and unless he's got the other ones with 
 him he wouldn't dare look at a man. It's the innocent 
 sheep them fellows do be digging their jaws into, and it 
 isn't until the whole flock be torn and mangled that they 
 get off" with themselves into the forests, and up and away 
 among the hills that you see around us now. The same 
 hills used to be all scrub and forest, and there's plenty of 
 hiding in the holes of the rocks for them fellows, and they 
 with tails like a pot-hook, and with pointy ears and long, 
 snouty chaps to their jaws, and up and down them jaws 
 
99 
 
 teeth, be God, that would give you the jigs to look at, all 
 sizes and sorts, terrible once they get inside the flesh, like 
 Micky Murphy's big cross-saw when himself and his 
 brother do be pulling at it, Micky in the pit and Pat 
 above on the balk : only the saw cuts cleaner ; the wolves 
 snap and snatch away, that's the way they fight, snatching 
 and tearing until the bit comes out, not like the dog, that 
 holds on to his bite. But the dog is quick to learn, and 
 what made the Irish hound a great fighter was the same 
 snapping trick that he got off the wolves. 
 
 You were telling. Alec, about some hounds that came 
 over from the Pyrenees. I'll be at the story presently, 
 your honour, or maybe it would do me as well to 
 go on where I left off. And where was that? I 
 disremember it now. You were telling about the de- 
 struction of the flocks belonging to the monks that 
 lived at Bregen. 
 
 I was, indeed, your honour; they were terribly cut 
 about by the wolves, and the monks lost their best 
 hounds in the fighting that was always going on. There 
 was only an old bitch left, and they without a dog to line 
 her on account of a falling out they had with the king 
 about a piece of land. While they were telling each 
 other about their losses, and planning snares and pitfalls, 
 what do you think but there came into the Abbot's mind 
 the thought of a young Irish monk who had left Ireland 
 a while before that to teach Latin and Greek to the folk 
 beyond there in the Pyrenees. I wouldn't give a rotten 
 nut, says he, for the snares they do be setting. There 
 isn't a wolf will go into them, except an odd one, and it 
 blind with old age or hard of the hearing, or without a 
 smell in his nose. Far better it would be to send a letter 
 to the Pyrenees asking the Abbot beyond if he has a few 
 hounds he could be sparing, or a pup maybe. He won't 
 like to part with his dogs, though he had them from us a 
 matter of ten years ago, so it's only fair if he gives us a few 
 
100 
 
 of the pups to pull us through. He did that. The French 
 Abbot told them in a letter that he was sending three 
 dogs to Bregen bred from the stock that had come to them 
 from Ireland ; each of the three, he said, was a match for a 
 wolf. Mind you, it's a good dog will face the wolf and 
 the pair of them all alone. 
 
 The monk he was sending with the dogs was Marban, 
 a young fellow of the Gael that had gone to the Pyrenees 
 with his share of the Latin and the Greek the way he'd 
 be teaching. The Abbot had to send him, for nobody 
 could travel easy in Ireland, and they not knowing the 
 language of the country. How long would your honour 
 say it would be from this place to the Pyrenees ? About 
 a thousand miles. Alec, I'm thinking. And a thousand 
 miles, with three dogs under your hand. Alec answered, 
 would be a journey of about a couple of months if he 
 came through the Frenchmen's country. Which is not at 
 all likely, I rapped out. It's more likely he took ship at 
 Bordeaux and landed at Waterford. Waterford itself is a 
 good step from the county of Mayo. Alec interjected : 
 it is ; it's a long, weary walk, and it's full of dangers. A 
 man might easily lose himself in the forests at that time. 
 My grandfather was never tired of talking of Ireland in 
 the days gone by, and of the forests that were everywhere 
 except where there were bogs. Some of the hills were 
 free from trees, of course, or the people wouldn't have 
 been able to live at all, for they hadn't a thing barring 
 the sheep and the cattle, just like now. 
 
 Perhaps there's no part of the world that is changed 
 less than Ireland herself. In those times there were four 
 great roads, one running from north to south, and another 
 going from east to west, and the people were divided 
 between the ones that lived in the monasteries and the 
 ones that drove the cattle from this pasture to the next 
 one. Over the lot of them were a few warriors who rode 
 in chariots. The houses were made of wood, and that's 
 
101 
 
 why there's none of them left now. They were all burned 
 or battered down by the foreigner. Has your honour 
 ever been to the Arran Islands to see the big fort ? And, 
 mind you, that was built before Patrick came, when the 
 men were pagans. 
 
 Well, putting it all together, it was no easy time young 
 Marban had, doing his twenty miles a day, for if he did 
 less than that the wolves wouldn't have left a sheep in 
 the county of Mayo. So he struggled on, thinking about 
 the monks that were losing their flocks, asking his way 
 from this monastery to the next one, and sometimes 
 holloing for an advice to the wild lads on the hills, and 
 getting, perhaps, only half an answer from them. Many's 
 the time he must have lost himself between forest and 
 bog, and it was only the best of good luck or the pro- 
 vidence of God itself that got him across the Shannon. 
 After crossing it he had to ask his way through the 
 county of Roscommon, a fine big county, and Mayo is 
 a fine big county too, and Bregen wasn't many miles 
 from where we are now sitting. He must have had a 
 hard time, eating berries out of his hand, and the dogs 
 themselves picking up whatever was going in the way 
 of a stray rabbit or a hare, and in that way Marban and 
 his dogs came out at day-fall from a great wood in West 
 Mayo. In front of him there was a marsh covered with 
 wild-fowl, and more coming in at every minute : every 
 kind of duck ; gulls would be there too. Faith, they're 
 in it still and plenty of them, but there was more then, 
 and herons and bitterns were as common as children are 
 now. 'Tis a lonesome place a marsh at the close of day, 
 and the boom of the bittern would put a traveller's heart 
 crossways, and he listening to it in the dusk. I believe 
 there were bears, too, in Ireland ; and 'tis said the hug 
 of a bear makes pudding of a man's insides. Bears are 
 not partial to flesh, they like berries better, and that's 
 a queer thing for such a bulky lad, but there isn't an 
 
102 
 
 animal that came out of Noah's Ark that dislikes being 
 interfered with or meddled with more than a bear does. 
 At the time of Marban's arrival, I'll be bound the deer 
 were skipping down to the rivers to drink, but I needn't 
 be wasting my breath on these things, it's only that I'd 
 like you to hear the story the way I heard it. 
 
 Well, as Marban was going back to the wood, wishing 
 to tie up his dogs to a tree and make himself as easy as 
 he could up in the fork of a bough, he saw a light, and 
 after following it for some time he said : maybe that isn't 
 a natural light at all. Maybe that is a will-o'-the-wisp that 
 will lead me to my destruction. He was wrong there ; it 
 wasn't to his destruction the will-o'-the-wisp led him, but 
 to his safety, if you can call it that when you've heard the 
 story out, but God knows what might have happened to 
 him if he had done the night in that wood. 
 
 When he was going back into it he caught sight of 
 another light, and he said : that looks a better one, that's 
 a fine steady light ; that's the light from a window, and 
 wherever there's a window there's a door, and wherever 
 there's a door there's a roof, and wherever there's a roof 
 there's a bed ; and for this night any sort of bed will do 
 me. But the poor man didn't know the sort of bed he 
 was going to, he was that full of hope, and every step he 
 took he said to himself : no doubt at all but it's a house 
 I'm walking to this minute, or it's a monastery, or maybe 
 it's the court of a king. He tried to remember who were 
 the kings in Mayo, but he had been so long out of the 
 country that he couldn't think of their names. Well, said 
 he, small the thing whether I sleep in a castle or a nunnery, 
 or the court of a king this night, if only I can put a bit 
 into my own mouth and the mouths of the pups here ; 
 and if I get a pillow underneath my head I'll be well 
 contented. I need no more and ask no more. God be 
 praised, I'm saved ; I am so, glory be to God, he cried, 
 and he hit a thump on the gate. 
 
103 
 
 It was at the third knock that the Mother Abbess 
 poked her head out of a window, and not three minutes 
 afterwards there were three other heads poking out of 
 other windows. Good, decent women they are, and of my 
 own race, the monk said. They won't be grudging me the 
 bit to eat and the sup that washes it down. He wasn't 
 wrong there, for as soon as the Abbess heard his story and 
 his tale she bid him wait till she had got some clothes on 
 her back. We've been in bed, young youth, this half-hour, 
 she said ; but I'll let you in. When she had slung a cloak 
 on she opened the door and let himself and his dogs in, and 
 she saying : the blessing of God on yourself and on these 
 three fine dogs that are sniffing at my feet this minute. 
 Badly they're wanted. The boys up the hill will be glad to < 
 have them three the way the wolves have been making 
 havoc and destruction amongst the flocks. There isn't a 
 flock left in the country, my son, not a shepherd but has 
 his share, some of them two, and some of them three, and 
 some of them the good half of a flock, but with the help of 
 God and these three fine dogs, we'll have mutton to our 
 bread on Sundays and holidays and odd times as well. 
 We haven't tasted much meat lately, but here's a bit left, 
 she continued, from last night, and we depriving ourselves 
 of it, little thinking that you would be wanting it more 
 than we do after your long travel, my poor young man. 
 Was it Marban you said you were called ? A good name it 
 is surely in this country. 
 
 Such was her canter while she cut the bread and poured 
 him out a noggin of ale. We don't drink ale ourselves, 
 she said, but we have it for strangers, the ones that do 
 be wanting it. While talking she kept on looking at the 
 lad, taking stock of his size and his shape, and from what 
 father told me and what he heard from his father before 
 him, Marban was a fine young fellow when he was in it, 
 a long-legged lad with spreading shoulders to him, with 
 red lips, and a mouthful of teeth as white and as strong 
 
104 
 
 as the ones inside the faces of his hounds that were 
 already stretched and snoring by the hearth, too tired 
 for even their feed. 
 
 She seemed to be well pleased with the traveller, and 
 kept on putting questions to him about himself and the 
 ways of the monastery he had left behind in foreign parts. 
 She wasn't a woman you would be calling young, and 
 she wasn't an old woman either : a youngish woman 
 falling into flesh as the roses will be doing in a month's 
 time, when they open out like small cabbages. She only 
 had a few clothes on, being in a hurry to open the door 
 to him, one of the long blue cloaks you might have seen 
 worn by the married women when you were a boy, and 
 it slipped on over the gown she'd gone to bed in. Well, 
 she was so full of the lad eating at her table that she 
 had no heed of herself, more often than not showing 
 herself away up her legs and down into her bosom, 
 puzzling the young monk, who did not know how to 
 let on he wasn't taking notice of her. You will under- 
 stand how this was right well, your honour, when I tell 
 you that one of the questions she was haggling at was 
 the distance between his monastery and the nearest 
 nunnery ; and great was her surprise when she heard 
 that there wasn't a nunnery closer to him than twenty 
 miles. Sure that's ridiculous, said she. How do you be 
 getting your temptation .»* said she. Tell me that now, 
 said she. What good are we doing here if we be not 
 overcoming strong temptations ? she said. And barring 
 the women, what temptations are there in this world for 
 monks who have the height of eating and drinking, and 
 aren't called away to fight for any king ? There aren't 
 any, said she. And the young man not answering her, 
 she went on that way all the time, until at last, by dint 
 of arguing, she got him to fall in with her way of thinking 
 instead of the one he was used to, and he told her that 
 all she said seemed to be true enough, and that the 
 
105 
 
 sticking of yourself into the way of temptation so that 
 you'd get a prize for standing out against it used to be 
 practised in the monastery of the Pyrenees long ago, but 
 had been reneged by the Church because lots of the folk 
 hadn't been able to shove back the temptation quick 
 enough to save their souls from the danger. But as I've 
 been telling ye, the Mother Abbess answered him : what 
 good is it to be living at all if it isn't to be overcrowding 
 the devil ? And if a few should fall back into his claws, isn't 
 that their own sin and their own folly and their own look- 
 out ? Is there to be no thought for the ones that be 
 striving to get a place up in heaven and they not having 
 any longer the ways and means, temptation having been 
 forbidden by the Church. 'Tis a poor thing, I say, and 
 a hard thing when the strongest are held back by the 
 weakest, and the fine places in heaven are empty, there 
 being no person to win them. 
 
 As the remark came the door opened and Sister Blathnat 
 came, and she so tidily dressed that the Mother Abbess 
 couldn't keep her tongue quiet and snapped out that she 
 had been too long delaying to bid the stranger welcome. 
 And when will the rest of the sisters be coming in } 
 They'll be here. Sister Blathnat answered, inside a minute 
 or two minutes. And strange things they will be hearing 
 when they do come. And when all had forgathered the 
 Abbess repeated all the monk had just told her: that 
 there wasn't a nunnery with a female in it within twenty 
 miles of his monastery in the Pyrenees, and that they 
 didn't want one, it having come to pass that a man is 
 forbidden to put himself into temptation for fear he might 
 be bet. Did you ever hear the like of that story before, 
 Sister ? And isn't it the great nonsense ? As I was 
 telling Brother Marban here, our work in the world is the 
 overcoming of the devil, and if we aren't at it all our lives, 
 what chance is there for us to get a place in heaven at all, 
 to say nothing of a fine easy one ? 
 
106 
 
 Sister Blathnat was a tall, sloping woman, with soft eyes, 
 such as one sees in a deer. Her hair was like silk, brown 
 with a yellow shine in it, and the longest legs a woman 
 ever had, measuring them from the knee to the ankle, 
 and wonderfully sweet were they, the sort that would stir 
 up the heart of any man to be at her. And she gained 
 great advancement with her legs, moving them while she 
 spoke, her eyes fixed on the monk, crossing and uncrossing 
 them as she'd a right to do, for all this was her business, 
 and his business was to think of our Lord Jesus, who had 
 died for him on the cross, and she too would have to think 
 of the same thing, and be saying prayers while all this 
 was going on. 
 
 The nun sitting beside her. Sister Muirgil, was a small 
 woman, with round, inquisitive eyes, which she kept raising 
 and lowering as if she'd set the monk thinking that it 
 might be harder for him if he were put to it to resist her 
 than Sister Blathnat. After her there came another nun. 
 Sister Brigit, a thin woman that at first sight you might 
 be taking for a girl, so rosy were her cheeks, and the 
 finest head of hair she had in the county of Mayo, it 
 ringletting about her neck like the ferns in May, and her 
 eyes were kindly, yet she was in no way good-looking, 
 barring that she made a fine shape through her gown. 
 
 Other men found that they were better helped up the 
 difficult way to heaven by Sister Eorann, a girl as brown 
 as a berry she was, with crinkly hair and merry eyes and 
 with much pleasant talk. She was the last but one to get 
 out of bed and come down, and Marban guessed that she 
 was someone in the nunnery, for she joined in with the 
 Mother Abbess, interrupting her telling Marban that God 
 allowed the devil to test men with temptations, but 
 measuring these always to their strength. The women, 
 said she, are the best temptation of all the temptations ; 
 everybody knows that, and it is only the great and good, 
 the ones that are worthy of high places in the kingdom of 
 
107 
 
 heaven, that can resist the women without going to the 
 tub. The monks from Crith Gaille come down and they 
 stretch beside us as quiet and gentle as lambs beside 
 their ewes, and no eviJ in them at all. Of course they 
 are burning all the while, and well they may, but it is 
 only by burning here that we escape the burning and 
 the blazes of hell. Is it not the same with you women ? 
 Brother Marban asked. And the Mother Abbess answered 
 him : it's the same for us as for them. Burning we do 
 be, and mighty uneasy, for are we not always tempting 
 each other, and together overcoming our temptations, 
 thereby winning great rewards } 'Tis like going up the 
 ladder, we begin at the lowest step and end at the top 
 one. For myself, being forty years of age, the young men 
 lie with me, who, though no longer young, am still able 
 to stir their blood ; but the old monks lie with the sisters 
 until they contrive power over themselves and great 
 resistance to any of us. Any, Sister Blathnat said, except 
 Sister Luachet, who hasn't yet lain with a man. The 
 Abbot, said the Abbess, picking her up, will lie with 
 Sister Luachet if he recovers from the sickness that is on 
 him. He's very sick, the poor man, and he's as old as the 
 hills. It will be his last temptation. He'll not be long 
 with us, and I'd like to have him high up in heaven, ready 
 to receive us all when the time of temptations is over and 
 done with. 
 
 The talk went on about Sister Luachet till she came 
 into the room, and when she came in the monk saw the 
 prettiest girl he ever did see. Her hair was the colour of 
 the corn before the reaper goes in with his sickle, and her 
 eyes were well set in her head, and round and blue and 
 pleading, and her shape was pretty throughout. Small 
 breasts she had, and straightened flanks, and round thighs, 
 and ankles as pretty as a young donkey's. She had a live 
 smile on her face, something that put one in mind of a 
 bird and of a flower, and of pleasant harmless things. 
 
108 
 
 The Mother Abbess told Luachet to strip herself, so that 
 Marban might see what a trial she would be to the devil 
 in times to come, and she winning high places in heaven 
 for the monks, and he not getting one monk of the 
 monks for his realm below. 
 
 Isn't that so, my little Luachet ? said she, and the girl 
 clapped her hands, saying : it is. Mother ; I'll be making 
 saints and saving saints in the times to come. The 
 Mother Ajbbess continued her canter : but we'll wait till 
 she fades a little, the girl, before we allow her to lie with 
 the monks at Bregen, only with the Abbot himself if he 
 comes out of the sickness, and it will take little Luachet 
 to stir up a flame in him, poor old man, and he seventy- 
 five if he's a day, so that he may win a place in heaven 
 will do honour to Ireland. And now, the Reverend 
 Mother continued, slip into your gown, child, and your 
 cloak, for the night is chilly. 
 
 In the PjTcnean monastery, the place this man comes 
 from, there is no nunnery within twenty miles, and the 
 monks live there without temptation from a woman year's 
 end to year's end, eating their fill and drinking their load, 
 but not a chance nor the ghost of a chance for them to 
 conquer themselves. Strange ways the Church has fallen 
 into, and strange times for the world. Ah ! it's only in 
 holy Ireland, I'm thinking, that the saints are still living. 
 
 Mother, interrupted Brother Marban, in the South the 
 blood is hotter than it is in the North. Ah ! the Mother 
 Abbess grunted ; true for you. It's in holy Ireland only 
 that strength is given to man to best temptation, and 
 now, for it's getting late, which of us is going to lie with 
 Brother Marban to-night, and he not having had a tempta- 
 tion to strive with for this long while back ? Any one of 
 you might strike up a flare in that kind of flesh. Brother, 
 though you do look like a virtuous and a holy young man, 
 I'll lie with you myself this night, for I'm older and wiser 
 and better able to be staunch if the devil tries to cut any 
 
109 
 
 capers beyond the ones that we expect from him and are 
 used to. We've managed to keep him out of this place 
 up to now, so don't be worried or frightened, for he won't 
 pass the doors and windows, sprayed as they are with holy 
 water, nor will he try the chimney, for the vane itself is 
 the form and shape of a holy cross, protection enough. 
 Maybe you have an extra crucifix handy, Mother, said 
 Marban, and there is great virtue in that indeed. 
 I have, she answered. I will put this one round your 
 neck, the way you'll hold it in your hand and be kissing 
 it while you're in the bed, for that's what will give you 
 courage to hold out against the temptation. And now, 
 my children, good-night to the lot of you, she said to the 
 other nuns. Out with you, and leave me here to my trouble 
 with this young man. 
 
 When she had the door shut behind them she came 
 over to Marban and told him to kneel down alongside 
 herself and say a prayer ; so they did that, but she prayed 
 so long that the boy thought his knees would break away 
 from under him. Tender you do be about the knees 
 when you're young. First he lifted up one knee and 
 then he lifted up the other one and there wasn't the 
 smell of a prayer left in him when the nun got up with 
 a grunt and gave her leg a shake. Now, said herself, 
 we'll be getting into bed. Do you begin to strip, and 
 I'll not be long behind you. 
 
 The young man was in travelling dress, and there were 
 boots to be unlaced, and brooches to be unhooked, and 
 many other things, and while he was laying his clothes 
 aside and folding them up, he had his back to the Abbess, 
 for he wasn't used to this kind of thing; but she had 
 little on her, barring the cloak and the shift, and when 
 the cloak was off she says to him : now, Brother Marban, 
 none of this dodging your lawful temptations ; turn round 
 here and take a look at me and don't be afraid, for God 
 will give you grace to resist me. He found she was very 
 
no 
 
 like what he thought she would be, like one of those 
 big cabbage roses, all pink and white, thick about the 
 thighs, too big in the belly for sightliness, or, as they 
 say, beef to the heels like a Mullingar heifer. But a 
 fine woman all the same, and when they were side 
 by side together, she gave him a prod and said she again : 
 face round here to your temptations, and face them bravely, 
 for your guardian angel is always beside you. But, says 
 he, if the devil should be stronger in me and overcome 
 the angel ? You mustn't talk like that, said she. The 
 monks in the monastery above would come down here and 
 drive you out into the wilderness with clouts of a stick 
 
 if they thought They'd kill me, he interrupted. I 
 
 wouldn't go as far as to say that, she said, but they would 
 do a damage to you, and they'd have no further truck 
 with you. The wilderness is a bad place at night, the 
 way it's so full of bears and wolves. Be thinking of that 
 now and you're safe. But you mustn't be thinking of the 
 other things, for everything comes out of your head, 
 and if you don't let the thought into your head, you're 
 as safe as I am. You're quiet enough as it is. There's 
 nothing to fear, my good boy, and the nun passed her 
 hand over him, and finding him slack everywhere, she 
 said: there's not much temptation in you, young man, 
 so let you lie now in my arms, and look into my eyes, 
 and whatever temptation there may be about will rise 
 up and you have the chance to scoop it out of yourself. 
 
 If I get away from this place with my life, said the 
 young man to himself, they won't catch me here again 
 for ever, and I won't stop running either until my feet 
 give out, and until there are nine twisting miles of scrub 
 between myself and themselves here in this house of 
 God. The monks up yonder would be hard men with 
 no pity in them for them that tumble. God be praised 
 that I did my forty miles this day through tough country, 
 and me with three healthy dogs pulling out of me, for 
 
Ill 
 
 the same journey would leave the sinfullest man with 
 little humour for a bit of tallow at the end of it, to say 
 nothing of a cleric and he guaranteed by the grace of 
 God. But never a word of all this to the nun that was 
 in his arms, and she thinking that nothing but the power 
 of God could make him so like a dish-cloth. You've 
 conquered your temptation before you came here, said 
 she. But we must find a better one to rouse you. The 
 devil a one here will do that, said the lad to himself. At 
 daybreak I'm away to the monastery, and maybe I'll 
 be safer there. 
 
 CHAP. XIX. , 
 
 HE was asleep the minute after the door closed behind 
 her, and he didn't rouse or budge until the sun was high 
 up in the heavens and the nuns had been knocking at 
 his door more times than once. Nor was it till the third 
 or fourth knock that he opened his eyes, but at the fifth 
 or the sixth ; and seeing the sun that strong in the room, 
 he said to himself: I'm done for; I've slept it out. I'll 
 be kept here by the women, and if I'm fresh and vigorous, 
 and lying with one of the younger ones in the night that's 
 coming, the lord will be put to the pin of his collar to 
 save me from the devil. I'd do well to kiss the crucifix, 
 said he, and dragged on his clothes, for he could hear a 
 gathering of them beyond his door, and thinking they might 
 be coming in upon him, he bounced out into the very 
 middle of them and very soon Sister Eorann was stuck on 
 him like a burr. You remember, your honour, the almost 
 crooked little figure with crinkly hair and grey eyes, a 
 babbling little nun, that was soon telling Marban to his 
 face of his grand success last night. As quiet as a lamb 
 you were, said the mother to me, and you inside her arms 
 and well in, and that we'd have our work cut out to 
 
112 
 
 work a temptation in you. But it's grand work, indeed, 
 getting the better of the devil. 
 
 Before Marban could answer her she was telling him 
 the story of their nunnery; how a hundred years ago 
 Suibhne MacCalmain, king of Dal Ariadhe, was mad and 
 distracted by a great sickness that was on his wife, and 
 no one could cure her, though all the wise women in 
 Connaught had been by her bed-side giving her every kind 
 of medicine, and no good coming to her out of it. Sorra 
 one of them could tell what was the matter with her, only 
 that she was wasting away, and she was no more than a 
 dead bird at the bottom of a cage with its legs poked up 
 when MacCalmain came running out of the house to throw 
 himself into the river and drown himself therein. On the 
 way he met three nuns, and said they to the king : where 
 are you off to, MacCalmain ? I'm off to throw myself into 
 the water. What's that for? said they. It's to drown 
 myself, said he ; for the wife is dead, said he, or she's 
 dying on me. How do you make that out ? said a nun of 
 the nuns, and MacCalmain said: there's hardly a grip 
 of her left. All the same, said the nuns, her life isn't 
 done with yet. How is that ? said the king. What do 
 you mean by that ? said he. Do you not know, said the 
 nun, that the angels are gathering this minute of the 
 minutes above there in the clouds, blue and white they 
 be, to bear her soul to God ? I know that same, said the 
 king; I know it well. Good for you, MacCalmain, said 
 the nun. And tell me this now, said she : do you want 
 to separate yourself from herself for ever ? Is that it ? 
 Separate myself from herself, it is not that, said he ; and 
 he stood gazing and gaping without a word in him. As 
 soon as he got hold of a few odd words he said that he 
 was off to his drowning in the river because he couldn't 
 live without her. Live ! said a nun of the three nuns. We 
 don't live on this earth at all, it's a dream ; our own life 
 is heaven itself, close to the Lord God, and he in the 
 
lis 
 
 middle of the holy saints. Come away from the river, 
 MacCalmain, and pray to have your sins forgiven and you 
 to be restored to your wife when she's wearing a better 
 crown than the one you gave her. Don't say a word 
 against the crown, says the king, for he was a proud man, 
 and he got the crown made himself; but all the same the 
 words of the nun struck him as being wise words, and he 
 was going off to do their bidding when one of the three 
 nuns called him back. We are going to pray to God the 
 way you'll get back your wife. Do that same, said he, 
 for heaven itself would be a poor place to me if I couldn't 
 plant my seat alongside the seat of Etain, the one I gave 
 my crown to and my heart, and all my wishes and my 
 wants. And now tell me, he said, since you understand 
 these things so well, will he be giving her to me plump 
 and hearty, the way she was last year, or will she be all 
 skin and bone, the way she is this year } A foolish question, 
 to be sure, but the man was ruined with the grief, and 
 even the holy faces of the nuns, and they looking side- 
 ways at him, could only pacify him bit by bit, until the 
 truth dawned on him that life on this earth is no more 
 than a shadow of the long life that's stored up for us in 
 heaven. If it*s that way, said he to himself, the less I 
 think about earth the better, for I'm getting on and there 
 can't be many more years in front of me. But if I get to 
 heaven I'll have an eternity with Etain, and that's a long 
 time. So here goes for Etain. 
 
 With that he gave up the kingdom and went and joined 
 the hermits that do be in the wilderness, passing his 
 kingdom over to his brother Guaire and giving the nuns 
 a whacking lump of his forests and glebe for the building 
 of a nunnery, they bargaining to be offering up prayers, 
 and good ones, so that he might meet his wife, her body 
 and soul, in heaven. 
 
 It wasn't long after that he began to study the Latin, 
 and as soon as he had enough of the tongue to get through 
 
 H 
 
114 
 
 Mass they made a priest out of him, and with his cassock 
 on his back he was the proud man, thinking small, rough 
 potatoes of his brother Guaire, the new king. You have 
 a soft silk shirt on you like I used to wear when I was a 
 king and a sinner, but my cassock scratches my skin, 
 making many a sore place, but every one of these scabs 
 will be lifting me up nearer and nearer to the blessed 
 Etain, and she, if it's the will of God, a saint among the 
 saints. Whereupon the two brothers went up to where the 
 nuns were building, and MacCalmain put off his cassock 
 and dug into the work of collecting wattles and driving in 
 stakes with a hammer, and Guaire watching him, wishing to 
 do the same, but of course he couldn't, for that's no king's 
 job. But he was proud of the brother all the same, and 
 he thought a lot of the nuns too. Great women were the 
 nuns of old Ireland, content at first with little enough, 
 a church, a refectory, a kitchen, a library, a workshop, a 
 guest-chamber maybe, and to get these built, great labour 
 was needed. My father was apt at telling a story how 
 St Patrick, going the road from Mayo to Ulster, cried 
 like a baby when he saw the blood on the woodmen's 
 hands, the tears rolling down his cheeks in two great 
 streams. The nuns would never have been able to clear 
 the land of forest if MacCalmain had not asked his brother 
 Guaire to send up help ; sure, they couldn't do it. The 
 nuns, he said, haven't time to say as much as a prayer, and 
 my poor wife and I are lonely one for the other, she away 
 there in heaven and I where I am in this place. Send 
 these nuns good help the way they'll get their building 
 finished and be able to say their prayers. The wife may 
 be in purgatory yet for all we know. Send up some good 
 help, Guaire, and we'll all get a prayer said for us against 
 the time we'll be in purgatory, for there will all of us be 
 sooner or later, this day or the next, and God knows for 
 how long. 
 
 All that I'm telling your honour Mar ban heard from 
 
115 
 
 Eorann^ and when his turn came to speak he said : you've 
 heard, Sister, that in heaven there is neither marriage 
 nor giving m marriage. We read the same words in the 
 gospels, Eorann answered, but it is the Abbot beyond 
 explains hard things to the laity ; and sure it is only just 
 and reasonable that we should be rewarded in the next 
 world for the temptations that we conquer in this one. 
 
 To this Marban could only answer : 'tis true for you, 
 Sister. 'Tis true indeed. And he wondered at her blab- 
 bing little tongue, her round, childlike eyes, and it was 
 with an uneasy mind and an itchy body that he followed 
 her round the lands of Crith Gaille, asking himself, if 
 he had to lie with every nun in the nunnery, would he 
 be strong enough to resist the lot of them the way 
 he did Mother Abbess, or would he have to give in. 
 Let me out of this place, he said to himself, and I'll 
 take care not to put one foot of my feet into it again. 
 I would never have come back to the old country if 
 I dreamt that such trials and goings on were in pickle 
 for me. You're not listening to me, Marban, the little 
 nun was saying. I am, indeed, said he ; and to prove 
 it, you're telling me that when a school is added huts 
 are built round it for the students, and that the Mother 
 Abbess was often of the same family as the founder, 
 the office coming down from father to son. Isn't that 
 what you said, or isn't it ? And Eorann had to give in that 
 he did know what she was talking about. But what is 
 there on your mind } she asked. For there is something. 
 I'm thinking about the difference there is between the 
 Ireland I left and the one I've come back to. What 
 difference can you be seeing, for you were no better than 
 a child when you left Ireland ? she answered. And you've 
 come back to the same Ireland as always was and always 
 will be, praise be to God for ever and ever. 
 
 They hadn't walked very far before he said : we've got 
 out of the way of putting ourselves into temptation, and 
 
116 
 
 she answered him : is it how the Mother Abbess made 
 you out to be holier than you are and that you're afraid 
 of us ? It isn't that, said Marban. It is not that indeed. 
 What else can it be, said Eorann, that would stop a man 
 from winning a high place in heaven and he getting the 
 chance ? He might be a humble sort of man, said Marban, 
 and he might be one would be content with a small place. 
 You won't be talking like that to the sisters whom I see 
 coming towards us, for they will be expecting you to look 
 upon the temptations we are laying out for you as your 
 heavenly fortune. 
 
 You never could be sure with Eorann that she wasn't 
 making fun of you, for there was a sting at the back of 
 whatever she said, and Marban felt that he didn't like 
 her. As she went off, he said to himself: well, it won't be 
 that one will give me a fall. And he threw an eye over 
 the others that were now round him, talking to him, each 
 one trying to get him to herself, for they all wanted to 
 hear about the monastery in the Pyrenees, and what sort 
 of men the foreign monks were, and if he liked speaking 
 the French better than he did the Irish ; and they wanted 
 to know if the prayers and the fastings were long beyond 
 there in the Pyrenees, and what penances they got, and 
 if the Abbot called up every monk in turn to receive 
 many stripes on the hand. We get two hundred, one 
 said to Marban, in the days before Lent, to remind us 
 that we are at the beginning of the year's penance. But, 
 said he, your prayers here don't seem to me to be out 
 of the way long. You had matins at midnight the same 
 as there is in every convent, and I said Mass for myself 
 at seven. The monks at Bregen, said he, don't seem to 
 be coming down to fetch their hounds. We didn't send 
 them word, Blathnat answered. And we won't send them 
 word yet a while, Muirgil rapped out, for we want to have 
 you here to ourselves so that you may be getting great 
 glory for us. 
 
117 
 
 Now Mar ban didn't give her an answer, for he was 
 brooding on the dangers that Crith Gaille held for him, 
 and wondering how soon he'd be out of the place, and 
 wondering if he could hit on a plan to trick the nuns and 
 make off. So he kept turning and twisting the ways of 
 escape over in his mind, but nothing came of it until he 
 thought of the dogs. Wouldn't you like, said he, to have 
 a look at my fine hounds ? So they went round together 
 to the outhouse where the dogs were tied, and when he 
 called out Cathba, a great baying and scratching answered 
 him. Crede's welcome was an impatient whimper, and 
 Marban bade the nuns hearken. The finest tongue of all 
 is Duban's, he said. And when the doors were opened 
 the three great hounds rose up on their hind legs, straining 
 at their chains, and the nuns cried out and ran and hid 
 themselves behind the doors ; but Marban said : you could 
 trust a child with them, 'tis only the smell of a wolf raises 
 up their bristles. So eagerly did the hounds strain against 
 their collars that Marban could hardly loosen them from 
 their chains, but once they were free it was a fine sight 
 to see them at play, jumping over each other and over the 
 nuns, up on the shoulders of everybody, licking their faces 
 and away again, smelling round the tree-trunks, and 
 relieving themselves ; going down on their haunches and 
 then scattering the earth and leaves in a great tumult, 
 jumping, barking, and galloping ahead of Marban, who 
 was chewing away at the idea of how, in the name of this 
 and that, he was ever to get away from Crith Gaille. It 
 would be a fine thing, he was saying to himself, if I up 
 and told these fine ladies : my dogs are on the trail of a 
 wolf; I must after them. And that's the very thing he 
 would have done if he'd any luck. But a wolf that was 
 lying in a thicket was startled out of it, and the three 
 dogs overtook him at the end of the glade. A good fight 
 it was, for the wolf was in his prime, and had there been 
 but two dogs at him instead of three he might have 
 
118 
 
 overcome them and got away. But he couldn't fight his 
 way past three. He broke Crede's paw in a snap, and took a 
 lump out of Cathba's throat, but while he was doing them 
 deeds, Duban got him by the windpipe, and the wolf 
 gave in. Terrible animals wolves ; and the Irish wolf was 
 as bad and worse than the Pyrenean fellow. 
 
 I never saw a wolf fight like that one, said Marban. 
 But what ailed the beast to be lying out in that copse ? 
 he said to himself, for he has knocked my plans upside 
 down. 
 
 The rest of the day went doctoring Crede's broken paw 
 and Cathba's wound. So busy was he attending the dogs 
 he forgot night was coming on, and he had no more eaten 
 his supper when the door opened and Blathnat came in, 
 and she in her night-shirt. We go to bed early in this con- 
 vent, she said. Does it be like that with you away in the 
 Pyrenees ? Marban was hard set to answer her, so dry was 
 his throat, and his heart misgave him, for Blathnat' s voice 
 was winning, and he liked the pale brown hair showing 
 under the coif she was taking off her head. Seeing that 
 the monk was beginning to shiver and shake she stopped 
 undressing to reprove him, saying, in a quiet, even voice, 
 that he must smother that look of fear on his face, and 
 that he could count on her to see him through the worst 
 of the temptations. Do you be putting your trust in me, 
 she said, and leave shivering and shaking, for while I'm 
 here there's nothing can harm you. But before we lie 
 down tell me what happened last night between yourself 
 and herself. Brother Marban. He told her the truth, 
 only leaving out that perhaps it was the fatigue of his 
 journey had made him able to lie alongside the Mother 
 Abbess's side without a kick in him. I understand you 
 well. Sister Blathnat said. After forty no woman is what 
 she used to be, though for her age there isn't a finer 
 woman in Ireland than herself, and there was a day when 
 she would raise up temptation in the stones. Sister 
 
119 
 
 Blathnat, the young man answered, from one year s end 
 to the other, we don't see a woman in the cells beyond, 
 and we think it well enough to live without sin. Now if 
 there is no temptation there's no merit, not a scrap, she 
 said, and he replied to her that he had talked that 
 question over the night before. This is what I want to 
 ask you now, said he. Is it true that none of the monks 
 from Bregen have fallen into sin.'' Tell me that now, 
 said he, and the question seemed to fall so innocently 
 from his lips that it startled Sister Blathnat so much that 
 she said : if that be the way you're going to talk, per- 
 haps another nun had better lie with you, and she was 
 making her way towards the door when Brother Marban 
 said: 
 
 Oh, Sister Blathnat, if it must be that I lie with any, 
 let it be with you, for you've a kind face and you'll keep 
 the devil out of my mind. And she said: the same 
 words prove you to have a good disposition anyway. 
 Maybe I made a mistake, so I'll lie with you without 
 tempting you much. But before lying down together we 
 will say a little prayer, and Marban prayed for his life, 
 being sore afraid both of her and of the monks up at 
 Bregen. 
 
 I hope, the nun said, I've not kept you too long on 
 your knees. You have not, said he ; not so long as herself 
 last night. She always was a long one at her prayers, 
 said Blathnat. We'll strip now, said she, and on these 
 words he put off the cloak and unloosened his tunic. 
 Look at me, said Sister Blathnat. Tell me now if I'm 
 not nicer than dear mother about the bosom } And the 
 monk, turning round, thought that he never saw two 
 breasts prettier or whiter than Sister Blathnat's. Like 
 two white birds they are, he said, being a bit of a poet. 
 And as innocent, she added. Now kiss the crucifix about 
 your neck, and then kiss me, and pray that the temptation 
 that will rise up in you shall be overcome. I will pray 
 
120 
 
 indeed; he said. I'll pray for all I'm worth. Faith and 
 troth, you are a holy man, she said, after a while, for 
 you're lying as quiet and easy by my side as a man 
 would lie by the side of his brother. I've met them that 
 were more restless than you, and they advanced in years. 
 Great will be your reward. And creeping in closer, 
 she began telling him that he might seek her shape 
 behind and in front, and between her limbs, wherever 
 he pleased ; in the moss about the ditch ; now your 
 fingers are in it, she said, and you not tempted at all, 
 I am tempted, indeed, said Brother Marban, and what I 
 see in front of me is three years and half a year and me 
 eating dry bread and drinking water at every one of my 
 meals. Starved I'll be, God help me. Then have recourse 
 to your crucifix, she replied, and you'll win out. Get the 
 best of the devil, said she, and keep your grip on me. 
 That's right. Now lie quietly and doze a little. But 
 there was no doze upon him that night, and if he had not 
 the bread and water and three years of it to think about, 
 there's no knowing what would have happened. After a 
 while she took him in her arms and kissed him, saying : 
 Brother Marban, I'll be leaving you now, the devil has 
 been worsted this time for good and all, though one 
 moment I did think I'd got a sniff of him from under the 
 door. .Marban agreed to that, and said that he too had 
 smelt the old boy, and that it was well for both of them 
 the windows and doors to be barred the way they were. 
 
 And then they fell to talking of the crevices the old man 
 could get through if he were so minded, till Sister Blathnat 
 said: take your hands from my breasts. You've been 
 tempted enough, Brother, and God would not wish a person 
 to be tried beyond his strength. Sleep well, now, like I 
 will myself, and good-night to you, she said, looking at him 
 from the door before closing it. It's just as well that he 
 didn't, she said to herself, as she stood on the stairs ; it's 
 always better in the end. For what is the value of the poor 
 
121 
 
 life we're living ? And it isn't I that would be bringing 
 disgrace upon it, God help me, and on myself, and on our 
 own convent. She said this for she couldn't get it out of 
 her head that Marban was a fresh young lad, and it wasn't 
 more than half-an-hour after getting into her bed before 
 she woke up with a scream out of her, and starting out of 
 her bed with one leap she got to the middle of the floor, 
 the other nuns coming to her, saying: what is it, 
 Blathnat? Tell us what it is now. But all she could 
 do at first was to stare at them, her senses coming back 
 to her slowly, saying: it was only a dream, thank God. 
 That was no more than a dream. And they, guessing that 
 she had been dreaming of the young man, got round the 
 bed, and she told them all she had done, the way she had 
 put herself up against him and telling him that he must 
 take her in his arms, and to be sure and say a prayer lest 
 the devil should be getting the better of him. You weren't 
 tempted yourself at all, Sister? said one of them, with 
 a look. I was, faith, said she, and who knows what 
 would have become of me, for there was a swimming 
 behind my eyes.? But I gave a Hail Mary and got rid 
 of it, glory be. 
 
 CHAP. XX. 
 
 WELL, there they were, sitting round Sister Blathnat's 
 bed just as I'm telling you, and they settling which of 
 them was to give the poor lad his share of trouble on the 
 next night. The monks will be here on Saturday, so you 
 three can lie with him. Sister Eorann, Muirgil and Brigit, 
 one after the other ; as soon as one comes out the other 
 goes in, and if he lies quiet while you're with him, there's 
 no doubt but they've sent us a great saint and one that 
 will do honour to Ireland. He's a holy man, indeed. He's 
 a very holy man ; you couldn't stir him up with a stick, 
 
122 
 
 said the Abbess. These were her very words as they have 
 come down to us in the old stories. 
 
 But which of us shall be the first one to lie with him } 
 the nuns asked, and the Mother Abbess answered : you'll 
 draw lots, and on this she got three straws and put them 
 in a box. Whoever draws the smallest one will be the 
 first to lie with him. And the first, your honour, was 
 Brigit, and the second Muirgil. And the third Eorann. 
 That was the way of it. And Brigit, as I told your 
 honour, was a thin girl, with red hair ringletting down 
 her rosy cheeks, who if she hadn't been nun she might 
 have been as wicked as the old woman of Blair, she that 
 lay with more kings than any other woman in Ireland 
 till she got old and couldn't manage anything. But we 
 mustn't be getting into another story. Alec said. Well, 
 Marban had all he wanted in the way of trouble from 
 that one. She was a great torment, indeed, turning all 
 his senses reeling, and setting his soul fluttering in him, 
 but he stood his ground, for the grace of God was on him 
 that night. And when the Abbess gave a ring of the bell, 
 Brigit said : 'tis time for me to be off; you're a great man 
 and a holy man, for you've lain very quietly by me con- 
 sidering everything. I tried you deeply, Brother, but I 
 wouldn't have done it only they were bragging about the 
 piety that is in you, and in you it surely is. 
 
 The door opened, and as Sister Brigit went out Sister 
 Muirgil went in, saying, as she passed the other one : I 
 can see by your face. Brother Marban, I can see that you've 
 been greatly tried by Sister Brigit, who is famous all over 
 Ireland for the tests and the trials she puts on the men. 
 While saying these words she slipped off the gown ; and 
 she stood up, one of them round figures, with plenty of 
 shape despite the flesh that God has put upon them, and 
 with one shape in her that struck the saint's eyes : she did 
 not go in at the knees, her thighs sloping down into her 
 ankles, and from that out into her feet. And when his 
 
125 
 
 hand passed over the limbs and between them, anything 
 might have befallen him if she hadn't been a kind-hearted 
 woman. But seeing the trouble he was in, she folded 
 him in her arms just as his mother used to when he was a 
 gossoon, and said : we'll say Our Father together. A Hail 
 Mary might bring me more relief, he answered. Muirgil 
 laughed at that, and tossed her hair from her little round 
 forehead, and for the rest of the time she told him stories 
 about the monks at Bregen, and how anxious they all were 
 to be tempted by her and to resist the temptations, for all 
 thought of this earth, said she, was gone clean out of their 
 minds, only of heaven do they be thinking, and that's what 
 puts the great strength in them. And she told him she 
 got into the same way of thinking herself, but there were 
 times when she could only get a grip on the things of this 
 world. And then the things of the other world didn't 
 seem worth a lot, which put a great fright into the monk's 
 mind that while she was with him she might be thinking 
 too much of the things of this world and not enough of 
 heaven ; but it was all to the differ, for after a bit she 
 quieted down. Now I must be leaving you, she said, for 
 Sister Eorann will be here in a minute or two, rousing you 
 up again and doing her best against you. But you will be 
 a match for her, won't you, now ? You don't fear her. Do 
 you now } Ah ! It's a shame, so it is, for you're only a 
 boy, and she's educated. You're not afraid, are you ? said 
 she, and she gave him another kiss. 
 
 Not a great deal, he answered cheerfully, for he was 
 like a man close to the top of the hill, or one that had 
 come very nearly to the top, and sees the ring of day 
 breaking all around him. He was proud, to be sure, and 
 that sort of pride is what the clergy calls the spiritual 
 elation that comes on a man when he has beaten the 
 devil. And well he might be proud, I say, for himself 
 and four fine women had defeated and murdered the devil 
 in four great battles. As he gave a twist in the bed, he 
 
124 
 
 remembered that his fight had been stiffer than any the 
 monks had waged, for weren't they and the nuns all 
 known to each other for years past as confessors and 
 penitents ? And with that thought he got twice as proud. 
 The fresh enemy is the stifFest to conquer, said he to 
 himself, and now the old boy is to deliver the last assault, 
 which will be, I am thinking, no great matter for me to 
 overcome. She isn't to my liking, and that's no gain to 
 me, but I've won such a load of honour as it is, that God 
 himself will be hard set to find a reward that he can offer 
 me without shame to himself. Here she comes, the hind 
 end of the temptations, and he drew the blanket up to 
 his chin and let on to be asleep. 
 
 Asleep you are, Marban, said Eorann, when her turn 
 came, or is it only falling asleep you are without a thought 
 for me at all ? The other ones wore you out, but them 
 ones would make anybody tired. I drew the bad number 
 myself. Number three it is. A holy number and lets 
 you in for all the poor jobs. Won't you wake up now and 
 let me into your bed } I'm nearly as tired as you are with 
 the time I was waiting and all. Even if there's no 
 temptation between the pair of us, said Marban, you can 
 get into the bed. After a while, said she : have you got 
 no eyes for me at all, or a pair of hands on yourself? I've 
 all them, Marban thought, but he didn't say a word, for 
 he couldn't think of what to say, and being a polite man 
 he didn't like to say : lie quiet in the bed now like a good 
 girl, and let me be. His weakness was kindness, and so 
 he took her into his arms and kissed her and said : I've 
 said that many prayers this night that the devil is driven 
 out of the convent entirely ; not a sniff of him do we get, 
 not one is upon you nor is there one upon me. We're 
 wasting time, said Eorann. She commenced to cry with 
 her head on Marban's shoulder, and soon her tears were 
 running down his neck, first hot and then cold, and then 
 tickling him like a troop of fleas. He asked her what she 
 
125 
 
 was crying for, and she said : I did hope to get a great 
 reward with you in heaven, but you won't not so much 
 as look at a girl. 'Tis a poor thing and a hard thing to 
 be a nun in this place. Just because I happened to pull 
 the wrong straw, bad luck to the same straw, I'm left 
 without any way of earning a place in heaven. It would 
 make you think that heaven itself, like earth, is all 
 favouritism. 
 
 You must not be talking like that. Sister. 'Tis easy for 
 you, full of glory the way you are this night, but here's 
 myself with nothing to do. And she bent down her head 
 on to his shoulder and whispered : can't you tempt me a 
 little ? and handling him freely, she said : it's not so bad 
 after all, for you're beginning to be restless, and that's a 
 sign, and when you're a little more so, we'll have to begin 
 to say our prayers, or we're a lost pair. What is that I 
 hear.^ Marban cried. 'Tis only myself talking to you. 
 But I hear a sound from the forest ! 'Tis nothing, she 
 said. 'Tis the hunters following the wild swine at the 
 ring of day. Don't mind them, but mind myself. 
 
 A great and wonderful music there is, he said, in the 
 sound of a horn heard far away in the depth of the forest. 
 A fine sound it is for the laity to be listening to, she 
 replied, but we should be thinking of the trumpets of 
 heaven which the angels will be sounding to awaken us 
 from the dead, and our Lord coming on the clouds to 
 reward us. And let me tell you this, there won't be as 
 much as the ghost of a reward for me if you lie there 
 with your ears cocked listening to the horn the way 
 you're doing now. The horn is nearer now than it was, 
 Marban answered. 'Tis only the echo of the horn that 
 you do be hearing, and on this earth there's nothing 
 more treacherous than the horn, and she sent a wet 
 stream of tears down into his neck the way he thought 
 he would have to be swimming for his life in another 
 minute. 
 
IS6 
 
 Let me up, he said. Let me up out of this bed. One 
 horn, two horns, three horns, and they sounding from 
 different sides. 'Tis a company that must be hunting 
 after the boar. Forget the boar, she cried, and lie here, 
 and take your ease. He was sorry for her, but he said 
 to himself : I've earned a big enough reward. 
 
 The monks at Bregen he began. But she rapped out : 
 
 what good are they to us } And what good are you ? I'm 
 only wasting my time here. Good-bye, Marban, and 'tis 
 the great talk I shall be having with the Abbess about 
 the great power that God has given you, and the prayers 
 you have offered up with me. We haven't said many 
 prayers, said Marban. If we haven't said them out we've 
 said them in, she added, and hurried away to tell the 
 Mother Abbess about the holiness of the man she had 
 been lying with and that they all should be thankful to 
 the Lord for sending them such a man. 
 
 CHAP. XXI. 
 
 NEVER have I lain with man as quiet as this one, 
 Eorann repeated, as she went upstairs. I might as well 
 have been in bed with my mother. Will you be telling 
 me, said the Mother Abbess, who was waiting at the head 
 of the stairs, that he didn't leave his bed once to dip 
 himself in the cistern ? I will so, said the nun ; he lay 
 by my side talking to me about horns that he was hearing 
 far out in the forests. That's a great saint, I'm thinking, 
 said Mother Abbess. That's a very great saint, surely. 
 There isn't a monk of the monks at Bregen is holier than 
 him, not the Abbot himself, though perhaps I shouldn't 
 be saying it, and he earning great glory with all of you 
 these last ten years ; and with myself off and on for the 
 last twenty. But he isn't as big a saint as that lad, I'm 
 thinking. True enough we're stale to him now, and men 
 
m 
 
 that are seventy-five take a deal of stirring, but a little 
 virgin like Luachet might set up a great burning in him 
 that our Lord would be greatly gratified to see overcome. 
 'Tis a great thought surely that has come to you, dear 
 Mother. Let Sister Luachet lie with Brother Mar ban. 
 It would be a poor thing indeed if a holy man like him 
 should be denied all the chances that the earth can give 
 him of getting a good place up above. I am in the one 
 mind with you, the Mother Abbess answered. But what 
 about the Abbot ? He'll be missing his last chance. Why 
 should he be missing it indeed ? Won't Luachet be the 
 same coming from Marban's bed as she went into it? 
 Blathnat asked. She will not, the Mother Abbess 
 answered, for 'tis the thought that she has never lain by 
 a man's side before that I'm counting on to stir up the 
 devil in our good Abbot, for the last time ; the man's 
 years are three score years and ten, and for a while back 
 he hasn't been looking himself at all. Ah ! well, I 
 
 remember the time when he 
 
 But you needn't be telling him, cried Sister Blathnat, 
 butting into the middle of the Abbess's recollections. 
 I wouldn't say that, the Mother Abbess answered ; once 
 you begin telling lies there's no end to them. Won't 
 Luachet be getting her experience from Marban } Eorann 
 murmured slyly. True for you, replied the Abbess. A 
 little knowledge of mankind in her won't be amiss when 
 it comes to her turn to get into bed with the Abbot, if 
 it ever does come, for it was a bad account we had of him 
 a week ago, and the cough's worse. But isn't it the truth, 
 said Sister Blathnat, that the Abbot would like a man 
 that had resisted all of us, and we all fresh to him, to be 
 allowed the advantage of Luachet ? I wouldn't be saying 
 he wouldn't, the Abbess answered. A man's luck is his 
 own luck, and isn't it a great thing that he should come here 
 and show all that holiness } It would be no good thing for 
 us if we denied him what God wishes him to receive. Now, 
 
128 
 
 my dear, and she turned round to Luachet, you've been 
 listening to what we said, and as the day is done, put 
 aside the vestment that you're making for the Abbot, and 
 go to the oak chest yonder and take out of the orris root 
 and lavender the finest linen garment, and remember that, 
 lying by our brother, you will be as pleasing in God's sight 
 as you are here stitching a vestment for the holy Mass. A 
 beautiful one it will be, she continued, and she held up 
 the white satin chasuble, embroidered with gold, for the 
 nuns to admire — the one the Abbot was to wear on his 
 seventy-fifth birthday, when he would celebrate High Mass 
 for them all. 'Tis Luachet is the fine stitcher, God be 
 praised, our little Luachet ; but a much finer offering than 
 the vestment she will be herself beside the holy man 
 below stairs, and on these words she took the child to 
 her bosom and asked her if she was afraid. 
 
 Afraid, Mother? Why should I be afraid, since it is 
 you who are sending me to this stranger, a holy man, as 
 all the sisters here have proven him to be } 
 
 Could the child say better than that ? the Mother Abbess 
 said, turning to her nuns. And they all said she couldn't 
 and that no one could. She turned again to Luachet : get 
 yourself ready now. Wash your hair the way there'll be a 
 gloss on it. Look at the gold that is shining through it, 
 and isn't she as nice and as graceful as a little kitten ? A 
 great temptation, surely, that none should venture into 
 but the holiest. Go and get ready, Luachet, and don't be 
 shy, for there's no good in that ; let him win the greatest 
 prize of all. Do you hear me now, she said ; be not shy 
 but push yourself up against him and kiss him in the nape 
 of his neck. You may do that, for it's your business to 
 wake up the old man in him if you can, and we'll be pray- 
 ing for you while we are getting to our beds, and till we 
 fall asleep prayers will be on our lips. We shall be chanting 
 the psalms at midnight, and from lauds to complin, thank- 
 ing God for the honour we shall be earning, for to-morrow 
 
129 
 
 every nun of the nuns in this place will get from me fifty 
 smacks of the ferrule on her hand. Go, dear child, and 
 remember all I've told you, for there is nothing that gives 
 more pleasure in heaven than seeing the man denying 
 himself the woman and they both in the one bed. 
 
 'Tis time for us to be going to our rest, she said, turn- 
 ing to the other nuns ; but you won't forget, my children, 
 what I told Sister Luachet, to be praying well for her, 
 and all the nuns said they would do that and that they 
 would do it well until the sleep came. 
 
 CHAP. XXII. 
 
 NOR did one of them break her promise, and out of bed 
 the whole lot of them were at midnight, chanting the 
 psalms, till at last the Mother Abbess said : now, children, 
 here's the day beginning in the east. The time has come 
 for me to use the ferrule on to your hands. On these 
 words she turned to the press in which she kept the 
 thong, and all the nuns wincing and watching, knowing 
 well the length of the handle and the breadth and the 
 hardness of the leather, and being faint-hearted, as all 
 women are, they would have been glad to do without the 
 bit of merit they would earn if they could be let off the 
 slaps, for the morning was bitter cold. 
 
 Maybe your hands are sore, the Mother Abbess said, 
 as the last nun retired, holding her bruised hands between 
 her knees, but my own back is broken the way I have 
 to leather the lot of you into heaven. 'Tis I myself 
 should be getting whatever recompense is going, for my 
 loins are cracked on me and I've a pain in my head. 
 Now will you have finished with the moaning and the 
 tears, and think a bit of the way the Lord suffered on the 
 cross, and of the way Marban is suffering now and he up 
 against our little Luachet's thighs. She is staying with 
 I 
 
130 
 
 him a long while now. Too long, indeed, for there ought 
 to be an end to everything, and great saint as the man is, 
 he shouldn't get it too heavy. Are they chanting psalms 
 together ? We might do well to hear them, for to see or to 
 hear the holy is next door to being holy. 
 
 Down went the lot of them, stepping on the tips of 
 their toes for fear they might disturb the saints in their 
 mutual devotions. Devotions it is, said the Abbess, for 
 we can hear their voices mingled in sweet sighs. But 
 after listening a little while longer she turned to Blathnat 
 and said : your ears are better than mine maybe, what I 
 hear doesn't sound like psalms. Let you listen now, and, 
 giving her place to the nun, she waited. After listening, 
 Blathnat said : Mother Abbess, it's no psalm I'm listening 
 to. That's no psalm at all. Then what can they be 
 doing to each other.? And it isn't prayers that I hear 
 either. Them's not prayers. 
 
 Then give your place to Brigit, who may hear better. 
 Yes, let me listen, said Brigit, and she cocked her ear 
 to the keyhole. Sister Blathnat is right. There isn't 
 a psalm in it of all the psalms. After Brigit it came to 
 Eorann to put her ear to the keyhole, and having more 
 courage than the rest, she turned to the Mother Abbess, 
 saying : it's like the doves on the roof they are. Like 
 the doves on the roof? cried the Mother Abbess, and with 
 a great fear in her heart she put her ear to the door, 
 and hearing a scream that could be none else than a 
 love scream, she cried out : 'tis profanation of our holy 
 convent. And together with the nuns she bumped herself 
 against the door until they got it down. Faith, sir, the 
 pair within were in the last round before the Abbess 
 could pull the clothes from off the bed, and tear them 
 asunder. 'Tis all over, said she ; the tallow is spilt, said 
 she, her maidenhead is lost to the Lord, the sheets testify 
 to it, said she. Woe is woe. Woe to the Abbot. Come 
 out of it, daughters ; come out, I say, for the devil is here. 
 
ISl 
 
 and here he may stop. Sin, sin, she said, and sin on the 
 top of sin. It's not the first ; it won't be the last. Come 
 out, children. Come out with yourselves from this cell 
 of sin. Innocents ye are. Get out, I say. Isn't that 
 one the divil } Isn't that one the divil } Ah, you'll pay 
 for it. You'll pay for it. Hell's your portion. Hell and 
 hot water. Get out, I say. I'm ruined. I am so. I'm 
 ruined. Will ye get out, or will ye not get out.'* I'll 
 skin you if you don't get out. Ah, you divil ! Ah, you 
 divil ! 
 
 The nuns followed her out to the terrace, and the five 
 of them walked there, never addressing a word the one 
 to the other in their sorrow, till the monks began to come 
 from Bregen. I see them coming. Mother, Blathnat 
 cried ; and now they've stopped at the foot of the hill, 
 for the Abbot is out of puff. How am I going to tell 
 the holy man about that pair.** God help me, said the 
 Abbess. What am I going to say to him at all } 
 
 I think I mentioned to you, sir, that the Abbot was 
 at this time seventy, and maybe a few years over. My 
 grandfather wasn't sure but it was eighty. Thin he was, 
 and lean and shadowy, frail as a sick bird, he used to 
 say. I liked to hear him tell Marban's story, and he 
 told it so often to me that there was a time when I had 
 this part of it off by heart. But it is a long time since 
 I've told this back end of the story. It not being to 
 the liking of them that do be asking me for stories, I 
 leave it out. 
 
 Don't leave it out on my account. Alec. Very well, 
 sir, I'll tell the whole of it. 
 
 My daughter, said the Abbot to the Abbess, who had 
 just mentioned that she had a tale to tell him sadder 
 than any he had ever heard, it must be a very sad tale 
 indeed, for I've heard my share of sad stories. But before 
 you hear the story, said she, tell me, did the medicines 
 I sent you do you any good } You've got the cough on 
 
182 
 
 you yet. Thank you, my daughter, for the medicines; 
 I did not take them, feeling sure that I'll not be better 
 than I am this side of Jordan. But won't you come 
 inside, she said, for there's a wind stirring in the trees ? 
 A pleasant wind, he answered her. Get me a chair to 
 sit in. She cried to Blathnat: find my Lord Abbot a 
 chair, and bring a rug for him as well. 
 
 When he was seated in the chair, and the rug tucked 
 round him, he said : there's one thing good about a wolf, 
 and that's his fur. Once his fur is taken from him there's 
 no evil in him ; and he dipped his hand into the fur as he 
 
 might into the holy-water stoop itself. My Lord Abbot 
 
 the nun began, and she stopped as a horse will at a heap 
 of stones on the road. Go on, woman, he said : there are 
 words for everything ; out with your story. Well, she 
 said, you know about Marban. Know about Marban? 
 said the Abbot. Why, wasn't it myself that wrote to 
 the Abbot in the Pyrenees to ask him to send Marban 
 with the wolf-hounds.^ Is he here.'' and how many 
 hounds has he with him ? He has three hounds, the 
 Abbess replied. Then all is well. What! Has he 
 been wounded on the way ; go on, woman. But instead 
 of doing as she was bid she started asking him if he 
 had taken his medicine, and other foolish questions, 
 setting him coughing again. Go on, woman, he cried, 
 as soon as he could get his breath. Go on, woman; 
 go on. 
 
 How long has Marban been here ? Go on with your 
 story, and be delaying no longer if you'd have me hear it. 
 You see the state I'm in. And afraid to delay any longer, 
 though there was nothing she liked better than dragging 
 a story out by the heels, she told him that Marban had 
 been with them for three or four days. But no further 
 could she go, saying that she'd rather be lying dead at his 
 feet than that her mouth should be telling the dreadful 
 story, and much more rubbish of the sort, angering the 
 
ISS 
 
 Abbot, setting him coughing till he might have choked 
 as much with anger as phlegm. 
 
 Oh, my blessed convent ruined, disgraced by him whom 
 we took to be the holiest man in Ireland, saving your 
 
 Reverence's presence He may be easily holier than 
 
 I am without being the holiest man in Ireland. Go on, 
 my sister, say what you have inside your mouth. Then, 
 with many sobs and waving of hands, for she was one of 
 them high-flown women, she told the story, watching the 
 Abbot's face out of the corners of her eyes all the while. 
 But so distracted was he by his cough that it wasn't till 
 she came to telling him how she wished to benefit him 
 that she knew for sure he'd been listening to her, for 
 then he gave a little smile, but it soon died away and his 
 face darkened again. 
 
 It's the custom of our country to put ourselves into 
 temptations, said he, so that we may be more pleasing in 
 God's sight. I've done as others have done; and with 
 God's grace came safely through many perils. I thank 
 you for your heavenly thoughts of me, but I'm glad I was 
 spared the pain of refusing the last trial, as I would have, 
 for it's God's truth that it would have been no trial to me 
 at all, as my condition makes plain to you. You're not 
 satisfied with what I did, my lord, said she, I am so, 
 the Abbot answered, but I've often had my doubts about 
 the wisdom and the humanity of these same trials, and 
 wondered if they were as pleasing in the sight of God as 
 we think they are, and if we hadn't better accept mankind 
 as God made it without trying to remake it for him our- 
 selves. Let me see Marban and hear what he has to say 
 for himself. Bring Luachet to me too ; she may have a 
 word to put in about her own trangressions. But as a 
 stock she stood before him, having lost her wits entirely. 
 Woman, will you be doing my bidding? And she went 
 away, sure to find them, for hadn't she the sinners under 
 lock and key ? 
 
134 
 
 We're greatly afeared, said the nuns one to the other, 
 as soon as she was gone, that the news may be the undoing 
 of the last thread of life. Now will you be looking at 
 hira dozing in his chair — wasted like the hills themselves, 
 the monks answered. But will he be turning them into 
 the wilderness as Abraham did Hagar ? Blathnat asked, 
 and before the monks could give her an answer the 
 Abbess came back with the two of them — the girl 
 crying, for she was right frightened, but Mar ban with a 
 face on him grey as a stone until he caught sight of 
 the Abbot. 
 
 I'm sorry, my Lord Abbot he began. 
 
 I'm at the end of the plank, Marban, but don't be 
 thinking about my cough ; pay no heed to it. We pray 
 that God will spare you to us for many years, Marban 
 answered. There are few years in front of me if there's 
 a year itself, said the Abbot. But this is a bad tale 
 they've been telling me about you. It is, indeed, a bad 
 tale, so it is, in their minds, was the answer the Abbot 
 got from Marban. Would you have me think that they 
 have told it falsely ? the Abbot whispered. Stories are 
 told and taken the way we understand them, Marban 
 answered, and these women look on me as an evil-doer, 
 it being true that I've broken the rule. But an evil-doer 
 by nature I'm not, as you can learn for yourself if you'll 
 write a letter to my own abbot. The monks beyond 
 know me there day in and day out, and no man can be 
 fooling a whole monastery day in and day out for ten 
 years, as you will know, none better than yourself, my 
 Lord Abbot ; and they'll tell you that I was decent ever 
 since I went to live with them and that they wouldn't 
 take me nor make me out to be what the nuns think. 
 
 You would plead, Marban, said the Abbot, that there 
 are temptations against which no man's strength is enough ; 
 that the temptation might be increased till the saints 
 themselves fall. But St Anthony 
 
135 
 
 I'm not comparing myself with anyone^ my Lord Abbot. 
 All I want is to tell my tale and get it out of me. The 
 Mother Abbess has told hers, and you've a right to tell 
 yours ; go on with it, said the Abbot. I thank you for 
 that, Marban answered, my Lord Abbot, and as for my 
 story, you know most of it yourself as well as I do myself : 
 that I left this country no more than a gossoon, not know- 
 ing a word about the way they crucify the body in this 
 place for the love of God and to win a prize in heaven. 
 I went away knowing nothing at all of the customs of the 
 old country, and returned as ignorant of them as the day 
 I took ship for Bordeaux, as I told the Mother Abbess, 
 and likewise too did I tell her that the custom of the 
 temptations had been stopped in France in the years 
 back, it not having been found to work well at all in 
 France. But she told me Ireland was the land of saints 
 and France was the land of lechers and wantons ; and she 
 said that I'd have to prove myself, and show what I was, 
 and that, being a young man, she would let me off from 
 the young sisters and would lie with me herself to give 
 me an easier time. 
 
 I was shy, and that prevented me from saying no to her 
 offer of the bed. I should have said no ; but she would 
 have thought I meant that what she said about France 
 was true. I've no answer to make against the charge of 
 cowardice nor any excuse on that head. And I've no 
 answer to make against the charge of vanity, for after 
 having proved I could stand up against the flesh and the 
 devil in five combats I may have said to myself that I'd 
 show these nuns how a man may live in holiness out of 
 Ireland as well as in Ireland. 
 
 This idea of mine was helped maybe by the fact that 
 I've lived a chaste life ever since I told to you, long ago, 
 my lord, that I wanted to dedicate my life to the service 
 of our Lord Jesus Christ. You can get the truth of it 
 from my own monastery, and you can get the proof of it 
 
136 
 
 here from the nuns themselves ; ask of the nuns that lay 
 with me, and every one'll tell you, if she doesn't tell a lie, 
 that our embraces were according to the rule. It's not 
 a small thing, my lord, and I'm telling you what you 
 know yourself, for a young man to stand out against five 
 women, one after the other, and all of them naked in his 
 bed. If I'd been a bad one I'd have given in at the first 
 go off to the lusts that every woman awakens in every 
 man, but the nuns can tell you the same thing. I resisted 
 the whole lot of them as well as the monks there around 
 about you, and as well as you did yourself, my Lord Abbot. 
 My son, said the Abbot, after he got a venomous cough 
 up out of his throat, we have all resisted the nuns at Crith 
 Gaille. You were all well known the one to the other, 
 my lord, and where there's no novelty there isn't much 
 temptation, for it's novelty and strangeness is the devil's 
 strongest weapon against man. The women here were all 
 new to me, but I resisted them all, though I'm younger 
 and a lot younger than the youngest man I see in front 
 of me, and 'tis for that I'm confident and sure that I only 
 speak the truth when I say that last night I fell to her 
 who was destined for my arms, for my lips, and for my 
 usage only. 
 
 Luachet is beautiful, but it wasn't her body altogether 
 that drew me. Well, this much I can say with truth, that 
 there is something beyond the lust of the eye and the desire 
 of the flesh, something that is beyond the mind itself, and 
 maybe that thing is the soul ; and maybe the soul is love, 
 and whosoever comes upon his soul is at once robbed of 
 all thought and reason, and becomes like a flower. It was 
 like that with me when my mother told me about our 
 Lord Jesus' appearance in Galilee, and about his suffering 
 and his death, for you'll remember it, my Lord Abbot, that 
 I went to yourself and told you that the love of Jesus was 
 in my head ever since I heard the story from my mother, 
 and that I wanted to lose myself in love of him. And 
 
137 
 
 last night I was earned away just as I was on that first 
 occasion, and I somehow cannot believe it true that my 
 love of her will rob me of my love of Jesus, nor that her 
 love of me will rob him of her love, for in our hearts it is 
 all one and the same thing, and aren't we more sure that 
 God made our hearts than of anything else ? It may be, 
 Marban continued, after he had had a look round, that 
 I did not know this always. It may be that yesterday 
 I would have denied the truth of what I'm now saying 
 to you all. All the same it is the truth I'm telling you, 
 that when the door opened and Luachet came into the 
 room, the light of the candle that was in her hand shining 
 
 on the white scriptures 
 
 The scriptures tumbled out of her hand, the old Abbot 
 interrupted. 
 
 They did not, my lord. She gave them to me, and they 
 made plain to me that she is herself a good part of me, 
 my scripture for ever, as long as this life lasts in me and, 
 if I may say it without heresy, she'll be that for the life 
 everlasting that's to come with our Lord Jesus Christ. As 
 good doctrine as I've heard this many a day, said the Abbot, 
 and what's true in it God will be no doubt taking into his 
 own consideration when the time comes, but what answer 
 will you be making when he comes to ask you about your 
 broken vows ? God knows as well as your Reverence that 
 the ones that put on the vows can take off the vows, and 
 as the journey before me is a long one, I'll be starting on 
 it and it will hearten the pair of us to have the blessing of 
 your hand and your voice if you will be giving it. 
 
 I can and I will give it. I'm with you both in this much 
 that I hope the temptation that was put upon you will be 
 put on no one else in my diocese. 
 
 My Lord Abbot, jerked in the Abbess, I'm thinking that 
 you shouldn't be staying longer in the air, for there's a 
 keenness in it, and a great draught, and your soup is ready 
 in the house. My soup, I thank you for reminding me 
 
188 
 
 of itj Mother Abbess. Have you only scolding for me 
 this day^ your Reverence, and I sinking under the trouble ? 
 she said. Scolding.? Have I not said. Mother Abbess, 
 that I'm at the end of the plank, and the flesh is liable 
 to a shiver or two when it comes to the last lep. Is it 
 scolding you I am } I've this much to say, Mother Abbess, 
 that I've had my doubts about these temptations for a 
 long time, and it's often in my mind that at the heel of 
 the hunt some poor girl would be left on her back. 
 
 He knew, said Alec, how to speak up to her, and as 
 small as a mouse making off through a chink in the wain- 
 scoting, she brought him up to his soup in the big room, 
 tied a napkin round his neck, and sat watching him while 
 he drank it. At another table the nuns were giving the 
 monks their bit, saying : take a little piece of this. Father 
 Bhendan ; that bit won't lie heavy on the stomach. But 
 there was no need at all, for they were all men of fine 
 appetites and had gathered a lot of cold air into their bellies 
 coming down from Bregen. It was Blathnat alone that was 
 a bit forgetful of the guests, and seeing her making off, the 
 nuns began to ask what she was after, passing on a wink and 
 a word and a saying that she always had something in her 
 head, but not guessing at all that Blathnat was thinking 
 that it was a long journey from Mayo to Waterford, and a 
 dangerous one, everybody except them in the monasteries 
 going his own gait, and a lot of unfriendliness in the 
 country, the same as now. 
 
 Well, she overtook them on the fringe of the forest and 
 pushed a basket of bread over Marban's arm. It will soon 
 begin to weigh heavy, said she, but Luachet will take her 
 turn at it, and turn and turn about' s fair play, and there is 
 here within this basket what will take you to the Shannon 
 if you're careful about the teeth. Now I must be off with 
 myself; good luck to you. And with that she gave them 
 both a kiss, and away with herself on her own road. 
 
 They stood watching the glimpses of her habit flying 
 
139 
 
 through the trees, and they silent enough, and when 
 there was no more of her to be seen they stepped out on 
 their journey that would take them long weeks, long 
 months. We'll get to Waterford before the summer is 
 out, said Marban, according to our luck. But Luachet, 
 for she was no more than a child, didn't care how long 
 the journey lasted, she being with her sweetheart, and 
 the quiet forest all round them. They had not gone far 
 before Marban remembered his hounds, and he would 
 have turned back for them but Luachet wasn't a bit sure 
 that the Mother Abbess would let her go with him the 
 second time, and she said she would die of fright if he 
 left her in the forest by herself Marban could only 
 listen to her pretty talk and look down into her clear, 
 childish eyes — still childish, for up to last night she knew 
 nothing of life at all. And so they walked and wandered 
 in the month of May, seeing the ferns uncurling and the 
 speedwell showing between the ground ivy ; and listening 
 to all the singing birds and eating their bread where the 
 banks were mossy. 
 
 We still hear the squeal of the badger in these parts. 
 Alec said, and there were many more animals in ancient 
 Ireland — bears, I believe, and wolves in plenty for sure, 
 and it was the thought of these same beasts, and every 
 one of them with a jowl and a jaw, that put the shadow 
 on Marban's face — a shadow that distressed Luachet 
 when she came running back to him with her hands full 
 of ferns and wildings. You're not sorry you came away 
 with me } she asked. He took her in his arms then and 
 kissed her, and walking on together through the woods, 
 they began speaking about the trees, and I can remember 
 to this day the wonder that rose up in me when I heard 
 my grandfather say that while sitting under a great oak, 
 where they were to sleep that night, Luachet said to 
 Marban : I don't like the oak ; there's no welcome in it. 
 The oak doesn't invite us to sit beneath its branches as 
 
140 
 
 the beech does. But Marban answered her : you mustn't 
 be saying anything against the oak. And she said she 
 would never speak against the oak again when she heard 
 from him that the ribs of the ship that had brought 
 Marban to Ireland were cut out of an oak-tree, and that 
 the ribs of the ship that would take them to France 
 would likewise be made of the oak. It's a good tree then, 
 Luachet replied, and I shall be loving it better. But why 
 don't you love it now ? Marban asked her, and she replied . 
 it's that I'm thinking that there seems to be an un- 
 friendly spirit inside of the tree we're sitting under. 
 That's a queer thing to be saying, he said, and I'm think- 
 ing that you're saying hard things about the oak because 
 it's leafless in the month of May ; but in the heel of the 
 season, when the acorns do be dropping through the still 
 air, it is a rich and hospitable tree enough. Let the oak 
 be friendly to the pigs but I would sooner be sitting 
 under a beech-tree, was her answer to him. Well, that 
 is strange, for the pigs love beech mast as well as oak 
 mast. Now, Marban, will you be telling me what tree 
 you're most disposed to, she said, for they must be all 
 well known to you and you walking along through the 
 forests from Waterford .'' What tree am I most disposed 
 to ? Marban said. Well, taking all in all, it's the holly, 
 for it sheltered me in the cold March nights. And he 
 called her to admire one near by under whose branches 
 they would find it hard to squeeze themselves. And 
 Marban never said a truer word than this. Alec inter- 
 jected, as I know well myself; the holly is as good as a 
 broken house to a man on a winter's night. Luachet 
 thought that the leaves looked dark, and she didn't like 
 the thorns, and later in the evening she stopped before a 
 birch and said : that tree is more beautiful than the 
 holly. And Marban answered her that the birch rose up 
 as sweetly as Luachet's own body, and he said that the 
 wind in the tree was as soft as her voice. It's the most 
 
141 
 
 musical of trees ; his very words as reported by my grand- 
 father, who got them from a book. Now what tree is 
 that naked one? Luachet asked. That one, Marban 
 answered, is the ash, the last one in the forest that the 
 summer clothes. The most useful of the many that God 
 has given us, he added, and to help the time away he 
 told her it was the ash that furnished the warrior with 
 fine spears. And when they came upon a hazel copse, 
 he told her of the nuts that would be ripe for gather- 
 ing in the autumn. And when they came to some 
 poplars, he said the poplar and the aspen were useless 
 trees, one as the other, the poplar giving but poor 
 shade to the wayfarer, and the aspen not doing much 
 better, a ragged, silly tree, shivering always as with 
 ague. I like the willow better to-day than I did 
 yesterday. How is that? she said. And he answered 
 her that as soon as they came to a willow he would 
 tell her. See, he said, how faithfully they follow the 
 brook, as faithfully as I shall follow you, Luachet, 
 listening to your talk of your mouth, bending my ear to 
 it, the way the willows listen to the rippling water. And 
 she asked if there was no tree he did not love at all. 
 He said there was one, the pine, for it sheds only a 
 fibrous litter in which nothing grows. A pine wood is 
 without birds or animals, the marten is the only animal 
 one meets in a pine wood. My grandfather knew more 
 about trees than any man I ever knew, and he'd go on 
 telling about their qualities until you'd be tired. Alec, 
 he'd say, you've been away ; I'll talk to you no more. 
 No, no ; I've been listening ever so hard. Then tell me 
 the quality of the alder. I remember it all but can't 
 put words upon it; and then I'd tease him to tell me 
 again of the ruined fort, in which Marban and Luachet 
 spent the night, to be driven out of it at daybreak by 
 the eagles, a nesting place it was for them birds, and at 
 dawn they were screaming, frightening Luachet so that 
 
142 
 
 she couldn't do else than to climb into the limb of a 
 tree overhanging the fort. And Marban was driven to 
 follow her out by the birds. 
 
 A fine story that was to tell a boy, how, creeping out 
 on the limb of the tree after her, she cried to him that 
 the branch was breaking; but she cried out too late, 
 and down the two of them tumbled, through a thicket 
 much like the one in which I spied the Murrigan, coming 
 down in the dry bottom all bleeding and torn ; they were 
 hardly able to drag themselves down to the brook, where 
 they stripped themselves of what clothes was left to 
 them ; and a fair sight it was to a boy's mind, the pair 
 picking each other clean, or as clean as may be, for after 
 a drop through a blackthorn thicket 'tis hard to get the 
 last spikes out of you, as hard as it is to get the last 
 rabbit out of a ditch. There's always one left, and it 
 itching somewhere and in the sorest place in your body, 
 you may be sure. 
 
 They journeyed on and spent the next night in a sheel- 
 ing by a lonely lake, but there was a friendly woman in 
 it, who shared a couple of eels with them. But begorra 
 I'm forgetting to tell you about the fawn they took charge 
 of. The wolves had had the doe, and the fawn was dying 
 in the ditch ; but the woman in the sheeling milked her 
 goat, and after that drink of milk the fawn would not 
 leave them, but kept springing after them, jumping over 
 the bushes in front of them, delighting them with his 
 agility and lying down by them at night. I don't 
 rightly remember what became of this fawn ; you'll have 
 to look it out for yourself, sir, when you go to DubUn, 
 in one of the old books where my grandfather found it, 
 and you'll read in them some of the tales he used to be 
 telling me of the madmen. Yourself must have known 
 not a few of them in your childhood, for not later than 
 fifty years ago they were common enough, the idiots going 
 about the country with the beggars, an encouragement 
 
143 
 
 to the people to put their hands in their pockets. You've 
 seen them, haven't you? And I answered that I had. 
 Well, you can easily imagine, your honour, at the time I'm 
 relating, when there was no madhouse at all in Ireland, 
 but a great deal of wilderness, that the mad would be 
 going astray from their relatives, living upon sloes and 
 holly berries and nuts from the hazel-trees, and cress from 
 the springs, and how they would be finding but little 
 nourishment from these and would be crying about the 
 travellers they might come across for bread and meat; and it 
 was one of these madmen maybe that robbed the fawn from 
 Marban and Luachet, who had come to love it, thinking of 
 the time when they would be taking it back to France 
 with them, and keeping it till it grew into a fine stag with 
 horns upon it, reminding them of the eagles and the 
 branches they had fallen through into the dry bottom, for 
 though hurt, Luachet said herself, they would be thinking 
 of this fawn and this journey to the day of their death. 
 It must have been the madmen that stole the fawn from 
 them, but I disremember. 
 
 And there was much more my grandfather used to tell 
 of their adventures in the wilderness, how they came 
 upon some women beating flax by a river-side, and how 
 one laid down her scutch, saying she was feeling uneasy, 
 as well she might, for she was going to have a child ; and 
 as she stood watching the river going by it dropped from 
 her like an egg from a hen ; there was no more about it. 
 But your honour should have heard my grandfather tell 
 of all the adventures that befell them in the monasteries 
 on their way to the Shannon, how — but it would be weari- 
 some to relate all the odds and ends : how they got across 
 most of the road in safety from Magh Line to Magh Li, 
 from Magh Li to Ana LifFey, and passed through the 
 wooded brow of Sliabh Fuaird till they reached Rathmor, 
 and over Magh Aoi and across bright Magh Luirg until 
 they stepped across the mering of Cruachan, and how 
 
144 
 
 they footed it from Cruachan to Sliabh Cua and off 
 again through Glaisgaile and southward through stony 
 hills and curving paths until they were within a couple of 
 days of the seaport. 
 
 A big ship will take us off there, he said, for now 
 Luachet was sore in all her bones, and weary of the great 
 wilderness they had been through, and weary of the 
 monasteries they had rested in. Only one more forest, 
 he said, lies between us and the sea ; and after that the 
 world is all fair valleys and pleasant hills and beautiful 
 trees that we shall sleep under in comfort and in love. 
 And so did he comfort her and encourage her to bear the 
 fag end of the journey. Now we're at the skirt of the 
 last forest, he said. But he didn't say that it was in that 
 forest he had heard wolves howling and snarling when 
 he came up from Waterford on his way to Crith Gaille, 
 and that he might have left his bones there had it not 
 been for the hounds that were with him. His hope was 
 that the wolves might be seeking their food in some other 
 forest, so he said nothing until, as the day drooped and 
 the darkness gathered into the branches, he stopped to 
 listen. 
 
 There's a howling near by, she said ; would that be a 
 wolf or a dog ? A wolf it is, he replied. It's on our 
 own tracks ; and he's calling to his fellows, and they'll 
 be after us soon. We must be looking round, Luachet 
 said, for a tree to climb into. But this wood is a pine 
 wood, said she, and there isn't a branch of the branches 
 within our grip. Oh, Marban, are we to be eaten and 
 devoured by wolves } 
 
 CHAP. xxni. 
 
 SO Luachet and Marban were devoured by wolves, Alec ? 
 Vm sorry for that. All the rest of your story I like very 
 
145 
 
 much — the Bregen monks sending to the Pyrenean 
 monastery for hounds, they having themselves run out 
 of hounds owing to a dispute with a king about a piece 
 of land; that motive brings Ireland up before us — a 
 quarrel over a piece of land ! Excellent. And all the 
 different episodes told faithfully and candidly without 
 immodest insistence. Excellent ! And the last, Marban's 
 vindication, a masterpiece! Your honour is very kind 
 to speak to me like that, but tell me why you don't like 
 the end of the story as well as the beginning. Because, 
 Alec, I suspect that an ecclesiastic unleashed the wolves. 
 It would never do to allow a pair of lovers to go away to 
 the Pyrenees to live happily in broken vows. So you 
 think, your honour, that the story did not come down 
 unchanged from father to son } I'm not saying it didn't. 
 
 Alec, only But isn't yourself the great story-teller, and 
 
 should be knowing better than another what end a story 
 should be taking? How would you have me alter the 
 story ? Faith and troth, Alec, in that question you have 
 me bet, for Ireland was full of wolves at that time, and 
 it would be well-nigh a miracle not to be overtaken by 
 a pack of them fellows. . . . Let me think. The alterna- 
 tive is : babies in the Pyrenees. Marriage bells there 
 could not be, unless Marban went to Rome and got 
 relief from his vows. Now that I come to think of it, 
 the end of your story seems to me to be the right one. 
 A sad and a cruel end ; but it may have fallen out just 
 as you relate it. The only thing I regret is that we 
 have not all the adventures of the lovers in the wilderness 
 before the end came. 
 
 Well, sir, I've told it the way I got it from the grand- 
 father, just as he used to tell it when he was in the 
 humour for dreaming over the old Ireland of long ago, 
 and he had it from his father or from the old writings, 
 for he was reading every evening in the National Libraries 
 in Dublin, leaving me after his supper to go away to the 
 
146 
 
 library, or maybe taking me with him : 'tis many an hour 
 I've spent sitting by him, kicking my heels and wearying 
 
 of the place. Your grandfather I began. — was away 
 
 in the country looking after the farm. You see, sir, the 
 grandfather was the second son, and the elder brother, 
 Patrick, got the farm ; and when he died without children 
 he left it to his wife, and when she passed away, God be 
 merciful to her soul, the farm came to the grandfather, 
 who had been a clerk in Dublin ever since he was twenty. 
 Before that he was a clerk in Castlebar, without knowledge 
 of the country at all. He would have sold the lease, 
 thirty-one years and three lives, only that my father, who 
 was then a lad of seventeen, said : let me go down and 
 work the farm for you. Which he did, making a fair profit 
 from the first. He got married soon after that. I was 
 born and reared on the farm, but was always a botch at 
 a fair, and, seeing how it was, the father thought it would 
 be better for me to follow after my grandfather, who got 
 me a job in his office when I was about fifteen, and I was 
 a messenger boy there till I was twenty. Then that 
 grandfather died, leaving me just what took me to 
 America in search of a fortune. At that time people used 
 to be talking about America, and the great things that 
 were doing there. So you went to America, Alec ? I 
 did, your honour, and was at all sorts of work, till the 
 sun caught me in the nape of the neck, and I travelling 
 in the dry goods line in Mexico. 
 
 But so empty is my mind of any Mexican memories that 
 my attention must have been drawn from Alec's narratives 
 by the rising and falling lines of the Westport hills, all 
 beyond reproach except perhaps the too symmetrical 
 Croagh Patrick, for the next time I heard him he was 
 saying that he didn't believe that there was another such 
 queer place as Ireland anywhere in the whole world. I 
 replied : I am with you, and not less queer in the past 
 than in the present. Ireland is a poor place, he said. 
 
J 47 
 
 compared with what she once was, and we talked politics 
 for a while. But in no place, he interjected suddenly, 
 has there been such grand saints as in Ireland. Where 
 else would you find .'' 
 
 All the same, Alec, in the stories you've told me 
 they've shown themselves as weak as ourselves might 
 have been if we had been exposed to the same tempta- 
 tions. Isn't that so ? 
 
 Alec seemed unwilling to commit himself to an opinion 
 on this point, and, after some equivocation, began to tell 
 me there had always been grand saints in Ireland, men who 
 had gone into temptations, the temptation of food and 
 drink and of women, and had resisted them all. Did your 
 honour never hear of Father Scothine ? he said suddenly. 
 
 I had to confess that I had not, and the admission, 
 although given reluctantly, with apologies for long years 
 of absence from Ireland, seemed to cause him some 
 disappointment and drew from him the reflection that 
 Irishmen live out of Ireland the best part of their lives 
 usually. But Ireland, I said, is always with us wherever 
 we are, and perhaps Ireland was never nearer to you than 
 the years you were in Mexico. True for you, he inter- 
 jected ; and Ireland, I continued, is always in my mind, 
 whether I live in Paris or in London. I'm sure it is, your 
 honour, for your father was a good Irishman, God rest his 
 soul. 
 
 And now will you be telling me the story of Father 
 Scothine ? 
 
 His eyes, of uncertain blue, were fixed upon me, and 
 I said to myself: he is asking himself if he ought to tell 
 the story of Father Scothine to a man who has been so 
 long out of Ireland, who is no better than an English- 
 man ; or is he, I continued, thinking the story out afresh, 
 shaping it to the idea that holy Ireland entertains of 
 herself, putting a good skin on the lie, as himself would 
 word it; and to interrupt him in the fabrication of a 
 
148 
 
 homily, if he were engaged on one, I asked him suddenly 
 if he could tell me what kind of man Father Seothine 
 was. A story, I said, gains in interest if we can" see the 
 characters plainly ; one should have them in one's mind 
 all the time whilst listening to a story. 
 
 CHAP. XXIV. 
 
 rVE always heard my grandfather say, he answered, that 
 Father Seothine was the strongest man in the County 
 Mayo in his young days, great at hurling and throwing 
 the stone and in all the sports ; six feet and some inches, 
 he was, with a head on him as round as the balls that top 
 the pillars before a landlord's gateway. Big hands, long 
 feet and the eyes of them that fear hell, for though he 
 was the holiest man in or out of Ireland, Seothine lived 
 in fear of hell always, and it was this fear sent him out 
 of his village, and away from his chapel, into the 
 wilderness. 
 
 And did he learn in the wilderness, 1 asked Alec, that 
 he was not to go to hell, and was it the knowledge that 
 he was saved brought him back to his village ? 
 
 I'm notable to answer that question, sir. Alec answered. 
 I can only tell you the story the way I got it from the 
 grandfather, and from what he said I think Seothine 
 didn't bother himself a lot about miracles or visions, but 
 that he was troubled with a great fear of hell that now 
 and again slackened and left him in peace and at other 
 times gripped him entirely and sent him climbing the 
 trees for a lodging out of the way of the wolves. That 
 was how he used to live out in the crags and up in the 
 trees when the fear took hold of him, along with the 
 thought that he was losing his soul in village idleness, 
 doing nothing but saying a mass now and again when 
 the people required it. But when the fear wasn't on 
 
149 
 
 him he was as soft and quiet and sensible a man as you 
 could meet in a long day's walk. A thick, heavy lump 
 of a lad, taking things easy and saying his mass like 
 another priest on Sunday. The only difference between 
 him and the other priests was that it was rare he missed 
 saying Mass on weekdays. His eating and drinking, it's 
 true, was never the same as other men's, for when he was 
 in the village he lived very much as he did in the 
 wilderness, his diet being seldom more than cress, which 
 he would gather himself from the spring, and a few 
 acorns from the oaks in autumn and a fistful of hazel 
 nuts. When there were no more of these he lived on 
 rye bread, and didn't touch the meat except on Christmas 
 Day. That puts me in mind of the leg of mutton. He 
 ate one, and it tormented his conscience the way he 
 took the pledge never to chew meat again, but not 
 wishing to make Christmas Day like any other day, he 
 would let you give him a trout from the river on Christmas 
 Day or an eel out of a bog hole. The rest of the year 
 he went meatless, lowering his health until he got 
 sick, and it being dinned into his ears that he was 
 killing himself, which no Christian is permitted to do, 
 he let them give him a pot of broth. The same 
 broth did him a power of good, and he got back the 
 health in a few days, but no sooner was he on his legs 
 again than his conscience began to worry him about the 
 broth, and once more the thought caught hold of him 
 that he must be hiding to save the soul he would be 
 losing if he stayed another day in the village. Off he 
 went to hide in a place called Glenn o' Goshleen. You 
 may have seen it, sir, for it was part of your father's 
 property ; it was sold in the famine years ; a beautiful 
 place that was in Father Scothine's time, with woods all 
 over the Partry hills, and in these woods he hid himself; 
 and there he lived for months, dodging away from every- 
 body, afraid they might bring him things to eat, or put 
 
Ir-' 
 
 150 
 
 a roof over his head, which they might have done too 
 if they could have found him, for he was well thought of. 
 But being as artful as a pet fox, he was able to keep his 
 distance, and when people began to think he was dead in 
 the woods, and to forget him, he was making his way 
 round the bend of the lake across the country, never 
 stopping till he came to the naked crags above the salt 
 water, a place that is now known as Oldhead, but what 
 they called it in the time gone by I disremember. He 
 lived there on gulls' eggs and the mussels and winkles that 
 he picked up on the shore, lying out every night on the 
 naked crags, doing penance for his sins. What they were, 
 sir, I cannot tell you : vapours of the brain, I'd say, and no 
 more than that. One day the vapours left him, and he 
 went back to his parish and did his share of shriving and 
 saying Mass and reading the gospels, as quiet a man as 
 you'd find in the whole of Ireland, and everybody thinking 
 the old madness had left him. He was the same mind 
 himself, if he thought about it at all. All we know is 
 that his mother came to see him, and she said : everything 
 must seem to you like a dream. And he said : like a dream 
 it is, maybe, but our dreams are as much a part of ourselves 
 as our waking moments. And a solemn look came into his 
 face, and his big eyes rolled in their sockets. It would 
 be better, mother, said he, according to the talk that's 
 going, not to be judging anything, but to be always doing 
 something and mortifying this flesh, which will drag souls 
 down into hell if we are not subduing it day in and day out. 
 You see, sir, his mind was the same as it always had been, 
 only hell wasn't quite so plain to him as it was the time 
 he ran off to Glenn o' Goshleen or got among the crags 
 at Oldhead. He was always a bit afraid that he was 
 doing wrong, and it was at this time of quiet, the greatest 
 he ever knew in his life, that a vision came to him, and 
 he sitting underneath an oak-tree by the river-bank, 
 watching the water go by. A pleasant place the same 
 
151 
 
 place is now, for that matter. The same oak may be 
 standing yet, for I've heard tell that an oak will live a 
 thousand years. A willow is not so lasting a tree, but 
 belike them that are now standing are from the seed of 
 those that were dropping to the river in Sco thine' s day. 
 That was his favourite place for hatching out his 
 thoughts, and seeing him sitting there so much at home 
 among the birds, the word went that he had learnt 
 the talk of the birds in Glenn o' Goshleen, which is a 
 strange story enough, but not stranger than that a man 
 should build himself a nest in the fork of a tree, and 
 that the pigeons in the branch above him should come 
 and go and feed their chicks without minding him. 
 As much as the birds he loved the beasts — the foxes and 
 the badgers — and they came to him out of their holes, 
 and the gulls came to him from the sea ; and there were 
 ducks and geese and wild swans on the river, and he would 
 listen to them chattering away at each other when the 
 south wind blew. And there were otters in the stream, 
 and he used to be sorry when the otter slid down into the 
 water and came up with a fish in his mouth, but he never 
 interfered with them. I take the water- grass and he 
 takes the fish, he would say. But he liked the badgers 
 that lived up in the woods better than the otters, for 
 the badgers ate the roots and hurt no one. You see the 
 sort of man he was, a gentle and happy lad, fearing his 
 own kind more than he feared the wolves and the bears, 
 for in Scothine's days bears and wolves were as plentiful 
 as weasels are nowadays, and martens were hopping from 
 branch to branch in the pine-trees, and they after the 
 birds. He was unhappy when he found the wings and 
 the breast feathers of a wood-pigeon, and would look at 
 them sadly, saying : was it a marten that did the deed, 
 or was it a hawk ? As for the robins, they never left 
 him alone ; the blackbirds and the thrushes knew him 
 and trusted him, the way that they would take bread out 
 
152 
 
 of his hand when he had any to give, which was often 
 enough, for he used to go without the bit himself so that 
 he might have something for the shuler and the wandering 
 rogues, and he'd only keep for his own jaw a few acorns 
 that he'd pick up ; a poor diet, and many's the belly-ache 
 he got on the head of it, I'd say. But he didn't mind, 
 claiming that God knew better what was good for him 
 than he did himself. It was on one of these fast days, 
 while sitting under the oak, with his eyes on the river, 
 and he not seeing it at all, for his thoughts were away 
 in the desert whither Jesus, our Lord, had gone to be 
 alone, and where he met the devil, who told him he'd 
 give him all the kingdom of earth if he'd fall down and 
 adore him, a great lie, your honour, for the devil hadn't 
 got the kingdom of earth to give our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 who is himself possessed of all that is in the heaven 
 above and in the earth beneath and in the waters under 
 the earth. I mayn't have the devil's own exact words, your 
 honour, but I'm thinking the gist of it was that if our 
 blessed Lord would bow down and worship him he could 
 have whatever he liked in this world ; perhaps no 
 mention was made of heaven at the time. Scothine 
 was thinking the devil must have been a bit artless that 
 time, and should have known that Jesus would answer 
 him : thou must not tempt the Lord thy God, the way 
 he did answer him. All the same, said Scothine to 
 himself, it must have been a great temptation to the 
 Lord Jesus not to turn the stones into bread, and he 
 doing a fast for forty days and forty nights, and hungry 
 enough, I'll go bail, at the end of it, but he had promised 
 his Father that the spirit should not yield to the flesh, 
 and he wouldn't go back on that, and his Father had 
 promised to reward him by raising him from the dead 
 after three days' burial. 
 
 It was while thinking on this temptation that Scothine 
 came to say to himself: I wish God would send the 
 
153 
 
 devil to tempt me, and I sitting here, so that I would 
 make sure of resisting the temptation, and getting a high 
 place in glory hereafter for my own self. Let the devil 
 appear, he said, and I'll manage somehow to give him a 
 fall. 
 
 It was in the shape of a black man with goat's feet and 
 a scut of a tail that Scothine expected to see the devil, 
 but the devil suits his shape to the job he's on, and this 
 time he took the shape of a beautiful woman, come up 
 through the willow-trees from the river. She stood, in 
 his vision, smiling, and beckoning him to follow her into 
 the woods. Maybe his mind was wandering, and maybe 
 he was upset by the hunger, but he got on his feet and 
 took after her up the path. He hadn't gone far before 
 she disappeared into the willows, and he heard a mocking 
 laugh that gave him the fright of his life, and set him 
 wondering if God had answered his prayer and sent the 
 devil to him indeed. He wasn't sure either that he had 
 rightly resisted the devil, for hadn't he looked after the 
 vision eagerly, and the one that looks after a woman hath 
 committed adultery with her in his heart ; the same being 
 what our Lord said, or nigh to it. Scothine would have the 
 words off better than I. He went home with his heart 
 going pit-a-pat, like a duck's foot in mud, from the fright 
 he got, and he thinking and asking himself whether he 
 ought to go back to the crag of the gulls and live there 
 for a year on raw eggs or the leavings of the fish that the 
 birds didn't want, guts and the like ; or if he ought to go 
 to Glenn o' Goshleen and eat water-grass and oak apples, 
 and sleep up in a tree at the heel of the day out of harm's 
 way of the wolves, the prowlers. The morrow would 
 settle all that, said he, but something ought surely to be 
 done at once in the way of penance and mortification. 
 He could not think of a thing except to strip himself to 
 the buff and, going to his cupboard, he took out the 
 scourge; but he could not do more, it seemed, than to 
 
154 
 
 tickle himself with the lash, and the man that he used to 
 pay wages to beat him be foretimes, until the blood would 
 run down his hams and his shanks, had gone back with 
 himself to his own parts. Scothine had no mind, and no 
 time, to go looking for another man to lay on with the 
 scourge, he was that worried by the persecution going on 
 in his head, one time his thoughts saying that it wasn't 
 water-grass and oak-falls, nor prayers at all hours of the 
 night and day, nor scourgings and weltings by his own 
 hand or the hand of another that he wanted, but a big 
 temptation that he might be standing out against, and so 
 be giving great pleasure to God Almighty. And the 
 hunger of this great temptation became stronger day after 
 day, till the prayer was never off his lips that God would 
 send the devil back to him. Night and morning he would 
 cry to God in his prayers : give me my chance now. Give 
 me another chance. And he spent a deal of time thinking 
 of the words he would utter out against the devil, and he 
 didn't take as much as a walk without a bottle of holy 
 water to dash in the devil's face, or without a rosary to 
 cast over him if he came near enough. Scothine had a 
 plan how he would lure the devil near till he could lasso 
 him with the rosary, like they lasso and catch the wild 
 cattle in Mexico. Won't he give a kick and a lep when 
 he feels it drooping over his ears, he kept saying to him- 
 self. For the rosary he had brought out with him had been 
 blessed by the Pope of Rome, and while he was wriggling 
 out of it, Scothine thought that he'd spit in his face and 
 jeer at him, and call him names. 
 
 This prank that he was going to play on the devil made 
 him as happy as a lark, until at last he began to say to 
 himself: the year wastes after July, and I wish God 
 would give me my chance before the year is out. He 
 hadn't forgotten that the devil came to him looking like a 
 woman ; and he was real vexed to think he had gone after 
 her, for he wasn't sure by any means that he had the 
 
155 
 
 rosary in mind at the time. It was just curiosity, that's 
 what it was, he muttered to himself, on his way to his 
 favourite seat under the oak. Still, and all the same he 
 was bothered and vexed, for his thoughts were like a swarm 
 of bees in his head the way he couldn't tell himself what 
 he was thinking about, one thought flying away and 
 another one coming into his head at the same moment, 
 so that there was never such a going and a coming in 
 this world before. At one moment it was the great 
 reward he would be gaining in heaven, and the minute 
 after it was the great punishment he would be getting in 
 purgatory, or singeing and grizzling on the hob of hell, 
 for mind you, Scothine was not sure at all that if the 
 devil had come along with horns and hooves, and a nose 
 like a chimney, all smoke and smuts, and his tail hanging 
 out, that he would have been so anxious to get up and 
 go after him the way he went after the woman. I might 
 have let my liver drop out of me with the fright, he said 
 to himself, and I wasn't frightened a bit. How was that 
 now } Why was it, said he, that I stood all up and down 
 like a poplar-tree to look at a woman with her clothes 
 oW} He used to keep his eyes sideways and baw-ways 
 when he was talking to a woman, the way he wouldn't 
 see her, even if it was his own mother. . . . Yet the 
 memory of this woman's larky eye, and the two breasts 
 lifting out of her, could not be rooted out of his mind 
 anyhow, nor the memory of her backside, that was like 
 a great white mushroom, as she vanished away through 
 the willows. But the breasts were better in his memory 
 than all the rest of her, and maybe it's the breasts is the 
 part a man has to struggle against if he wants to get the 
 old soul safe for an eternity of happiness : God above the 
 lot ; Jesus on the right-hand side, his blessed mother on 
 the left, and all the angels parading around, and they 
 having the great time. 
 
 While he was thinking these things he heard a splash 
 
156 
 
 in the water, and there he saw a girl with a pair of the 
 finest tits a man could wish to be looking at. Scothine, 
 thinking the devil had come back to him, felt in his girdle 
 for the holy water and the rosary, which was to make the 
 devil get into his own shape. He got hold of both these 
 weapons against the Evil One, and he stole down to the 
 edge of the river and made ready. Faith and troth, said 
 he, that's not the devil, bad luck to it, but it's the eldest 
 daughter of the female that lives in the cottage at the 
 bend of the river. Up he lepped again on the bank and 
 away with him to the ford, stepping gingerly over the 
 stones, as a man must on his way to salvation, fearing he 
 would be drowned before he was saved. Now, says he, 
 to the woman who was feeding her pigs, leave feeding 
 the pigs, let the pigs be, for I've come to talk to you 
 about a thing that's more important than pigs. Sure, I 
 can be listening to you while I'm throwing the food to 
 the animals, and they ready to eat their own ourbeens off 
 with the hunger, she said. Well, said Scothine, for there 
 was nothing in his head but the idea of how to get a soft 
 seat in heaven, a red and golden chair, with a doeskin 
 pad filled with goose feathers : is there another red- 
 headed girl in the parish beyond your own daughter .f* 
 There is not, she answered, not one with a head of hair 
 like that head. She's in the river, said Scothine. She 
 is so, said the woman, since the dawn of day, leaving me 
 to do the work ; she and her sister, as big an idler as her- 
 self, the pair of straps ; up and down, and in and out of 
 the same river they do be going, splashing about all the 
 summer-time as if it was ducks they were, and not christian 
 females. It's a great loss to me, the bathing. Did they 
 go and interrupt your Reverence, and they splashing, for 
 if that's what you've come about, I'll give them a leather- 
 ing when they come home, and it won't happen the second 
 time. It isn't that, Scothine answered, that I've come 
 to talk to you about, but to tell you this, that your daughter 
 
157 
 
 has a pair of breasts on her would raise great tempta- 
 tion in a man. That's the truth itself^ the woman said ; 
 they're the fullest I've ever known on a girl of her age, as 
 I'm always telling the clergy that comes here seeking a 
 temptation. Is that the way it is ? said Scothine. There's 
 them have been after her before me. But which of them 
 has that right to lie with her as I have earned myself by 
 such terrible fastings and prayers in more woods and 
 wildernesses than you could reckon on your fingers and 
 toes? Who has a better right.'' Will you tell me that 
 now.^ That much I'll say for myself, so you may send 
 her to me, and to no one else. Why should I send 
 her to you, more than to another ? Distracted I am and 
 moidhered with people asking for the loan of my daughters 
 to be a temptation to the flesh, and it all comes from the 
 sporting and tumbling they do be going on with in the 
 river. I'll put a stop to it. I will so. They won't see 
 water again as long as they live ; they will not. My good 
 woman, Scothine answered, don't be forgetting that it was 
 God put the breasts on the women. Are you telling me 
 that } said she. And what do you think he planted them 
 there for ? For she was one of them who wasn't backward 
 in coming forward, even to the priests. For the suckling 
 
 of babes, I always thought, but to listen to yourself 
 
 It was for that surely, Scothine interrupted, and for more 
 than that ; for, let you deny it if you dare, that God in his 
 wisdom knew about the temptation they might be before 
 the children came, and what I've come for is to ask you 
 to let me have the loan of your daughter to lie with me, 
 for, from the peep that I had through the bushes, her 
 breasts are just the ones that might awaken the devil in 
 me, if there's any devil left in me. 
 
 Woman is the temptation of the temptations, so I've 
 heard, not from knowledge, mind you, having been busy 
 till now with the conquest of my belly ; all temptations 
 rise out of the belly, the woman as well as the victual 
 
158 
 
 and the drink. The pleasure of food and drink I've 
 passed and done with, for I live on water-grass from the 
 spring and oak balls from the oaks, as well as you do 
 yourself with the meat and the mead. Plain water I 
 drink without as much as a wish rising in me for a 
 slug of ale. Nor are the scourgings and weltings I give 
 myself any use ; my flesh doesn't heed them, and the man 
 who would scourge yells out of me one time has left the 
 country ; gone he is, and here am I without a temptation 
 to my name unless you let your daughter lie with me ; 
 you won't get out of it yourself, my good woman, unless 
 you send her to me, mind you that; for it is on me 
 you've got to reckon to be readying your place in 
 heaven for you. And, said he, if I get lazy and lob 
 around with my bum on a warm stone, I'll be in 
 purgatory for my sins after you are dead yourself, and 
 what's going to intercede for you or to bother their 
 brains about you at all. Get me to heaven as quick 
 as it can be managed, or maybe you'll howl in hell like 
 a dog with hot water on his tail. 
 
 You're a great saint. Father Sco thine, said the woman ; 
 you are so, and high enough will you be perched up in 
 the kingdom of heaven without making a step-ladder of 
 my daughter's two breasts. 'Tis on my shoulders you 
 and your daughters will be hoisted up, that's the way it 
 is, each one helping the other and the priests helping 
 the most. You're wiser, I'm thinking, about the way to 
 get a crown on your head than I could be, that have 
 never known anything but a handkerchief tied under 
 my chin, but I'll not be giving my daughter to lie 
 with you. I will not ; and there I leave it. God knows 
 what might happen to her in a sudden weakness such 
 as we're all liable to, and it in the blood. Now, my good 
 woman, I'm not sure if you're thinking about me or about 
 your daughter. I think the thoughts are in my own head, 
 and this I say, Father Scothine, that the sin is the same 
 
1'59 
 
 to the one that is atop as to the one that is below. You 
 might be in the right of it, Scothine answered humbly, 
 for he was one of those men who think the next one 
 to him is wiser than himself, and to escape from the 
 persecution of his thoughts, which were about him again 
 like a swarm of bees, he turned away. Don't be in that 
 much of a hurry, the woman cried after him. My curse 
 on the bathing in the river, but I'll give you your 
 chance* the way we'll all get to heaven. Wouldn't it do 
 you as well to lie between my two daughters ? They would 
 be keeping each other company in the temptations and 
 helping each other to make it hot for you, and to keep 
 out of it themselves. Ah, said Scothine, you're cutting 
 my danger in two halves, and I the sort that likes to 
 feel the bones and the brunt of the business, but since 
 it cannot be, send me the pair of them to-night, and I'll 
 have them again on Saturday week, and every Saturday 
 from this on, if I feel the strength in me to stand 
 temptation. Not a sparrow is hatched in the nest but 
 the Lord provides food for it, and he will provide me 
 with strength once a week to resist and hold out and 
 get over the temptation. Send the pair of them to me 
 at the close of day. Well, said the woman, when the 
 priest was out of sight, heaven must be a great place, 
 since a man has to go through all the fastings and 
 prayers that Father Scothine has been through, and 
 now he's putting his head into a noose. 
 
 I must be telling Dare and Lalloc not to pull that 
 noose too tight, or by this and by that, with breasts 
 like Dare's even him that feeds upon water-grass and 
 nuts, like a pet lamb, might be learning the tricks of 
 a buck goat, and who knows that my girl might not 
 fall in with him just at the right time, and then there 
 would be the devil to pay surely. But whichever way 
 we look, danger there is, and the saint must have his 
 temptations ; he must indeed ; he refused a shoulder 
 
160 
 
 of kid last week ; he'd refuse anything, that man 
 would. 
 
 As soon as her girls came up from their dipping she in- 
 structed them : they were to lie with the saint on Saturday 
 night for the good of his soul, and as we are walking to 
 Mass, says she, you'll be telling me what happened to you, 
 without forgetting anything, or I'll break both your backs. 
 Without forgetting as much as a nod or a wink, they 
 answered her, and the story they told of the great fight the 
 saint put up against temptation was so wonderful that she 
 sent them up every Saturday night to him. And in this 
 way Scothine rose every Sunday morning from his bed 
 greater in the eyes of the Lord than the night before. 
 
 But you know, sir, there are bad tongues wagging 
 everywhere, and when the news of the saint's martyr- 
 dom, and of miracles performed by him and the girls 
 themselves, who came in to him with red coals in 
 their bibs, the coals not scorching them at all, reached 
 the Bishop, he began to scratch his head and to think he 
 must try and put a stop to the talking. He sent his 
 chaplain, one Brenainn. 
 
 Can you tell me. Alec, what sort of man the chaplain 
 was ? I'd like to have the two priests before my eyes. 
 Sure I can, Alec answered blithely. He was a spongy 
 little man, with eyes like sloes, and great red lips that he 
 kept licking with a big coarse tongue all the while. You 
 could hear him licking, for he licked with a click, setting 
 Scothine against him at first. But he was a friendly 
 fellow, and the friendliness in his heart couldn't be held 
 back. And he was a merry chap too, so these qualities 
 made up for the looks which were against him, and it 
 wasn't long before Scothine began to feel that life was 
 lying easier upon him. The sun was shining into the 
 room, and the sweet air, going and coming in and out of 
 the half-door, and Brenainn was telling so pleasantly that 
 the Bishop didn't believe the report, but would like to 
 
m 
 
 have it from Scothine direct that he didn't lie every 
 night between two girls with pointed breasts. 
 
 Not every night surely, for the man isn't alive in 
 Ireland that could be without his night's rest all through 
 the week, and he in pain, in restlessness, and in such dis- 
 comfort that I cannot put words on it, Brenainn. It is 
 only the Mass I say on Sunday gives me the courage to 
 bear up at all. So that is the story I'm to carry home to 
 the Bishop } Brenainn said. That's the tale, and the story, 
 and the truth. The truth is sometimes hard to believe, 
 Brenainn answered ; but, my dear Scothine, I do not doubt 
 a word of it, and getting it from yourself, but those that 
 
 get it from me What will they be saying ? Scothine 
 
 answered. But what matters it what they will be saying 
 if I'm winning a place in heaven for myself.? And let you 
 be doing the same, Brenainn, this night of all nights, and 
 God giving you the chance. Not a sparrow falls without 
 his will, well you know it. It was for this you were sent 
 here, to lie between two girls with pointed breasts. Why 
 not, he continued, if thereby you please God } Aren't 
 we here for that } Brenainn turned his eyes from 
 Scothine. You're not saying anything, Scothine said. 
 And Brenainn, who did not wish to be behindhand, or to 
 show himself a coward before Scothine, replied : well, 
 since you say there are two, I'll try it, and with the help 
 of God I'll come out on the right side of the bed. Brave 
 words are these, Scothine answered, but mind you, 
 Brenainn, her breasts are round and white, for all the 
 world like little mushrooms come up in the night at 
 the ring of day, and her backside like a big one ; and 
 he kept on telling of her temptations, not to make 
 himself out a great man for having overcome them 
 but to frighten Brenainn, for though Scothine was the 
 gentlest of human beings there was malice at the 
 bottom of the box, and he enjoyed the fear that he 
 was reading all the time on Brenainn's face while he 
 
 L 
 
162 
 
 kept the talk going, asking Brenainn if there was any 
 word in his parish about Brian Boru, who had come out of 
 the forest with a remnant of his followers to redeem 
 Ireland from the Danes. But it doesn't much matter to 
 the story I'm telling what their talk was about. As 
 likely as not it was stray talk, that people drop into 
 when they have something else on their minds, and it 
 went on until each felt he wouldn't be able to bear it 
 much longer. 
 
 So it was a relief to both when the girls poked their 
 heads through the half-door. But when they saw Father 
 Brenainn up went their eyebrows, and round they popped, 
 and away with themselves. Scothine called after them, 
 but they were half-way across the field, and he had to 
 pick up his cassock and go after them. You would run 
 away, would you ? You would leave a holy man without 
 his temptation, you would do that ? he was saying, as he 
 brought them in. Sure we didn't know. Father, the girls 
 cried out ; and let go our ears, or we'll never give you a 
 tempt again. Now sit you down, will you, and I'll give 
 you a news will surprise the pair of you. How would you 
 like to hear that the talk going round is that the three of 
 us are living together in sin ? Would they say the like ? 
 the girls yelped out together. Aren't there the wicked 
 people to say the like of that, and we giving up all fun 
 and diversion an(J breaking our backs to get here every 
 Saturday night, and getting pains in our heads trying to 
 torment yourself the way God may be pleased, and you 
 holding yourself in ? It's no work for a girl, or a pair of 
 girls ; it is not, and God knows it. That sounds like the 
 truth, don't it? Scothine asked Brenainn. It does so, 
 said Brenainn. That has the ring. I'm satisfied with 
 that. And my little sister too, said Dare. Let you 
 Lalloc here be telling the truth to the Bishop's legate, 
 about the temptations we've been giving to Father 
 Scothine, and how hard put we were to keep them up 
 
165 
 
 and we wanting to go asleep. There's no need for her 
 to tell him, said Scothine, for you'll be lying with him 
 this night instead of with myself, and I'll back you to 
 give him as good as you give me, and good you gave it. 
 We'll do that surely, the girls replied. Isn't it plain to 
 you now, Brenainn, that they are talking out of their own 
 mouths and not out of mine ? It's plain, Brenainn 
 answered ; it is plain. And he said he wished he was as 
 sure of heaven as Scothine, but that he wasn't a bit sure, 
 and he would have been out of the house and away on 
 the minute if Scothine hadn't got a grip of his arm. The 
 Bishop mightn't believe you, said Scothine ; he might 
 say, or there's them might say it for him, that we'd been 
 fooling you up to the two eyes. Lie with the girls to- 
 night ; do the deed the way I did it, for only in that way 
 can we keep our characters in this world of the tongues, 
 and be straight with the Bishop. Out of your own sight 
 and hearing, said Dare ; and, wiping her eyes, Lalloc re- 
 peated : the only fair way, your Reverence. If you don't 
 our characters will be lost for ever, and a girl without 
 her character has no chance in life. 
 
 He'll do it, Scothine said, and, pushing Brenainn 
 before him up the stairs, he called to the girls to light 
 the censers. What are the censers for } Brenainn asked. 
 We will pray together that strength may be given to you, 
 and no sooner were these words out of his mouth than 
 the girls came up the stairs singing a psalm, as was their 
 wont when Scothine was the penancer, and after seeing 
 that the bed was easy if Brenainn should escape from his 
 tormentors in sleep, which might happen, for he had come 
 a long way on foot, Scothine bade them all good-night and 
 closed the door behind him, rejoicing, good man though 
 he was, at the suffering and the trouble would be put on 
 Brenainn that night. 
 
 But he wasn't more than half-way down the first flight 
 of stairs when he was stopped by a sudden little whisper 
 
164 
 
 in his ear. It was his good angel come to tell him that 
 he had been listening to his bad angel all the time, 
 taking one for the other, as you can easily do if you're 
 not careful, for the bad one puts on the whisper of 
 the good one at times, and after listening for a while 
 Scothine thought he ought to go and offer his peaceful 
 bed to Brenainn and lie himself in the hot place, he being 
 better able to bear the temptation. But there seemed to 
 be a hand in the darkness keeping him back, pushing him 
 down the stairs, and down he went step by step saying to 
 himself that after all he wasn't putting anything on the 
 man that he hadn't borne with himself; and asking him- 
 self why should he be patting himself on the back and 
 thinking that he was a grander man than Brenainn. It 
 is the evil angel surely putting these evil thoughts into my 
 mind, he said ; and it wasn't long before he was asking him- 
 self whether it was because he wanted to get the better of 
 Brenainn that he had shoved him into danger. Get the 
 better of Brenainn ! Scothine cried out as he stood by his 
 bed-side. Why should I want to do the like ? But there's 
 no help for it now, what is done is done, and there's the 
 end of it, he said, and he lay down in the bed. But his 
 thoughts kept him awake, tumbling over each other all 
 the night like waves in the bay, so afraid was he that he 
 might have done the wrong thing in landing Brenainn 
 into the midst and middle of temptation, a thing which 
 is permitted to no man to do, for no one knows another 
 man's strength, only God knows that. But if the devil 
 should worst him in the battle my prayers and fastings 
 will be wasted, and it will be an easy job for him to lose 
 the game with a girl like Dare lying alongside of him. 
 But is that sure ? She'll tell him if he gets wild that he 
 must lift up the window and stand in the cistern till he 
 gets cool ; but if Dare should fall asleep the devil may 
 get hold of the little one, who would put her arms about 
 Brenainn's neck and tempt him to sin with her, for she's 
 
165 
 
 but a child^ and has no more than a smattering of religion 
 as yet, and if Lalloc falls asleep Dare may stick a tempta- 
 tion on to poor Brenainn which his strength is not great 
 enough to resist. We're all liable to strong weaknesses, 
 Dare like the rest, like her mother Eve. 
 
 If I was wrong, O great and merciful God, in whose 
 girdle is the key of purgatory's gate, tell me if I've done 
 wrong in letting Brenainn lie in my place to-night. 
 There's no key to hell's gate, I know, for it's always open ; 
 wide it is, and gaping, but it isn't hell that I've been 
 deserving, for my act wasn't heinous, but only a while in 
 purgatory, and out of that dismal place thou wilt give me 
 a free pass. Well I've earned it by my fastings and prayers 
 which are written down in the Great Book, and the days 
 I spent on the crags picking up a gull's egg out of the 
 nest or a clutch of dulce from the shore. 
 
 And when Scothine had come to the end of the prayers 
 and his lamentations he gave a great cry out of him, and, 
 unable to bear with his fears any longer, he jumped out of 
 the bed, saying : I can stick it no longer. I must find out 
 whether God or the devil got the best of it in the next 
 room or if nobody won yet. But no sooner was he on his 
 legs than a weakness fell upon him which he couldn't 
 understand, for there was little strength in him and he 
 couldn't as much as walk away from the bed. It seemed 
 to him that it must be the devil was holding him back. 
 Gripped I am and held I am, he said, and he was shaken 
 with a great fear and a queamy feeling in the insides, so 
 that he did not know whether he ought to go back to his 
 bed or what to do. I'll pray, said he. I'll pray, for that's 
 the last resource of the sinner, and falling on his knees 
 he began praying, without knowing what he was praying 
 about, and his prayers went on and on, himself all in the 
 dark about them. He didn't feel his knees under him, 
 though the hours of the night were going by, nor the 
 cold of the morning, though he was in his pelt. 
 
166 
 
 CHAP. XXV. 
 
 THE sun had risen above the mountains and he was still 
 praying that Brenainn might come out of the fiery 
 furnace a better man than he went in. Dear God, let 
 him not be tempted too much, he was saying to himself ; 
 not above his strength, dear God, for I've been thy 
 faithful servant this many a year, and the temptation of 
 pointed breasts and smooth limbs is great to a man of 
 his years, although he be but a roll of lard to look at ; 
 he's young, dear God, he is young and unprepared for 
 the temptation by a long diet of water-grass and nuts. 
 Another long cry burst from him, and he was starting 
 off on another prayer, when a knock come on the door. 
 Scothine rose to his feet, and, thinking it was the girls 
 come to give him news of Brenainn, he went to meet 
 them. But it was Brenainn himself come to tell him 
 that the girls had gone home an hour ago and that 
 Scothine ought to be dressing himself if he was going 
 to say Mass. 
 
 I've stayed on a bit, he continued, so that I may 
 be serving your Mass for you. You had a fine easy 
 night of it, Scothine, he said, and have overslept yourself. 
 Overslept myself! said Scothine. Why shouldn't you 
 be oversleeping yourself, and you lying quiet in the 
 comfortable bed .'' said Brenainn, and he turned away 
 gloomily. The thought was in Scothine that the gloom 
 on Brenainn's face might be the shadow of the sin he 
 had committed during the night, but he said nothing 
 about that, only : I'll be with you presently. Brenainn 
 hadn't been out of the room long before Scothine fell on 
 his knees again to pray to God that any sin Brenainn 
 had committed might not be visited upon him. But 
 what's done cannot be undone, he said to himself: there's 
 the end of that, he said, whatever way it went, and 
 
167 
 
 rising from his knees, and beginning to dress himself, he 
 shouted over the banisters to Brenainn that he wouldn't 
 be delaying long and that Brenainn might start off to 
 the chapel and ring the bell. 
 
 CHAP. XXVI. 
 
 THE people up from the village, as they watched 
 Scothine reading the Mass to the right and to the left, 
 thought that his face was pale and full of weakness, 
 and they feared he would be overcome and that Brenainn 
 would have to finish the Mass for him. But he stuck 
 it out and went right on. And when he came to the 
 Communion it was a relief to him to put the Host on 
 the tongues of Dare and Lalloc, for he didn't think 
 they'd have taken it if there had been sin, and he 
 continued to put his trust in God till the end of the 
 Mass. And after the Mass the two priests went into 
 the house and ate their breakfast without a word pass- 
 ing, until Scothine said : and what message will you 
 be taking back to the Bishop about me } You're the 
 greatest saint in Ireland, Brenainn answered, and that's 
 what I'll tell the Bishop. I'll tell him that same. I hope 
 that some part of what you say is the truth, Scothine 
 answered, and he ate tw^o or three mouthfuls of oat- 
 cake. In those days oatcakes was the breakfast fare, 
 with a noggin of ale or milk, for not a drop of tea was 
 in Ireland, as your honour knows, till centuries after. 
 Scothine only drank water himself, but he had a noggin 
 of milk to offer Brenainn, who seemed glad of it. He 
 may be a saint after all, Scothine said to himself ; and my 
 innocence must be plain to him by the maidenheads of 
 the girls ; but he didn't like to ask Brenainn about the 
 thing, though his heart was sick, and his thoughts were 
 teasing him like bees, one stinging him here and another 
 
168 
 
 there till he was stung all over. At last Brenainn said : 
 well, I must be going ; the day wastes after midday and 
 I've a long way before me. I'll take a cake along with 
 me. Take two ; take three or four ; you won't be at your 
 door till dark, and now the thought is upon me that your 
 way through the forest is full of danger. You may be 
 overtaken by the evening wolves, or you may fall in with 
 robbers. What do you say to preparing yourself for 
 your death by kneeling down there and making your 
 confession ? 
 
 Faith, he said, I will ; and down he plumped on his two 
 knees. Wait a bit, Scothine cried, till I get my stole, 
 and when he had it on he was sure of knowing the truth. 
 Now tell me, how did things pass with you last night.'* 
 I didn't know, Brenainn answered, till the door was shut 
 upon myself and the girls that I would have to lie with 
 them and keep myself from temptation the best I could. 
 Nor did I know if I'd be able, and when they were 
 stripped, I said : glory be to God, will I get out of this, 
 or will my soul be roasted on me for the pleasure of a 
 night ? It wasn't so much the little one. 
 
 I understand that, Scothine said; I understand that; 
 get on with your confession. 
 
 It was the big one that perplexed me and drove me 
 as wild as a puckaun for the first half-hour. But the 
 backside, the red hair, the round eyes shining like stars 
 can be overcome by prayer, said Scothine. It's true, 
 indeed, Scothine, but she was at me all the while, saying : 
 for the temptation thou resistest to-night thou shalt receive 
 a great reward in heaven. That's where you should have 
 meditated on the cross, Scothine whispered. I did that, 
 you may be sure, Scothine, and she, knowing my great 
 torment, said : keep on saying your prayers, or turn to 
 my little sister, for she won't be stirring you up as I seem 
 
 to do. But the little sister was asleep She was 
 
 asleep, was she .'* Scothine cried out. She was that, and 
 
169 
 
 every moment I thought that I was a lost man. Such 
 restlessness, Dare said, is not in the bond. If you're 
 as bad as this in the first hour, what will you be later 
 on when I wake my sister and we begin the greater 
 temptations .'* Are there greater ones than these } I 
 asked. There are, surely, she said, and you must 
 prepare for them by the tub, the way Scothine does 
 when he's hard hit. The tub! I cried. Yes, she said; 
 up with you and I'll show it to you. And taking me 
 to the window she told me to climb into the cistern, 
 and I stood in the cistern up to my neck for the best part 
 of half-an-hour. It wasn't till then I was let back into 
 the room, and the pipes were given to me. You can play 
 them ? Dare said. I can that, I said. 
 
 And you stood the test of the dancing, did you? 
 Scothine asked. 
 
 For a while ; but I had to make a lep for the cistern to 
 prepare myself for the game of leap-frog, and the greater 
 temptations. 
 
 And you withstood them all without incontinence, 
 voluntary or involuntary } I did so. Well, then, let us 
 pray together, and let us thank God that you were able 
 to keep the devil out of the bed, for I was afeared for 
 you, and on my knees I prayed all the night long that 
 you might be swung up to heaven in a golden scarf and 
 not let down into hell on a black pulley. Brenainn, it 
 may be that my prayers saved you. Why should you be 
 taking all the credit to yourself, Scothine, believing, in 
 your vanity, that you're the only man in Ireland that can 
 lie with two young women without sinning with them, 
 if you be not on your knees in the next room praying 
 that strength may be given unto him ? A sore place this 
 would be for God to rest his eyes on if I were the only 
 one, Scothine answered, and Brenainn turned his eyes on 
 Scothine, trying to understand him. Then why were you 
 praying for me ? Hadn't you been with the girls yourself 
 
170 
 
 and didn't you know all their tricks ? I've only dared the 
 temptations after a diet of water-grass and acorns, but you 
 overcame the temptation of the thighs and the temptation 
 of the breasts, and the feast of the eyes that the dancing 
 affords, and the game of leap-frog, with a full belly, for 
 I'm not forgetful, though I was at the moment, of the 
 great big trout that we ate for our dinner. It was the 
 thought of the trout kept you awake all night praying for 
 me ? Brenainn asked. It was that and nothing else, for 
 why should you not succeed where I have succeeded.? 
 Scothine continued. And your thought all the time, my 
 poor friend, was that I might lose my soul through you. 
 That is so. I was asking myself all last night what 
 would happen to me at all if my share of the thing had 
 lost your soul, Brenainn. But let us say no more about 
 it. You threw out the temptation after eating the trout, 
 and it weighing two and a half pounds if it weighed an 
 ounce. I couldn't get that trout off my mind, and my 
 conscience was sorely stricken that I should have led you 
 into temptation after eating the trout, and all the night 
 on my knees my entrails were wambling, and my head so 
 light that I hardly knew what kind of prayers I was 
 saying, the way they were coming and going like sparks 
 from a smith's anvil. But I'm talking too much. Tell 
 me at once that there was no incontinence. There was 
 none, Brenainn replied. Then you're a great man and a 
 holy man indeed, a great glory to Ireland herself; you're 
 all that, and I'll shrive you this instant of the venial sins 
 you've committed, for there are always venial sins, and it 
 were better that the earth and sun, moon and stars should 
 fall out of their places, and the skies be for ever empty, 
 than that the least sin should be committed, so great is 
 the least of these in God's sight. And Scothine began 
 the Latin prayer, mumbling through it quickly, his voice 
 getting clear at the words " absolvo te." And these being 
 pronounced, Brenainn rose from his knees. And now, 
 
171 
 
 Scothine, one last question : tell me, when we're in 
 heaven together, will these two girls be given to me or 
 will they be given to you ? If they're given to anyone, 
 Sco thine answered, his face clouding a little, they should 
 be given to me. But you didn't resist them with a trout 
 weighing two and a half pounds in your belly ! Didn't you 
 eat half the trout yourself, so there was only a pound 
 and a quarter after all. Don't let us be arguing about 
 what's going to happen to us in heaven, but do you be 
 looking out and searching in your own parish for two 
 other girls that may tempt you as mine have tempted 
 you, and get you up into the front row. I'll do that if the 
 Bishop lets me, but, Scothine, in heaven there is neither 
 marriage nor giving in marriage. We've read that in the 
 scriptures. You're a great story-teller, Alec, and I fell to 
 thinking that the priests departed from each other in 
 happiness, and with a little regret at the back of the 
 happiness which neither could understand, so entirely 
 without cause did it seem to both of them. 
 
 CHAP. XXVII. 
 
 WE had left Westport in plenty of sunshine, but as 
 soon as we came to the great bog, lying between West- 
 port and Loch Conn, squalls, charged with stinging rain, 
 rushed down upon us from the hills, dun-coloured hills 
 frowning under their cloud caps ; and the road we were 
 following seemed so unlikely to lead us towards woods 
 filled with rhododendrons (now in their decline, my host 
 said, as we started, the flush of June being over ; a sort 
 of evening hour of beauty gone, I cried back to him) 
 that when I found myself crouching behind a turf stack 
 for shelter, the suspicion rose up quite naturally that we 
 were being befooled. Alec, I said, do you think Mr 
 Ruttledge is putting a joke upon us } Mr Ruttledge isn't 
 
172 
 
 the man would make it a joke to send you off to Loch 
 Conn for a wetting, Alec answered. I've never been in 
 this part of the country myself, but I've heard of the 
 rhododendrons, and we shall be among them soon if your 
 honour will have patience ; you see the weather is mending, 
 the clouds are lifting from the tops of the hills yonder. 
 But the bog, I said. It seems as if it was going on for 
 ever. That is the way with a bog, your honour ; it ends 
 and begins without any warning. I've remarked the 
 same thing myself, I answered, and we trudged for two 
 miles more, weary travellers at last rewarded by the 
 sight of green hill-sides. Now wouldn't this be the 
 domain Mr Ruttledge was talking about ? Alec asked, 
 and my surprise was great, for the woods seemed to me 
 to become more beautiful as we proceeded into them, 
 rising steeply from the shores of the lake, and full, as 
 my host had told me, with declining bloom, white, pink, 
 purple and mauve, with one great tree flaunting so 
 insolently over the ruin of the gate lodge, or steward's 
 house or cabin (it matters not which, once a human 
 habitation) that it was pleasant to pass into the demure 
 woods ; the world we live in being a green one, our eyes 
 return to green eagerly after too much colour. 
 
 We had been told that we should find the Royal 
 Osmunda by the lake-side, and the owner conducted us 
 from terrace to terrace till we came to a plank bridge, a 
 crazy structure that had been built out into the marsh ; 
 there were gaps in it, but with the aid of stepping-stones 
 we reached the corner in which the great fern grew, but 
 alas, it grew in such profusion that we took little pleasure 
 in it and returned inland disappointed, depressed perhaps 
 tells my feelings better. I shall expect you back at 
 tea-time, the owner said, after giving us leave to roam 
 his woods whither it might please our fancy, calling 
 us back to advise an excursion to a ruin. We should 
 find it, he said, if we followed the lake shore for about 
 
 i 
 
ITS 
 
 half-a-mile. But I do not know that it's worth visiting, 
 he added on consideration ; very little of the original 
 convent remains. But the evening looks like clearing* 
 and if you meet an old peasant ask him to tell you 
 the story of a nun who is buried there. I've only 
 heard it hinted at. A saint it appears she was. You 
 may be more successful than I have been ; you see I'm 
 a stranger, an Englishman living on good terms with 
 the people but looked upon as an alien We'll try, I 
 said, turning my eyes towards Alec. A moment before 
 it seemed to me that I had descried an awakening of 
 interest in his face. He knows the saint's story, I said to 
 myself, and hoping to hear it from him, I thanked the 
 owner and entered his woods again ; a beautiful and 
 silent domain, I said, not a bird singing in it, for the 
 rain is threatening still ; a strange day, not a wave on 
 the beach nor patter of hare or rabbit among the leaves. 
 Sorra one, said Alec. And we walked idly to the little 
 pier, almost forgetful of the ruin we had been invited 
 to go in search of. A boatless pier, I said. What 
 has become of the owner's boats ? Alec was unable to 
 answer me and we stood gazing across the lake. Not a 
 gull, nor a sand-piper, nothing but the gaunt shores 
 yonder. A lake famous for its trout, I added, hoping to 
 tempt Alec into an observation. It was once the finest 
 water in Ireland for trout, he answered, but it is no good 
 since they got rid of the pike. But the pike ate the 
 trout, I said. All the same. Alec replied, where there 
 are no pike there are no trout : they've ruined the lake. 
 He nudged me and pointed to a great heap of stones by 
 the little pier. Stoats, he whispered, and in response to 
 an imitation given with his lips of a rabbit wounded or 
 in distress, four little red heads peeped out. The game- 
 keeper will be able to get them all by the end of the 
 week ; catch the bitch first and then the young ones 
 will come looking after her and trot into the trap. 
 
174 
 
 It seemed to me sad that the pretty litter of red animals 
 should all be struggling in traps before the end of the 
 week, and to rid myself of the doleful spectacle I began 
 to ask questions about the ruin ; a famous convent it was, 
 no doubt, in the years back. You've heard of it. Alec ? 
 I've heard of it surely, he muttered, and we walked on 
 in silence through wet stones and tussocks and juniper 
 bushes. A poor country, I said, grey lake and gaunt 
 shores, naked everywhere save whence we have come. 
 But Ireland was once called the island of woods. I've 
 always heard it was here, he said, interrupting my 
 meditation ; and I found myself beside an ivied ruin. 
 '' Ruin " seems an exaggerated expression, for there was 
 little more than a heap of stones covered with a thick 
 mane of ivy, but a closer examination of the ground 
 disclosed traces of ancient walls that the earth had not 
 yet overgrown. Yes, it was in this place, he repeated, 
 that one of Ireland's greatest sons was done out. 
 
 The story is coming, I said, but dared not ask Alec 
 to continue it lest he might take fright. He came here 
 from the wilderness when he was getting a bit too old 
 to live on water-grass and cockles. You remember 
 Scothine, your honour ? He that put the great trial on 
 Brenainn, making him lie between two virgins with round 
 breasts and after dining him on a fine trout. Well, 
 Moling was another such a saint as himself before he 
 came to the convent, and there's no saying that he 
 wouldn't be as high in heaven to-day if it hadn't been 
 — ah, well, 'tis true what they do be saying, that no man 
 is safe from temptation till he's dead. 
 
 There's a story on his mind without doubt, I said to 
 myself, and I could listen to it with more comfort in 
 these woods than on a gusty bog trying to keep my hat 
 from blowing away. Don't you think. Alec, that we're 
 going too far.? I asked, and tea waiting for us in the 
 house beyond. Faith, a cup of tea would be better than 
 
175 
 
 a blow of a stick, he answered cheerfully ; but I thought 
 your honour might like to see one more twist of the lake. 
 
 I've heard of the view beyond that hill There are 
 
 few things, I interrupted, more beautiful than a fine 
 evening after the rain. Whatever your honour likes. 
 Perhaps the tea would be better, I answered, and as soon 
 as we came to the ruined wall on our way back I began 
 to examine it, without, however, putting any questions 
 to him. I'm slow to go beyond this spot, said Alec, 
 without getting down on my two knees, wet and all as 
 the ground is. 
 
 An ill-judged word might stop the story on his lips, 
 and to say nothing at all might allow it to pass away. 
 All but that corner wall has disappeared, I mentioned 
 casually. True for you. Alec murmured, the ground has 
 grown over most of the convent, all but her grave and 
 the clay will never climb over that, for wherever there's 
 been a great wickedness done theress a scar left. The 
 story is coming, he will tell it, and how suitable these 
 woods are for the telling of a story, these quiet, almost 
 soundless woods, only the raindrops falling from the 
 leaves, I said, and began to admire the architecture of 
 the trees — tall boles of elm and beech with the hills 
 showing through the top branches, and, I said to myself, 
 the misted lake through the lower. A beautiful wood 
 whose monotony is relieved by a rough pine — that one 
 making a break in the pale greenery. 
 
 But the story Alec was cherishing of the saint who 
 came out of the wilderness in search of temptations, 
 like Scothine, but who, unlike Scothine, failed to conquer 
 them, diverted my attention from the trees to Alec's 
 anxious face, and putting together all my knowledge of 
 Alec, gathered, it is true, in a week's intimacy, and 
 adding to it my instinctive comprehension of what is 
 lowly and remote, I concluded, rightly or wrongly, I 
 know not which, but I concluded that outside of his gift 
 
176 
 
 of story-telling he differed in no essential fact from any 
 casual peasant picked out at Westport on market day; 
 and that if I pressed the analysis a little further, we 
 should come to this : that very little of his gift of story- 
 telling is personal to him — to himself. But can anyone 
 say : this much belongs to me and to no one else ? Is not 
 all reflection and derivation ? My refusal, however, was 
 firm not to be led into this blind alley, and fixing my 
 thoughts firmly on Alec, striving to see him steadily and 
 to see him whole, as a good mid- Victorian should, I said : 
 his gift of story-telling amuses me because it is new to 
 me, but it is as old as the hills themselves, flowing down 
 the generations since yonder hills were piled up. Sheep 
 paths worn among the hills. His grandfather or grand- 
 uncle, whichever the Dublin scholar was, trimmed these 
 paths a little. Sheep paths, nothing else. Alec is a 
 creature of circumstance, and like myself can be accounted 
 for. He tells stories against the priests and nuns of the 
 twelfth century, for these are not far removed, in his 
 knowledge and imagination, from druids and druidesses. 
 It was only a few centuries before the twelfth that the 
 druids began to discard the oak leaves for the biretta ; 
 but in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries they were 
 full-bellied Roman priests ; by that time the word had 
 become flesh ; it is just touch and go if he tells me the 
 story he is brooding over or refrains from telling it. I 
 can do nothing. 
 
 On this thought I raised my eyes for another look at 
 him, and as I did so Alec said : mind he must have been 
 one of the greatest saints that ever fell out in Ireland, for 
 it was the great deed he did, saving a soul from the devil 
 himself. I told your honour, as I should have done, that 
 it was at the end of his life ; he came out of the wilder- 
 ness where he had been along with the hermits, since he 
 was a bit of a gossoon living on cress and gulls' eggs. It 
 was after twenty years of the tough eating that he came 
 
177 
 
 to rest his bones in the convent that you saw this day. 
 A man between fifty and sixty, yet the diet did not seem 
 to have taken a feather out of him, for his hair was as 
 black as you hke, and it hung down on his shoulders in 
 fine curls, and the pair of eyes in his head were as shiny 
 as a young cat's. A spare, wiry little man that no one 
 would believe to be so old. But it was just as I'm 
 telling you. He came out of the wilderness between 
 fifty-five and sixty to hear the confessions of nuns by the 
 lake beyond ; he came down from the crags above Old 
 Head. You know Old Head, your honour. Mr Ruttledge 
 goes there every summer with the children to swim. It 
 was there Moling had been living many a year the way 
 I told you. A queer place it is too, and he thought that 
 his rest was well-earned anyhow. But there was no rest 
 for him in this world, poor man, from the day he waved 
 his hat at the crags above Old Head, and came down at 
 the trot to Loch Conn to confess the nuns of Cuthmore. 
 And then didn't the bad luck start up in the most un- 
 likely place, in the mind of Sister Ligach, as pious a one 
 as ever wore out a pair of knees on the top of this earth. 
 I've come. Father, she said, dropping down on the same 
 bones, I've come with a great sin stuck in my conscience ; 
 but I've faith in the sacrament to relieve me. Well you 
 might, said Moling, for you are the one got well instructed. 
 On these words, he settled his stole and cocked his ear, 
 and wasn't it a relief to him to learn that the only thing 
 that was wrong with her was this, that she wasn't able 
 to pray to the saints to put in a word for herself and the 
 sisters in the convent. A light sin, surely, but being a 
 priest he had to blame her, and tell her she'd be better 
 off remembering the saints that stand by us when the 
 word of death is in our throats, singing and praying round 
 the throne of God to spare them that do be passing away 
 from the world, or if that cannot be owing to mortal sin, 
 getting their share of purgatory a bit easy. 
 
 M 
 
178 
 
 After saying all this he thought he had done with 
 her and that she would get up from her knees, but there 
 wasn't a move out of her. My child, said he, what are 
 you waiting for? Well, Father, said herself, what good 
 would it be for me to be leaving you and I not making a 
 clean breast of it ? I confessed that I can't pray to the 
 saints any longer, but I've worse than that in my head. 
 Well the priest puckered up his lips and a thoughtful 
 look came into his eyes. No more than to the saints am 
 I able to pray to the holy virgin to succour us. Are you 
 telling me that you can't pray to the holy virgin, the 
 mother of the blessed God ! said the priest, and he in a 
 fright. Not to herself who bore the son of God in her 
 womb ? It is like that, Father, indeed. The priest next 
 to jumped out of his skin at that, and the chair he'd 
 been sitting on fell behind him. Pick up your chair, 
 Father, and hear me out, said Ligach, or you'll be sorry 
 afterwards. I can pray to no one but to Jesus himself, 
 said she. To no better could you nor anyone else be 
 praying, said the priest; but don't forget that there is 
 no one could put in a word better or quicker for you and 
 for us all than his own mother. Tell me, my child, 
 who would he be likely to be listening to more than to 
 his own mother ? To which Ligach replied : the truth 
 indeed. Father, but I've no thought for anybody but 
 himself, and there's no use giving a prayer when your 
 thoughts aren't in it. I wouldn't say so far as that, said 
 the priest, for by saying the prayers themselves the sinner 
 brings himself under the rule of the Church, and the 
 frozen waters of his heart will loosen and burst. It is 
 as you say, Father, but you haven't heard all yet. I can't 
 say a prayer at Mass ; my thoughts aren't on the Mass 
 that you're saying, but out in the garden. 
 
 At the words "out in the garden" Moling's brow 
 blackened, and maybe it was the quiet drawl of the girl 
 got him on the raw as much as anything else. Is it that 
 
179 
 
 your thoughts are out gallivanting in the garden when 
 I'm calling down God into the bread and wine? But, 
 Father, isn't it much of a much ? Isn't it the same thing ? 
 Jesus gave us the sacrament, and if I'm thinking of him 
 I'm thinking of what is going on at the altar too. It is 
 of the upper chamber in which he ordered the sacrament, 
 cried the priest, that you should be thinking ; and it 
 would be better still if your thoughts were on the miracle 
 and me at it. My child, Tm afraid I don't understand 
 you. I haven't got the rights of it yet. Well, it's like 
 this. Father ; all the time you're saying your Mass I'm 
 thinking of Jesus on the cross, and he suffering great 
 torments for me. A very good thought that is. Moling 
 answered ; a holy thought indeed ; but you ought to be 
 thinking too that it was himself ordered the apostles to 
 celebrate Mass when he was gone. I believe all that, 
 said Ligach, but it's the way that his suffering on the 
 cross puts every other thing out of my head, for am I not 
 his bride whom he will take in his arms.^* That's true 
 for you, said the priest, but you mustn't be thinking too 
 much of your meeting with him in heaven. It is well 
 enough for you. Father, to say that, but 'tis of our meet- 
 ing in heaven I'm thinking all the time, and there's 
 nothing will ever get that thought out of my mind. 
 
 All the same I won't be refusing you absolution, said 
 he. But, Father, will you be hearing me out first, for 
 I've not told you the lot of it yet } A great part of my 
 prayers to Jesus is that he will be giving me a sign, a nod 
 of the head or the like. Faith, said the priest, I do not 
 come to this place to listen to nonsense and rameis. Say 
 your prayers and obey the rule, and let me be hearing the 
 rest of the parish. How many more are there waiting to 
 come in to me ? Three of us. Father. And now, Ligach, 
 if you want my absolution, bend your head ; for you see, 
 your honour. Moling was a hot-tempered man, and Ligach 
 one of those that would work up a passion in the greatest 
 
180 
 
 saint in heaven. All the same, said she, I'd be glad of 
 a sign. But what would the like of you be wanting a 
 sign for } Haven't you heard that humility is the top of 
 the virtues ? Be off with you. But Ligach wasn't to be 
 
 outdone. I'm afraid. Father, without a sign Without 
 
 a sign of what ? snapped out Moling. The day may come, 
 Ligach continued, when I shall not feel as sure as I do 
 now that he suffered all those torments for me. I want 
 to believe always and to be sure of it, never thinking of 
 anything but my belief in the son of God our redeemer. 
 You're wanting a lot and plenty, said the priest — to live 
 on earth as we shall live hereafter in heaven. But it's 
 not a bit too much, surely, when we remember the death 
 he died, which I never can let out of my thoughts. 
 You're a good little nun, said the priest; I used to be 
 like that myself in the years back. You'll give me 
 absolution, Father ? Faith, I will, said the priest, startled, 
 for he'd been away. 
 
 Other penitents were waiting ; he shrove them all 
 without giving much of his mind to their sins, for he was 
 thinking of Ligach all the time, and on leaving the chapel 
 who did he meet but Ligach and the Mother Abbess 
 coming in from the garden, Ligach dripping like a spaniel 
 that had been in the river. Father, cried Mother Abbess, 
 I'll ask you to refuse her absolution if she doesn't give in 
 and be biddable. Look at the way she is in, and you 
 wouldn't guess where I found her in three guesses — in 
 front of the cross kneeling down in a pool of water. See 
 the way she's in — out there in the teeming rain, catching 
 her death of cold. Go and change your clothes at once, 
 my child, and remember that the first duty of a nun is to 
 give in to her superiors. To back up the Mother Abbess, 
 Moling said he never remembered so severe a winter, 
 and when Ligach came to confess to him he wasn't a 
 bit surprised to hear a bad cough. The cough was 
 followed up by another, and before she could confess one 
 
181 
 
 of her sins, she was taken with such a fit of coughing and 
 sneezing that Moling said : my child, that's the bad cold 
 you've got, and a cough on the top of it. Yes, I suppose 
 I got it in the garden, for it's been wet enough there 
 lately. But didn't I hear the Mother Abbess tell you that 
 you weren't to go there ? You did, Father. But it was 
 for a sign I w^ praying, and if I do not get one I may 
 fall into a worse sin than that of disobedience. Now 
 what sign are you wanting ? asked Moling. A sign that 
 he is waiting for me in heaven. You've got a bad cold, a 
 very bad one, the priest repeated. Faith, I have, but a 
 cold is a small matter compared to what he suffered on 
 the cross. 'Tis true for you, said Moling, but a cold may 
 put an end to you just as well as a thrust of a spear. 
 You wouldn't be comparing myself to himself, would you ? 
 said the nun. Of course not, the priest snapped out, and 
 began to speak hard and stiff about her folly in wanting 
 God to grant her special favours. You're sinning in the 
 sight of God, said he, by endangering your life in the 
 way you're doing. Be off with you now ; and Ligach just 
 bowed her head, and her cough was so bad as she left the 
 chapel that the priest would have taken his words back 
 if he could, and not being able to do that, he rang the 
 parlour bell as soon as he had had dinner and asked for 
 herself. 
 
 Now, said he to herself, Ligach has as bad a cough as 
 I've ever heard in my born days, and the Mother Abbess 
 answered : true for you, Father ; it keeps us all awake at 
 night. We can hear her all over the convent barking, 
 and now there are three other sisters and the lot almost 
 as bad as Ligach, and there will be more laid up, for be it 
 wet or cold, they're all kneeling round the cross catching 
 their full of cramps. Well, I was like that myself once ; 
 and Moling began to tell of the years he spent among the 
 gulls on the crags above Old Head, and the twenty-three 
 years in the woods living on water-grass. For thirty years 
 
182 
 
 I didn't sleep under a roof, but as the years go by we 
 begin to weary of the things that we hung on to in our 
 youth. But our lives are in God's hand ; we belong to 
 God, who has given life into our keeping, and expects us 
 to look after it. I'm altogether of the same idea as your- 
 self, the Mother Abbess replied, but it will be no change 
 while that same cross is left in the garden. A better 
 place for it, said the priest, would be in the chapel. Now 
 you've said it. Father, and as soon as we can get a little 
 
 help we will have the cross Put up in one of the side 
 
 chapels, the priest interjected. I'll show you the place. 
 
 And it was a fortnight after the shifting of the cross 
 that Sister Ligach crawled out of her cell more dead than 
 alive ; the others were well before her. And what did 
 she do ? Out with her into the garden to kneel down in 
 front of the cross that had nearly cost her her life, and 
 finding it gone out of the garden, she cried : how are we 
 to keep our thoughts from wandering from him who 
 died for our sins and waits for us in heaven? Do we 
 know that he got the best of health always when he 
 lived on this earth ? Not a word in the scripture ; not 
 a word. And such was her canter till Mother Abbess 
 had to say: now, Ligach, obedience is the first rule in 
 a convent. But, Mother, think what he suffered for me 
 and I not allowed into the garden for his sake. Well, 
 that is my rule, said herself, but to make matters lighter 
 for Ligach, she gave the young nun permission to rise 
 out of her bed at eleven o'clock and go into the chapel 
 and do an hour's devotion before the nuns rose out of 
 their beds for matins. At which indulgence the tears 
 came into Ligach' s eyes, and she said : may the Lord 
 have mercy upon you for that. It is all I can give you, 
 the Abbess answered ; make the best of it, Ligach. Faith 
 and troth I will, and you won't be left out of the prayers. 
 Mother Abbess. And every night Ligach was on her 
 knees before the cross praying for a sign. But not the 
 
185 
 
 sign of a sign nor the ghost of a sign came near her, and 
 when she next went to confession, she said : no sign 
 has come to me, Father, and the temptation is always 
 pushing me from behind. What temptation is that one, 
 my child ? the priest asked. The devil himself and not 
 one of his bailiffs either, telling me always that if I can't 
 get a sign from Jesus, I must be getting one from himself, 
 which would do me as well. My child, my child, do you 
 know what you're saying ? I do indeed, she answered, 
 and I cannot help myself much longer. Every time 
 the thought comes into my head I shake it and say : 
 Hail Mary, but it doesn't help me at all. If I were 
 you I'd give myself a pinch in some soft spot, said the 
 priest, or a pin I'd stick into me when the temptation 
 came around ; here's one for Satan, you will be saying, 
 as the pin goes into your thigh or your bosom ; and if 
 you aren't hurt enough push the pin into the sorest 
 place you can find, under one of your nails, and if that 
 doesn't stop the black fellow I'll have to put on my 
 considering cap and think it out, but do what I tell 
 you first. 
 
 It must be the devil, he said, as he walked home 
 thinking what he could do to save her soul ; and if, said 
 he, his thoughts taking a sudden turn, I were a bit 
 of a carpenter I might make something with a pulley 
 that would let the head nod at her when she's on her 
 knees asking for a sign ; a nod of the head is all that's 
 wanted to save her soul. But bad luck to it, for I am an 
 unhandy man, said the saint — for he was a saint, or a sort 
 of a saint, your honour, though a sinner into the bargain. 
 I'm no good at carpentering ; there isn't one in the town 
 of Westport that could learn me in a year what the little 
 boy playing among the shavings knows already. So I 
 needn't be getting a pain in my head thinking about 
 pulleys and the like. I'll get another thought soon, and a 
 better one. Nor was he long waiting for a second thought ; 
 
184 
 
 in five minutes, neither more nor less, he had it, and it 
 frightening the life out of him — the queerest thought that 
 ever came into a man's head, one that left him without a 
 prayer to throw at the devil. Let me at all events be 
 pulling myself into a shape of prayer, he said, and if the 
 thought isn't driven off while I'm down on the knees, I'll 
 know for certain it was sent to me by the Lord Jesus — for 
 what he was thinking was that he had just the figure for 
 the deed. 
 
 It is as like as not, he thought, his hair was as black 
 as mine, he being from the country of the Jews, but they 
 always paint him with fair hair. But maybe she'll be too 
 deep in her prayers to take much notice of the colour of 
 my hair, if any colour be showing. As soon as she lifts 
 her eyes to me I'll give a nod of the head to her from 
 above and she'll get enough faith out of that nod to last 
 her till she's called up before the throne of God. But if 
 she comes kissing my feet and begging me to come down 
 to her it will be the great temptation I shall be over- 
 coming, getting thereby a higher place in paradise than 
 them gone before me ; and for a chance like this one it was 
 well worth my while to have come out of the wilderness. 
 
 The priest's thoughts broke off suddenly, and after one 
 or two more turns up and down his garden he went back 
 to the house with the fear on him that Jesus might not be 
 wishing his cross interfered with. How do I know that it 
 isn't Satan is tempting me ? he asked, and going to the 
 holy-water stoop he splashed nearly all the water in it 
 about him. But aren't I the fool ? said he ; for why should 
 the devil be prompting me to save a soul and he wanting 
 as many as he can get hold of.'* It is God himself is putting 
 this thought into my head, relying on me to outdo the 
 devil, who has a mighty big wish on him at present to 
 get Sister Ligach's soul, one of the beautifullest that ever 
 looked out of a human face. A great prize she'd be to him, 
 surely. The face of a saint if there be one walking about 
 
185 
 
 on two legs in holy Ireland. But if I lose my soul in the 
 saving of hers ! cried Moling. But it is the old boy himself 
 that is putting that fear into my head, for whoever lost 
 his soul while at the work of robbing the devil of a soul he 
 set his heart on ? I'll lead her out of the chapel quietly, 
 and bid her tell no one. Risks there are, he said a few 
 minutes after, in every hour of life, but a holier one than 
 mine, which is to rob the devil, I don't know of. Now 
 can anybody tell me it won't be Jesus himself that 
 will be thanking me for the robbing on the day of judg- 
 ment. . . . But I'm bet after all — how will I fix myself 
 up on the cross ? The image is nailed there — nails in 
 the hands and the feet ; but my feet aren't made of 
 wood, and must have a support; and for my hands I 
 must have two rings of rope, and Moling, not being much 
 of a handy man, as I've said, spent many hours more than 
 another would have done making them rings. 
 
 At last they were twisted and hidden away in the 
 chapel, where he was himself at half-past ten, removing 
 our Lord from his cross and fixing himself up in his place, 
 which he had just time to do before Ligach came in to her 
 devotions ; and he might have dropped down from the 
 cross so great was his fear that she might see the loin- 
 cloth was missing from his body, for he'd forgotten it in 
 his hurry, and, says he to himself, if Ligach wasn't 
 innocent of the difference in the make of a man and a 
 woman, I'd be fairly caught. But he was safe enough, 
 Ligach having no thought but for him that is in heaven. 
 Christ with me, Christ before me, Christ behind me, 
 Christ in me, Christ beneath me, Christ above me, Christ 
 on my right, Christ on my left, Christ when I lie down, 
 Christ when I sit down, Christ when I arise. Thou'lt not 
 deny me a sign, said she, lifting her eyes to the cross ; it 
 will increase my faith in thee till thou shalt be in him 
 that sees me, in him that I see, in him that speaks to me, 
 in him that I am speaking to, in him that I hear and in 
 
186 
 
 him that hears me. And seeing and hearing naught but 
 theej so would I hve and die aloof from all else, from the 
 world. Dear God, I would be unto thee on earth as I 
 shall be in heaven. A sign, a sign of thy love of me. A 
 sign that will save me from the temptation of thinking 
 that the devil would answer me if I were to pray to him. 
 
 On hearing them terrible words the priest took such 
 a fright that he slipped his hands out of the ropes and 
 came down to her, sure and certain that he'd be able to 
 quiet her. But while he was telling her of the great 
 meeting it would be for them both up in heaven, she 
 kept saying: am not I up in heaven now? the sparks 
 flying out of her eyes all the time as you might see 
 them in Jimmy Kilcoin's forge when he pulls at the 
 bellows. Am not I Christ's bride .'* she kept calling 
 to the poor man, trying his best to get to the holy 
 water; and if he'd got there 'tis a different story I'd 
 be telling, but the senses failed on him, and he no more 
 than a yard off the stoop, and when they came back 
 the nun was beside him in a faint so deadly that he 
 mistook it for her death. It's a poor thing to be tempted 
 like this, surely, says he ; but no more than a venial sin 
 can it be, for 'tis the intention that counts. But I must 
 be attending to her, and it took a lot of sprinkling and 
 calling into her ears that she must obey him before her 
 lips opened and she muttered : thy will be done, Lord. 
 Open your eyes, Ligach, said he ; and she opened them, 
 but only to see what she was minded to see, and, led to 
 the door of the chapel, she heard him say : what has fallen 
 out this night must be kept to yourself. One word of 
 it to anybody and the sign that you got to-night will lose 
 its power, and the blessing will be changed into a curse 
 altogether. Return to your cell, Ligach, and close the 
 door behind you. 
 
 And no sooner was she out of the chapel than the priest 
 put the image back and made oflP with himself in the great 
 
187 
 
 fright of his life, as well it might be, for by dint of 
 what had passed he didn't seem to know himself rightly 
 at all ; his thoughts were all astray, and he couldn't get 
 them together in his poor head. At one moment he 
 was thinking that he had planned the lot from the 
 beginning, and the next that if he hadn't got down off 
 the cross and made her his bride she would have come 
 to her right reason and found out what a trick he was 
 working on her. Her faith would have gone for good 
 and all, he cried out, and instead of saving a soul I'd 
 have well damned one for ever. As soon as she came 
 to kiss my feet, I was bound to come down. But the 
 rest } All right from her side, but maybe my soul is lost. 
 But it is the intention that counts; and all night he 
 was asking Jesus if a sin committed with a good intention 
 could be a sin. The sins of the flesh, he began again, 
 are small ones compared with the sins of the spirit ; her 
 sin was of the spirit, mine was of the flesh. The flesh 
 has redeemed the spirit, a thing which doesn't often 
 happen, for it is usually the spirit that redeems the flesh. 
 But in this world things often fall out contrary-like. 
 
 She won't tell anybody, not even myself, he murmured ; 
 she will keep her sin dark; but there was no sin on 
 her side, only on mine, and on mine but a venial sin, 
 if my intention was to save a soul, which it was, and 
 a man should be judged by his intentions, so it is 
 said. 
 
 CHAP, xxvni. 
 
 BEFORE long it seemed to the nuns that Moling hurried 
 them up in their confessions ; they missed the bits of kindly 
 reproof, and left him wondering, saying : his mind is off; 
 our sins don't seem to matter to him. It's your turn now, 
 Ligach ; and seeing a light on her face that made them 
 
188 
 
 think of the sun shining on the sea, they said : what's 
 wrong with Ligach this time ? 
 
 Father, she said, dropping on her knees, a sign has 
 been given to me, and a greater one than I hoped for, 
 and, the nun went on : he came down from his cross and 
 took me in his arms. But no sooner were the words 
 across her lips than a great fear and a great fright came 
 over her. Oh, but I've been told not to speak of all this ; 
 he put a bond on me, and I've broken the bond. It 
 would have been broken, the priest answered, if you'd 
 spoken to anybody but myself. Every secret is safe with 
 me. Don't you know the seal of the confession has never 
 yet been broken and never will be ? But, Father, a bond 
 was put upon me never to reveal what passed between us 
 by himself at the door of the chapel. Am I not the 
 representative of Christ on earth } Moling asked, and when 
 you tell me what happened between you, you're telling it 
 to himself. Haven't I the power to bid him come down 
 from heaven into the bread and wine ? Must he not obey 
 me .'' I know that, said Ligach, I know it well. And 
 don't I absolve sins that are committed } 'Tis true for 
 you, said the nun. But it is hard to tell. 
 
 He came down from his cross, and he took me in his arms, 
 and made me his bride in life as he will afterwards in 
 heaven. 'Tis a great honour he did to you, surely. It is that, 
 she replied, and one that I wouldn't have dared to think of 
 if it hadn't happened to me, but it is just as I told it to 
 your Reverence, just as I told it, and no way else. But 
 not a word out of you about this, cried the priest. I won't 
 say a word. Father, Ligach replied, for I was told not to. 
 And now, said Moling, I'll be giving you absolution. But 
 would you be giving me absolution for being visited by 
 himself.^ I forgot that, said the priest, but mind what 
 I'm telling you : let not a word out of your mouth to 
 anyone of this, or he'll never visit you again. Visit me 
 again ? said I^igach ; what would he come to me again for ? 
 
189 
 
 though indeed I'd be glad if he did. The priest did not 
 answer, and she repeated : for what, I'm asking you, 
 Father, would he visit me again? And the priest still 
 not saying a word she kept on at him. For what, I'm 
 asking you ? for why should he be treating me different 
 from Mary, who was visited only once so far as the 
 scriptures goes. True, true, said Moling, he will never 
 come to you again. But something will come to me, for 
 it wasn't for nothing he came down from his cross. Time 
 will prove me right. I was forgetting, said the priest. 
 A strange thing to be forgetting, a thing that doesn't 
 happen once in every thousand years, she replied. 
 
 CHAP. XXIX. 
 
 WHAT did she say. Moling asked himself, when Ligach 
 rose up from her knees and left the chapel ; what did she say 
 about expecting ? Will there be a child } he asked. And 
 on his way home he asked himself if he came down from 
 the cross because he was afraid that if Ligach did not 
 get the sign she had been praying for so long her belief 
 might fade. Did she not tell him that the temptation 
 was pressing her from behind that if she addressed herself 
 to the devil she'd get an answer ? O Lord, have mercy 
 upon me, he muttered, and he knew that all the colour 
 was out of his face, and that his hand was trembling. 
 I'm bet and bothered with it all, said he. If I've sinned, 
 forgive me. Lord. But who is to tell me if I be in 
 mortal sin or venial sin } Not a bishop in Ireland could 
 tell me that, nor the Pope of Rome himself, for what 
 happened last night never happened to anybody in this 
 world before. He walked on a bit and then stopped 
 again. I'm the most miserable man in all the world, 
 and will not be able to pull through this business. He 
 went on walking ahead, mile after mile, without a 
 
190 
 
 prayer in his heart and his thoughts tormenting him, 
 buzzing in his poor mind hke flies, stinging him, stopping 
 him in his walk, making him drop his knife and fork 
 out of his hand when he was at his dinner, leaving 
 him staring across the room, thinking of the good days 
 he spent with the hermits living on water-grass, and 
 the better ones when he was on his own picking 
 seagulls' eggs out of the rocks. 
 
 Them were fine days, he said, and I had the good 
 health then, but it is all going now, though I'll not be 
 what you would call an old, ancient man for a good while 
 yet. It is the fear that I am in mortal sin is destroying 
 me and wasting my bones. And then he would stop to 
 ask himself what she meant when she said that something 
 would happen to her. Was it a child ? Of course it was 
 that same, and he hadn't much longer to wait for the 
 news from herself in the convent. Father, I think I'm 
 with child. Women that live in chastity are often 
 troubled with fancies, and to speak of such a thing and 
 
 it not the truth might How could it be else, said 
 
 Ligach, he after coming down from his cross to me } All 
 the same keep it to yourself till the child leaps in your 
 womb, if 'tis there he is, he said to her, and to himself: 
 the news will soon be out ; the nuns will soon know all 
 about it. Highly favoured, they will say, is our convent. 
 And, Ligach, now will you be telling the others that I can 
 hear no more confessions to-day. Oh, my Lord Jesus Christ, 
 cried Moling, as soon as the nun closed the door behind 
 her, the torture is in the waiting ! And from that day 
 out he'd be saying : another day has gone by and I'm one 
 day nearer to the day when the Mother Abbess will come 
 with her nuns, Ligach in the middle of them, to tell me 
 about the great miracle : Ligach in the family way though 
 she has never known a man. 
 
 The weeks went by and he counting them till the 
 week came when he said to himself: she must be seven 
 
191 
 
 months gone, yet the nuns haven't come to me, though 
 her appearance is great. As these very words were 
 passing through his mind the parlour door opened and 
 in came the Mother Abbess, surrounded by her nuns, 
 with Ligach in the middle of them. Father, said the 
 Mother Abbess, we have come to tell you something 
 you will find it hard to believe, yet it is true. It's a 
 miracle, surely, said Moling, after he had heard the 
 Mother Abbess, and at these words the nuns were so 
 overjoyed that they linked their hands and danced round 
 Ligach for all the world like a lot of children. It is not 
 for me, said Moling, as soon as a little quiet had been 
 gotten, to discourage your faith in the miracles that 
 God grants to us sometimes so that we should not 
 altogether forget him, but I call upon you to be mindful 
 that you all keep this a secret among yourselves, for if 
 the miracle you speak of should not prove to be as great 
 
 a miracle as you think it is, we shall be But, Father, 
 
 they began, it is either a great miracle or it's no miracle 
 at all, and you're the last man that should say a word 
 against Ligach. I am indeed, said Moling, the very 
 last in the world; her sweet face tells that she knew 
 no kind of man any more than the virgin herself did 
 till the birth of our Lord. But in this world it's not so 
 easy to find believers ; there are always gabby tongues, 
 and this neighbourhood is not freer from them than 
 another. But who, Mother Abbess asked the priest, would 
 say a word against our little Ligach, whose conception is 
 as miraculous as Mary's } and the priest, without a word 
 in his chops, stood looking at the nun. 
 
 Her conception is certainly a great mystery, he said at 
 last, and until we learn more about it my advice to you 
 all is to keep this secret from everybody. But, said 
 Mother Abbess, what do you mean. Father Moling, when 
 you say till we know more about it ? Well, this is what I 
 mean, said he, that the boy himself will be proof enough of 
 
192 
 
 his miraculous birth when he grows up. Let us hope so. 
 But we don't know, said Mother Abbess, whether it will be 
 a girl or a boy. A boy, a boy, cried the nuns, clapping 
 their hands, and they began to argue that it could not 
 be else than a boy, for that no woman had ever borne a 
 girl miraculously. Oh, said the priest, I'm afraid we're 
 travelling on a road that will carry us into a fine heresy ; 
 but after thinking a while he saw he was mistaken, for 
 St Anne herself wasn't conceived miraculously, only without 
 sin. There will be a child for sure, but, as I've told you 
 already, until we learn more about it, I'd be advising you 
 to speak to none about the miracle that God has been 
 pleased to work for us. The Mother Abbess was of the 
 priest's way of thinking, and having gotten a promise from 
 them all in the name of Jesus, Mary and Joseph, the priest 
 said to himself : well, God knows how all this will turn out, 
 and we must leave it to him. 
 
 At times he was tempted to hope that she might die, 
 for only her death and the death of his child could stop 
 the scandal ; but he was a saint as well as a sinner, and 
 every time the thought came he shook his head, for he 
 knew it was the devil that sent it, and he kept the holy 
 water going about him all the time. His real torment 
 was that, thinking over the reason for his sin, he didn't 
 know if he was guilty of a mortal sin or venial sin, or of 
 no sin at all. Be this as it may, he often said : I'm doing 
 a good share of my purgatory on the earth, and these were 
 the words he was speaking to himself the day the Mother 
 Abbess came in to him with the joyful tidings that Ligach 
 had been delivered of a fine boy, and with no more than 
 two hours' trouble before he came : no more than a little 
 uneasiness. 
 
 Didn't we tell you, cried the nuns, that Ligach would 
 bear a boy and not a girl ? and the priest, not knowing 
 what to say to all this, asked if the child was a weakling ; 
 and, a bit surprised that he should ask that, the Mother 
 
19S 
 
 Abbess answered : there's nothing weak about him barring 
 that he has a strong weakness for the breast, even if it was 
 a virgin bore him into the world. Is a virgin's child 
 different ? he asked, not knowing very much what he was 
 saying, and the two of them fell to talking of the christen- 
 ing, which was to be at the end of the week, the priest 
 thinking his mind would be easier when it was over. But 
 from this hour out he never got an easy minute, and he 
 put in a week before the christening thinking of his 
 sermon, which would all be about miracles and mysteries. 
 Said he : I mustn't say a word against one or t'other, for 
 the sisters are right in this, that to say her case was not 
 miraculous is much the same as taking away her character 
 and she a nun enclosed in the Convent of Cuthmore. And 
 he began to think of the men they'd suspect if the miracle 
 were denied, but he could think only of the gardener and 
 the gardener's boy. No one, he muttered, would believe 
 
 that Ligach The nuns won't be cheated out of their 
 
 miracle, and the best I can do is to persuade them to let 
 the child be put out to nurse. We can say it was found 
 by the convent door ; left there by someone that didn't 
 want it. A moment after, he remembered a woman down 
 the road who had lost her child : she would be glad to 
 
 rear it for us, if Ligach But will she consent to be 
 
 separated from her child ? And the nuns give in to part 
 with it ? Not a chance of it, poor childless women, and 
 they are looking forward to this child, and not one of 
 them but is already a mother in her heart ; the most I'll 
 be able to do will be to get them to promise to keep the 
 secret of Ligach's miraculous conception to themselves till 
 the boy begins to show what sort of a man he'll be stretch- 
 ing into; and mind you, he kept on telling them, for 
 though the way she got him is a miracle we don't know 
 for sure and certain who he was got by. But, Father, 
 would you have us think that Satan had a finger in it ? 
 cried the Mother Abbess, and the nuns dropped their 
 
194 
 
 hands and eyes. .I'm the last man in the world who'd be 
 putting a sore thought into your minds, said Moling. I'm 
 all for taking things easy, saying nothing about the miracle 
 and letting him grow up naturally without any cramming 
 up of Latin and Greek. But, Father, he must get the 
 education. 
 
 The priest heaved a big sigh, for he knew well there 
 
 was to be no rest for him on this earth, and hardly was 
 
 the boy four years of age before he could read his native 
 
 Irish tongue, and when he was seven or eight he could 
 
 con the Latin and Greek; and between ten and eleven 
 
 he was running down to his father's house taking out the 
 
 books into the garden, reading and learning and refusing 
 
 to be a shepherd or a carpenter or a blacksmith. Not one 
 
 of the decent trades that Moling offered him could he be 
 
 got to take up. It was only books that he had a thought 
 
 for, and it was great delight to the nuns when he began 
 
 to read the scriptures to them, and he only fourteen years 
 
 of age. After this proof of his learning there was no 
 
 holding the good sisters, and nothing the priest could say 
 
 could stop their blabbing tongues. One and all of them 
 
 went about telling how the boy had given out the scriptures 
 
 to them in the Greek and the Latin, asking if that wasn't 
 
 sign enough that a great prophet he would be in time to 
 
 come : one who would hunt the heretics out of Ireland .'' 
 
 Prophet ! said the priest, who was now at his wits' end to 
 
 quiet them. And what would there be wonderful in that ? 
 
 said the Mother Abbess. Only this, said the priest, if 
 
 Ligach conceived miraculously it would not be a prophet 
 
 that she'd bring into the world but a Messiah ; and no 
 
 sooner were the words out of him than he saw he had 
 
 made a mistake, for, as Mother Abbess put it to him and 
 
 to the nuns, by means of the Holy Ghost God begot a son 
 
 that was neither greater nor lesser than himself, and full 
 
 equal to the Ghost. But we're not asked, said she, to give 
 
 in that the Son, with or without the help of the Ghost, can 
 
1P5 
 
 beget himself a son ? Sure, being God, the priest answered, 
 he could do anything. That is so, said the nun, but this 
 is the vexation : have we got to believe that our little 
 Martin is God's grandson ? If we believe him to be a 
 grandson aren't we upsetting the Trinity, a thing that no 
 person here would have hand or part in ? Bothered and 
 badgered we are, thinking out the same question, and I'd 
 like to know if the doctrine, as I'm giving it to you, will 
 hold good at the Court of Rome. 
 
 Well, now, said the priest, I'll think that over, for it's 
 a tough point indeed, and one that won't be untied in 
 a month of days, with the parishioners dropping in, to say 
 nothing of yourselves banging away at my door on one 
 business or another. A knotty point which a man must 
 give the whole of his head to. And where, would you tell 
 me, can a man give his mind to a deep matter like the 
 Trinity, unless it's in the wilderness that I came out of 
 years ago, and where I am going back to think the whole 
 thing out ? If I make any head on it I'll come back with 
 the news. But the nuns were very fond of Father Moling, 
 and at that they started in to weep and wail and cry 
 aloud, a fair keening it was ; all ochon ee 6 go deo, and 
 woeful is the day, very distressful to the priest, who, to 
 quiet them, reminded them of the forty days Jesus spent 
 in the desert. We'll pray that God will not keep you 
 waiting, cried the nuns. And I'll make a prayer too, he 
 said, that will be the dead image of the one you're making, 
 and now my blessing be upon you all, and on our little 
 Martin, whom I give into your charge, and if you don't 
 
 see my face again We will, we will, they all cried, 
 
 for be the word, and the Mother Abbess took a grip and 
 a swing out of his cassock, but he hauled it off her with 
 a rip in it maybe, and their eyes rested on him for the 
 last time as he stood for a moment at the edge of the 
 wood with his bundle on his shoulder, and he waving a 
 farewell sign to them. 
 
196 
 
 May God speed him, cried the Mother Abbess, on his 
 way, and help him to untie the knot, for it's a knot of 
 the knots, and I'm dead sure that he is too old to 
 stand the hardships of the wilderness, with them joints 
 and them bones. May God send him back safe to us, 
 said another nun. I'm thinking now, said the Mother 
 
 Abbess And the nuns cried out to know what she 
 
 was thinking. What will we be doing ourselves without 
 a priest and he gone ? Without confessions, without 
 Mass we will be lost entirely. True for you, said a 
 nun, and the others added : we never thought of that. 
 Mother. We'll have to write to the Bishop, and tell him 
 of the loss of our pastor, who has gone into the wilder- 
 ness to think out a hard bit of doctrine, one so knotty, 
 said the Mother Abbess in her letter, that he may be 
 away for long enough. So we should be glad of a 
 temporary priest if it would be convenient to your 
 lordship to send us one. 
 
 CHAP. XXX. 
 
 THE man that goes into the wilderness in his youth 
 returns to it in his old age, and I doubt if they'll ever see 
 him again, the Bishop remarked, as he passed the letter on 
 to his clerk. A man of seventy-five hasn't got it in 
 him to spend his nights on the hill-side in draughty 
 huts. But no more than that did he think about it, 
 except, of course, to send them a priest, and when the 
 priest came, Manchin was his name, the first talk was 
 about the disappearance of Moling into the wilderness, 
 and the great and holy man that he was. The last 
 words his lordship spake to me, said he to the nuns, 
 were : the wilderness is no place for a man of his age, and 
 all the nuns cried out that they thought the same. But 
 there was no holding Moling with them for the knot he 
 
197 
 
 had to untie What knot ? said Manchin. And bit by 
 
 bit the story came out, the priest's face getting more and 
 more troubled and queer-looking, till at last the Mother 
 Abbess cried out : I can see by your Reverence's eye that 
 you'll have none of the miracle, and that you think our 
 little Martin is somebody's leavings. I wouldn't be say- 
 ing that, said the priest, and he had a long talk with 
 Ligach, who gave him the story as well as she could for 
 the water in her eyes, and she guessing that the priest 
 didn't swallow much of her story ; and afterwards he 
 wrote to the Bishop saying that a great heresy might 
 arise out of this story that was going the round, and 
 a great many souls be lost in it. The Bishop was 
 fairly put out by the news, and wrote to his brother 
 bishops, and seven or eight of them came, and they 
 went at it. 
 
 The news had travelled far and wide ; pilgrims were 
 coming all the time, the whole country was talking of 
 the miracle, and nothing else. As the bishops didn't 
 want to disappoint the people there is no knowing what 
 mightn't have happened if, just as the bishops were leav- 
 ing, their mitres on their heads and their crosiers in their 
 hands, three long-bearded old men hadn't come down out 
 of the wilderness and began talking. The story they had 
 come to tell was that Father Moling was doing penance for 
 the great sin he had fallen into in the years back with a 
 nun of the name of Ligach, whom he had deceived and 
 had a child by. Enough, enough, cried the bishops ; it was 
 God sent you, lest a great heresy should eat the Church 
 the way a wolf eats a lamb. And the nuns and the 
 bishops and all the country went after the Archbishop 
 into the church, which was fuller that day than it ever 
 was before or since. 
 
 Well this is the way it was : the Archbishop began to 
 tell them out of the pulpit that it must have been God 
 sent the three hermits with the news of Moling's sin, and 
 
that they didn't come a bit too soon either, for they, the 
 bishops, were about to give it up as a bad job without 
 coming to any judgment, none of them liking to say a 
 word for or a thing against the story of such an out-of- 
 the-way miracle as a miraculous conception, though 
 there wasn't a man jack of them but agreed that such a 
 thing was less likely than one of the little miracles the 
 Church is always willing to accept, such as the curing of 
 palsy with a touch, the giving back of sight and hearing 
 with a spit, the setting of one that has not been able to go 
 about without crutches for years on his feet again ; for not 
 like any of these little miracles are the greater miracles, 
 such as the lifting of a dead man alive out of his tomb, or 
 a woman thkt has never known a man bearing a child ; 
 these great miracles were done once in the Eastern world 
 for the saving of the world. So it isn't likely that God 
 would let his greater miracles happen again: for if a 
 woman bore a child all by herself, or if a corpse lifted him- 
 self out of the tomb alive, the great truth of the Church 
 would not be the plain pikestaff that it is to everyone that 
 cares to open one of his two eyes. You may be sure and 
 certain, my brethren, you may give in to it once for all, 
 that no woman will get a child that way again, and who- 
 soever says she has done it is just trying to disturb people 
 in their faith. It is with sorrow that I give it out, but 
 Father Moling was guilty of the crime ; but let it be re- 
 membered always that he was punished for his sin year 
 in year out, day after day, minute by minute, expecting 
 all the time, and sure and certain of it, that something 
 would happen to drag the secret out of him, till at last he 
 could bear the torment no longer and ,took himself off to 
 the wilderness to pray for forgiveness. 
 
 The people were reminded by the Bishop that God had 
 forgiven Moling, and that they were bound to believe 
 this, for Moling had confessed his sin and sent three holy 
 men with tidings of his confession to them, the only thing 
 
199 
 
 he could do to make up for his sin. The three holy men 
 will tell you of Moling's repentance as they heard it from 
 the lips of Father Moling himself. They will stand up. Up 
 the hermitSj said he, but not a hermit of the hermits moved, 
 and as nobody stirred the people began looking here and 
 there for the men, but they were not in the chapel, and so 
 the Bishop sent out to see if they were in the yard. But 
 they were not in the yard either, and all the news that they 
 could get about them was from a shepherd who had seen 
 them sloping away with themselves into the wood ; thinking, 
 the Bishop said, their mission was finished. Which it was 
 indeed. All that was wanted, he went on, was proof that 
 no miraculous conception had fallen out in this parish, and 
 they had that. I would have liked you aW to hear the 
 story again from their lips, but it isn't the will of God that 
 you should : for these holy men have gone back to the 
 wilderness they came out of. 
 
 The Bishop was a great hand at a sermon, and he said 
 much more than I'm telling your honour, and would 
 have said more than he did if a commotion had not 
 begun in the chapel, Ligach suddenly falling faint or 
 dead, it wasn't certain at first ; so white and still was 
 she, that many began saying that the news that her son 
 was a by-blow had finished her. Water was sprinkled 
 on to her face, and she was well rubbed ; they got a 
 drop of whisky between her teeth, and as soon as she 
 opened her eyes the Bishop began to take pity on her, 
 and he told the people that she wasn't a bit to blame 
 nor a scrap in the wrong. She had been, he said, a 
 victim, and next door to a martyr, but a victim she was, 
 one of Satan's many victims, for the devil never flinched 
 from doing a big wrong if he could only get his own 
 way, which, in this case, was the soul of a man who, 
 until he gave in to temptation, had been a good man 
 and a very good man; one who had left the wilderness 
 because the health failed on him, who had sinned, but 
 
200 
 
 we must not judge a man by a single case, but by his 
 whole life ; Moling had sinned, not a doubt of that, but 
 he had gone back to the wilderness to repent, he had 
 not hummed nor hawed about it, old man though he 
 was, and the Bishop churned on till Ligach had another 
 faint. 
 
 This time her son carried her to the door of the 
 church, putting back all the people who would help 
 him, saying to them : let none lay a finger on my mother, 
 I am here to care for her and to stick by her. At the 
 chapel door he kissed her and at that she opened her 
 eyes, and they put words in his mouth, and leading her 
 back till they were on the threshold, he stood up to 
 the Bishop in the pulpit, asking his lordship was a story 
 told by three hermits to be believed rather than the 
 story that the nuns of Cuthmore had known to be true 
 for the last fourteen years. If the hermits had the rights 
 of it why have they disappeared like evil spirits.'' he 
 asked, and the people thought well of that, and the 
 priests were frightened. Let the Bishop call the 
 hermits back. At that the Bishop interrupted Martin, 
 and said that he didn't know a thing about these hermits. 
 Then why, asked Martin, do you believe them before 
 the words of every sister in this convent? Women my 
 mother lived with from her young youth, always known 
 to them to be as pious as any nun of the nuns, often 
 going stricter than the rule of the convent in her wish 
 to please God, putting her life in the danger too. My 
 mother's life is well known, so it is, and you said yourself, 
 my lord, that a man's life ought not to be judged by a 
 single deed. Why then should the whole of my mother's 
 life be struck out as nothing ? No one accused your mother 
 of sin : we hold her to be blameless, cried the Bishop 
 from the pulpit. And by that you hold her to be a silly 
 woman who believed a living man got up on the cross 
 and let on to be God himself. My mother has never 
 
201 
 
 been known as an omadhaun, and if it was true would 
 not the hermits have stood their ground here and had 
 it out with me ? If they went off with themselves it is 
 because they were afraid of my questions ! Let them be 
 called back here if they are hermits itself, coming here 
 and dropping their bad egg and skedaddling off with 
 themselves. All the people gave in to the rights of 
 that, saying : true for you, my boy, more power to the 
 gossoon, and who hid the hermits ? 
 
 The mistake Martin made was speaking of the hermits 
 as if maybe they weren't hermits at all ; for that gave the 
 bishops the handle they wanted and they called on the 
 people not to hear another word from the man who 
 accused the clergy of calling the devil to give a hand, 
 which was the way the clergy got the people over to 
 their side, and seeing that he and his mother hadn't a 
 defender in the world, Martin said : I'll go on the track 
 of the hermits and I'll bring Father Moling back with 
 me too, and he'll tell you that the three hermits told a 
 lie. So off he went with himself into the wilderness, 
 and if I were to begin to tell your honour of the 
 adventures he met and the queer things that happened 
 to him we'd be here until the day after to-morrow 
 morning ; for Ireland was a wild place in the days gone 
 by, and it was through the wildest parts he had to be 
 trotting his boots in search of the hermits and Moling, 
 looking for them in the forests and glens, along the 
 naked seashores and from lake island to lake island, but 
 sorra sight or light he could get of one of them, for 
 Ireland is too big a place for one man to go visiting the 
 whole of it ; and it was with a belly full of disappoint- 
 ment and a grown man that he came again to Loch 
 Conn, the only place in the wide world he had a memory 
 of. His heart was sick and sore, I'm telling you, as he 
 stood in the place you stood in to-day, your honour, and 
 he looking on a few ruined walls. Is it, says he to the 
 
202 
 
 goatherd that was passing by at the time, is it that 
 these walls are all that are left of the Convent of 
 Cuthmore ? There was a convent here one time, I've 
 heard tell of it, the goatherd answered ; but the nuns 
 left it years ago because a nun of them thought she had 
 been put in the straw by the Lord himself, but it turned 
 out to be by a robber that came through the chapel 
 while she was praying before the cross. 
 
 The woman that is buried here was my mother, said 
 Martin to the goatherd, and I have gone Ireland up and 
 down and back and forth for the last seven years of my 
 life, through forests and mountains, trying to come up 
 with the hermits that brought the news that killed her. 
 Bad and real bad the same news must have been, said the 
 goatherd; what kind of news was it at all, and it that 
 deadly ? It was the news that Moling, who was the priest 
 in the convent while my mother was carrying, went to the 
 hermits in the wilderness to repent his sin, and confessed 
 to them that he was my father, and they came along 
 afterwards and told the bishops. It's not likely at all, 
 said the goatherd, for who ever heard in the world of a 
 confession being told; if Moling had told that to the 
 hermits they couldn't have told it to the bishops, and you 
 can take it from me that if the nun buried under this 
 stone was your mother indeed, then your father was a 
 robber that done a climb in through a window on a dark 
 night and played his trick ! Not a bit of it, said Martin, 
 and a great argument and a great row began between the 
 pair of them, and how it would have turned out I don't 
 know, only that the goatherd had to make off after his 
 goats. 
 
 As soon as he got the one hobbled that was setting the 
 others astray, he came back to ask Martin who the this 
 and the that was his father, if it was neither the priest 
 nor the robber, and they must have talked a bit before 
 they separated ; but the man my grandfather had the story 
 
203 
 
 from, and who got it from his father before him, told my 
 grandfather that Martin believed his soul had come down 
 from a star and went into Ligach's body while she was 
 at her prayers — it's the queer thoughts do be in the heads 
 of them heretics. Heretics, Alec ? Heretic he was, sir, 
 surely, though I wouldn t be saying anything about the 
 soul coming down from a star, for can't the power of the 
 devil work up above as well as down below ? But he told 
 the goatherd that his mother's name was under his own 
 special care, and that everybody would believe in her 
 virginity, for it was part of the new religion he was going 
 to set up, with himself at the head of it. 
 
 And the new religion ? I asked. It is said that Martin 
 went off to Germany, Alec answered, and that he got 
 married there to an escaped nun, for you couldn't set up a 
 new religion or do any of them tricks in Ireland. Are you 
 telling me. Alec, that he married Catherine Bora r That 
 might be her name indeed, for the religion itself was no 
 better than a whore. You don't mean that Ligach's son 
 was Martin Luther ? Faith, I wouldn't be saying anything 
 or too much, and we standing at the edge of her grave, still 
 and all the German Martin might easy have been one of 
 the sons of our Martin, but here's the grave beside us, 
 and you have the story as well as I can give it to you. 
 
 CHAP. XXXI. 
 
 AN excellent tea awaited me in the parlour, cakes of 
 different kinds and many various jams, and Alec was 
 speaking in praise of the tea he had been served with 
 in the kitchen, when Mr Ruttledge's car came to fetch 
 us. Its arrival was opportune, for another ten miles' 
 walk, and five of it through a gusty bog, was more than I 
 should have cared to undertake in the days of my youth, 
 and now I looked forward to leaning back among comfort- 
 
204 
 
 able cushions, and following in imagination the young 
 man as he strove through the uttermost of night, hearing 
 the stars, as he ascended the hill-sides, telling him that 
 his mother's womb was quickened by a celestial visitant 
 — an explanation of the mystery of his birth which he 
 received eagerly, for he was one whose mother's virginity 
 was dearer to him than his own life ; one who would 
 forgo his life rather than possess it at the price of his 
 mother's maidenhood : a sentiment commoner than we 
 think for, for who amongst us is there that has not looked 
 at his father with hatred, or a grudge, in his heart ? 
 
 A story, I said, that would have won its way into Pater's 
 heart ; and I fell to thinking how he would have written 
 it, beginning perhaps : 
 
 And oh, the pity of it ! the young man returning to 
 the Convent of Cuthmore after long years of vain 
 searching for Moling and the three hermits, only to 
 find her grave — her grave and his birthplace (the 
 goatherd had told him that Ligach was buried in 
 the cell in which she had lived all her life) and 
 to stand by it, hopeful, looking on himself as the vin- 
 dicator of her sad cause, his life devoted to that end — 
 a long knight-errantry — and on the religion he would 
 found as the warrant he needed of her virginity and his 
 own Messiahship ! 
 
 A beautiful story, I muttered and, catching sight at 
 that moment of Alec's face, out of which all expression 
 had vanished, I said ; when he is not telling a story he 
 is as common, as witless, as any man picked out of the 
 streets of Westport. How very strange ! and how un- 
 important ! Not himself but his beautiful story is worth 
 considering — the beautiful story whose origin we must 
 seek further back than the Middle Ages, whose counter- 
 parts we shall find certainly amongst the rudiments of 
 the world ; in the story of Bacchus, who visited Semele's 
 grave before he set forth on his pilgrimage to found a 
 
205 
 
 new religion, and in the story of Hippolytus, the son 
 of Antiope, the Amazon queen who fell in love with 
 Theseus, King of Athens, for he too believed his mother 
 to have been a virgin who was impregnated by some starry 
 influence as she lay sleeping in a mountain cleft. 
 
 Alec, I cried, irritated by the sight of his impassive 
 countenance, your story revives my interest in the Celtic 
 Renaissance, and when I return to Dublin the first person 
 I will tell it to will be dear Edward ; it will strengthen 
 his belief in the Renaissance. Who might he be ? said 
 Alec. 
 
 CHAP. XXXII. 
 
 ALEC accompanied me to the wicket, and before parting 
 with him I said once again : I'm sorry I shall not see 
 you all next week. You've told me some wonderful 
 stories, and without doubt are the great shanachie of 
 Connaught. Many's the one that has said the same to 
 me, your honour, but if they were right itself, it isn't 
 much of a brag to be above those going up for the 
 competitions with no more than two and three and a half 
 a story between the lot of them ; and the fellows stutter- 
 ing and stammering them out. But, compared with the 
 shanachies that were in it in the old time, your honour, 
 I'm not so much maybe. 
 
 I begged him to believe that he was unjust to his gifts 
 and inspirations, and suppressed the smile that I felt 
 to be at hover about my lips. I've never, I said, heard 
 better stories than those you have told me, or a more 
 spirited relation. So much have your stories pleased 
 me that I don't know how the time will pass while you 
 are away. I'm longing to hear more stories. And what 
 shall I be doing while you're away } It would be a great 
 honour to me to hear a story from yourself, your honour, 
 
206 
 
 and all the week I'm away you can be turning it over in 
 your mind. But you see. Alec, my stories are intended 
 to be read; my stories are eye stories, yours are ear 
 stories, and at an ear story you beat me easily. Tm far 
 from thinking that, your honour, but whichever of us 
 may come out first, I'd like to hear you tell a story. 
 •; Alec's blue, almost forget-me-not, eyes were fixed upon 
 me and, cowed by them, I promised him a story. But 
 you mustn't expect too much from me, I called down 
 the road, for already I had begun to feel that I should 
 be worsted in the contest. 
 
 He lifted his hat and went away, laughing, I thought, 
 as if he were sure I could match his stories. But as I 
 turned in the wicket it seemed to me that Alec had 
 gone away laughing at the thought of my being able 
 to match his grandfather's stories. Not an easy task, 
 I said, especially the Marban story. An hour remains 
 between now and dinner, I continued, and bethought 
 myself of the high wood as a likely place to find a subject ; 
 and turning to Jim, I said : how often have you believed 
 in the rabbit and been disappointed.'' It may be, how- 
 ever, your luck will be to get the rabbit, and mine to 
 return with nothing in the shape of a story. You can 
 come with me ; we'll go hunting together ; and Jim, lean 
 and eager and hopeful, rushed ahead, leaving me to follow 
 after, doubtful and already a little despondent, saying to 
 myself : to match his stories I shall need a very striking 
 subject. 
 
 A story of modern life wouldn't impress Alec. He'd 
 be more interested in a wonder tale — a legend or fairy 
 tale, a fairy tale being better than a legend. But is 
 there any difference between fairy tales and legends ? I 
 asked, and wasted some time considering the question 
 from a literary point of view, awaking from my reverie 
 with the words : a wonder tale, on my lips. A wonder 
 tale it must be, and if I tell him an astonishing story he'll 
 
207 
 
 speak up for me in the ale-houses : no shanachie will be 
 put in front of me, saving himself, of course. Something 
 dramatic will impress him more than a story of every- 
 day life, however good it may be. A murder story! and 
 I bethought myself of a woman whom a verdict of not- 
 proven saved from the gallows and imprisonment, leaving 
 her free to pick and choose a husband from out of a crowd 
 of supplicating suitors ; and, as if determined to close all 
 possible avenues of further romances, she chose the 
 dowdiest. But it would seem that romance was her lot 
 in life, for after twenty years of virtuous married life her 
 husband became possessed of the belief that she was 
 planning how she might rid herself of him, and the fact 
 that her interest was to keep and not to rid herself of 
 him did not help him. 
 
 Day by day and night by night the most trivial 
 accidents of life started his mind on the trail of some 
 fresh suspicion, till at last he was driven to asking 
 his wife to go away whither she pleased so long as she 
 left the county. He gave her the choice of the child 
 she would take with her (there were two), and it was 
 not till the mother and child reached Chicago that her 
 husband drew a happy breath. A striking subject, I said 
 to myself, but one more suited to Nature's handling than 
 to mine, for it is, shall we say, sufficient in itself. An 
 unliterary subject — the opposite to Esther Waters — 
 and I remembered how a single sentence in a newspaper 
 gave me the subject of Esther Waters. We're always com- 
 plaining of the annoyance that servants occasion us, but 
 do we ever think of the annoyance we occasion servants } 
 were the words that set me thinking of a young lady in 
 love with her footman. The subject was rejected as un- 
 worthy, and a moment after it seemed to me that some- 
 body anxious to learn a trade was the character that enticed 
 me. A kitchen-maid, I said. A kitchen-maid's adventure 
 is an illegitimate child. On fourteen pounds a year she 
 
cannot and on sixteen pounds she can rear the child. 
 The life of a human being at two pounds is my subject, 
 and before I reached the Law Courts, distant about two 
 hundred yards, the story of Esther Waters was decided 
 upon. 
 
 The story of The Brook Keritk discovered itself as quickly 
 one evening in the National Library. John Eglington 
 spoke to me of something he had been reading in 
 which the theory that Jesus had not died but merely 
 swooned on the cross was put forward, and the dream 
 began instantly that if he did not die on the cross 
 nothing was more likely than that he returned to the 
 Essenes and met, years after, Paul, peradventure, in the 
 cavern above the brook. J*»6i:*Jni 3i*ii.ai*ii i 
 
 Accident furnished me with subjects for both books, but 
 no literary accident may befall me in this lonely wood. 
 My thoughts are wilful ; I cannot fix them : the trees are 
 beautiful and lean over the stream with noble gesture. 
 The water tumbles from boulder to boulder merrily ; 
 without, however, mooting a story, I said. Blackbirds 
 and thrushes are singing, but of what do they sing, of 
 themselves or of nothing? My thoughts fled out of the 
 high wood, crossed the seas, and in a second I was in 
 Medan seeking a story in an account of a flood that we 
 had just been reading in a newspaper. A whole family 
 was drowned in it, all except an old man of eighty. Zola, 
 impressed by Nature's indifference, wrote the story, and 
 I wrote it too, but who wrote the better story could 
 not be decided, Zola not knowing English (mine was in 
 English) and I not caring to read his lest I should find 
 it superior to mine. 
 
 But I'm now composing a story in competition with 
 Alec Trusselby, and shall not find one if my thoughts will 
 not come to heel. 
 
 All night I lay awake ; and all the next day I spent in 
 the high wood, seeking a subject, my thoughts distracted 
 
209 
 
 constantly in the wood by the beauty of the trees, by 
 the birds in the stream and in the branches ; and when 
 I emerged from the wood, the hills set me thinking that 
 if they would break their lofty silence they could tell me 
 the tale of a beleaguered castle, with a fair-haired woman 
 ascending the stairs, built between the walls. It is well to 
 be fair-haired but it is not enough. Something must happen 
 to her ; she must be carried away by a rival chieftain ; the 
 battle must be waged from island to island. An Irish 
 Helen, I said, and began to curse myself for wasting time 
 upon tawdry Walter Scott nonsense, as poetical as a story 
 about a burning mill and no jot more so, one in which the 
 author has not forgotten to include a strong love interest. 
 But sneers at Fleet Street are no help, and at the end 
 of a short walk the story of a burning mill was dismissed 
 as unworthy. The story I need, I continued, is a story not 
 less perfect than those Alec told me, nor less complete, 
 and dropped into a new consideration of the old woman 
 who wouldn't give her money to the priest to rebuild the 
 walls of his church, her need being a stained-glass window. 
 The word '* need " reminded me of my own great need 
 of a short story while writing The Brook Kerith — of 
 a short tale complete in itself, relating the adventures 
 of .Jesus while in search of a ram of a particular breed. 
 The same fear was upon me then as now ; but the 
 needed tale was vouchsafed to me the same afternoon 
 in the train on my way to Epping. But will the needed 
 tale be vouchsafed to me again } I asked, and watched 
 my thoughts scouting at adventure, one of them at 
 last espying an old monk who had just finished telling 
 the story of Lilith on the balcony overlooking the Brook 
 Kerith. A Talmudic tale, I said, a lilt, such as a reaper 
 might sing while reaping — a folk-tale told over the fire- 
 side, hardly as much. She is mentioned in Faust, 
 Faust asks Mephistopheles : who is that yonder ? and he 
 answers : Lilith, Adam's first wife. Beware of her, for 
 o 
 
210 
 
 she excels all women in the magic of her locks. If a 
 young man should get entangled in them she will never 
 set him free again. 
 
 Michelangelo seems to have painted Lilith as an 
 eternal temptation; Rossetti translated Michelangelo's 
 design into verse, but neither seems to have perceived 
 the story that the old chronicler's lilt stands for. As 
 likely as not the old chronicler didn't guess that a 
 great story lay behind his brief record. The meaning 
 of the story was perchance forgotten when he wrote, 
 and his summary is but a cocoon left over to be un- 
 wound by me. And the more I considered the cocoon 
 the more full of thread it seemed to me to be. And 
 all the next day and all the day after were spent in 
 the high wood by the babbling water, unwinding, 
 forgetful of Alec, absorbed in the story, happy in the 
 conviction that were I to search the world over I 
 should never find a woodland more like the Garden of 
 Eden than this one. 
 
 These trees, I said, sheltered our first parents : if not 
 these trees their progenitors, and who knows that Lilith 
 and Adam may not have drunken from this stream ? If not 
 from this one, from one like it. I am walking in Eden 
 without a doubt of it ; the only difference between this 
 wood and the woods of Eden is that there must have 
 been fruit trees in Eden and there is none here, not 
 even a nut bush, some hips and haws only. But it's easy 
 to imagine a few fruit trees ; besides, this is but a corner 
 of the domain that God gave to Adam and into which 
 Lilith came from the underworld. The story is coming, 
 I said, the story is coming, and at the end of the "week 
 I went to relate it to Alec in the woods of Ilanaidi. A 
 pretty adventure, I said, on my way thither, and I 
 stopped to consider the style in which I was to tell 
 it; and while looking round admiring the far-away air 
 iof the plaintive little country, it seemed to me that 
 
211 
 
 every language, except its own, the beautiful Anglo- 
 Irish idiom, odorous as the newly upturned clod of 
 earth, would be inappropriate, and knowing myself to 
 be as imitative as a monkey, I asked myself if I should be 
 able to pipe my tune in it : with some outbreaks into 
 Fleet Street, of course, I said. But he'll be listening to 
 the story and will not hear the outbreaks, and if he 
 does hear them they will seem to him the very thing he 
 should admire, alas ! 
 
 And in regretful mood I continued walking, but very 
 slowly, for there was a thought at the back of my mind that 
 hesitated to come into words. At last I asked myself if it 
 were wise to translate a Hebrew story into peasant idiom. 
 As well might I translate Congreve's Comedies into the 
 same, I added, a little further on ; derisively, of course : 
 and the passer-by must have descried an expression of 
 perplexity upon my face, for I had begun to think that 
 if I told ray story in Anglo-Irish all the characteristics by 
 which Alec knew me would disappear, and, worst of all, 
 he might think I was putting a joke on him. But related 
 in London idiom my story will be like music played on 
 a worn-out piano. Good heavens ! I said, I shall make no 
 sort of a match in this competition, and might have run 
 home if Alec, who was before me by the great stone, 
 sacred in my memory, Liadin and Curithir having met 
 there, hadn't at that moment risen to his feet. 
 
 CHAP. XXXIII. / 
 
 IT seemed at first as if he had forgotten my promise to 
 relate a story, and I honestly hoped that we might go 
 fern-gathering instead. But at last the words came : 
 have you brought the story with you, your honour } Yes, 
 I answered ; I've a story to tell you, and it's of Adam's 
 first wife. But Adam's first wife was Eve, he rapped out, 
 
212 
 
 and more energetically than I had expected ; and to quiet 
 him I said that many stories related to the famous garden, 
 and that the one I was going to tell was from the Talmud. 
 The name at once quelled any rebellious spirit that may 
 have been in him, and he allowed me to inform him that 
 there are two sacred books of the Hebrew law, one known 
 as the Bible, an inspired work, and another work, which is 
 the Talmud, uninspired and four times as large as the 
 Bible. And from the Talmud, Alec, we learn that Adam 
 had a first wife, and there is a broken relation which I 
 have pieced together, the right of every shanachie, as you 
 know well. Who should know better than yourself how 
 stories are spun and woven, you the great shanachie of 
 Connaught ? The stories you tell me you learnt from your 
 grandfather : he read them in books, but added to them, 
 and you developed them just as the Hungarian gipsy 
 develops on his fiddle the snatches of song that he hears 
 the reapers singing in the cornfields. I think I under- 
 stand, sir, Alec said, and without leaving him time for 
 reflection out of which might spring thoughts of his parish 
 priest, who had never heard of Lilith, I began : 
 
 A great temptress she was, greater than our neighbour's 
 wife, greater than the scarlet woman, and the daughters 
 of Baal of whom you have no doubt heard in church. 
 Sorra one of any of them names have I heard of, your 
 honour. But all the same I'd like to hear the story of 
 Adam's first wife, no matter the book she comes out 
 of. A great trouble, I said gloomily, she always was to 
 Adam, leaving him often without ever saying when she 
 was going to return, going away like a bird, still better 
 as a wreath of mist which melts in the morning sun, and 
 returns when the sun sinks behind the mountains. And 
 once she was gone there was silence, nobody to bid him 
 the hour of the day or to say : here's a fine fig here, or 
 would you like a rosy peach better ? Nor anyone to say : 
 I'm as dry as a limekiln, and could drink a jug of water 
 
213 
 
 at a draught, if you'd go to the river for me. His life lay 
 like a lump of lead upon him, and his legs got too shaky 
 to bear his body ; he would come tottering down the path, 
 his knees knocking together, not knowing how to bear 
 with his grief, for Lilith had gone once more from him, 
 and as was usual with her, without saying whither she was 
 going or when she was coming back. She has gone, he 
 said to himself, and henceforth the memory of her will 
 be burning in me always ; and he walked back and forth, 
 unable to comprehend how he could go on living day after 
 day in this garden, which already had begun to lose its 
 beauty in his eyes, never seeing or hearing of her again. 
 
 He could no longer wander through the garden taking 
 pleasure in the graceful trees, the shady dells and sunny 
 glades, for every spot was associated with her. The 
 flowering bank beneath the fig-tree reminded him of 
 many sweet midnight visitations, and he thought that the 
 moss still retained the impress of her head. A great big 
 sigh escaped him, and he turned away from the beauti- 
 fuUest parts of the river, for since her departure the river 
 was running very shallow indeed between long gravel 
 reaches, and he wearied of the pair of ousels that flitted 
 from boulder to boulder ; they are faithful to each other, 
 why did she abandon me .^ he said, and fell to thinking, 
 asking himself if Lilith came to him from Lucifer's domain 
 by lahveh's order or if she were sent by Lucifer to tempt 
 him from his allegiance. None can answer these questions 
 but lahveh himself, he said, and he turned into the twist- 
 ing path that led up the hill-side to the praying stone that 
 he had raised there. lahveh. Alec, was the first Hebrew 
 God, and I don't think I'm going too far if I say a sort 
 of tribal God. 
 
 Adam threw himself on the ground, and bowed himself 
 three times : my God, hearken to me, for I come to thee 
 in great distress of mind and body, not having seen the 
 golden-haired Lilith for many days, and without her the 
 
214 
 
 garden in which thou hast placed me has become a 
 wilderness in my eyes; bid her return to me, else I 
 perish. My God, my God, hear thy servant Adam, for 
 he calls to thee to save him from his wretched plight. 
 My God, my God, hearken to thy servant, again Adam 
 cried out, but he had to cry many times before he could 
 rouse lahveh, who was dreaming in his golden chair of 
 the last stubborn fight before the archangels were able 
 to shut Lucifer up in hell. 
 
 At length Adam's prayers awakened him, and a mutter- 
 ing began in his great beard. Adam calls me, lahveh said, 
 and having gained his ear, Adam rose to his feet and spoke 
 outright, telling lahveh that Lilith had left him without 
 saying she would return, as she had done many times ; but 
 now I know. Lord, that she will never return to me again, 
 unless thou commandest her to do so. Left thee for ever ? 
 lahveh replied, and there was some tone of astonishment 
 in his voice that perplexed Adam. Lilith ! lahveh 
 repeated, as if he had forgotten her, and when he in- 
 quired of Adam, Lilith's reason for leaving, Adam related 
 the story : that Lilith left him because he prayed morn- 
 ing and evening at the praying stone and inquired all 
 things of God. Thereat God was moved in the imagina- 
 tion of his thoughts towards his servant Adam, and raised 
 up by God's praise Adam continued his doleful recitations, 
 saying that Lilith never avouched whether her visits were 
 within God's knowledge or outside of it, in a measure 
 embittering the pleasure that I took from her ; for. Lord, 
 I would obey thee in all things, and have now come to 
 ask if Lilith, by thy good will, may return to me. But 
 if it be not thy will I will try to bear my life of loneliness 
 in resignation, repenting all my days of the great sin I 
 was guilty of towards thee in heaven long ago. Lilith, 
 lahveh answered, for now he remembered her, was one 
 of the angels like thyself, Adam, who neither took sides 
 for nor against me. All these have been condemned to 
 
215 
 
 wander on a gloomy border-land. All but thou. I have 
 placed thee in a beautiful garden, thy transgression being 
 lighter than theirs. lahveh is a just God. 
 
 But, Lord, is it by thy will that Lilith comes forth from 
 gloomy glens and sterile clefts to visit me in the garden ? 
 Neither for nor against my will, but lahveh is well 
 pleased with his servant Adam for not having listened 
 to the coaxing voice of the temptress who would have 
 beguiled him from his lord God. My lord, if I have 
 earned thy praise, reward thy servant with Lilith, and be 
 sure that although I shall take pleasure in her golden 
 hair I shall not cease to offer prayers to thee morning and 
 evening by the praying stone that I have raised to thy 
 
 honour. Offering will I bring My servant, Adam, I am 
 
 well pleased with thee, lahveh answered. Return to the 
 shadowy peacefulness of thy garden and leave me to con- 
 sider how Lilith may best be persuaded to return to thee. 
 
 The silence of the sunny mount was not broken again. 
 Adam prayed, inly thanking God for his great mercies, a 
 great sigh, however, escaping from him as he lay upon the 
 ground, lifting his head from it from time to time, bowing 
 and rejoicing to himself that his humility should have won 
 from God a promise to use his power to persuade Lilith 
 to return to Eden, for lahveh couldn't compel Lilith, she 
 having passed beyond his power into that of Lucifer. 
 But Adam did not doubt that lahveh would be able to 
 persuade her. It may be that if she refuses he will 
 thrust her out of the border-land into hell ; and he 
 found great pleasure in his thoughts, for at the back 
 of his mind was the certainty that very soon Lilith would 
 be given back to him, whether in the middle of the 
 night or when he dozed on the sunny bank he did not 
 know, and it mattered little when, so long as she was 
 returned to him. 
 
 As he descended the twisting path to the dell he 
 remembered a corner by the river's brink in which 
 
216 
 
 he could dream of Lilith more intently than elsewhere, 
 under the spotted branches of some plane-trees that 
 were, however, still full of leaves. The river swirled 
 by almost silent, and the willow weed wilted, its life 
 having been lived ; only a few faded and torn blooms still 
 clinging to the stalks. But Adam had seen the flowers 
 return : the word return had a significant beauty for him : 
 Lilith was about to return, he said, and he watched the 
 water ousels fly up and down the stream, alighting on the 
 boulders with the same eagerness as when he had 
 watched them while waiting for Lilith to appear to him. 
 The sky, too, entranced him, for when he raised his 
 head he could see between the mottled branches white 
 clouds unfolding. A squirrel cracked a nut in the 
 branches above him, the shells fell at his feet and he 
 said : the season of the nuts has come ; Lilith and I 
 will share them together, and he remembered the different 
 parts of the garden where the different nuts grew large 
 and rich. Nuts and fruit we shall have in plenty this year, 
 he continued, and suddenly his thoughts broke away and 
 he began to ask himself what lahveh's designs might be. 
 
 He will send forth angels to seek her if she be on 
 earth, but if she have returned to Lucifer God cannot enter 
 the portals of the world below and say that she must be 
 given up. We shall have to wait, and ages will pass by. 
 His heart failed him a little, but revived soon after, for 
 it seemed to him that he could hear the sound of wings 
 in the air. He is sending his angels. Doubtless Michael, 
 Gabriel and Raphael have been chosen for they are the 
 swiftest of God's messengers. 
 
 CHAP. XXXIV. 
 
 THE sound I hear is not the sound of wild geese speed- 
 ing northward, he said, and his ears had not deceived him : 
 
217 
 
 the wings he heard were those of Michael, Gabriel and 
 Raphael come from the battlements of heaven, flying 
 over continents and seas, and always in circles, lest any 
 corner of the earth wherein Lilith might be hidden should 
 escape their eyes. But there may be days, and weeks, 
 and months, Adam said, before they find her. It was as 
 he had said, days and weeks and months passed before the 
 angels flying over the earth cried to one another: night 
 is coming on, the clouds are thickening ; soon there will 
 be no more light ; it might be well for us to descend. A 
 fair island lies in the sea below us, Michael said ; one 
 that we have often overlooked. And Gabriel answered 
 Michael : as likely as elsewhere she may be yonder. 
 Raphael and myself will be glad to rest our wings ; and 
 balancing themselves like the gulls, they descended, and 
 alighting on a long reach of white strand, they sat there 
 resting, and watching the warm breeze coming and going, 
 shaking the juniper bushes with which the tussocked grass 
 was sprinkled, shaking them and leaving them still again. 
 The earth is not without its beauty, the angels were 
 thinking, as they sat listening to the waves creaming up 
 into the bay over the ribbed strand, retiring and advanc- 
 ing, and creeping up to the angels, obliging them to retire 
 to some rocks whither the tide did not come. A beautiful 
 evening, Michael said, for beyond the bay, seaward, there 
 was a bar of gold and a flush of crimson. There are 
 pleasant things to be seen* in this world, Michael 
 continued, and this island seems a spot that our witch 
 might choose to hide herself in. It seems to be filled 
 with woods, and we may find her in some clough or dell 
 tressing her hair, a favourite occupation of hers, so it is 
 said. And then they began to talk about the neutral 
 angels and the miserable lot assigned to them to wander 
 always in the border-land between earth and hell. All 
 are there except Adam, and Lilith is sometimes in the 
 deepest circles of hell with Lucifer himself, whose aider 
 
218 
 
 and abetter she is, and sometimes wandering over the 
 earth scheming how she may embarrass the lord. Whereas 
 Adam is a poor, weak creature, said Gabriel. The only 
 one, Michael responded, whose sin was so slight that to 
 our lord lahveh the border-lands seemed too great a 
 punishment for him. So our lord and master placed him 
 in a garden, Michael continued, and methinks that Lilith's 
 visits thither were decreed not by him but by Lucifer, 
 whom we threw into hell after many great battles : you 
 remember how my spear struck him between the eyes as 
 he led his legions against us up the battlements. It was 
 Michael's way to ramble on, and, heedless of him, Gabriel 
 and Raphael watched the moon, like a white moth, that 
 had fluttered peradventure out of the earth's orbit, till 
 at last the waves rushing over the white strand wetted 
 the shingled bank on which the angels were seated. 
 We had better be looking out for some cave inland 
 where we can pass the night, Gabriel said ; and Raphael 
 answered he was cold though he had drawn his wings closer 
 round him. 
 
 A great bird went by: he, too, seems cold, Raphael 
 cried, and is seeking a warm roost ; let us go up into the 
 island and find a quiet corner in the woods. Raphael's 
 counsel was approved by Michael and Gabriel, and 
 lahveh's three messengers retired from the shore, and 
 picking their way through the juniper bushes they 
 penetrated through the brambles into the clough, and 
 lifting a curtain of trailing plants, Gabriel said : behold ! 
 the cave we are looking for. And stooping their heads 
 the angels passed under a woof of flowers and tendrils 
 into a great hall, in which lay a pool and in it the moth- 
 like moon they had seen without ; at which the angels 
 were astonished ; but on looking up through a fissure in 
 the rocks and seeing the moon still in the sky they were 
 at one that there was a beauty on earth that seemed lacking 
 in heaven ; whereupon Michael said : we have been in the 
 
219 
 
 atmosphere of the earth now for forty days, flying in 
 search of Lilith, and have lost some of our angelic nature ; 
 let us hope that we may find her and return to heaven 
 lest we become contaminated. 
 
 Gabriel and Raphael did not share Michael's fears and 
 were glad of the white sand with which the floor of the 
 cave was covered : we shall awaken to-morrow as celestial 
 as the day when we left the ramparts of heaven. lahveh 
 would not have sent us on this errand If we were to be 
 contaminated, Gabriel said. We are immortal, Raphael 
 answered, and he asked 'Michael if that weren't so, but 
 Michael answered nothing, he being asleep. But it was 
 not many minutes before he began to moan and toss 
 himself in his sleep, setting Gabriel and Raphael wonder- 
 ing : what has befallen our brother ? for he murmurs now 
 in his sleep, so loudly that we cannot hear the doves in 
 the clefts of the rocks, Gabriel whispered. He murmurs, 
 Raphael said, somewhat like the doves ; and Gabriel 
 replied : but now his cooing has changed into cries : 
 the doves go away out of the clefts with a clang of 
 wings ; what can have befallen our brother ? The island 
 is enchanted, Raphael whispered; let us away. But, 
 Gabriel answered, we cannot leave our brother in the 
 power of the enchantress. 
 
 At that moment a great cry broke from Michael and 
 he rolled into the moonbeam and lay in it gazing at the 
 moon, recovering himself at last sufficiently to overlook 
 his brethren who were pretending sleep. And they 
 seeming to him to be in deep sleep he ventured to his 
 feet and passed under the curtain of trailing plants out 
 of the cave. Is our brother playing us false? Gabriel 
 whispered to Raphael. Has she bidden him to her in 
 a dream ? Raphael asked ; and the twain rose, and going 
 to the mouth of the cave they stood like stocks and 
 watched their brother in amazement, and he walking 
 down to the sea and bathing therein like one who 
 
220 
 
 wished to purify himself after sin. Michael must not 
 know that we have observed him, Gabriel said. The 
 spell of the enchantress has certainly fallen upon him, 
 Raphael muttered; let us to our beds, and, convinced 
 that his brethren slept, Michael laid himself down. But 
 they had not slept long before Gabriel began to sigh in 
 his sleep, and very soon his sighs became moans; he 
 tossed himself, lifting himself bridge-wise, falling back 
 again, at last rollftig over on his side. 
 
 She has visited brother Gabriel in his dream, Raphael 
 whispered to Michael, and Michael said : hush ! Let 
 us pretend to be asleep, and just as Gabriel and Raphael 
 had seen Michael go down to the sea to bathe himself, 
 they saw Gabriel do the same, and were astonished 
 thereby. 
 
 Now when Gabriel returned to the cave he spied upon 
 his brethren to make sure they were sleeping and had 
 learned nothing of what had befallen him, and they 
 feigning sleep so well that he believed them to be 
 asleep, he laid himself down. But sleep had not long 
 obtained hold of him when Raphael was overtaken by 
 a dream of the enchantress ; his sighs and moans were 
 the same as his brothers' had been ; and when at last his 
 desire was eased in one sharp pang, he did as they had 
 done ; he went to the sea for purification, and believing 
 his brethren to be really asleep when he returned to the 
 cave, he chuckled, saying to himself: in the morning I 
 will question them, and they will give evasive answers, 
 but I know that Michael dreamed of her ; Michael knows 
 that Gabriel dreamed of her, but none knows that I too 
 was taken in her net of pleasure and of pain ; and while 
 thinking how he might discern between the twain he fell 
 asleep listening to a nightingale singing in the vine in the 
 fissure of the rocks. Other nightingales began soon after, 
 and the birds awakened the tired angels. We have no 
 such music in heaven, Gabriel said ; and Michael answered: 
 
221 
 
 we might take one of these birds to teach our choristers. 
 And Raphael muttered : we must not let our thoughts 
 dweU on the pleasures of the earth, for our habitation 
 is with God among the peaks ; let us not forget that 
 we are the angels of the lord. 
 
 These admonitions from Raphael were felt to be un- 
 called for and unjust, but the three angels were overcome 
 by the desire of sleep ; they slept despite the chorusing 
 of the birds and it was broad daylight when they 
 awoke. We have overslept ourselves, said Michael, and 
 lifting the curtain of creeping plants, he added : a lovely 
 morning awaits us. On these words Gabriel and Raphael 
 arose, and blinking still, they stumbled into what seemed 
 to them the most beautiful day that had unclosed before 
 their eyes since lahveh sent them on their errand. And 
 thanking God for having sent them on it, they walked 
 about the island admiring the woods, the dells within the 
 woods, the reaches of white sand leading to the sea and 
 the rocks rising above the sea. We have not alighted as 
 often as we should have done ; we have wearied ourselves 
 flying from dawn to sunset, Raphael murmured to himself, 
 with the intention that his companions should hear him, 
 which they did, and Michael, remembering how he had 
 admonished them overnight, lest their thoughts should 
 linger on the many beauties they beheld in the world, 
 answered him : yesternight my words were that we should 
 not think overmuch of what we saw and heard in this 
 world, but remember always that we are archangels. The 
 beauty of the morning refreshes the eyes, and the air is 
 sweet in the lungs, Raphael answered, and the angels 
 stopped on the outskirts of the woods, so that they might 
 watch the love dance of the butterflies. Shall we cross 
 the flowering plain, Gabriel asked, and Michael answered : 
 yes, for in that ring of trees she may be sitting ; and 
 Raphael, the slyest of the three, asked his brother why, 
 having searched the earth all over in vain for Lilith, he 
 
222 
 
 should think to find her in that ring of trees. Enchant- 
 ment was abroad last night, Michael answered ; didst find 
 it so, Raphael ? And Raphael answered : I heard sighing 
 and moaning as of doves; and they were speaking of 
 the songs of the nightingales when they entered the 
 ring of trees in the middle of the plain, in the centre 
 of which was a well, and by it, as Michael anticipated, 
 Lilith sat combing her locks. So you've found me at 
 last, she said to the angels, and Michael answered : thou 
 talkest as one that expecteth visitors. And she replied : 
 expecteth you, yes, and a long time past, for many is the 
 time I've caught sight of your wings in this well, and 
 expected your alighting in the flowering meadow, but 
 you went away north and south, leaving me waiting for 
 you here. 
 
 I have watched your pursuit of me, for in this well all 
 things are mirrored ; and from this spot I need not turn 
 to know everything that befalls the world. 
 
 And last night said Michael. Last night, Lilith 
 
 interrupted, 1 saw you sweep down and alight on to the 
 firm sand after long flying. You went up the beach 
 together in search of a cave, and I was with you during 
 the night in dreams, she continued, causing the angels 
 to hang down their heads ashamed. But Lilith being 
 among the fallen angels was in no wise ashamed, and 
 extorted from Michael a confession that he had followed 
 a white phantom in his dreams, and overtaking her among 
 the woods, she had whispered to him : seek some soft bank 
 of flowers. They had wandered in search of this bank and 
 were always on the point of discovering it, but the flowers 
 vanished. At last a pang of pleasure or pain, he knew not 
 which, divided them. I saw thee no more, he said. And 
 now, Gabriel, emulate the truthfulness of thy brother's 
 words, and tell me in what form I came to thee, in what 
 form thou sawest me. Thou camest upon me, Gabriel said, 
 as I was on my way to obey a summons to attend upon 
 
223 
 
 our lord the mighty lahveh ; thou earnest upon me, and I 
 begged thee to allow me to answer his summons, promising 
 to return to thee. But thou wouldst not hide thy bosom 
 with thy hair, and we sought to hide ourselves behind a 
 cloud ; but Michael and Raphael, who were jealous of me, 
 dissolved the cloud into rain. And now, Raphael, Lilith 
 said, tell thy dream of me, for I was with thee too. And 
 Raphael, who was filled with subterfuge, stood by more 
 embarrassed than his brethren, and tried to elude the 
 witch's examination, but Lilith pursued him with questions, 
 and the companions turned upon him and said : we were 
 awakened by sighs and moans; we feigned sleep, but 
 through our half-opened eyelids we saw thee leave the 
 cave and go down and bathe thyself in the sea. Where- 
 upon Raphael, seeing that further concealment was 
 unavailing, answered that all he had seen or felt of the 
 temptation that had visited him in the night were two 
 red lips, winged lips, he said, that hovered over me and 
 sank upon my lips, sending a sting between at which 
 all my flesh shuddered : for a moment it seemed to me 
 that I was lifted into an ecstasy more intense than 
 heaven : I seemed to dissolve. At last thou hast found 
 the truth, Raphael, Lilith said, and it was thus in many 
 shapes that I visited Adam on the flowering bank in Eden, 
 between sleeping and waking, and in deep dreams. 
 
 We have come, said Michael, interrupting Lilith 
 suddenly, to ask thee if thou wilt return to Adam ; we 
 have come from the lord lahveh, shall we say thy God ? 
 Say it not, said Lilith. You have come from lahveh to 
 ask me to return to Adam, and my answer is that my 
 lord is Lucifer and he would not have me obedient to any 
 other God. Not to exact obedience, said Raphael, have 
 we come ; not to exact obedience, Gabriel insisted. And 
 standing on either side of Lilith, who continued combing 
 her golden locks, regaling herself with her beauty reflected 
 in the still waters of the well, the angels besought her to 
 
224 
 
 return to Adam ; and she answered : I cannot abjure 
 Lucifer, he has power over me as the lord hath power 
 over you. It is by his will that I visited Adam and it is 
 by his will that I left Adam. A last word we would have 
 with thee, Michael said. Knowest thou, Lilith, that if 
 thou wilt not return to Adam, lahveh will create out 
 of earth a fairer woman for Adam's enjoyment and 
 companionship in the garden ? A fairer woman than 
 I am, Lilith answered, raising her head from the well, 
 and it is you who were with me last night that say it ? 
 I doubt the power of the lord in heaven to do what you 
 say. And the angels who were smitten with doubt 
 whether she had not spoken the truth feared to look 
 upon her longer lest their doubts should be strengthened 
 regarding the power of the God they served. 
 
 We will return, said they, to the lord with thine insolent 
 answer, and she saw the angels spread their wings and 
 depart up into the beautiful morning sky, passing over the 
 clouds into the blue spaces beyond. They will reach the 
 ramparts of heaven before many hours have passed, she 
 said to herself. 
 
 CHAP. XXXV. 
 
 lAHVEH is impatient and restless, Lilith said, for she 
 could see him in her well looking over the battlements 
 awaiting his archangels ; and she could see too the 
 scouting cohorts of seraphim and cherubim that he had 
 sent forth, seeking the wings of their brethren on every 
 horizon. At last 6ne of the winged messengers stood 
 before the lord. Michael and Gabriel and Raphael have 
 been seen by our distant brethren, he said, and they 
 have passed the word on to us. I have arrived with the 
 news for the lord, glad to be the first to bring it. At 
 these words the angels broke into song, and spreading 
 
225 
 
 out their wings they formed circle-wise around the lord, 
 who, after thanking them, dismissed them abruptly, his 
 mind being perturbed and beset with thoughts of the 
 news that his archangels were bringing to him. iig^ 
 
 All things were reflected in his wisdom ; he was dis- 
 traught thereby, and Michael, Gabriel and Raphael dared 
 not advance from the battlement on which they had 
 alighted. Our lord lahveh, said Michael, after many 
 wanderings we return to thee. Is Lilith returning to 
 Adam? the lord asked. We were flying one night 
 
 above an island Michael began. Her words were, 
 
 Lord, Gabriel interjected, that she was one of Lucifer's 
 vassals and obedient only unto him. Whereat a cloud 
 gathered on the lord's face, and Michael and Raphael 
 regretted Gabriel's admission that Lilith had vowed her- 
 self unto Satan, for lahveh' s face was like the whirlwind, 
 terrible, and the mountains shook with his voice. She will 
 not return to Adam, the Lord repeated, and the subaltern 
 angels hid themselves in the clefts. A companion must 
 be given to Adam, for I have promised him one. Tell 
 me of your discovery of Lilith ; and begin thy narrative, 
 he said, raising his eyes to Michael. Michael began. 
 But God was listless and gave a poor ear to the story 
 of the great flying excursion, wonderful though it was ; 
 and Gabriel, seeing that Michael was speaking dryly, 
 began to grow impatient, and might have related the 
 curious dreams that befell them in the cave if the Lord 
 had not dismissed his archangels suddenly, saying : leave 
 me to meditate. And for many days the Lord sat in his 
 golden chair, his brow darkened by the shadows of 
 coming difficulties, his thoughts revolving in memories 
 of his wars against the highest and best-beloved of the 
 archangels. 
 
 Lucifer had plotted against him, and the cohorts had 
 been at battle pursuing the foe or being pursued by the 
 foe, aeon after aeon. Heaven was without music of harp 
 p 
 
226 
 
 and lyre, only the clash of swords and shields was heard 
 echoing from spears, aeon to aeon, while the war was 
 pursued from star to star across the sky and down the 
 sky, angels falling into the pit and rising out of the 
 pit to renew the fight. But at last the Lord's angels 
 discovered a way to victory : the evil angels were enclosed 
 within the gates of hell, and when the gates clashed 
 upon them, the Lord said : we are at peace again ; 
 the weariness of battle is over, and a happy peace 
 broods once more in heaven. But my perplexities are 
 not over yet. I have created an earth so that I may 
 have a garden in which to place Adam, whom I wish to 
 separate from the other neutrals. Let my will be done, 
 said the Lord, and instantly Adam found himself in a 
 garden with Lilith for his ghostly visitor, till Lucifer, 
 who still plotted against the Lord, bade her away from 
 Adam, for in his evil heart he hoped through Adam to 
 bring lahveh's kingdom to naught. He must have a 
 companion, said the Lord, for after his great victory over 
 Lucifer the Lord's heart was softened, and he was moved 
 to abide in peace in his heaven among the angels, listen- 
 ing to their glorifications, to their praise, to their songs, to 
 the music of harp and of timbrel year after year, century 
 after century, aeon after aeon. But over lahveh himself 
 is a law, and by virtue of that law I am compelled to 
 create, to equalise all things, to pair all. Again the Lord 
 was troubled, and he asked himself in vain why this was 
 so, for was he not, since Lucifer's overthrow, almighty? 
 Almighty, yes ; but he must create though his creations 
 might lead to his own destruction in some distant time. 
 A fate there is behind the gods surely, he muttered once 
 again and, compelled by his fate, he descended one night 
 into the garden of Eden and reached out his hand to take 
 a rib out of the side of Adam, and with that rib he 
 made a creature like unto Adam, and when Adam woke 
 in the morning he found God's last work, Eve, sleeping 
 
227 
 
 by his side. God was pleased with his work, and Adam 
 wondered at it. Eve's sloping shoulders surprising him, 
 and her bosom even more so; he could not under- 
 stand why she should bulge under her throat; and he 
 said : she is so heavy about the hips that she'll never be 
 much good at the climbing of trees after fruit; I shall 
 have to climb and shake the branches for her. The 
 other differences in her shape seemed to him still more 
 strange ; she seemed to him incomplete, and wonder- 
 ing at her incompleteness he walked towards the river, 
 thinking that she seemed to need washing and would 
 smell the sweeter after plunging. As he was about to 
 turn back to ask her to come to the river with him he 
 remembered that to rouse her would be unkind, so 
 peaceful was her sleep and so healthful did it seem. 
 So he turned towards the river again, but his steps had 
 awakened Eve, who, sitting up on her buttocks, watched 
 him, and the instinct of pursuit arising in her in an 
 instant, she followed him, stumbling over the ground in 
 her great hurry. 
 
 Over the brink he went head foremost into a deep 
 pool, and she, knowing nothing of water and its dangers, 
 tumbled in after him, making a great plop, fortunately 
 causing him to look round, and, seeing what had 
 happened, Adam dived. He didn't recover her, and 
 dived again, and this time he managed to get hold of 
 her by the hair, and by it he towed her to the bank 
 and laid her out, wondering why she lay so still. It 
 might be well to let some of the water run out of 
 her, he said to himself, so he turned her over, and 
 when she had vomited forth her eyes opened, and it was 
 not long before she was sitting up and asking Adam to 
 tell her what had fallen out. Thou art Eve, he answered, 
 the companion that lahveh promised me. We are in 
 Eden ; and the river is for swimmers, and until thou hast 
 learnt to swim thou must not venture into the deep pools, 
 
228 
 
 But I will teach the art to thee ; and it pleased Eve to 
 hear that she was going to learn from Adam. But shall I 
 go under the water? she asked. Adam answered that 
 he would support her. She liked to hear that his hand 
 would be under her chin. But her thoughts turning 
 from to-morrow suddenly, she said : but thou hast 
 not told me how I came hither. Adam looked forward 
 to telling her the whole story, for since he had washed 
 her as she lay unconscious on the bank, and disentangled 
 her hair, she had begun to seem different in his eyes, and 
 they went through the garden together, Adam showing 
 the fruit trees that abounded, giving her fruit to eat, 
 and Eve gathering flowers wherewith to weave a wreath 
 for her hair. 
 
 lahveh gave thee to me for I was lonely in this garden, 
 he said, and her eyes brightened, and she said: who is 
 lahveh .f* Hush, said Adam, the sacred name must be 
 spoken more reverently ; he put his fingers to his lips, 
 and the alarmed twain stood gazing at the pillared fir- 
 trees that grew round the stone altar, their skins drying 
 quickly in the warm air. A touch of autumn was in it, 
 but the sun was glowing, and when the lonely cloud that 
 had hidden the sun for a minute passed on, the garden 
 by the spell of contrast seemed more beautiful than before. 
 Come thou with me to his altar. Eve : I would thank him 
 for his gift to me of thee, and they went up the path, and 
 as soon as he had thrown himself on the ground and 
 bowed himself three times, and muttered in his beard, he 
 arose and, taking Eve's hand in his, he said : by lahveh's 
 altar 1 will tell the story of lahveh's wars against Lucifer. 
 
 Eve listened because Adam's voice pleased her, but she 
 would rather have heard his voice on a subject nearer to 
 them than the clashing of shields of long ago, the whirling 
 of swords and the thrusting of spears in the abyss ; and 
 despite her desire to please Adam her thoughts were 
 ofteii away from the conflicts that had taken place in 
 
229 
 
 the middle, air over against the ramparts of heaven and 
 about the gates of the pit. 
 
 Adam was at this time a young man of comely presence, 
 tall and lithe, and Eve would not have had his shoulders 
 different from what they were. They flanged out from the 
 neck nobly, and she liked his long, thin, sinewy arms, and 
 the big hands that she could see were stronger than hers. 
 His chest is flat and the hips narrow ; his legs are long 
 and sinewy, not round, like mine, she said. I like his 
 shape, she murmured, and hoped that he liked hers. Now 
 of what are you thinking } he said. I was thinking, she 
 answered, that if thou hadst headed the army of Lucifer 
 thou wouldst have conquered lahveh. Adam's face filled 
 with shadow, so lightly did she speak the name, and he 
 said: thou must not think such wicked thoughts, and 
 leaving the altar he paced before her. His steps pleased 
 her, so strong and rhythmical were they, and she enjoyed 
 his back, so strong did it seem. Thou art the most 
 beautiful thing in this garden, she said, and my eyes will 
 never weary of overlooking thee. Now what is this hairy 
 thing I see, and what use is it? she said. And Adam did 
 not answer her. He was thinking the while of the great 
 battles of long ago, the clashing of the shields and the 
 dense array of spears, but at last her hands awoke him 
 from his reverie. Don't pull it so, he said, and she loosed 
 his beard. Why have I not one ? she asked ; my poor face 
 is bare. But it is more beautiful bare than hairy. I have 
 often wished to be without my beard. But I would not 
 wish thee without it, she answered, and each was a gazing 
 stock to the other. Adam's muscles were Eve's admira- 
 tion, and the sweet roundnesses of Eve's limbs, Adam's. 
 Why these breasts? he said. Dost not like them? she 
 asked. Yes ; they are beautiful. How flat and shapeless 
 am I. Say not so, thou art very beautiful, Adam. How 
 much stronger, how much fleeter, and she continued to 
 find pleasure in Adam as they walked along and across 
 
230 
 
 the garden under the fruit trees, eating of the purple figs 
 and the pink peaches, Adam showing how the fruit must 
 be skinned before it can be eaten and Eve doing as 
 she was bidden : though her appetite had not yet begun 
 to awaken she ate the fruit, for she could not do any- 
 thing except that which she thought would please Adam. 
 But thou wilt not listen to the valour of the angels, said 
 Adam. I will listen, she replied, when I grow weary of 
 looking upon thee. But wilt thou grow weary of me? 
 Adam asked. And they fell to pondering on the chance 
 words that had been uttered. At last Eve asked : 
 whither leads that path ? It leads, he answered, to the 
 fig-trees, under whose shelter I sleep at night. Let us go 
 thither, for I would share thy bed, she said. Thou shalt 
 share it. Eve, but before we lie down together thou must 
 learn to pray to lahveh. 
 
 Eve had little heart for learning prayers, and his face 
 telling his disapprobation, she said : thou art not satis- 
 fied with me. And on these words they fell asleep on 
 the flowering bank. And they slept till morning arose 
 on the garden, as children do. 
 
 CHAP. XXXVI. 
 
 IT was the sparrows twittering in the vine that awoke Adam, 
 and laying his hand on Eve's shoulder, who was still asleep, 
 he said : the day is beginning ; come, let us offer thanks 
 to lahveh for the joyful light, and Eve, rousing herself from 
 her sleep, said : thy will be done, and she followed Adam 
 up the hill-side, and imitated him in all things, throwing 
 herself on the ground and bowing herself three times ; and 
 when this ritual was accomplished she gave ear to Adam's 
 prolonged mutterings, and strove to understand them, but 
 soon her brain wearied, and she might have renounced the 
 task of trying to follow his repentance for the sins he had 
 
231 
 
 committed in heaven if she had not suddenly heard the 
 name of Lilith, Now who can Lilith be ? One of the 
 angels of whom Adam tells such long stories ? she asked 
 herself. Somebody he knew before the fall, she added, 
 and resolved to await an occasion when she could inquire 
 of him who Lilith was. Nor was it long before she heard 
 him speak again of Lilith's visits to the garden. By whose 
 orders did she come to the garden : lahveh's or Lucifer's? 
 she asked herself, and the question would have been put 
 to Adam if he had not been muttering prayers, and if the 
 thought had not come to Eve that it might be well for her 
 to get a confession from Adam that the memory of the days 
 he had spent in the garden with Lilith were still dear 
 to him. lahveh is but a blind, she said, as she set the 
 peaches and figs she had gathered before Adam ; and 
 while he ate thereof she began to speak to him of their 
 thanksgivings, and offerings of fruits, and to tell the hope 
 she cherished that the day's work before them would 
 be pleasing to lahveh, making herself pleasing to Adam 
 thereby and advancing herself still further in his favour 
 when she returned to the stories he had told her yesterday 
 as if she had been considering them ever since : the 
 clashing of the shields when lahveh's angels descended to 
 give battle unto Lucifer ; how Gabriel whirled his sword 
 and an entire legion fell before it, and how a plump of 
 spears fell back before Michael's spear. On these feats and 
 on the recital of Raphael's ruses in outflanking the enemy, 
 Adam relied to engage her mind, and remembering how 
 languidly she had listened yesterday he was overjoyed at 
 seeing that he had in the main misjudged her, and began 
 to relate the story over again from the beginning, watch- 
 ing her carefully all the time ; but her attention never 
 relaxed, and she showed desire to be instructed, saying ; 
 thou wast wise not to join with Lucifer's angels, for 
 lahveh is all-powerful, and knowing him to be all- 
 powerful, thou hadst the wisdom to refrain. I knew the 
 
232 
 
 power of lahveh the almighty, Adam answered her. 
 And Lucifer, she said, must have known that too. Yes, 
 he too knew him to be an almighty God. Then why, 
 she asked innocently, did Lucifer rebel against that 
 which he knew to be almighty ? 
 
 At this question a cloud came into Adam's face, and he 
 began a tangled explanation to which Eve listened, know- 
 ing well that the thing she desired to hear would soon 
 be made -known to her. So she had patience with Adam, 
 and listened to his prolix relation that although God was 
 almighty he had, as it were, delegated the administration 
 of evil to Lucifer, reserving to himself the administration 
 of all good things. This was the first circle of thought 
 into which Adam descended. He descended into still 
 further circles, and with Eve's eyes upon him he couldn't 
 doubt that she listened. But did she understand ? he 
 asked himself, and was satisfied that she did. And then, 
 as if picking up her thoughts a little farther on. Eve said : 
 thou wast lonely in the garden before he gave me to 
 thee ? and Adam answered innocently : not lonely, for 
 there was Lilith. At which she opened her eyes as if she 
 had not heard the name before, and asked : who is Lilith ? 
 Who is Lilith ? Adam answered ; and he seemed to drop 
 back into a past time and away from her. 
 
 The sound of her name carried him as a sudden breeze 
 carries a barque from the shore out into the sea. He 
 seemed to forget the woman by his side, and when he 
 spoke it was not Eve that prompted him to speak but a 
 sudden memory. Lilith, he said, was my wife before 
 thou earnest. We were angels in heaven before the fall. 
 Adam's thoughts seemed to die away, and Eve had to 
 awaken him with her voice. And she came to visit 
 thee in the garden? She came to me, he answered, 
 between waking and sleeping and in dreams. Didst 
 never see her in the noonday as thou seest me? Eve 
 asked. And Adam knew not how to shape an answer 
 
233 
 
 that Eve would understand, for Lilith was clear to 
 Adam only so long as he did not try to express her in 
 wordsj or think about her too closely. '^'Hl 
 
 ' The mist at the edge of the stream vanishes in the 
 morning when the sun's heat is strong, and the mist returns 
 to the edge of the stream when the sun sinks behind the 
 hills. She was evanescent, Alec, as the mist, yet she was 
 very real, more real than Eve sitting by him ; Adam could 
 not put his thoughts into words and Eve would not 
 have understood him if he had said : Lilith is the reality 
 behind the appearance. By appearance I mean all that our 
 senses reveal to us. An orange will serve for an example. 
 We know an orange only through our senses — sight, 
 hearing, touch and smell — but it may be held that there 
 is something behind the appearance and that if we 
 willingly forgo the appearance we reach reality, that 
 which is behind the appearance. You find it difficult 
 to follow this. Alec, but the hermit that you told me of, 
 Scothine, who lived in the woods on water-cress and on 
 the crags by the sea on gulls' eggs, may have gained the 
 reality that is perhaps behind the appearance. Be this 
 as it may, that was his aim : he was, in something more 
 than the conventional sense of the words, a seeker of 
 reality. We are always told, Alec answered, by the 
 clergy that the world we live in is but a shape of the 
 real world that is beyond heaven, is it that you would be 
 telling me, sir ? Well, not exactly that, Alec, but some- 
 thing like that. And now, to get on with the story. 
 Eve listened to Adam, trying to puzzle out his idea of 
 Lilith to her, all the while mad jealous she was of this 
 ghostly playmate who used to come to him in dreams, 
 bringing such anguish of delight with her. But she was, 
 begob, too wise a woman to show her jealousy, and she 
 continued to listen to Adam, who, she could see, gained 
 great pleasure from his narrative, he being one of those 
 who retired into the past as some do into a church. At 
 
234 
 
 times we'd all like to get the world behind us. And in 
 these moments we're all seekers of reality, Alec. I think 
 that I'm beginning to comprehend, he answered. But 
 women aren't like that, I'm thinking ; for them life is all 
 in the present. 
 
 CHAP. XXXVII. 
 
 IF thou wouldst learn swimming, come with me to the 
 river, said Adam, and Eve followed Adam thither, doubt- 
 ful, without enthusiasm, one might say in fear, for since 
 yesterday her memory of the suffocating moments that 
 she had passed under the water was more distinct. 
 But Adam was firm with her; and supporting her with 
 one hand, he bade her put her trust in him, and told her 
 that in a little while she would cross the river as easily 
 as the animal swimming in the current yonder. Ah, now 
 he has gone under. Drowned, said Eve. No ; he has come 
 up yonder. He has caught a fish. Eve had not yet seen 
 any fishes, and began to be interested in them, and in the 
 animal that had caught the fish. Trust thyself to me, 
 Adam said ; and let thy legs and hands move together. 
 
 Eve was now tired, and begged to be allowed to return 
 to the bank, but after resting, the swimming lesson was 
 continued, and with so much success that hope was held 
 out to her that she would be able to cross the river in a 
 few days, a thing which she very much wished to do, for 
 the brown animals they had seen diving in the current 
 brought the fishes they caught in their jaws to a great flat 
 rock, and Eve was curious to learn what became of the 
 fishes they brought thither. She could see four little 
 brown spots, but did not know that these were the otters' 
 cubs ; nor that otters lived upon fish. And every morning, 
 to please Adam, she applied herself to the task of learning 
 to swim in the pool, and, as he had foreseen, in a few days 
 
235 
 
 her arms and legs began to move together, and in a few 
 days more she was on the other side of the river, wading 
 very quietly towards the rock on which the cubs waited. 
 
 The otters had already distributed some fishes among 
 the cubs, and these were eagerly disputed with a strange 
 whistling noise, each holding a fish in his forepaws, and 
 eating his way from the head down to the tail which he 
 discarded. Adam and Eve could see the fishes did not 
 like being eaten, for the fishes struggled, but the cubs held 
 them tightly in their paws, and continued to gnaw them. 
 I wonder what the fishes taste like, Eve said ; but neither 
 had eaten flesh, and they were loth to take a piece from the 
 cubs, which they could have easily done, for one of the 
 cubs had shown such signs of friendliness that he almost 
 offered them a piece of fish, but they were loth to accept 
 his gift, for they were suddenly possessed of a strange 
 premonition, a sort of instinctive knowledge it was that 
 the larger animals were responsible for the coming into 
 the world of the smaller animals, and these smaller 
 animals were being fed by them upon fish. But what 
 becomes of the fishes ? they asked themselves ; for they 
 that are now within the otters were swimming in the 
 river, leaping in the sunlight a while ago, and feeling that 
 neither could explain the mystery to the other, Adam 
 and Eve retired to their own side of the river, perplexed 
 and unhappy. 
 
 It was some days later, while they were bathing in the 
 river, that they caught sight of the otters with their 
 four cubs in the river, daddy and mummy teaching the 
 younglings how to pursue the fishes under the water, and 
 a great commotion they were making, the terrified fishes 
 striving to escape from their enemies in all directions, 
 some of them darting up an inlet in which there was so 
 little water that Adam and Eve might have picked them 
 out with their hands. One of the cubs followed these, 
 and presently he caught a fish, and Adam and Eve 
 
236 
 
 expected to see him return to the river and bring his spoil 
 to the rock in front of the den and eat it there, but a 
 second thought seemed to come through his mind, and 
 instead of returning to the river he trotted up the bank 
 and laid the fish at their feet. 
 
 He allowed them to stroke him ; he jumped round 
 them, and then, remembering that his business was to 
 pursue fishes, he returned to the water, and they saw no 
 more of him till next day. Will he bring us a fish again ? 
 Eve said, and they waited at the head of a creek. He 
 had not forgotten them and, not content with giving them 
 one fish, he returned to the water and began the hunt 
 again. Adam and Eve thought they would see no more 
 of him, and with the fish he had given them they 
 returned to their dwelling under the plane-trees in 
 the clough or dell, out of reach of the winds ; and great 
 was their surprise when they saw the otter following 
 them with a fish in his mouth, and, as if to encourage 
 them to eat the fish he had brought them, he laid it 
 before them and began to eat another, one they had 
 picked out of the shallows ; and he ate with a relish 
 which they accepted as wilful exaggeration, his purpose 
 being to win them over to his mode of life. We shall 
 do well to imitate the animals. Eve said, for they know 
 more than we do, isn't that so ? she asked, as she sliced 
 a fish with a sharp stone and gave half of it to Adam. 
 The animals must know more than we do ; it could not 
 be else, he said, they having lived upon the earth always, 
 and as he said these words a shadow overran his face, 
 and to disperse it she called to Othniel, the name they 
 had given the otter, and he came trotting round her 
 feet, and jumped upon her knees. Look at our little 
 swimmer, she said, who didn't need any teaching. Is 
 he not asking us to take him down to the river .^ We 
 must, for his diet is fish, and we cannot catch them 
 for him. But he has just eaten, Adam answered, for he 
 
237 
 
 was thinking that it might be better to wean Othniel 
 from the river, if that were possible. But as his diet 
 is fish we cannot keep him from the river. Eve replied, 
 and all three went down to the river together, Othniel 
 passing into the stream silently as oil, and showing 
 himself a faster swimmer than his wild brethren, and a 
 more expert fisher. 
 
 He remained so long under water that Eve clasped her 
 hands, certain he was drowning ; a moment after they 
 caught sight of the beloved brown-whiskered face coming 
 towards them, a silver fish in his jaws. But though^ he 
 seems to prefer us to his brethren, the river will tempt him 
 away from us, Adam said. Thou art thinking of Lilith, 
 Eve answered, and Adam denied that this was so, saying 
 that he was dreaming of weapons whereby he might 
 take the fishes from the river, and, possessed by this idea, 
 he began to sharpen flints. But the fishes were swift 
 and sudden and eluded the spear till Othniel, as if he 
 would save Adam from humiliation, began to drive 
 them towards Adam. At last a frightened fish fell to 
 Adam's spear, and over this fish Othniel started a great 
 gambol ; nor would he be gainsaid of his fun, and his pretty 
 ways and intelligence took such a hold on their affections 
 that they lived in dread lest they should lose him, a not 
 unreasonable dread for he was often unable to subdue his 
 mood to remain in the river : he would raise himself 
 half-way out of the water, acknowledging their calling 
 by the gesture ; and by a sudden dive he sought to tell 
 them that they need not expect him yet awhile. They 
 sought the little runaway up the river where the water 
 rushed over the boulders ; he allowed them to capture 
 him after a long frolic in the warm autumn nights, 
 and in turn they carried him to a comfortable bed 
 of leaves in the cave. But if his mood was for deep 
 waters he kept down the stream and they called 
 and swam out to him in vain; to swim after an 
 
238 
 
 otter is vainer than to call to him; and the alarmed 
 twain stood watching the current swirling almost silently 
 past the walls that lahveh had built round the garden, 
 widening as it flowed, looping round islands, dis- 
 appearing into forests, seeming by times to lose itself 
 in marshes and fens, but recovering itself always and 
 threading its way into the grey autumn hills safely. 
 But going whither? they asked themselves, forgetful of 
 Othniel ; but only for a moment : the river brought him 
 to us. Eve said, and the river has taken him away. lahveh 
 is greater than the river, Adam answered, therefore we 
 must pray that he may bid Othniel return to us. The 
 words were on Eve's lips to reply : lahveh cannot do that, 
 but her feet turned into the path and they prayed at the 
 stone altar on the hill-top that Othniel might be given 
 back to them. 
 
 lahveh is in no mood to listen to us to-night, Adam 
 said : we cannot awaken him. And Eve answered : 
 though he doesn't answer us, he may have heard us, and 
 certain that he had heard their prayers and would answer 
 them favourably they slept lightly, awakened often, first 
 by sighings that seemed to come from Othniel's bed. 
 Eve's ears were quicker than Adam's, but in answer to 
 her Adam said : it isn't he, but the wind sighing in the 
 trees. Again Eve awakened Adam, saying : hearken, 
 and Adam answered : it is not he but a pebble fallen 
 from the roof. Again they were awakened : a bird or 
 bat, Adam said, may have come, but it has gone again. 
 Sleep on. 
 
 A day passed and another without seeing him, and 
 they had begun to despair of ever seeing him again, 
 when their despair passed into joy for they saw him 
 coming towards them thinking more of his warm bed 
 of leaves than of them. But he had come back, and 
 they excused his heartlessness. Eve saying : he has been 
 thrown about by the current and is well tired. This 
 
239 
 
 might well have been so for the river was in flood, 
 and even an otter cannot swim against a current flowing 
 heavily against him. Let him lie and rest himself, 
 and while he is resting, Eve continued : do thou be 
 fishing for him in the river with the new spear, and 
 if thou canst catch fish for him we may keep him in 
 the cave always. And Eve waited while Adam fished, 
 but he brought no fishes home with him, and Othniel, 
 waking hungry in the evening, was taken to the river. 
 Canst not see. Eve said, how turbulent is the water ? the 
 river is no longer the same river; the banks are over- 
 flowed and the edges thronged with birds — birds we 
 have never seen before. These come up the river, Adam 
 answered her, when the cold weather is near. 
 
 CHAP. XXXVIII. 
 
 THE rainy season began soon after, and the river rose 
 steadily day after day, till Adam was of a mind that it 
 would be safer to move up the hill-side to lahveh's altar 
 than to remain in the clough in which they might be 
 easily drowned ; even Othniel, Adam said, great a swimmer 
 as he was, could not contend against the waters as they are 
 now running. Again and again Adam thrust his spear into 
 the pools, but the fishes had sought to escape the force of 
 the flood by sinking to the bottom, and to get himself 
 a dinner, Othniel ascended the river and remained away 
 for days over the hill-side, fishing being easier higher 
 up the stream ; and when he returned he was so tired 
 that it seemed as if he would not be able to sleep off his 
 weariness. They were glad of this for the storms con- 
 tinued despite their prayers to lahveh; it were better, 
 they said, that Othniel should fast than that he should 
 drown ; and he was very hungry indeed when a south wind 
 began to blow over the garden. He caught his dinner 
 
240 
 
 quickly, and they thought to persuade him to leave the 
 river; but he lingered by the brink, loth to leave it; 
 for him every breeze seemed to be laden with tidings ; 
 and with beating hearts they watched him sniffing 
 through the reeds. He is not seeking fishes, but his kin, 
 Eve said, and a few days after, an otter that had doubt- 
 less scented him from afar, belike from the banks of 
 the islands beyond the walls, met him in the current, 
 and the otters went away together. 
 
 The river brought him to us. Eve said ; the river has 
 taken him from us ; under yonder bank they will beget 
 young. As these words were spoken it fell out that 
 Adam's eyes should meet Eve's and they knew that the 
 same suffering as had befallen Othniel was upon them. 
 
 Adam's tongue clove to the roof of his mouth, and it 
 was with an effort that he threw out some words to 
 Eve, hoping thereby to hide his trouble from her. He 
 will weary of his mate. Eve, he said, and he would have 
 continued to reassure her, but Eve's eyes were upon him. 
 It is, perhaps, lahveh's will to enlighten us, he said : so 
 let us go to his altar, and pray that he may do so. We 
 were there this morning. Eve answered. But we did not 
 pray that we might be enlightened, he replied. Our 
 prayers this morning were not heart-felt prayers, there- 
 fore lahveh did not hearken to us. And so that we may 
 be enlightened. Eve said, I will cast myself before him 
 and bow myself three times, and repeat the prayers thou 
 hast taught me. Let us go to the praying stone, and they 
 went thither, and so heart-felt were Eve's utterances of 
 the prayers he had taught her that Adam, on rising to 
 his feet, was moved to draw her to him, and to kiss her 
 again and again ; and the emotion that their prayers to 
 lahveh had caused continued while they descended the 
 hill-side. 
 
 It was on their way to the fig-trees that Adam said : 
 see, Eve, how large the leaves are already, and in my 
 
241 
 
 prayers on the mount I heard lahveh command that we 
 weave garlands and wear them about our middles. Eve 
 asked if the garland she had woven for her hair were 
 not enough. Adam answered : he said about our middles. 
 When we go fishing, Eve persisted, may we not leave 
 our garlands on the bank ? Adam could not answer her, 
 nor when she asked if the water were to wash away 
 their garlands would they be answerable for the loss of 
 them. While climbing up the bank, she persisted, we 
 shall be naked. No matter, the cold water will subdue 
 us, Adam said. Eve was minded to reply : the water will 
 grow warmer, which it did, and when in it our troubles 
 will begin, if perchance shoulder should touch shoulder. 
 
 The lord punishes us, Adam cried, for our trans- 
 gressions. But we have not transgressed. Eve answered. 
 Why should he punish us ? The ways of the lord are 
 mysterious, we may not strive to look into his heart, 
 Adam replied, words that brought no distinct meaning 
 to Eve's mind, but she wished to please Adam, and in 
 accordance with his wish she did not gaze upon him 
 as she often wished to do, but kept her eyes averted. 
 It was her eyes that caused the rising of the flesh 
 of which he was ashamed, for the lord had not vouch- 
 safed the knowledge to him that he had bestowed 
 upon Othniel. But the day will come when he will 
 reveal the secret to us, said a voice within him, and with 
 tears rolling down his cheeks he fell upon his knees and 
 prayed till Eve could no longer keep her thoughts fixed 
 on the great throne in which God sat, watchful over 
 his creatures, lest they should transgress his will. So 
 Adam had told her, this was his belief, and it was her 
 desire to share his belief, but a bird in the lilac distracted 
 her thoughts from God, for she perceived the bird was 
 building itself a little house in the bush. It came with 
 fibre in its beak, which it wove into the moss, and the 
 inside of the nest was plastered with clay, and when 
 Q 
 
 1 
 
 
( 
 
 242 
 
 the nest was finished Eve could see the bird flattening 
 itself out in the nest, the head only appearing above 
 the rim, the black eyes shining through the green leaves. 
 She told the story of the nest to Adam one day after 
 prayers, and they went to the lilac bush and, finding five 
 eggs in it. Eve said : let us not disturb her nest, for we 
 know not what her design may be. 
 
 The mate that had helped to build the nest now sat 
 upon the bough above the nest, and Eve said : he sings 
 to pass away the time of her labour. But of the design 
 of the birds Adam could not tell Eve ; for he had never 
 noticed the ways of birds before, and was astonished when 
 Eve said : Adam, the bird returns with worms to the nest ; 
 come, let us look into it, for it may contain something that 
 our eyes have never seen. 
 
 As you have already guessed. Alec, the nest contained 
 chicks all gaping to be fed. Adam said to Eve : this is very 
 wonderful, and the wonder of the twain seemed to deepen 
 when a cat came about their tree, and the parent birds 
 came down on to the pathway and challenged it to fight, 
 shrieking at it, bidding it go hence. Their eyes are like 
 the sparks we see in the fire, Adam said, so angry are 
 they. How they must love their young ! Eve answered, 
 and a great sorrow fell upon Adam and Eve, and he to 
 himself and she to herself said : why have we no offspring 
 like the animals we see about us? The squirrels and 
 the cats, and the rats and the mice, and the birds have 
 offspring, and love their offspring ; only we are alone. 
 
 And Lilith, who saw all these things in her magic well, 
 said : my time has come to go to the garden and finish the 
 story. 
 
 CHAP. XXXIX. 
 
 HE will be somewhere about here, she said, watching 
 for his chance, for all that is going on in the garden he 
 
248 
 
 knows well ; and we shall come upon each other before 
 long for sure if I keep marching up and down these 
 woods. A pleasant place enough for walking they are, 
 she continued, looking round, well pleased with the 
 woodland she was in, for though the trees were close 
 together up above, there was plenty of room for walking 
 between them — long, tall boles they were, as in the park 
 over against Westport where I met you. Alec, for the 
 first time, jumping from boulder to boulder, and climbing 
 up the bank, saying you were sure that the master would 
 not mind your having a look round for ferns. That was 
 in the weeks back, and ever since we have been telling 
 stories as friendly as any two men in the country. It 
 seems strange that it should be so, but so it is ; and now 
 I must be getting on with my story of my lady Lilith, 
 who was, at the time I'm speaking of, walking under the 
 trees outside the garden, mindful of Lucifer, whom she knew 
 to be about somewhere, and not far off, for she could get 
 a smell of him in the air, and walking on whither her 
 nose led her, she said : 'tis thicker about here, a sour 
 smell like that of a snake. But it cannot be that, and 
 walking on farther, looking round at every step she 
 took, she said : something is here but my eyes cannot 
 find it, and they have searched everywhere for it. She 
 walked on, her eyes always set on the ground, never 
 thinking that the one she was seeking might be in 
 a tree till she heard a voice speaking to her, saying : 
 Lilith, raise thine eyes and thou shalt find me, and when 
 she raised her eyes, what do you think she saw but a 
 big green and golden serpent coiled about the branches 
 of a cedar with one great branch stretched out from the 
 tree itself right over the garden wall, and the thought 
 passed through her mind that it was a convenient branch 
 for whomsoever would pass over the wall into the garden, 
 and that perhaps that was the reason why Lucifer had 
 changed himself into a big serpent, a serpent being able 
 
244 
 
 to glide and lift himself, whereas a four-footed beast, or a 
 two-footed, for a matter of that, would be making no 
 progress at all. Thou hast guessed rightly, he said, 
 answering her thoughts, for Lucifer being an archangel 
 could see into the mind, and having knowledge of all 
 that was accomplishing on earth, said : right well thou 
 didst answer them, meaning the angels of the Lord. 
 
 Adam and Eve are at variance, he continued, each with 
 the other, and with lahveh, who has refused to tell how 
 Adam must conduct himself with Eve so as to get offspring 
 from her. It is odd surely that he should desire offspring 
 of that puny creature with sloping shoulders and wide 
 hips, short legs and very dirty, Lilith rapped out, forgetful 
 of the presence of her lord. It is true that Eve as she 
 came to Adam from lahveh's hands was not agreeable 
 to his sight and smell; but a great change has come 
 over Adam since he washed her and tressed her hair, 
 Lucifer replied ; and her legs are not shorter than thine, 
 not in his eyes. Then, said Lilith, lahveh has put a 
 great spell upon him, blotting my image from his mind. 
 But as soon as he sees me he will forget her; lahveh's 
 
 spell is My plan is better than a garden broil, 
 
 Lucifer answered, and when Lilith asked him what 
 these plans were, he said that his design was to provide 
 Adam with the knowledge that God withheld from him. 
 
 I was telling before the interruption Master, forgive 
 
 me, Lilith cried, and Lucifer continued : Adam went to 
 the praying stone and besought lahveh to tell him how 
 he should love Eve, but he only got commandments from 
 lahveh : speak not of cocks and hens to me, said lahveh ; 
 thou shalt not tread thy wife as a cock treads a hen, nor 
 line her as a fox lines the vixen, nor cover her as the 
 stallion covers the mare. How then ? said Adam, and at 
 this question lahveh was angry, and with the temper 
 flying out of both his eyes he bade Adam give his 
 commandments to Eve, who was waiting to hear the 
 
245 
 
 joyful tidings as to the manner in which it is pleasing 
 to lahveh that mortals should obtain offspring. 
 
 Did Eve weep, master, when she heard that she was 
 not going to bear children ? No, Lucifer, she answered 
 Adam in words which she knew would please him, 
 that he would do well to observe the will of God, 
 and to make it easier for him, she said she loved him 
 sufficiently to live with him though he might never 
 make a woman of her. Cunning little minx, Lilith cried, 
 she tries to keep the man by agreeing with him in every- 
 thing he says, and submitting to him in all things. But 
 why, she asked, does lahveh refuse to allow Adam and 
 Eve to have children .'' For that he is tired of the long 
 struggle he had before he was able to throw us into hell, 
 Lucifer replied, and yearns to live at peace among his 
 angels, but the victor is never altogether victorious. 
 Ever since our overthrow Adam has been a perplexity 
 to him, and the perplexity has deepened since Adam 
 asked him how he might procure offspring. lahveh is 
 afraid that the new race may take our side, and together 
 we might succeed in giving him a fall. lahveh, Lucifer 
 continued, is great at present, but there is a fate over the 
 God, and he that is now on high lives in fear of a race of 
 unbelievers ; and to save himself he would forbid man to 
 eat of the tree of knowledge. I will cross the garden wall 
 and reveal the secret, Lilith cried. But, said Lucifer, 
 Adam will know thee as his dream of old time. God 
 has put a spell on him, said Lilith. Maybe he did, but 
 I'm not sure of it, Lucifer replied. Well, what shall we 
 do } she asked, and Lucifer said : by a stealthier method 
 than by giving Adam the choice between thee and Eve, 
 for remember that if he were to choose Eve we should be 
 undone. I have thought of a better way, and for it I 
 shall confide my snake shape to thee ; in it thou shalt 
 cross the garden wall, and as soon as Adam passes by the 
 tree in which thou art hidden thou shalt lean out of the 
 
246 
 
 branch, and say : Adam, why so downcast, why so hope- 
 less ? Give thine ear to me and learn the secret. 
 
 CHAP. XL. 
 
 BUT before going on further with the story, Alec, I 
 think I would like to give my legs a stretch. If your 
 honour has a match about you I'd be glad to have a 
 shaugh at the pipe. I'd like a smoke too, I answered, a 
 cigarette ! A cigar will take too long ; and to keep Alec 
 in good humour I spoke of Liadin and Curithir and the 
 throbbing love night they had passed together, and Alec 
 promised to give me his opinion of my story when I had 
 finished it. I like the stipulation ; and, Alec, you're a 
 good listener. A story-teller must know how to listen, he 
 answered, for 'tis out of stories a story comes. A maxim 
 that deserves all my congratulations, I said, and as soon 
 as we had finished smoking, I reminded him that Lilith, 
 after exchanging shapes with Lucifer, coiled herself into 
 a tree within hearing distance of the flowering bank on 
 which Adam and Eve were sitting, Adam looking into 
 the depths of the wood disconsolate, making up a story 
 about a little bird that might come hopping along the 
 branches and let out the secret to him. A welcome bird 
 he would be, by my faith, cherished by the two of us, 
 and allowed to eat his fill of the fruit trees. But neither 
 bird nor beast will come to our aid, and Adam continued 
 to sit with his eyes averted from Eve, who, having pity 
 for him, was thinking what she could say to console him, 
 but everything that came into her head she threw out 
 as likely to wound his feelings ; till at last the silence 
 seemed to her to be worse than anything she could say, 
 and convinced that she could not leave him thinking any 
 more she began talking to him about Lilith. And as soon 
 as the name passed her lips she began saying to herself 
 
247 
 
 that Adam would not like to speak of Lilith, who might 
 have left him for the reason that he did not know what 
 the birds knew and all the beasts. But she was wrong 
 in this, for Adam liked talking about Lilith, and Eve 
 was glad to see his face brighten, although it was 
 hard to keep her jealousy from gathering in her face. 
 She talked about Lilith soothingly, saying that she 
 believed her to be a woman tall and thin as far as one 
 could see through the mist that was about her always. 
 'Tis as if thou hadst seen her, Adam chimed in, for she 
 would steal upon me like a mist in which I could see 
 only a beautiful line of chin and ear ; like those hills 
 far away in the blue distance, he said. It was never in 
 waking but in dreams that thou knewest her. Eve said. 
 In dreams and between dreaming and waking. . . . Yet 
 we walked in the garden together. You spoke together ? 
 Eve queried, and Adam told Eve that he remembered 
 Lilith's voice and her silences. I do not know how she 
 came, or whether it was out of the sky or out of the 
 trees, but she came to me. And thou wast happy 
 with her? I was happy and I was unhappy, Adam 
 answered. Dost think, Adam, Eve asked sadly, that I 
 was made to make thee unhappy? Ah, Eve, thou art 
 blaming me now as Lilith used to do, Adam answered, 
 and I'm thinking that all women are alike. I will try 
 to tell thee everything, but it is hard to tell Lilith, for 
 she is only clear to a man when he is not thinking about 
 her at all. As soon as he tries to see or hear her she 
 has gone. I would tell all I know lest thou shouldst 
 think that I am keeping something back. Adam, I 
 understand. But I haven't told thee that my love for 
 thee is different from my love for her. I only loved her 
 as we love the clouds ; thou'rt here and kind and good, but 
 Lilith was cruel and wicked, and when she was here she 
 was yonder too. I could not lay hold on her, but thee 
 I can hold and see and hear. She was only a beam of 
 
248 
 
 moonlight. I read in thine eyes that a gleam from the 
 moon is better than the shining of midday to a man. 
 Why wouldst thou put thoughts into my head that were 
 never there ? she said. If I am satisfied, why shouldst 
 thou be dissatisfied ? I will try to be satisfied, he replied, 
 and if anybody can help me it is thou, with thy sweet, 
 gentle eyes and kindly hands. Lay thy hand upon my 
 forehead for my head is hot, I would sleep a little, but 
 before I sleep, tell me. Eve, that knowledge is not always 
 better than ignorance and that if we knew what the 
 birds and beasts know and the knowledge gave us off- 
 spring our happiness would not be greater than it has 
 been. And he gazed into her eyes as if he would read 
 her answer therein. I love thee well enough to live 
 with thee, though my life go by without off'spring, her 
 eyes said. 
 
 At that moment two doves came down from the 
 branches, love being easier on the ground than at perch. 
 If he turn his head, she said, and see those birds, the 
 sight of them will recall lahveh's commandment. Would 
 that they were not so noisy in their love, she continued 
 to herself, the wood resounds with their kisses ; if he 
 turn his head he will deem the birds were sent to make a 
 mock of him. Alas, said Adam, turning at the moment 
 when the cock was treading the hen, these birds are 
 more knowledgeable than we are. Shall we take our 
 knowledge from them, and kiss as they kiss ? And Eve, 
 nothing loth, took Adam in her arms, and having kissed 
 as they had seen the doves kiss, and suffered thereby 
 many great and terrible piercings, she fell back in front 
 of him like the hen. But Adam in this last moment 
 remembered lahveh's commandment, and a gloom beset 
 his face. It may be that we shall be guilty of some 
 great transgression, he said. Of what transgression shall 
 we be guilty .'' Eve asked. Adam could not answer her, 
 and so they sat estranged from each other until, unable to 
 
249 
 
 bear the estrangement any longer, Adam ran away through 
 the trees up the steep path to the praying stone, leaving 
 Eve absorbed in the thought that it might fall out that the 
 end of all this would be that they would live on different 
 sides of the garden, seeing each the other in glimpses 
 only ; and she asked herself if the meaning behind it 
 all was that lahveh created her so that he might punish 
 Adam because he had not joined him against Lucifer. 
 
 The thought that it might be so brought tears to her 
 eyelids and she retired into the grove to weep un- 
 restrainedly ; and when there were no more tears for 
 her to weep, her heart was moved to a great pity for the 
 man who could not live enjoying things as they went by, 
 but must needs pray. He will not come to me, said her 
 failing heart, but she waited for him till the moonlight 
 vanished. He will not come to me ; he fears lahveh more 
 than he loves me. Ah ! now he has fallen back, overcome 
 with weariness, but as soon as he awakes he will pray 
 again. If I do not leave some fruit for him he will not 
 eat to-morrow. 
 
 CHAP. XLI. 
 
 HE has put the river between us, and we shall not see 
 each other again but in glimpses. Eve said, as she walked 
 absorbed in the mystery of God and man, asking herself 
 why lahveh should trouble himself as to their conduct 
 on earth ; for having exiled Adam, it would seem that 
 he should be content to allow them to live according to 
 the ways of the earth. She repeated the sacred name, 
 and her unconcern in it reminded her of Adam's alarm 
 when she had repeated it casually after hearing it from 
 him for the first time. 
 
 lahveh is always the centre of Adam's mind, she 
 muttered, and the stone altar came into her thoughts, 
 
050 
 
 and the day he had been propelled thither by fear of 
 lahveh ; but there had been no fear in her mind ; she had 
 prayed because she had to live with Adam, and having 
 to live with him, she must make herself according to his 
 likeness as far as possible. But if lahveh comes between 
 us always, there is no life for me ; and the task of winning 
 him from lahveh seemed beyond her strength. But if 
 I can discover the secret he withholds from us, his power 
 over Adam will be lessened, she said; and she roamed 
 the garden, continuing her search, sure at noon that 
 love was stronger than hate, but at night, lying where 
 they had so often lain together on the bank under the 
 fig-trees, she cried : lahveh is over all ; and missing Adam 
 by her when she awoke, tears flowed over her eyelids 
 again; she often thought that her heart would break, 
 and it might have broken if her courage had been less 
 than her love. My task is to save him, she said, from 
 lahveh, and if I am borne away and dashed against the 
 rocks, and whirled on and on till darkness falls over me, 
 our troubles will be ended. 
 
 It was with these very words. Alec, that she turned down 
 the hill-side towards the river, and finding a place that 
 seemed shallow she waded into the stream, but did not 
 reach the middle of it, when she slipped into a deep 
 swirl of waters against which she strove, but was sucked 
 under and came up again and sank again, all the while sore 
 afraid that she would never look upon Adam again, which 
 she would not have done if he had not come to her and put 
 his hand under her chin, in that way upholding her. 
 
 Neither to that bank must I take thee, Adam said, nor 
 to the bank on which I left thee. But there are rocks in 
 the middle of the stream, and upon them thou and I can 
 talk if thou wishest to talk to me. If I wish to talk to 
 thee ? she repeated, and her look smote him to the heart. 
 Why didst thou venture into the river and it in flood ? he 
 asked, when they were seated on the rocks. I was looking 
 
251 
 
 for thee, she said. The fruits I left for thee by the pray- 
 ing stone were untouched, so it cannot be else, I said to 
 myself, than that he has put the river between us. And 
 was not that well done ? Adam replied. Should we not 
 be thankful to lahveh that he set a river flowing through 
 Eden : for it is his will that we must live asunder like a 
 pair of trees lest we break his commandment. <>w 
 
 Everything must be as thou wouldst wish it to be, 
 Adam. But how are we to live apart ? 
 
 We shall have to make two hoards of fruit, Adam replied^ 
 on which we shall live through the winter when there is 
 little fruit, or none at all, on the trees. But I know not 
 how to make a hoard. I will teach thee. The grapes will 
 be ripe in a month from now, and they must be gathered 
 and dried in the sun ; the figs the same. The apples too 
 may be saved. We shall sit on these stones, for this is 
 the meering ; and thou'lt learn from me how these things 
 may be done and to live without me. Thou'lt be lonely, 
 no doubt, without me; the days will seem long and 
 the nights too ; but there is no other way. It shall be 
 as thou sayest, she answered, and her arms went about 
 him : it shall be as thou sayest. But do not make it 
 harder for me, Adam said, and to disguise his great 
 love of her he plunged into the pool. But after a little 
 while he returned to her. We must try and bear our 
 lives and live them as lahveh seems to have willed 
 that we should live them. Thou shalt live on the right 
 bank of the river and I on the left bank, but we shall 
 meet here on these rocks, he said, and I will instruct 
 thee about the drying of fruits and thou canst make 
 thyself comfortable in the hut that we built last autumn 
 together. I shall build another hut on my side. But 
 tell me, she said, how I may reach my bank. The 
 current frightens me. I will swim with thee through 
 the places where the river is deep and strong, and 
 when thou'rt on the gravelly bank I will return unto 
 
tftt 
 
 the river, and remain on my side of it till thou comest 
 out on to those rocks, which thou wilt do when thou hast 
 need of me. 
 
 It would have been better. Eve thought, as she returned 
 to the grove in which they had spent so many happy 
 hours, if he had left me to drown in that pool, for it 
 would seem that man is made to make woman unhappy. 
 But must we, she asked herself, be always unhappy ? It 
 cannot be that there is no way out of this trouble. It 
 cannot be that we who are more intelligent than the 
 birds and beasts should not find it, and she went about 
 the garden watching all these, and when she was not 
 watching the beasts and birds, she gathered such fruits 
 as were ripe, and stored them as he had bidden her to do, 
 and took pleasure in so doing, for she was doing his will. 
 But the nights were long, and the calm dawns miserable 
 to behold. At last remembrance came out of misery : 
 he had told her that he would show her how the fruit 
 should be stored ! 
 
 Adam ! Adam ! she cried. And she had not to speak 
 his name a third time before she saw his head above the 
 water, and he rushing through it like a fish, so eager was 
 he to be with her. 
 
 As soon as he had climbed up beside her and shaken 
 the water from his hair and beard they began to talk of 
 the fruit she had gathered and the roof of the house in 
 which she lived. At last he said : thou hast wandered 
 much in the garden. Yes ; and have seen much, she 
 answered him ; birds and squirrels and mice and rats, 
 cockchafers, beetles and the ordinary fly. But we are not 
 as these and have been commanded to abstain from imi- 
 tating them in their swyvings, he said. Cats, she said, 
 come over the wall screaming after each other. But we 
 are commanded, he said, by the God, to abstain till he 
 
 reveals the secret of love And of offspring, she 
 
 interjected. She had seen from a gap in the walls a herd 
 
253 • 
 
 of great animals with long hairy tails on their rumps and 
 on their necks a yard of hair. 
 
 Among these was one taller, handsomer, more powerful 
 than the others, a sort of master among them ; and one 
 day she said he came whinnying, his ears cocked to meet 
 a female. I judged her to be one, she being smaller, 
 smoother, daintier than he was, like unto him as I am 
 to thee, Adam. A strange match they made as they 
 stood nosing each other, she shy, diffident, he eager 
 and valiant, yet gentle with her always, though she was 
 rough and angry with him, squealing betimes and kicking 
 at him till at last, like one that accepts another's will, 
 he drew away from her, regretfully, I thought, and then 
 like one that had forgotten he began to graze a bit 
 away. But he was only pretending to have forgotten 
 her, for when she came forward, trying to entice him 
 back to her, I could see that he was watching her, and 
 every moment I expected him to leave off feeding, but 
 it was a long time before she could get him to notice 
 her. At last she managed to entice him from his feed ; 
 and this time he was bolder with her, beginning at once 
 to bite her in the chest, in play, of course; licking her 
 sides and biting her again. She seemed to like this play ; 
 his cozening seemed to her taste ; but when he came to her 
 haunches she squealed and kicked, without striking him, 
 however, misdirecting her kicks perhaps of set purpose. 
 And this play was continued for several days, she always 
 inviting his intentions and never resenting them till he 
 tried to throw his fore-leg over her. So the days went by, 
 ripening her, and when her time was come he rose him- 
 self up and, gripping her by the neck, he went in unto her, 
 hugging her the while. And then? said Adam. Then, 
 Eve answered, he dropped exhausted on his hooves, and 
 they sniffed at each other once or twice before beginning 
 to graze, keeping together apart from the herd. 
 
 But of what concern to us are the ways of beasts ? 
 
« 254 
 
 Adam said, and hast thou forgotten lahveh's command- 
 ments ? It may be, she answered, that the God put a wall 
 round the garden, but when thou'rt not by me I forget 
 these things. I know of God only through thee, and am 
 different from thee inasmuch as thou wast an angel once 
 in heaven, but I'm a rib taken from thy side, else a handful 
 of dust. For thou knowest not exactly how God created 
 me, only that when thine eyes opened I was sleeping by 
 thee. Wouldst thou. Eve, have me return to the other 
 bank and live with thee like a beast? It shall be as 
 thou dost wish it, Adam. But it being my wish always 
 that thou shouldst be happy, or as little unhappy as may 
 be, I would have thee go to him with no desire in thy 
 heart but obedience to his will only. Adam, leave me, 
 Eve cried, but let me come to-morrow to these rocks, 
 for though they are hard to sit upon it is better to see 
 thee here than not to see thee at all. 
 
 Thou may est come here if thou wilt strive to make 
 
 lahveh's will thine and What else, Adam, is upon 
 
 thy mind to tell me ? Only this. Eve, that having looked 
 over the wall, a thing that lahveh has forbidden, it may 
 fall out that in thy wanderings a voice may speak to thee 
 out of a tree. Hast heard a voice, Adam, speaking out 
 of yon trees ? And Adam answered that it had seemed 
 to him that he had heard a voice speaking out of a tree, 
 saying he had but to listen to hear the secret. And thou 
 didst not listen ? Eve said. lahveh forbid, he answered. 
 And then thou fleddest, she said, to the thither side, 
 leaving the praying stone without offering. I had hoped 
 to find another, he answered, and Eve, guessing that the 
 desire of prayer was again upon him, said : why not cross 
 the river for prayer? The evening skies are calm, and 
 thy prayer will go up to lahveh's nostrils and refresh him. 
 
 With words like these I'm telling she beguiled him over 
 to her side of the river, and as soon as she saw him 
 going up the hill-side with the fruits she had given him 
 
255 
 
 for offering, her eyes turned to the trees out of which the 
 voice had spoken to him. The voice that he heard can only 
 be Lilith's, she said, who would not have Adam withhold 
 himself from me any longer, he having by now descended 
 altogether out of angel kind into man kind. So she 
 went to the tree that Adam had pointed out to her as the 
 one out of which he had heard the voice speak : whosoever 
 is in this tree, let her or him tell me how I may be Adam's 
 wife, and get offspring like the birds and the beasts, she 
 cried, and as soon as the snake heard Eve, she stretched 
 herself along the bough, and dropping a yard or two of 
 herself said : I am Lilith, who was Adam's first wife, but 
 in his mind rather than in his body. Lean thy ear closer, 
 lest lahveh should hear and send angels to hunt me into 
 hell again. Eve gave her ear, and having learnt from 
 Lilith the way of man with a woman, she waited for Adam 
 to return from the altar, all the while turning over in her 
 mind the delightful modes of love she had learnt from 
 Lilith. 
 
 Adam came to her full of God and unsuspicious, saying 
 that after prayer he had bethought himself of the house 
 they had lived in last winter, and how it might be 
 repaired. If the wind comes under the door thou'lt come 
 to the river and cry aloud for me, and it will not be 
 long before I'm swimming to thee, though the floods be 
 great in winter-time. The words came to Eve's lips to 
 thank him, but she kept them back, and they walked 
 to the house in silence. Thou'lt be building a house, she 
 said, for thyself as good as this one, one that will be 
 rain and wind tight, and he answered that it was as likely 
 as not he would be building something, but he did not 
 mind the wind and rain, he was pretty tough, he said. 
 But thou'lt find the cold weather hard to bear, and his 
 eyes going round the store of fruit she had laid in, he 
 said: thou hast not gotten enough of this fruit to feed 
 thee through the winter, more should be gathered ; and 
 
256 
 
 they went through the garden shaking the boughs and 
 gathering the fruit till the kindling of the evening star. 
 
 It was then in the dusk that Adam showed Eve how 
 she should store the fruit, and when it was laid by for 
 the winter the perplexed twain wandered from the house 
 to the bank under the fig-tree, and with Adam by her 
 side Eve was moved to tell him she had discovered the 
 secret, but she withheld it from him, afraid to speak to 
 him, so easily was he led away by words ; but in spite of 
 her silence, perhaps because of it, he began to speak once 
 more of lahveh's providence and his design, saying : Eve, 
 if it be within his design that we beget children the secret 
 how we shall beget them will not be withheld from us. 
 Adam, she answered, I cannot talk any more, and fell 
 back amid the mosses and he over her. Thou'rt not 
 upon my back for that is forbidden, yet we are mingled ; 
 belly to belly we lie, and guiding him a little she said : 
 therein is the secret, art pleased with it ? His ardour was 
 her answer, and his joy was so great that he could not 
 get a word past his teeth, and when relief came they lay 
 side by side, enchanted lovers, listening to the breeze 
 that raised the leaves of the fig-tree, letting the moon- 
 light through. 
 
 May we not, he asked, discover the secret again ? Will 
 the delight be as great? And she answered: we shall 
 know that presently, and her arms went about him ; and 
 their delight was greater than before, and when they 
 returned to rediscover the secret for a third time. Eve 
 screamed she knew not whether it was from pain or 
 pleasure, and her scream was so heartrending that Adam 
 was frightened, and thinking he had killed his wife he 
 sat up on the bank of delight and began to pray. But see- 
 ing he had done her no harm at all, he said : it is against 
 God I have sinned, and my sin might never have been 
 known if Eve had not screamed so loudly in her pleasure 
 that she must have awakened lahveh dozing in his golden 
 
257 
 
 chair, and if that misfortune has befallen us he will 
 be sending his angels with flaming swords to sever off 
 our heads. You see, Adam was well learned in the ways 
 of God. But Lucifer, too, had had a long experience of 
 heaven ; and while Michael, Gabriel and Raphael were 
 girding on their flaming swords he said : we must hide 
 Adam and Eve from God's angels, who will destroy them 
 and the seed of the new race that will bring about lahveh's 
 downfall in the years to come. Lilith answered : master, 
 as thou wilt. 
 
 CHAP. XUI. 
 
 BEFORE the ring of day Adam and Eve were hidden 
 beyond the walls of the garden in deep caves, where they 
 could not be discovered by the angels in search of them, 
 for when the angels came into one cave, Adam and Eve 
 found outlets into other caves, and as every cave had 
 two they went hither and thither, escaping the angels 
 always, suffering hunger and thirst, for outside of the 
 garden was all wilderness ; only a few berries and roots 
 could they find, but fruits nowhere. So it came to pass 
 that in their flight from the pursuing angels they were 
 several days without even a bilberry or a handful of cress 
 wherewith to quench their longing : we can go no 
 farther. Eve, the angels must take us here, Adam said. 
 And Eve answered : there is a way out of our trouble ; 
 and he asked her : which way is that ? and Eve replied : 
 the way that we came into it. And Adam said : I under- 
 stand thee not, and Eve said : was it not I that brought 
 all this trouble upon thee ? Was it not I that loved God 
 not at all and would not live according to his commands ? 
 But, Eve, thou camest with me to the altar and prayed, 
 and we made offerings of fruit to lahveh. But my heart 
 was not in prayer, Adam, and the offerings to lahveh 
 
 R 
 
258 
 
 always seemed to me a waste. lahveh had no place in 
 my heart nor in my thoughts, and it was to divide thee 
 from lahveh that I listened to Lilith ; for in my foolish- 
 ness I said : if I bring the secret to Adam he will forget 
 lahveh. But lahveh is all-powerful and we are over- 
 whelmed with hunger and thirst. I would give thee 
 back to lahveh. . . . How can I be given back to 
 lahveh ? Adam asked, and Eve answered : my thoughts 
 are not wandering, Adam, but are set upon undoing the 
 wrong I have done, and the undoing can be accomplished 
 in that river if we can reach it. In the pool from which 
 thou didst save me I will drown, and lahveh's fallen 
 angel will be restored to grace, and he will be put back 
 into the garden ; he will be happy again amid flowers 
 and fruits, and the pleasant rays that fall upon the altar 
 at noon will draw him unto prayer. Prayers are dearer 
 to thee, Adam, than I ever could be. Lead me to 
 the river, Adam, let one be happy if both may not be. 
 I am nothing, I was made out of one of thy ribs or 
 out of a handful of mould by lahveh for thy companion- 
 ship. I am nothing, but thou wast once God's angel. 
 God is all-powerful. Let my death give thee back to 
 lahveh. But, Eve, there is no happiness for me on this 
 earth except with thee, and hast no thought of the child 
 in the womb ? And hast thou no love for him ? I have 
 love for my child, but my love of thee, Adam, is greater, 
 and my child must die with me that the world be redeemed 
 from sin. So it would seem. lahveh will accept my death 
 as an atonement. Lead me to the river, Adam. 
 
 As we have lived so we must die, Adam replied ; and 
 the twain sat side by side against the rocks, and folded 
 their arms and waited for the power of lahveh to fall 
 upon them. And they did not know how long they had 
 waited, for time seemed at a standstill, but in the midst 
 of their stupor they were awakened by a voice, and Adam 
 §aid to Eve ; that is no angel's voice, and Eve said : who- 
 
259 
 
 soever' s voice it be concerns us not, for the end is nigh. 
 Thy will be done, Adam, if it be that thou shouldst die 
 with me unrepentant. But the voice brought them life 
 in the shape of a lamb, one of the mountain sheep that 
 the angels had frightened with their flaming swords. He 
 had become lost in the caves, or maybe had been sent 
 thither. Alec, by Lucifer himself, who looked to the 
 race of men to bring about the overthrow of lahveh. 
 Whosoever sent the lamb, it was the lamb's blood that 
 saved the twain in the cave and assured the victory, 
 accomplishing slowly, but always accomplishing from 
 that day to ours. Alec. 
 
 Since there is no fruit in the wilderness, we must kill 
 and eat always, Adam said, and from henceforth his days 
 were spent fashioning weapons, and Eve's in weaving 
 nets, wherewith they were able to encompass beasts and 
 birds. So did the twain live, flying from the angels of 
 the lord from cave to cave. Eve bringing forth Cain in 
 the first year of banishment, and Abel in the second. 
 And when daughters were born to them, Cain took one 
 sister to lie with him; she conceived and bore Enoch, 
 with whom Cain was so well pleased that he named 
 the city he built after his son. After Enoch came Irad, 
 and Irad begat Mehujael ; and Mehujael begat Methusael ; 
 and Methusael begat Lamech ; and Lamech took unto 
 him two wives, the name of one was Adah and the name 
 of the other was Zillah, and Adah bore Jabal. He was 
 the father of those that dwelt in tents, and his brother's 
 name was Jubal, and he was the father of harp and organ 
 players; and Zillah bore Tubal-cain, the craftsman in 
 brass and iron, and the sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah. 
 
 Very soon the earth was covered with men, and the 
 angels looked down from heaven, and seeing that the 
 daughters of men were fair, they lusted after them, and 
 the children that were born of woman- and angel kind 
 were giants, and God said : the children of these giants 
 
960 
 
 will join with Satan's legions and rise up against me. 
 My power will be overthrown ! So he called together 
 his cohorts, and gave the command unto Michael, Gabriel 
 and Raphael, and these going forth drove against the 
 celestial lechers, surrounded, overpowered and bound them, 
 and threw them into the centre of the earth for time 
 everlasting. And lahveh said unto his archangels : you 
 have done well, Michael, Gabriel and Raphael, you have 
 redeemed my heaven of lewd angels; but, he said, the 
 giants still abound, and ye are tired of long wars, so we 
 will open the sources of the sea and drown the world, and 
 make an end of man and his evil deeds. And the angels 
 replied : thy will be done, Lord, on earth as it is in heaven, 
 and the sources of the seas were opened. 
 
 But one man built an ark and it was with his progeny 
 that the earth was again replenished. God said, perhaps 
 fire will succeed better than water, and he showered brim- 
 stone and fire all over the world, and burned out every 
 man but one. Lot, and his daughters, and with these the 
 world was again replenished, the first daughter saying 
 to the younger: our father is old, there's not a man to 
 come in unto us after the manner of all the world. Come, 
 let us make our father drink wine and we will lie with 
 him that we may preserve the seed of our father. And 
 what the older had done the younger did the next night. 
 And seeing how all his designs had failed him, and 
 that tlie race of man was indestructible, lahveh bowed 
 his head, saying : my years are numbered. I am dying 
 and shall die, for the years are coming when men will 
 no longer believe in God. 
 
 CHAP. XLIIL 
 
 NOW, Alec, that is the end of the story that I composed 
 Jast week^ and you being the shanachie of old Connaught 
 
261 
 
 I should like to hear my story criticised by you, to hear 
 it blamed or praised, if there be anything in it that seems 
 worthy to you of praise or blame. Well, your honour, 
 there are fine things in your story, but I'm sure Father 
 Kennedy wouldn't have any truck with any story about 
 Adam and Eve that isn't in the Bible. The Talmud, I 
 interjected. But forget Father Tom and tell me what 
 you think of my story. A wonderful story, your honour, 
 for if I rightly understand you, it isn't more than a week 
 old; the best I've ever heard at that age, and when it 
 has been seven or eight years in your head it will be as 
 good as ten-year-old John Jamieson. That's how it is 
 with mine. At first they are poisonous stuff, but year by 
 year they mellow, and after sleeping and dreaming in 
 my head, like the whisky in the wood, they come out 
 good, sociable and kind, and them that listen become as 
 good and kind and gentle as the whisky itself. 
 
 You think that my story will improve on keeping ? I 
 do, your honour. I think you're right, I felt that I was 
 relating only a rough and ready version. As I told you, 
 my stories are eye stories, yours are ear stories. But I 
 would not have your honour thinking that I was making 
 little of your story ; it's a grand story as you have told it : 
 Adam praying on his two knees in front of Eve : I have 
 killed her, I have killed her, she is dead and all ; all is 
 done and damn the deed! But of course he soon saw 
 that he had not done her a bit of harm, and that she was 
 ready for some more of the same trouble. 
 
 Faith, I give in to your honour ; the shanachie of London 
 has pounded the shanachie of Westport. There are grand 
 things in it, the great squeal of a screech that Eve let off, 
 and himself frightened out of his very life, and every cat 
 of the cats, and every creature of the creatures, in the 
 same fright — a grand hullabaloo — a squeal, a whoop and 
 a whistle, and then all silent again. 
 
 Faith and troth, Alec, it's yourself that should have 
 
been the storyteller^ for you have put a polish on Eve's 
 love cry that raises a black envy of you up into my hearty 
 and I wouldn't be surprised if Synge himself were stirring 
 in his grave at this very moment. 
 
 CHAP. XLIV. 
 
 A FEW days after the relation of the Garden of Eden 
 I caught sight of Alec under the walls of the old mill, 
 looking out for a safe place to cross the river. There's 
 not much water in the river, I said to myself; he can 
 step from boulder to boulder ; and my heart quickened a 
 little at the thought of the new story he was coming to 
 tell me. Is it a long one? I asked, as soon as he had 
 scrambled up the high bank. His puzzled face was 
 sufficient answer ; he had not come to tell me a story, 
 but to bid me good-bye, having heard in the town that I 
 was leaving Westport at the end of the week. 
 
 But maybe I'm interfering with your honour in 
 coming to you now ; you may be composing another 
 story, and on asking him why he thought that, he said 
 there was no place for the unravelling of stories like a seat 
 by a brawling brook ; like water they come foaming and 
 swirling by, as if they couldn't get on fast enough. Yes, 
 Alec, it's like that by a brook, sometimes. But I'm sorry 
 you haven't come to tell me a story. Are you sure you 
 haven't one about you ? Well, no, your honour, it's just 
 the other way round ; I thought I'd come to you for an- 
 other one ; I'd like to hear a story from you — one of them 
 stories the publishers do be ferreting in their pockets 
 for the notes and the gold to pay you for. I'd like to 
 hear one of them as it comes out of your head. I think 
 you must take me for a keg. Alec, always on tap as soon 
 as the spigot has been driven in. Isn't every shanachie 
 like that ? he answered, and don't the country people be 
 
263 
 
 asking me for stories till the last sod of turf has melted 
 away into ashes ? A real story. Alec, without lahveh or 
 fairies, not even a priest in it nor devils nor serpents, an 
 English or an Irish story, which. Alec? I wouldn't be 
 sticking you to any one country, Alec answered, but I 
 think I'd be feeling more at home listening to an Irish 
 story than to an English one. And sure an Irishman the 
 like of yourself wouldn't be put to the pin of his collar 
 to tell an Irish story, for there must be manys the one 
 going the rounds inside your head, and you this many 
 a year away from us. True enough, I answered, so many 
 years that it ill becomes me to be telling an Irish story 
 to the shanachie of Connaught. Didn't you come out of 
 Connaught yourself? he asked, and from the heart of it, 
 from the county of Mayo like I did myself? Faith, it 
 will be the Ballinrobe cock against the Westport rooster. 
 I don't know that I can think of an Irish story, I said, 
 
 unless Unless what, your honour ? Unless I start out 
 
 of an old memory. The best stories babble themselves 
 out of them old memories, he said. But now I come to 
 think of it. Alec, the story I'd be telling you is Irish only 
 because it all happened in Morrison's Hotel. Isn't that 
 the hotel Parnell used to be staying in ? Alec interjected. 
 It is so, I answered ; and the story has been muttering in 
 me ever since ; but I'm no way sure that it won't tangle 
 on me in the telling. You'll bear in mind. Alec, that this 
 is the first telling. You said yourself that stories ripen 
 in the mouth. They do, faith, he answered. The tongue's 
 the fellow to put a good skin on a story. In the third 
 or fourth telling the pink do be showing out upon it, 
 and ever afterwards it do be as juicy in the mouth as 
 a blackberry in Samhain. 
 
2a* 
 
 CHAP. XLV. 
 
 WHEN we went up to Dublin in the sixties, Alec, we 
 always put up at Morrison's Hotel, a big family hotel at 
 the corner of Dawson Street, one that was well patronised 
 by the gentry from all over Ireland, and fine big bills 
 they would be running up in it, my father paying his 
 every six months when he was able, which wasn't very 
 often, for what with racing stables and elections following 
 one after the other, Moore Hall wasn't what you'd call 
 overflowing with money. Now that I come to think 
 of it, I can see Morrison's as clearly almost as I do 
 Moore Hall : the front door opening into a short passage, 
 with some half-dozen steps leading up into the house. 
 A dark entrance, so it was, the glass doors of the 
 coffee-room showing through the dimness, and in front 
 of the visitor a big staircase running up to the second 
 landing. I don't think the grand staircase went any 
 higher ; I think I can see it looping somehow about 
 the head of the staircase, and I'm sure I'm right; 
 it was always being drummed into me that I mustn't 
 climb on to the banisters, a thing I was wishing to do, 
 but was always afraid to get astride of them, so deep 
 was it down to the ground floor. I think I can see 
 the long passage leading from the stair-head so far 
 into the house that I didn't dare to follow it for fear of 
 losing my way. I think there was a little staircase at 
 the end of it, and I used to wonder whither it went. A 
 very big building was Morrison's Hotel, with passages 
 running hither and thither and little flights of steps in 
 all kinds of odd corners. So it was on the second floor and 
 
 on the third But we needn't be thinking what was 
 
 above the second floor, for we were always on the second 
 in a big sitting-room that overlooked College Green. I 
 can remember the pair of windows, their lace curtains, 
 
265 
 
 and their repp curtains, better than the passages, and 
 better than the windows I can remember myself looking 
 through the pane interested in the coal carts going by ; 
 the bell hitched on to the horse's collar jangling all the 
 way down the street ; the coalman himself sitting, his 
 legs hanging over the shafts, driving from the wrong 
 side and looking up at the windows to see if he could 
 spy out an order. Fine horses were in these coal carts, 
 sfepping out as well as those in our own carriage. I'm 
 telling you these things for the pleasure of looking back 
 and nothing else. I can see the sitting-room and myself 
 as plainly as I can see the mountains beyond, in some 
 ways plainer ; and the waiter that used to attend on us, 
 I can see him, though not as plainly as I see you. Alec ; 
 but I'm more knowledgeable of him, if you'd be under- 
 standing me rightly ; and to this day I can recall the 
 awful frights he gave me when he came behind me 
 awaking me from my dream of a coalman's life ; what 
 he said is forgotten, but his squeaky voice remains in my 
 ears. He seemed to be always laughing at me, showing 
 long yellow teeth, and I used to be afraid to open the 
 sitting-room door, for I'd be sure to find him waiting on 
 the landing, his napkin thrown over his right shoulder. 
 I think I was afraid he'd pick me up and kiss me. As 
 the whole of my story is about him, perhaps I'd better 
 describe him more fully, and to do that I will tell you 
 that he was a tall, scraggy fellow, with big hips sticking 
 out and a long thin throat. It was his throat that 
 frightened me as much as anything about him, unless it 
 was his nose, which was a great high one, or his melancholy 
 eyes, which were pale blue and very small, deep in the 
 head. He was old, but how old I cannot say, for every- 
 body except children seems old to children. He seemed 
 the ugliest thing I'd ever seen out of a fairy-book, and 
 I'd beg not to be left alone in the sitting-room ; and I'm 
 sure I often asked my father and mother to take another 
 
set of rooms, which they never did, for they liked Albert 
 Nobbs ; and the guests liked him, and the proprietress 
 liked him, as well she might, for he was the most 
 dependable servant in the hotel : no running round to 
 public-houses and coming back with the smell of whisky 
 and tobacco upon him ; no rank pipe in his pocket, and 
 of all no playing the fool with the maid-servants. Nobody 
 had ever been heard to say he had seen Albert out with 
 one of them. A queer hobgoblin sort of fellow that 
 they mightn't have cared to be seen with, but all the 
 same it seemed to them funny that he should never 
 propose to walk out with one of them. I've heard the 
 hall porter say it was hard to understand a man living 
 without taking pleasure in something outside of his 
 work. Holidays he never asked for, and when Mrs 
 Baker pressed him to go to the salt water for a week 
 he'd try to rake up an excuse for not going away, asking 
 if it wasn't true that the Blakes, the Joyces and the 
 Ruttledges were coming up to town, saying that he 
 didn't like to be away, so used were they to him and 
 he to them. A strange life his was, and mysterious, 
 though every hour of it was before them, saving the 
 hours he was asleep, which wasn't many, for he was no 
 great sleeper. From the time he got up in the morn- 
 ing till he went to bed at night he was before their 
 eyes, running up and down the staircase, his napkin over 
 his arm, taking orders with cheerfulness, as if an order 
 were as good as a half-crown tip to him ; always good- 
 humoured, and making amends for his lack of interest 
 in other people by his willingness to oblige. No one 
 had ever heard him object to doing anything he was 
 asked to do or even put forward an excuse for not being 
 able to do it. In fact his willingness to oblige was so 
 notorious in the hotel that Mrs Baker (the proprietress 
 of Morrison's Hotel at the time) could hardly believe she 
 was listening to him when he began to stumble from one 
 
267 
 
 excuse to another for not sharing his bed with Hubert 
 Page, and this after she had told him that his bed was 
 Page's only chance of getting a stretch that night. All 
 the other waiters were married men and went home to 
 their wives. You see, Alec, it was Punchestown week, 
 and beds are as scarce in Dublin that week as diamonds 
 are on the slopes of Croagh Patrick. But you haven't 
 told us yet who Page was. Alec interjected, and I thought 
 reprovingly. I'm just coming to him, I answered ; 
 Hubert Page was a house-painter, well known and well 
 liked by Mrs Baker. He came over every season, and 
 was always welcome at Morrison's Hotel, and so pleasant 
 wei'e his manners that one forgot the smell of his paint. 
 It is hardly saying too much to say that when Hubert 
 Page had finished his job everybody in the hotel, men 
 and women alike, missed the pleasant sight of this young 
 man going to and fro in his suit of hollands, the long 
 coat buttoned loosely to his figure with large bone 
 buttons, going to and fro about his work, up and down 
 the passages, with a sort of lolling idle gait that attracted 
 and pleased the eye — a young man that would seem 
 preferable to most men if a man had to choose a bed- 
 fellow, yet seemingly the very one that Albert Nobbs 
 couldn't abide lying down with, a dislike that Mrs Baker 
 could understand so little that she stood staring at her 
 confused and embarrassed waiter, who was still seeking 
 excuses for his dislike to share his bed with Hubert Page. 
 I suppose you fully understand, she said, that Page is 
 leaving for Belfast by the morning train, and has come 
 over here to ask us for a bed, there not being one at the 
 hotel in which he is working ? Albert answered that he 
 
 understood well enough, but was thinking He began 
 
 again to fumble with words. Now what are you trying 
 to say ? Mrs Baker asked, and rather sharply ; my bed is 
 full of lumps, Albert answered. Your mattress full of 
 lumps ! the proprietress rapped out ; why, your mattress 
 
268 
 
 was repicked and buttoned six months ago, and came 
 back as good as any mattress in the hotel ; what kind of 
 story are you telHng me? So it was, ma'am, so it was, 
 Albert mumbled, and it was some time before he got out 
 his next excuse : he was a very light sleeper and had 
 never slept with anybody before and was sure he wouldn't 
 close his eyes ; not that that would matter much, but his 
 sleeplessness might keep Mr Page awake. Mr Page 
 would get a better stretch on one of the sofas in the 
 coffee-room than in his bed, I'm thinking, Mrs Baker. A 
 better stretch on the sofa in the coffee-room ? Mrs Baker 
 repeated angrily. I don't understand you, not a little 
 bit, and she stood staring at the two men, so dissimilar. 
 But, ma'am, I wouldn't be putting Mr Nobbs to the 
 inconvenience o^ my company, the house-painter began. 
 The night is a fine one, I'll keep myself warm with a 
 sharp walk, and the train starts early. You'll do nothing 
 of the kind. Page, she answered ; and seeing that Mrs 
 Baker was now very angry Albert thought it time to 
 give in, and without more ado he began to assure them 
 both that he'd be glad of Mr Page's company in his bed. 
 I should think so, indeed, interjected Mrs Baker. But, 
 Albert continued, I'm a light sleeper. We've had enough 
 of that, Albert. If Mr Page is pleased to share my bed, 
 Albert continued, I shall be very glad. If Mr Nobbs 
 
 doesn't like my company I should Don't say another 
 
 word, Albert whispered, you'll only set her against me. 
 Come upstairs at once. It'll be all right. Come along. 
 
 Good-night, ma'am, and I hope No inconvenience 
 
 whatever. Page, Mrs Baker answered. This way, Mr 
 Page, Albert cried ; and as soon as they were in the room 
 Albert said : I hope you aren't going to cut up rough at 
 anything I've said; it isn't at all as Mrs Baker put it. 
 I'm glad enough of your company, but you see, as I've 
 never slept with anybody in my life it may be that I shall 
 be tossing about all night keeping you awake. W^ll, if 
 
269 
 
 it's to be like that, Page answered/ 1 might as well have 
 a doze on the chair until it's time to go, and not trouble 
 you at all. Troubling me you won't be, but I might be 
 troubling you. Enough has been said, we must lie down 
 together whether we like it or whether we don't, for if 
 Mrs Baker heard that we hadn't been in the same bed 
 together all the fault would lie with me. I'd be sent out 
 of the hotel in double quick time. But how can she 
 know ? Page cried. It's been settled one way, so let us 
 make no more fuss about it. 
 
 Albert began to undo his white necktie, saying he 
 would try to lie quiet ; and Page started pulling off his 
 clothes, thinking he'd be well pleased to be out of the 
 job of lying down with Albert. But he was so dog-tired 
 that he couldn't think any more about whom he was to 
 sleep with, only of the long days of twelve and thirteen 
 hours he had been doing, with a walk to and from his 
 work. Only sleep mattered to him, and Albert saw him 
 tumble into bed in the long shirt that he wore under his 
 clothes, and lay himself down next to the wall. It would 
 be better for him to lie on the outside, Albert said to 
 himself, but he didn't like to say anything lest Page 
 might get out of the bed in a fit of ill-humour ; but Page, 
 as I've said, was too tired to trouble himself which side 
 of the bed he was to doss on. A moment after he was 
 asleep : and Albert stood listening, his loosened tie 
 dangling, till the heavy breathing from the bed told him 
 that Page was sound asleep. To make full sure he 
 approached the bed stealthily, and overlooking Page, 
 said : poor fellow, I'm glad he's in my bed for he'll get 
 a good sleep there, and he wants it, and considering that 
 things had fallen out better than he hoped for, he began 
 to undress. 
 
CHAP. XLVI. 
 
 HE must have fallen asleep at once, and soundly, for 
 he awoke out of nothingness. Flea, he muttered, and a 
 strong one too. It must have come from the house-painter 
 alongside of me. A flea will leave anyone to come to 
 me, and turning round in bed he remembered the look 
 of dismay that had appeared on the housemaids' faces 
 yesterday on his telling them that no man would ever love 
 their hides as much as a flea loved his, which was so true 
 that he couldn't understand how it was that the same flea 
 had taken so long to find him out. Fleas must be as partial 
 to him, he said, as they are to me. There it is again, trying 
 to make up for lost time, and out went Albert's leg. I'm 
 afraid I've awakened him, Albert said, but Hubert only 
 turned over in the bed to sleep more soundly. It's a mercy 
 indeed that he is so tired, Albert said, for if he wasn't very 
 tired that last jump I gave would have awakened him. 
 
 A moment after Albert was nipped again by another 
 flea or by the same one, he couldn't tell; he thought 
 it must be a second one, so vigorous was the bite : and 
 he was hard put to it to keep his nails off the spots. 
 It will only make it worse if I scratch, he said, and 
 he strove to lie quiet. But the torment was too great. 
 I've got to get up, he said, and raising himself up 
 quietly, he listened. The striking of a match won't 
 awaken him out of that sleep, and remembering where 
 he had put the match-box, his hand was on it at once. 
 The match flared up; he lighted the candle and stood 
 a while overlooking his bed-fellow : I'm safe, he said, 
 and set himself to the task of catching the flea. There 
 it is on the tail of my shirt, hardly able to move with 
 all the blood he's taken from me. Now for the soap, 
 and as he was about to dab it upon the blood-filled 
 insect the painter awoke with a great yawn, and turning 
 
271 
 
 round, he said : lord amassy ! what is the meaning 
 of this? why, you're a woman! If Albert had had the 
 presence of mind to drop his shirt over his shoulders 
 and to answer: you're dreaming, my man, Page might 
 have turned over and fallen asleep and in the morning 
 forgotten all about it, or thought he had been dreaming. 
 But Albert hadn't a word in her chops. At last she 
 began to blub. You won't tell on me, and ruin a poor 
 man, will you, Mr Page ? that is all I ask of you, and on 
 my knees I beg it. Get up from your knees, my good 
 woman, said Hubert. My good woman ! Albert repeated, 
 for she had been about so long as a man that she only 
 remembered occasionally that she was a woman. My 
 good woman, he repeated, get up from your knees and 
 tell me how long you have been playing this part. Ever 
 since I was a girl, Albert answered. You won't tell upon 
 me, will you, Mr Page, and prevent a poor woman from 
 getting her living } Not likely, I've no thought of telling 
 on you, but I'd like to hear how it all came about. How 
 I went out as a youth to get my living ? Yes ; tell me 
 the story, Hubert answered, for though I was very sleepy 
 just now, the sleep has left my eyes and I'd like to 
 hear it. But before you begin tell me what you were 
 doing with your shirt off. A flea, Albert answered. I 
 suffer terribly from fleas, and you must have brought 
 some in with you, Mr Page. I shall be covered in blotches 
 in the morning. I'm sorry for that, Hubert said, but 
 tell me how long ago it was that you became a man. 
 Before you came to Dublin, of course. Oh yes, long 
 before. It is very cold, she said, and shuddering dropped 
 her shirt over her shoulders and pulled on her trousers. 
 
272 
 
 CHAP. XLVII. 
 
 IT was in London, soon after the death of my old nurse, 
 she began. You know I'm not Irish, Mr Page. My 
 parents may have been for all I know. The only one 
 who knew who they were was my old nurse and she 
 never told me. Never told you ! interjected Hubert. No, 
 she never told me, though I often asked her, saying no 
 good could come of holding it back from me. She might 
 have told me before she died but she died suddenly. 
 Died suddenly, Hubert repeated, without telling you 
 who you were ! You'd better begin at the beginning. 
 
 I don't know how I'm to do that, for the story seems 
 to me to be without a beginning; anyway I don't know 
 the beginning. I was a bastard and no one but my old 
 nurse, who brought me up, knew who I was ; she said 
 she'd tell me some day and she hinted more than once 
 that my people were grand folk, and I know she had a 
 big allowance from them for my education. Whoever 
 they were, a hundred a year was paid to her for my keep 
 and education, and all went well with us so long as my 
 parents lived, but when they died, the allowance was no 
 longer paid, and my nurse and myself had to go out to 
 work. It was all very sudden : one day the reverend 
 mother (I got my education at a convent school) told 
 me that Mrs Nobbs, my old nurse, had sent for me, and 
 the first news I had on coming home was that my parents 
 were dead and that we'd have to get our own living 
 henceforth. There was no time for picking and choosing. 
 We hadn't what would keep us till the end of the month 
 in the house, so out we had to go in search of work; 
 and the first job that came our way was looking after 
 chambers in the Temple. We had three gentlemen to 
 look after, so there was eighteen shillings a week between 
 my old nurse and myself; the omnibus fares had to come 
 
273 
 
 out of these wages, and to save sixpence a day we went 
 to live in Temple Lane. My old nurse didn't mind the 
 lane ; she had been a working woman all her life, but 
 with me it was different, and the change was so great 
 from the convent that I often thought I would sooner 
 die than continue to live amid rough people. There was 
 nothing wrong with them, they were honest enough, 
 but they were poor, and when one is very poor one lives 
 like the animals, indecently, and life without decency is 
 hardly bearable, so I thought. I've been through a 
 great deal since in different hotels, and have become 
 used to hard work, but even now I can't think of Temple 
 Lane without goose flesh, and when Mrs Nobbs' brother 
 lost his berth (he'd been a band-master, a bugler, or 
 something to do with music in the country), my old 
 nurse was obliged to give him sixpence a day, and the 
 drop from eighteen shillings to fourteen and sixpence 
 is a big one. My old nurse worried about the food, 
 but it was the rough men that I worried about ; the 
 bandsman wouldn't leave me alone, and many's the time 
 I've waited until the staircase was clear, afraid that if 
 I met him or another that I'd be caught hold of and 
 held and pulled about. I was different then from what I 
 am now and might have been tempted if one of them had 
 been less rough than the rest, and if I hadn't known I 
 was a bastard ; it was that, I think, that kept me straight 
 more than anything else, for I had just begun to feel 
 what a great misfortune it is for a poor girl to find her- 
 self in the family way ; no greater misfortune can befall 
 anyone in this world, but it would have been worse in 
 my case, for I should have known that I was only bringing 
 another bastard into the world. 
 
 I escaped being seduced in the lane and in the chambers 
 the barristers had their own mistresses, pleasant and con- 
 siderate men they all were — pleasant to work for ; and it 
 wasn't until four o'clock came and our work was over for 
 
274 
 
 the day that my heart sank, for after four o'clock till we 
 went to bed at night there was nothing for us to do but to 
 listen to the screams of drunken women ; I don't know 
 which was the most revolting, the laughter or the curses. 
 One of the barristers we worked for was Mr Congreve ; 
 he had chambers in Temple Gardens overlooking the 
 river, and it was a pleasure to us to keep his pretty things 
 clean, never breaking one of them ; it was a pleasure for 
 my old nurse as well as myself, myself more than for her, 
 for though I wasn't very sure of myself at the time, looking 
 back now I can see that I must have loved Mr Congreve 
 very dearly ; and it couldn't be else for I had come out of 
 a convent of nuns where I had been given a good educa- 
 tion, where all was good, quiet, refined and gentle, and 
 Mr Congreve seemed in many ways to remind me of 
 the convent: for he never missed Church, as rare for 
 him to miss a service as for parson. There was plenty 
 of books in his chambers and he'd lend them to me, 
 and talk to me when I took in his breakfast over his 
 newspaper, and ask me about the convent and what the 
 nuns were like, and I'd stand in front of him, my eyes 
 fixed on him, not feeling the time going by. I can see 
 him now as plainly as if he were before me — very thin 
 and elegant, with long white hands and beautifully 
 dressed. Even in the old clothes that he wore of a 
 morning there wasn't much fault to find ; he wore old 
 clothes more elegantly than any man in the Temple 
 wore his new clothes. I used to know all his suits, as 
 well I might, for it was my job to look after them, to 
 brush them ; and I used to spend a great deal more time 
 than was needed taking out spots with benzine, arranging 
 his neckties — he had fifty or sixty, all kinds — and seven 
 or eight great coats. A real toff, my word he was that, 
 but not one of those haughty ones too proud to give 
 one a nod. He always smiled and nodded if we met 
 under the clock, he on his way to the library and I 
 
275 
 
 returning to Temple Lane. I used to look after him, 
 saying: he's got on the striped trousers and the em- 
 broidered waistcoat. Mr Congreve was a compensa- 
 tion for Temple Lane ; he had promised to take me into 
 his private service and I was counting the days when I 
 should leave Temple Lane, when one day I said to myself : 
 why, here's a letter from a woman. You see, Mr Congreve 
 wasn't like the other young men in the Temple ; I never 
 found a hairpin in his bed, and if I had I shouldn't have 
 thought as much of him as I did. Nice is in France, I 
 said, and thought no more about the matter until another 
 letter arrived from Nice. Now what can she be writing 
 to him about ? I asked, and thought no more about it till 
 the third letter arrived. Yesterday is already more than 
 half forgotten, but the morning I took in that last letter 
 is always before me. And it was a few mornings after- 
 wards that a box of flowers came for him. A parcel for 
 you, sir, I said. He roused himself up in bed. For me ? 
 he cried, putting out his hand, and the moment he saw 
 the writing, he said : put the flowers in water. He knows 
 all about it, I said to myself, and so overcome was I as I 
 picked them up out of the box that I was seized with a 
 sudden faintness, and my old nurse said : what is the 
 matter with thee ? She never guessed, and I couldn't 
 have told her if I had wished to for at the time it was no 
 more than a feeling that so far as I was concerned all was 
 over. Of course I never thought that Mr Congreve would 
 look at me, and I don't know that I wanted him to, but I 
 didn't want another woman about the place, and I seemed 
 to know from that moment what was going to happen. 
 She isn't far away now, in the train maybe, I said, as I 
 went about my work, and these rooms will be mine no 
 longer. Of course they never were mine, but you know 
 what I mean. 
 
 A week later he said to me : there's a lady coming to 
 luncheon here, and I remember the piercing that the 
 
276 
 
 words caused me ; I can feel them here still, and Albert 
 put her hand to her heart. Well, I had to serve the 
 luncheon working round the tal^l^ ^^^ they not minding 
 me at all, but sitting looking at each other lost in a sense 
 of delight: the luncheon was forgotten; they don't want 
 me waiting about, I said : I knew all this, and said to 
 myself in the kitchen : it's disgraceful, it's sinful, to lead 
 a man into sin, for all my anger went out against the 
 woman, and not against Mr Congreve, for in my eyes he 
 seemed to be nothing more than a victim of a designing 
 woman ; that is how I looked at it at the time, being 
 but a youngster only just come from a convent school. 
 
 I don't think that anyone suffered more than I did in 
 those days. It seems all very silly now when I look back 
 upon it, but it was very real then. It does seem silly to 
 tell that I used to lie awake all night thinking to myself 
 that Mr Congreve was an elegant gentleman and I but a 
 poor serving girl whom he could never look upon as any- 
 body, except one to go to the cellar for coal or to the 
 kitchen to fetch his breakfast. I don't think I ever 
 hoped he'd fall in love with me. It wasn't as bad as 
 that. It was the hopelessness of it that set the tears 
 streaming down my cheeks over my pillow, and I used to 
 stuff the sheet into my mouth to keep back the sobs lest 
 my old nurse should hear me ; it wouldn't do to keep her 
 awake for she was very ill at that time ; and soon after- 
 wards she died, and then I was left alone, without a friend 
 in the world. The only people I knew were the char- 
 women that lived in Temple Lane, and the bugler, who 
 began to bully me, saying that I must continue to give 
 him the same money he had had from my old nurse. He 
 caught me on the stair once and twisted my arm till I 
 thought he'd broken it. The month after my old nurse's 
 death till I went to earn my living as a waiter was the 
 hardest time of all, and Mr Congreve's kindness seemed 
 to hurt me more than anything. If he'd only spared me 
 
 I 
 
277 
 
 his kind words, and not spoken about the extra money 
 he was going to give me for my attendance on his lady, 
 I shouldn't have felt so much that they had lain side by 
 side in the bed that I was making. She brought a dress- 
 ing gown to the chambers and some slippers, and then 
 more luggage came along ; and I think she must have 
 guessed I was in love with Mr Congreve, for I heard them 
 quarrelling — my name was mentioned ; and I said : I can't 
 put up with it any longer, whatever the next life may be 
 like, it can't be worse than this one for me at least, and 
 as I went to and fro between Temple Lane and the 
 Chambers in Temple Gardens I began to think how I 
 might make away with myself. I don't know if you know 
 London, Hubert? Yes, he said; I'm a Londoner, but I 
 come here to work every year. Then if you know the 
 Temple, you know that the windows of Temple Gardens 
 overlook the river. I used to stand at those windows 
 watching the big brown river flowing through its bridges, 
 thinking all the while of the sea into which it went, and 
 that I must plunge into the river and be borne away 
 down to the sea, or be picked up before I got there. It 
 didn't matter which, for my trouble would be over, and 
 that was all I could think about, making an end to my 
 trouble. 
 
 I couldn't get the Frenchwoman out of my thoughts, 
 she and Mr Congreve sitting together ; and her suspicions 
 that I cared for him made her harder on me than she 
 need have been — always coming the missis over me. It 
 was her airs and graces that stiffened my back more than 
 anything else. I'm sure if it hadn't been that I met 
 Bessie Lawrence I should have done away with myself. 
 She was the woman that used to look after the chambers 
 under Mr Congreve's. We stopped talking outside the 
 gateway by King's Bench Walk, if you know the Temple, 
 you know where I mean. Bessie kept talking, but I 
 wasn't listening, only catching a word here and there, not 
 
278 
 
 waking up from the dream how to make away with my- 
 self till I heard the words : if I had a figure like yours. 
 As nobody had ever spoken about my figure before, I 
 said : now what has my figure got to do with it ? You 
 haven't been listening to me^ she said, and I answered 
 that I had only missed the last few words. Just missed 
 the last few words, she said testily : you didn't hear 
 me telling you there is a big dinner at the Freemason's 
 Tavern to-night, and they're short of waiters. But what 
 has that got to do with my figure ? I asked. That shows, 
 she rapped out, that you haven't been listening to me. 
 Didn't I say that if it wasn't for my hips and bosom I'd 
 very soon be into a suit of evening clothes and getting 
 ten shillings for the job. But what has that got to do 
 with my figure ? I repeated. Your figure is just the one 
 for a waiter's. Oh, I'd never thought of that, says I, 
 and we said no more. But after leaving her the words 
 kept on in my head: so my figure is just the one for a 
 waiter's, till my eyes caught sight of a bundle of old 
 clothes that Mr Congreve had given me to sell. A suit 
 of evening clothes was in it. You see Mr Congreve 
 and myself were about the same height and build. 
 The trousers will want a bit of shortening, I said to 
 myself; and I set to work, and at six o'clock I was in 
 them and down at the Freemason's Tavern answering 
 questions, saying that I had been accustomed to waiting 
 at table. 
 
 All the waiting I had done was bringing in Mr 
 Congreve's dinner from the kitchen to the sitting-room ; 
 a roast chicken or a chop, and in my fancy it seemed to 
 me that the waiting at the Freemason's Tavern would be 
 much the same. The head waiter looked me over a bit 
 doubtfully and asked if I had had experience with public 
 dinners : I thought he was going to turn me down, but 
 they were short-handed so I was taken on, and it was a 
 mess that I made of it, getting in everybody's way ; but 
 
279 
 
 my awkwardness was taken in good part and I received 
 ten shillings, which was good money for the sort of work 
 I did that night. But what stood to me was not so much 
 the ten shillings that I earned as the bit I had learned. 
 It was only a bit, not much bigger than a threepenny 
 bit ; but I had worked round a table at a big dinner, and 
 feeling certain that I could learn what I didn't know, 
 I asked for another job. I suppose the head waiter 
 could see that there was the making of a waiter in me, 
 for on coming out of the Freemason's Tavern he stopped 
 me to ask if I was going back to private service as soon 
 as I could get a place. The food I'd had and the 
 excitement of the dinner, the guests, the lights, the talk 
 stood to me, and things seemed clearer than they had 
 ever seemed before. My feet were of the same mind, 
 for they wouldn't walk towards the Temple, and I 
 answered the head waiter that I'd be glad of another 
 job. Well, said he, you don't know much about the 
 work, but you're an honest lad, I think, so I'll see 
 what I can do for you, and at the moment a thought 
 struck him. Just take this letter, said he, to the 
 Holborn Restaurant. There's a dinner there and I've 
 had word that they're short of a waiter or two. Be off 
 as fast as you can. ^ 
 
 And away I went as fast as my legs could carry me, 
 and they took me there in good time, in front, by a 
 few seconds, of two other fellows who were after the 
 job. I got it. Another job came along, and another and 
 another. Each of them jobs was worth ten shillings 
 to me, to say nothing of the learning of the trade, and 
 having, as I've said, the making of a waiter in me, it 
 didn't take more than about three months for me to 
 be as quick and as smart and as watchful as the best 
 of them, and without them qualities no one will succeed 
 in waiting. I have worked round the tables in the 
 biggest places in London and all over England in all 
 
280 
 
 the big towns, in Manchester, in Liverpool and Birming- 
 ham ; I am well known at the old Hen and Chickens, at 
 the Queen's and the Plough and Harrow in Birmingham. 
 It was seven years ago that I came here and here it 
 would seem that I've come to be looked on as a fixture, 
 for the Bakers are good people to work for and I didn't 
 like to leave them when, three years ago, a good place was 
 offered to me, so kind were they to me in my illness. I 
 suppose one never remains always in the same place, but 
 I may as well be here as elsewhere. 
 
 Seven years working in Morrison's Hotel, Page said, and 
 on the second floor ? Yes, the second floor is the best in 
 the hotel, the money is better than in the Coffee Room, 
 and that is why the Bakers have put me here, Albert 
 replied. I wouldn't care to leave them; they've often 
 said they don't know what they'd do without me. Seven 
 years, Hubert repeated, the same work up the stairs and 
 down the stairs, banging into the kitchen and out again. 
 There's more variety in the work than you think for, 
 Hubert, Albert answered. Every family is diff*erent, and 
 so you're always learning. Seven years. Page repeated, 
 neither man nor woman, just a perhapser. He spoke these 
 words more to himself than to Nobbs, but feeling he had 
 expressed himself incautiously he raised his eyes and read 
 on Albert's face that the words had gone home, and that 
 this outcast from both sexes felt her loneliness perhaps 
 more keenly than before. As Hubert was thinking what 
 words he might use to conciliate Albert with her lot, 
 Albert repeated the words : neither man nor woman, 
 yet nobody ever suspected, she muttered, and never 
 would have suspected me till the day of my death if 
 it hadn't been for that flea that you brought in with you. 
 But what harm did the flea do? I'm bitten all over, said 
 Albert, scratching her thighs. Never mind the bites, 
 said Hubert, we wouldn't have had this talk if it hadn't 
 been for the flea, and I shouldn't have heard your story. 
 
281 
 
 Tears trembled on Albert's eyelids ; she tried to keep 
 them back, but they overflowed the lids and were soon 
 running quickly down her cheeks. You've heard my story, 
 she said. I thought nobody would ever hear it, and I 
 thought I should never cry again, and Hubert watched 
 the gaunt woman shaking with sobs under a coarse night- 
 shirt. It's all much sadder than I thought it was, and 
 if I'd known how sad it was I shouldn't have been able 
 to live through it. But I've jostled along somehow, she 
 said, always merry and bright, with never anyone to speak 
 to, not really to speak to, only to ask for plates and 
 dishes, for knives and forks and such like, tablecloths and 
 napkins, cursing betimes the life one has been through, 
 for the feeling cannot help coming over us, perhaps over 
 the biggest as over the smallest, that all our trouble is 
 for nothing and can end in nothing. It might have been 
 better if I had taken the plunge. But why am I thinking 
 these things ? It's you that has set me thinking, Hubert. 
 
 I'm sorry if Oh, it's no use being sorry, and I'm a 
 
 great silly to cry like this. I thought that regrets had 
 passed away with the petticoats. But you've awakened 
 the woman in me. You've brought it all up again. But 
 I mustn't let on like this ; it's very foolish of an old 
 perhapser like me, neither man nor woman ! But I can't 
 help it. 
 
 She began to sob again, and in the midst of her grief 
 the word loneliness was uttered, and when the paroxysm 
 was over, Hubert said : lonely, yes, I suppose it is lonely, 
 and he put his hand out towards Albert. You're very 
 good, Mr Page, and I'm sure you'll keep my secret, 
 though indeed I don't care very much whether you 
 do or not. Now, don't let on like that again, Hubert 
 said. Let us have a little chat and try to understand 
 each other. I'm sure it's lonely for you to live without 
 man or without woman, thinking like a man and feeling 
 like a woman. You seem to know all about it, Hubert. 
 
282 
 
 I hadn't thought of it like that before myself, but when 
 you speak the words I feel you have spoken the truth. 
 I suppose I was wrong to put off my petticoats and step 
 into those trousers. I wouldn't go so far as to say that, 
 Hubert answered, and the words were so unexpected 
 that Albert forgot her grief for a moment and said : why 
 do you say that, Hubert ? Well, because I was thinking, 
 he replied, that you might marry. But I was never a 
 success as a girl. Men didn't look at me then so I'm 
 sure they wouldn't now I'm a middle-aged woman. 
 Marriage ! whom should I marry ? No, there's no marriage 
 for me in the world, I must go on being a man. But you 
 won't tell on me, you've promised, Hubert. Of course 
 I won't tell, but I don't see why you shouldn't marry. 
 What do you mean, Hubert? You aren't putting a joke 
 upon me, are you ? If you are it's very unkind. A joke 
 upon you ? no, Hubert answered. I didn't mean that you 
 should marry a man but you might marry a girl. Marry 
 a girl ? Albert repeated, her eyes wide open and staring. 
 A girl.^ Well, anyway, that's what I've done, Hubert 
 replied. But you're a young man and a very handsome 
 young man too. Any girl would like to have you, and 
 I daresay they were all after you before you met the 
 right girl. I'm not a young man, I'm a woman, Hubert 
 replied. Now I know for certain, cried Albert, you're 
 putting a joke upon me. A woman ! Yes, a woman, you 
 can feel for yourself if you don't believe me. Put your 
 hand under my shirt ; you'll find nothing there. Albert 
 moved away instinctively, her modesty having been 
 shocked. You see I offered myself like that feeling you 
 couldn't take my word for it. It isn't a thing there can 
 be any doubt about. Oh, I believe you, Albert replied. 
 And now that that matter is settled, Hubert began, 
 perhaps you'd like to hear my story, and without waiting 
 for an answer she related the story of her unhappy marriage : 
 her husband, a house-painter, had changed towards her 
 
283 
 
 altogether after the birth of her second child, leaving her 
 without money for food and selling up the home twice. 
 At last I decided to have another cut at it, Hubert went 
 on, and catching sight of my husband's working clothes 
 one day I said to myself: he's often made me put these on 
 and go out and help him with his job, why shouldn't I put 
 them on for myself and go away for good ? I didn't like 
 leaving the children, but I couldn't remain with him. But 
 the marriage? Albert asked. It was lonely going home 
 to an empty room : I was as lonely as you, and one day, 
 meeting a girl as lonely as myself, I said: come along, 
 and we arranged to live together, each paying our share. 
 She had her work and I had mine, and between us we 
 made a fair living, and this I can say with truth that 
 we haven't known an unhappy hour since we married. 
 People began to talk so we had to. I'd like you to see 
 our home. I always return to my home after a job is 
 finished with a light heart and leave it with a heavy one. 
 But I don't understand, Albert said. What don't you 
 understand ? Hubert asked. Whatever Albert's thoughts 
 were, they faded from her, and her eyelids dropped over 
 her eyes. You're falling asleep, Hubert said, and I'm 
 doing the same. It must be three o'clock in the morning 
 and I've to catch the five-o'clock train. I can't think now 
 of what I was going to ask you, Albert muttered, but 
 you'll tell me in the morning, and turning over, she made 
 a place for Hubert. 
 
 CHAP. XLVIII. 
 
 WHAT has become of him ? Albert said, rousing herself, 
 and then, remembering that Hubert's intention was to 
 catch the early train, she began to remember. His train, 
 
 she said, started from Amien Street at I must have 
 
 slept heavily for him— for her not to have awakened me 
 
284 
 
 or she must have stolen away very quietly. But, lord 
 amassy, what time is it? And seeing she had overslept 
 herself a full hour, she began to dress herself, muttering 
 all the while : such a thing never happened to me before. 
 And the hotel as full as it can hold. Why didn't they 
 send for me ? The missis had a thought of my bed-fellow, 
 mayhap, and let me sleep it out. I told her I shouldn't 
 close an eye till she left me. But I mustn't fall into the 
 habit of sheing him. Lord, if the missis knew every- 
 thing ! But I've overslept myself a full hour, and if 
 nobody has been up before somebody soon will be. The 
 greater the haste the less speed. All the same, despite 
 the difficulty of finding her clothes, Albert was at work 
 on her landing some twenty minutes after, running up and 
 down the stairs, preparing for the different breakfasts in the 
 half-dozen sitting-rooms given to her charge, driving every- 
 body before her, saying : we're late to-day, and the house 
 full of visitors. How is it that 54 isn't turned out ? Has 
 35 rung his bell? Lord, Albert, said a housemaid, I 
 wouldn't worry my fat because I was down late, once in a 
 way don't hurt. And sitting up half the night talking to 
 Mr Page, said another maid, and then rounding on us. 
 Half the night talking, Albert repeated. My bed-fellow ! 
 Where is Mr Page ? I didn't hear him go away ; he may 
 have missed his train for aught I know. But do you be 
 getting on with your work, and let me be getting on with 
 mine. You're very cross this morning, Albert, the maid- 
 servant muttered, and retired to chatter with two other 
 maids who were looking over the banisters at the time. 
 
 Well, Mr Nobbs the head porter began, when Albert 
 
 came running downstairs to see some visitors off, and to 
 receive his tips : well, Mr Nobbs, how did you find your 
 bed-fellow ? Oh, he was all right, but I'm not used to 
 bed-fellows, and he brought a flea with him, and it kept 
 me awake ; and when I did fall asleep, I slept so heavily 
 that I was an hour late. I hope he caught his train. 
 
285 
 
 But what is all this pother about bed-fellows? Albert 
 asked himself, as she returned to her landing. Page 
 hasn't said anything, no, she's said nothing, for we're both 
 in the same boat, and to tell on me would be to tell on 
 
 herself. I'd never have believed if Albert's modesty 
 
 prevented her from finishing the sentence. She's a 
 woman right enough. But the cheek of it, to marry an 
 innocent girl I Did she let the girl into the secret, or 
 leave her to find it out when 
 
 This was a question one might ponder on, and by 
 luncheon time Albert was inclined to believe that Hubert 
 
 told her wife before She couldn't have had the cheek 
 
 to wed her, Albert said, without warning her that things 
 might not turn out as she fancied. Mayhap, Albert con- 
 tinued, she didn't tell her before they wedded and mayhap 
 she did, and being one of them like myself that isn't always 
 hankering after a man, she was glad to live with Hubert 
 for companionship. Albert tried to remember the exact 
 words that Hubert had used. It seemed to her that 
 Hubert had said that she lived with a girl first, and 
 wedded her to put a stop to people's scandal. Of course 
 they could hardly live together except as man and wife. 
 She remembered Hubert saying that she always returned 
 home with a light heart and never left it without a heavy 
 one. So it would seem that this marriage was as successful 
 as any, and a great deal more than the majority. 
 
 At that moment 35 rang his bell. Albert hurried to 
 answer it, and several hours wore away before a moment 
 propitious to reverie occurred again. 
 
 It was late in the evening, between nine and ten o'clock, 
 when the guests were away at the theatres and concerts, 
 and nobody was about but two maids ; it was when these 
 had ceased to trouble her with chatter that Albert, with 
 her napkin over her shoulder, dozed and meditated on the 
 advice that Hubert had given her. She should marry, 
 Hubert had said; Hubert had married. Of course it 
 
286 
 
 wasn't a real marriage, it couldn't be that, but a very 
 happy one it would seem. But the girl must have under- 
 stood that she was not marrying a man. Did Hubert tell 
 her before marriage or after marriage, and what were the 
 words ? It seemed to her she would give a great deal to 
 know the exact words. After all I've worked hard, she 
 said, and her thoughts melted away into a long meditation 
 of what her life had been for the last five and twenty 
 years, a mere drifting, it seemed to her to have been, from 
 one hotel to another, without friends ; meeting, it is true, 
 sometimes men and women who seemed willing to be 
 friendly. But her secret had forced her to live apart from 
 both sexes; the clothes she wore smothered the woman 
 within her; she no longer thought and felt as she used 
 to when she was a woman, and she didn't think and feel 
 like a man ; a mere appearance, nothing more ; no wonder 
 she was lonely. But Hubert had put off her sex, so she 
 said, and the suspicion that she had put a joke upon her 
 rose up in her mind and died away into a long dream of 
 what her home was like. Why had she not asked for 
 particulars ? 
 
 That's 54 again, one of the maids called from the 
 end of the passage, and when Albert received 54's 
 order and executed it, she returned to her seat in the 
 passage, her napkin over her shoulder, and resumed her 
 reverie. It seemed to her that Hubert had mentioned 
 that her wife was a milliner ; Hubert may not have 
 spoken the word milliner, but if she hadn't, it was strange 
 that the word should keep on coming up in her mind. 
 There was no reason why the wife shouldn't be a milliner, 
 and if that were so it was as likely as not they owned a 
 house in some quiet, insignificant street, letting the dining- 
 room, back room and kitchen to a widow or to a pair of 
 widows. The drawing-room was the workroom and show- 
 room ; Page and his wife slept in the room above. On 
 second thoughts it seemed to Albert that if the business 
 
287 
 
 were millinery it might be that Mrs Page would prefer 
 the ground floor for her showroom. A third and fourth 
 distribution of the "premises" presented itself to Albert's 
 imagination. On thinking the matter over again it seemed 
 to her that Hubert had not spoken of a millinery business ; 
 that was a mistake; she had said her wife was a seam- 
 stress. Now if that were so, a small dressmaker's business 
 in a quiet street would be in keeping with all Hubert 
 had said about the home. Albert was not sure, however, 
 that if she found a girl willing to share her life with her, 
 it would be a seamstress's business she would be on the 
 look-out for. She thought that a sweetmeat shop, news- 
 papers and tobacco would be her choice. 
 
 Why shouldn't she make a fresh start? Hubert had 
 foreseen no difficulties. She had said — Albert could 
 recall the very words — I didn't mean you should marry 
 a man, but a girl. She had saved, oh ! how she had tried 
 to save, for she didn't wish to end her days in the 
 workhouse. She had saved upwards of five hundred 
 pounds, which was quite enough to purchase a little 
 business, and her heart dilated as she thought of her two 
 successful investments in house property. In six months' 
 time she hoped to have six hundred pounds, and if it took 
 her two years to find a partner and a business, she would 
 have at least seventy or eighty pounds more, which would 
 be a great help, for it would be a mistake to put one's 
 money into a falling business. If she found a partner ! 
 she'd have to do like Hubert; for marriage would put a 
 stop to all tittle-tattle ; she'd be able to keep her place 
 at Morrison's Hotel, or perhaps leave Morrison's and rely 
 on jobs; and with her connection it would be a case 
 of picking and choosing the best: ten and sixpence a 
 night, nothing under. She dreamed of a round. Belfast, 
 Liverpool, Manchester, Bradford rose up in her imagina- 
 tion, and after a month's absence, a couple of months 
 maybe, she would return home, her heart anticipating 
 
288 
 
 a welcome — a real welcome, for though she would con- 
 tinue to be a man to the world, she would be a woman 
 to the dear one at home. With a real partner, one whose 
 heart was in the business, they might make as much 
 as two hundred pounds a year — four pounds a week ! 
 And with four pounds a week their home would be as 
 pretty and happy as any in the city of Dublin. Two 
 rooms and a kitchen were what she foresaw. The 
 furniture began to creep into her imagination little by 
 little. A large sofa by the fireplace covered with a chintz ! 
 But chintz dirtied quickly in the city ; a dark velvet sofa 
 might be more suitable. It would cost a great deal of 
 money, five or six pounds ; and at that rate fifty pounds 
 wouldn't go very far, for they must have a fine double- 
 bed mattress ; and if they were going to do things in that 
 style, the home would cost them eighty pounds. With 
 luck these eighty pounds could be earned within the 
 next two years at Morrison's Hotel. 
 
 Albert ran over in her mind the tips she had re- 
 ceived : the people in 34 were leaving to-morrow. They 
 were always good for half-a-sovereign, and she decided 
 there and then that to-morrow's half-sovereign must 
 be put aside as a beginning of a sum of money for the 
 purchase of a clock to stand on a marble chimney-piece 
 or a mahogany chiffonier. A few days after she got a 
 sovereign from a departing guest, and it revealed a pair 
 of pretty candlesticks and a round mirror. Her tips were 
 no longer mere white and yellow metal stamped with 
 the effigy of a dead king or a living queen, but symbols 
 of the future life that awaited her. An unexpected 
 crown set her pondering on the colour of the curtains 
 in their sitting-room, and Albert became suddenly con- 
 scious that a change had come into her life : the show 
 was the same — carrying plates and dishes upstairs and 
 downstairs, and taking orders for drinks and cigars ; 
 but behind the show a new life was springing up — a 
 
289 
 
 life strangely personal and associated with the life 
 without only in this much, that the life without was 
 now a vassal state paying tribute to the life within. 
 She wasn't as good a servant as heretofore. She knew 
 it. Certain absences of mind, that was all ; and the 
 servants as they went by with their dusters began to 
 wonder whatever Albert could be dreaming of. 
 
 It was about this time that the furnishing of the parlour 
 at the back of the shop was completed, likewise that of 
 the bedroom above the shop, and Albert had just entered 
 on another dream — a dream of a shop with two counters, 
 one at which cigars, tobacco, pipes and matches were 
 sold, and at the other all kinds of sweetmeats, a shop 
 with a door leading to her wife's parlour. A changing 
 figure the wife was in Albert's imagination, turning from 
 fair to dark, from plump to slender, but capturing 
 her imagination equally in all her changes ; some- 
 times she was accompanied by a child of three or four, 
 a boy, the son of a dead man, for in one of her dreams 
 Albert married a widow. In another and more frequent 
 dream she married a woman who had transgressed the 
 moral code and been deserted before the birth of her 
 child. In this case it would be supposed that Albert 
 had done the right thing, for after leading the girl astray 
 he had made an honest woman of her. Albert would 
 be the father in everybody's eyes except the mother's, 
 and she hoped that the child's mother would outgrow 
 all the memory of the accidental seed sown, as the saying 
 runs, in a foolish five minutes. 
 
 A child would be a pleasure to them both, and a girl 
 in the family way appealed to her more than a widow ; 
 a girl that some soldier, the boot-boy or the hotel porter 
 had gotten into trouble ; and Albert kept her eyes and 
 ears open, hoping to rescue from her precarious situation 
 one of those unhappy girls that were always cropping up 
 in Morrison's Hotel. Several had had to leave the hotel last 
 
 T 
 
290 
 
 year but not one this year. But some revivalist meetings 
 were going to be held in Dublin. Many of our girls attend 
 them, and an unlucky girl will be in luck's way if we 
 should run across one another. Her thoughts passed into 
 a dream of the babe that would come into the world some 
 three or four months after their marriage, her little 
 soft hands and expressive eyes claiming their protection, 
 asking for it. What matter whether she calls me father 
 or mother ? They are but mere words that the lips speak, 
 but love is in the heart and only love matters. 
 
 CHAP. XLIX. 
 
 NOW whatever can Albert be brooding ? an idle house- 
 maid asked herself as she went by, flicking her duster. Is 
 he in love? is he brooding a marriage? Which of us? or 
 perhaps it's some girl outside ! 
 
 That Albert was brooding something, that there was 
 something on his mind, became the talk of the hotel, and 
 soon after it came to be noticed that Albert, who till now 
 had showed little desire to leave the hotel, was eager to 
 avail himself of every excuse to absent himself from duty 
 in the hotel. He had been seen in the smaller streets 
 looking up at the houses. He had saved a good deal 
 of money, and some of his savings were invested in house 
 property, so it was possible that his presence in these 
 streets might be explained by the supposition that he 
 was investing new sums of money in house property, or, 
 and it was the second suggestion that stimulated the 
 imagination, that Albert was going to be married and was 
 looking out for a house for his wife. 
 
 Albert had been seen talking with Annie Watts ; but 
 she was not in the family way after all, and despite her 
 wistful eyes and gentle voice she was not chosen. Her 
 ^eart is not in her work, Albert said ; she thinks only 
 
291 
 
 of when she can get out, and that isn't the sort for a shop, 
 whereas Dorothy Keyes was a glutton for work, but Albert 
 couldn't abide the tall, angular woman, built like a boy, 
 with a neck like a swan's. Besides her unattractive appear- 
 ance, her manner was abrupt. But Alice's small, neat figure 
 and quick intelligence marked her out for the job. Alas ! 
 Alice was hot-tempered. We should quarrel, Albert said, 
 and picking up her napkin, which had slipped from her 
 knee to the floor, she fell to thinking of the maids on 
 the floor above. A certain stateliness of figure and also 
 of gait put the thought into her mind that Mary O'Brien 
 would make an attractive shopwoman. But her second 
 thoughts were that Mary O'Brien was a Papist, and the 
 experience of Irish Protestants shows that Papists and 
 Protestants don't mix. 
 
 She had just begun to consider the next housemaid, 
 when a voice interrupted her musing. That lazy girl, 
 Annie Watts, on the look-out for an excuse to chatter the 
 time away instead of being about her work, were the words 
 that crossed Albert's mind as she raised her eyes, and so 
 unwelcoming were they that Annie in her nervousness 
 began to hesitate and stammer, unable for the moment to 
 find a subject, plunging at last, and rather awkwardly, into 
 the news of the arrival of the new kitchen-maid, Helen 
 Dawes, but never dreaming that the news could have any 
 interest for Albert. To her surprise, Albert's eyes lighted 
 up. Do you know her } Annie asked. Know her ? Albert 
 
 answered. No, I don't know her, but At that moment 
 
 a bell rang. Oh, bother, Annie said, and while she moved 
 away idling along the banisters, Albert hurried down the 
 passage. 
 
 No. 47 wanted writing - paper and envelopes ; he 
 couldn't write with the pens the hotel furnished, would 
 Albert be so kind as to ask the page-boy to fetch some 
 J's. With pleasure, Albert said ; with pleasure. Would 
 you like to have the writing-paper and envelopes before 
 
292 
 
 the boy returns with the pens, sir ? The visitor answered 
 that the writing-paper and envelopes would be of no use 
 to him till he had gotten the pens. With pleasure, sir ; 
 with pleasure ; and whilst waiting for the page to return 
 she passed through the swing doors and searched for a new 
 face among the different young women passing to and fro 
 between the white-aproned and white-capped chefs, bring- 
 ing the dishes to the great zinc counter that divided the 
 kitchen-maids and scullions from the waiters. She must 
 be here, she said, and returned again to the kitchen in the 
 hope of meeting the new-comer, Helen Dawes, who, when 
 she was found, proved to be very unlike the Helen Dawes 
 of Albert's imagination. A thick-set, almost swarthy girl 
 of three and twenty, rather under than above the medium 
 height, with white, even teeth, but unfortunately protrud- 
 ing, giving her the appearance of a rabbit. Her eyes 
 seemed to be dark brown, but on looking into them Albert 
 discovered them to be grey-green, round eyes that dilated 
 and flashed wonderfully while she talked. Her face 
 lighted up; and there was a vindictiveness in her voice 
 that appeared and disappeared; Albert suspected her, 
 and was at once frightened and attracted. Vindictiveness 
 in her voice ! How could such a thought have come 
 into my mind ? she said a few days after. A more kindly 
 girl it would be difficult to find. How could I have been 
 so stupid.? She is one of those, Albert continued, that 
 will be a success in everything she undertakes, and dreams 
 began soon after that the sweetstuff and tobacco shop 
 could hardly fail to prosper under her direction. One 
 thing was certain : nobody could befool that girl. A girl 
 with a head on her shoulders, she continued, is a pearl. 
 I shall feel certain when I am away at work everything 
 will be all right at home. 
 
 It's a pity that she isn't in the family way. It would 
 be pleasant to have a little one running about the shop 
 asking for lemon drops and to hear him calling us father 
 
293 
 
 and mother. And it was with a wrench that Albert 
 renounced for ever hope of a son. At that moment a 
 strange thought flitted across Albert's mind — after all, it 
 could not matter to her if Helen were to get into the 
 family way later, when they were settled. But she wasn't 
 sure that it wouldn't matter. It is a man always that 
 divides women, and sets the friendship of years at naught. 
 It might be better to choose an older woman ; it might 
 be better, but Albert was unable to keep herself from 
 asking Helen to walk out with her, and the next time 
 they met the words slipped out of her mouth : I shall be 
 
 off duty at three to-day, and if you're not engaged 
 
 I'm off duty at three, Helen answered. Are you engaged .'* 
 Albert asked. Helen hesitated, it being the truth that 
 she had been and was still walking out with one of the 
 scullions, and was not sure how he'd look upon her 
 going out with another, even though that one was such a 
 harmless fellow as Albert Nobbs. Harmless in himself, 
 she thought, and with a good smell of money rising out of 
 his pockets, very different from Joe, who seldom had a 
 train fare upon him. But she hankered after Joe, and 
 wouldn't give Albert a promise till she had asked him. 
 Wants to walk out with you ? Why, he's never been 
 known to walk out with man, woman or child before. 
 Well, that's a good one ! I'd like to know what he's after, 
 and I'm not jealous; you can go out with him, there's no 
 harm in Albert. I'm on duty : just go for a turn with 
 him. Poke him up and see what he's after, and take him 
 into a sweetshop and bring back a box of chocolates ; 
 we'll share them together. Do you like chocolates ? Helen 
 asked, and, her eyes flashing, she stood looking at Joe, who, 
 thinking that her temper was rising, and wishing to quell 
 it, asked hurriedly where she was going to meet him. At 
 the comer, she answered. He's there already. Then be 
 off, he said, and his tone grated. You wouldn't like me 
 to keep him waiting.'* Helen said. Oh, dear no, not for 
 
994> 
 
 Joe, not for Joseph, if he knows it, the scuUion replied, 
 lilting the song. 
 
 Helen turned away, hoping that none of the maids 
 would peach upon her, and Albert's heart rejoiced at 
 seeing her on the other side of the street waiting for 
 the tram to go by before she crossed it. Were you 
 afraid I wasn't coming ? she asked, and Albert, not 
 being ready with words, answered shyly : not very. A 
 stupid answer this seemed to be to Helen, and it was 
 in the hope of shuffling out of a tiresome silence that 
 Albert asked her if she liked chocolates. Something 
 under the tooth will help the time away, was the answer 
 she got; and they went in search of a sweetmeat shop, 
 Albert thinking that a shilling or one and sixpence would 
 see her through it. But in a moment Helen's eyes were all 
 over the shop, and spying out quickly some large pictured 
 boxes, she asked Albert if she might have one, and it being 
 their first day out, Albert answered, yes ; but she could 
 not keep back the words : I'm afraid they'd cost a lot. 
 
 Helen's face blackened, and she shook up her 
 shoulders disdainfully, so frightening Albert that she 
 pressed a second box on Helen — one to pass the time 
 with, another to take home. To such a show of good will 
 Helen felt she must respond and her tongue rattled on 
 pleasantly as she walked, crunching the chocolates, two 
 between each lamp-post, Albert stinting herself to one, 
 which she sucked slowly, hardly enjoying it at all, so 
 worried was she by the loss of three and sixpence. As 
 if Helen guessed the cause of Albert's disquiet, she called 
 on her suitor to admire the damsel on the box, but Albert 
 could not disengage her thoughts sufficiently from Helen's 
 expensive tastes. If every walk were to cost three and 
 sixpence there wouldn't be a lot left for the home in 
 six months' time. And she fell to calculating how 
 much it would cost her if they were to walk out once 
 a week. Three fours are twelve and four sixpences are 
 
m 
 
 two shillings, fourteen shillings a month, twice that is 
 twenty-eight; twenty-eight shillings a month, that is 
 if Helen wanted two boxes a week. At this rate she'd 
 be spending sixteen pounds, sixteen shillings a year. 
 Lord amassy ! But perhaps Helen wouldn't want two 
 boxes of chocolates every time they went out to- 
 gether If she didn't, she'd want other things, and 
 
 catching sight of a jeweller's shop, Albert called Helen's 
 attention to a cyclist that had only just managed to 
 escape a tram car by a sudden wriggle. But Albert was 
 always unlucky. Helen had been wishing this long while 
 for a bicycle, and if she did not ask Albert to buy her 
 one it was because another jeweller's came into view. 
 She stopped to gaze, and for a moment Albert's heart 
 seemed to stand still, but Helen continued her choco- 
 lates, secure in her belief that the time had not yet come 
 for substantial presents. 
 
 At Sackville Street bridge she would have liked to 
 turn back, having little taste for the meaner parts of the 
 city, but Albert wished to show her the north side, and 
 she began to wonder what he could find to interest him 
 in these streets, and why he should stand in admiration 
 before all the small newspaper and tobacco shops, till she 
 remembered suddenly that he had invested his savings 
 in house property. Could these be his houses ? All his 
 own ? and, moved by this consideration, she gave a more 
 attentive ear to his account of the daily takings of these 
 shops. 
 
 Albert was a richer man than anybody believed him 
 to be, but he was a mean one. The idea of his thinking 
 twice about a box of chocolates ! I'll show him, and she 
 began to regret she had not stopped in front of a big 
 draper's shop in Sackville Street and asked him for a pair 
 of six-button gloves, and resolved to make amends for 
 her slackness, and ask Albert for a parasol the next 
 time they went out together. She needed one, and some 
 
296 
 
 shoes and stockings, and a silk kerchief would not be 
 amiss, and at the end of the third month of their court- 
 ship it seemed to her that the time had come for her to 
 speak of bangles, saying that for three pounds she could 
 have a pretty one — one that would be a real pleasure to 
 wear, it would always remind her of him. Albert coughed 
 up with humility, and she felt that she had "got him," as 
 she put it to herself, and afterwards to Joe Mackins. 
 
 So he parted easily, Joe remarked, and pushing Helen 
 aside he began to whip up the remoulade, that had begun 
 to show signs of turning, saying he'd have the chef after 
 him. But I say, old girl, since he's coughing up so easily 
 you might bring me something back ; and a briar-wood 
 pipe and a pound or two of tobacco seemed the least she 
 might obtain for him. And Helen answered that to get 
 these she would have to ask Albert for money. And why 
 shouldn't you? Joe returned. Ask him for a thin 'un, 
 and mayhap he'll give you a thick 'un. It's the first quid 
 that's hard to get ; every time after it is like shelling peas. 
 Do you think he's that far gone on me? Helen asked. 
 Well, don't you ? Why should he give you these things 
 if he wasn't ? Joe answered. 
 
 Helen fell to thinking, Joe asked her of what she was 
 thinking, and she replied that it was difficult to say : she 
 had walked out with many a man before but never with 
 one like Albert Nobbs. In what way is he different ? Joe 
 asked. Helen was perplexed in her telling of Albert 
 Nobbs' slackness. You mean that he doesn't pull you 
 about, Joe rapped out ; and she answered that there was 
 something of that in it. All the same, she continued, 
 that isn't the whole of it. I've been out before with 
 men that didn't pull me about, but he seems to have 
 something on his mind, and half the time he's thinking. 
 Well, what does it matter, Joe asked, so long as there 
 is coin in the pocket and so long as you have a hand to 
 pull it out? Helen didn't like this description of Albert 
 
mi 
 
 Nobbs' courtship, and the words rose to her lips to tell 
 Joseph that she didn't want to go out any more with 
 Albert, that she was tired of the job, but the words were 
 quelled on her lips by a remark from Joe. Next time 
 you go out with him work him up a bit and see what 
 he is made of; just see if there's a sting in him or if 
 he is no better than a capon. A capon ! And what is 
 a capon? she asked. A capon is a cut fowl. He may 
 be like one. She resolved to get at the truth of the 
 matter next time they went out together. It did seem 
 odd that he should be willing to buy presents and not 
 want to kiss her. In fact, it was more than odd. It 
 might be as Joe had said. I might as well go out with 
 my mother. Now what did it all mean ? Was it a blind } 
 
 Some other girl that he Not being able to concoct 
 
 a sufficiently reasonable story, Helen relinquished the 
 attempt, without, however, regaining control of her 
 temper, which had begun to rise, and which continued 
 to boil up in her and overflow till her swarthy face was 
 almost ugly. I'm beginning to feel ugly towards him, she 
 
 said to herself. He is either in love with me or he's 
 
 And trying to discover his purpose, she descended the 
 staircase, saying to herself: now Albert must know that 
 I'm partial to Joe Mackins. It can't be that he doesn't 
 suspect. Well, I'm damned. 
 
 CHAP. L. 
 
 BUT Helen's perplexity on leaving the hotel was no 
 greater than Albert's as she stood waiting by the kerb. 
 She knew that Helen carried on with Joe Mackins, 
 and she also knew that Joe Mackins had nothing to 
 offer Helen but himself. She even suspected that 
 some of the money she had given to Helen had gone 
 to purchase pipes and tobacco for Joe ; a certain shrewd- 
 
298 
 
 ness is not inconsistent with innocence, and it didn't 
 trouble her much that Helen was perhaps having her fling 
 with Joe Mackins. She didn't want Helen to fall into evil 
 ways, but it was better for her to have her fling before 
 than after marriage. On the other hand, a woman that 
 has been bedded might be dissatisfied to settle down with 
 another woman, though the home offered her was better 
 than any she could get from a man. She might hanker 
 after children, which was only natural, and Albert felt 
 that she would like a child as well as another. A child 
 might be arranged for if Helen wanted one, but it would 
 never do to have the father hanging about the shop : he 
 would have to be got rid of as soon as Helen was in the 
 family way. But could he be got rid of .^ Not very easily 
 if Joe Mackins was the father; she foresaw trouble and 
 would prefer another father, almost any other. But why 
 trouble herself about the father of Helen's child before 
 she knew whether Helen would send Joe packing, which 
 she'd have to do clearly if they were to wed — she and 
 Helen. Their wedding was what she had to look to, 
 whether she should confide her sex to Helen to-night 
 or wait. Why not to-night as well as to-morrow night .'* 
 she asked herself. But how was she to tell it to Helen } 
 Blurt it out — I've something to tell you, Helen. I'm 
 not a man, but a woman like yourself. No, that wouldn't 
 do. How did Hubert tell her wife she was a woman } 
 If she had only asked she'd have been spared all this 
 trouble. After hearing Hubert's story she should have 
 said : I've something to ask you, but sleep was so heavy 
 on their eyelids that they couldn't think any more and 
 both of them were falling asleep, which wasn't to be 
 wondered at, for they had been talking for hours. It was 
 on her mind to ask how her wife found out. Did Hubert 
 
 tell her or did the wife Albert's modesty prevented 
 
 her from pursuing the subject ; and she turned on herself, 
 saying that she could not leave Helen to find out she 
 
299 
 
 was a woman ; of that she was certain, and of that only. 
 She'd have to tell Helen that. But should the confession 
 come before they were married, or should she reserve it 
 for the wedding night in the bridal chamber on the edge 
 of the bed afterwards. If it were not for Helen's violent 
 
 temper And she fell to thinking : I in my nightshirt, 
 
 she in her nightgown. On the other hand, she might 
 quieten down after an outburst and begin to see that it 
 might be very much to her advantage to accept the situa- 
 tion, especially if a hope were held out to her of a child 
 by Joe Mackins in two years' time ; she'd have to agree to 
 wait till then, and in two years Joe would probably be 
 after another girl. But if she were to cut up rough and 
 do me an injury ! Helen might call the neighbours in, 
 or the policeman, who'd take them both to the station. 
 She'd have to return to Liverpool or to Manchester. She 
 didn't know what the penalty would be for marrying one 
 of her own sex. She'd have to catch the morning boat. 
 
 One of the advantages of Dublin is that one can get 
 out of it as easily as out of any other city. Steamers were 
 always leaving, morning and evening ; she didn't know 
 how many, but a great many. On the other hand, if she 
 took the straight course and confided her sex to Helen 
 before the marriage, Helen might promise not to tell ; 
 but she might break her promise ; life in Morrison's 
 Hotel would be unendurable, and she'd have to endure 
 it. What a hue and cry ! But one way was as bad as 
 the other. If she had only asked Hubert Page, but she 
 hadn't a thought at the time of going to do likewise. 
 What's one man's meat is another man's poison, and she 
 began to regret Hubert's confession to her. If it hadn't 
 been for that flea she wouldn't be in this mess ; and she 
 was deep in it ! Three months' company isn't a day, 
 and everybody in Morrison's Hotel asking whether she 
 or Joe Mackins would be the winner, urging her to 
 make haste else Joe would come with a rush at the 
 
300 
 
 finish. A lot of racing talk that she didn't understand — or 
 
 only half. If she could get out of this mess somehow 
 
 But it was too late. She must go through with it. But 
 how ? A different sort of girl altogether was needed, but 
 she liked Helen. Her way of standing on the doorstep, 
 her legs a little apart, jawing a tradesman, and she'd 
 stand up to Mrs Baker and to the chef himself. She 
 liked the way Helen's eyes lighted up when a thought 
 came into her mind; her cheery laugh warmed Albert's 
 heart as nothing else did. Before she met Helen she 
 often feared her heart was growing cold. She might 
 try the world over and not find one that would run the 
 shop she had in mind as well as Helen. But the shop 
 wouldn't wait, and at that moment she remembered the 
 letter she had received yesterday : the owners of the 
 shop would withdraw their offer if it was not accepted 
 before next Monday. 
 
 And to-day is Friday, Albert said to herself. This 
 evening or never. To-morrow she'll be on duty all day ; 
 on Sunday she'll contrive some excuse to get out to meet 
 Joe Mackins. After all, why not this evening? for what 
 must be had better be faced bravely ; and while the tram 
 rattled down the long street, Rathmines Avenue, past 
 the small houses atop of high steps, pretty boxes with 
 ornamental trees in the gardens, some with lawns, with 
 here and there a more substantial house set in the middle 
 of three or four fields at least, Albert meditated, plan 
 after plan rising up in her mind; and when the car 
 turned to the right and then to the left, and proceeded 
 at a steady pace up the long incline, Rathgar Avenue, 
 Albert's courage was again at ebb. All the subterfuges 
 she had woven — the long discussion in which she 
 would maintain that marriage should not be considered 
 as a sexual adventure, but a community o^ interests — 
 seemed to have lost all significance ; the points that had 
 seemed so convincing in Rathmines Avenue were for- 
 
801 
 
 gotten in Rathgar Avenue, and at Terenure she came to 
 the conclusion that there was no use trying to think the 
 story out beforehand ; she would have to adapt her ideas 
 to the chances that would arise as they talked under the 
 trees in the dusk in a comfortable hollow, where they 
 could lie at length out of hearing of the other lads and 
 lasses whom they would find along the banks, resting 
 after the labour of the day in dim contentment, vaguely 
 conscious of each other, satisfied with a vague remark, a 
 kick or a push. 
 
 It was the hope that the river's bank would tempt 
 him into confidence that had suggested to Helen that 
 they might spend the evening by the Dodder. Albert 
 had welcomed the suggestion, feeling sure that if there 
 was a place in the world that would make the telling of 
 her secret easy it was the banks of the Dodder; and 
 she was certain she would be able to speak it in the 
 hollow under the ilex-trees. But speech died from her 
 lips, and the silence round them seemed sinister and 
 foreboding. She seemed to dread the river flowing over 
 its muddy bottom, without ripple or eddy ; and she started 
 when Helen asked her of what she was thinking. Albert 
 answered : of you, dear ; and how pleasant it is to be 
 sitting with you. On these words the silence fell again, 
 and Albert tried to speak, but her tongue was too 
 thick in her mouth ; she felt like choking, and the 
 silence was not broken for some seconds, each seeming 
 a minute. At last a lad's voice was heard : I'll see 
 if you have any lace on your drawers; and the lass 
 answered : you sha'n't. There's a pair that's enjoy- 
 ing themselves, Helen said, and she looked upon the 
 remark as fortunate, and hoped it would give Albert 
 the courage to pursue his courtship. 
 
 Albert, too, looked upon the remark as fortunate, and she 
 tried to ask if there was lace on all women's drawers ; and 
 meditated a reply that would lead her into a confession of 
 
S02 
 
 her sex. But the words : it's so long since I've worn any, 
 died on her lips ; and instead of speaking these words she 
 spoke of the Dodjier, saying : what a pity it isn't nearer 
 Morrison's. Where would you have it ? Helen replied — 
 flowing down Sackville Street into the Liffey ? We should 
 be lying there as thick as herrings, without room to move, 
 or we should be unable to speak to each other without 
 being overheard. I dare say you are right, Albert an- 
 swered, and she was so frightened that she added : but 
 we have to be back at eleven o'clock, and it takes an hour 
 to get there. We can go back now if you like, Helen 
 rapped out. Albert apologised, and hoping that some- 
 thing would happen to help her out of her difficulty, 
 she began to represent Morrison's Hotel as being on the 
 whole advantageous to servants. But Helen did not 
 respond. She seems to be getting angry and angrier, 
 Albert said to herself, and she asked, almost in despair, 
 if the Dodder was pretty all the way down to the sea. 
 Helen, remembering a walk she had been with Joe, 
 answered : there are woods as far as Dartry — the Dartry 
 Dye Works, don't you know them ? But I don't think 
 there are any very pretty spots. You know Ring's End, 
 don't you ? Albert said he had been there once ; and 
 Helen spoke of a large three-masted vessel that she had 
 seen some Sundays ago by the quays. You were there 
 with Joe Mackins, weren't you ? Well, what if I was ? 
 Only this, Albert answered, that I don't think it is 
 usual for a girl to keep company with two chaps, and I 
 
 thought Now, what did you think ? she said. That 
 
 you didn't care for me well enough For what ? she 
 
 asked. You know we've been going out for three 
 months, and it doesn't seem natural to keep talking 
 always, never wanting to put your arm round a girl's 
 waist. I suppose Joe isn't like me then? Albert asked; 
 and she laughed, a scornful little laugh. But, Albert 
 went on, isn't the time for kissing when one is wedded? 
 
SOS 
 
 This is the first time you've said anything about marriage, 
 Helen rapped out. But I thought there had always been 
 an understanding between us, said Albert. It is only now 
 that I'm able to tell you what I have to offer you. The 
 words were well chosen, and the girl's anger at Albert's 
 neglect was lost sight of. Tell me about it, she said, 
 her eyes and voice revealing her cupidity to Albert, 
 who continued all the same to unfold her plans, losing 
 herself in details that bored Helen, whose thoughts 
 returned to the dilemma she was in — to refuse Albert's 
 offer or to break with Joe ; and that she should be 
 obliged to do either one or the other was a disappoint- 
 ment to her. All you say about the shop is right enough, 
 but it isn't a very great compliment to a girl. What, 
 to ask her to marry? Albert interjected. Well, no, 
 not if you haven't kissed her first. Don't speak so loud, 
 Albert whispered ; I'm sure that couple heard what you 
 said, for they went away laughing. I don't care whether 
 they laughed or cried, Helen answered. You don't want 
 to kiss me, do you ? and I don't want to marry a man who 
 isn't in love with me. But I do want to kiss you, and 
 Albert bent down and kissed Helen on both cheeks. 
 Now you can't say I haven't kissed you, can you ? You 
 don't call that kissing, do you ? she asked. But how do 
 you wish me to kiss you, Helen? Well, you are an 
 innocent, she said, and she kissed Albert vindictively. 
 Helen, leave go of me ; I'm not used to such kisses. 
 Because you're not in love, Helen replied. In love? 
 Albert repeated. I loved my old nurse very much, but I 
 never wished to kiss her like that. At this Helen ex- 
 ploded with laughter. So you put me in the same class 
 as your old nurse ! Well, after that ! Come, she said, 
 taking pity upon him for a moment, are you or are you 
 not in love with me ? I love you deeply, Helen, Albert 
 said. Love ? she repeated : the men who have walked 
 out with me were in love with me In love, Albert 
 
S04 
 
 repeated after her. I'm sure I love you. I like men to 
 be in love with me, she answered. But that's like an 
 animal, Helen. Whatever put all that muck in your 
 head ? I'm going home, she replied, and rose to her feet 
 and started out on the path leading across the darkening 
 fields. You're not angry with me, Helen ? Angry ? No, 
 I'm not angry with you ; you're a fool of a man, that's 
 all. But if you think me a fool of a man, why did you 
 come out this evening to sit under those trees .^ And 
 why have we been keeping company for the last three 
 months, Albert asked, going out together every week ? 
 You didn't always think me a fool of a man, did you ? 
 Yes, I did, she answered ; and Albert asked her for a 
 reason for choosing his company. Oh, you bother me 
 asking reasons for everything, Helen said. But why did 
 you make me love you? Albert continued. Well, if I 
 did, what of it? and as for walking out with you, you 
 won't have to complain of that any more. You don't 
 mean, Helen, that we are never going to walk out again ? 
 Yes, I do, she said sullenly. You mean that for the future 
 you'll be walking out with Joe Mackins, Albert lamented. 
 That's my business, she answered. By this time they 
 were by the stile at the end of the field, and in the next 
 field there was a hedge to get through and a wood, and 
 the little path they followed was full of such vivid re- 
 membrances that Albert could not believe that she was 
 treading it with Helen for the last time, and besought 
 her to take back the words that she would never walk out 
 with him again. 
 
 CHAP. LI. 
 
 THE tram was nearly empty and they sat at the far end, 
 close together, Albert beseeching her not to cast her off. 
 If I've been stupid to-day, Albert pleaded, it's because 
 
305 
 
 I'm tired of the work in the hotel ; I shall be different 
 when we get to Lisdoonvarna : we both want a change of 
 air ; there's nothing like the salt water and the cliffs of 
 Clare to put new spirits into a man. You will be different 
 and I'll be different ; everything will be different. Don't 
 say no, Helen ; don't say no. I've looked forward to this 
 week in Lisdoonvarna. But Helen could not hold out 
 hopes that she would go to Lisdoonvarna, and Albert urged 
 the expense of the lodgings he had already engaged. We 
 shall have to pay for the lodgings ; and there's the new 
 suit of clothes that has just come back from the tailor's; 
 I've looked forward to wearing it, walking with you in 
 the strand, the waves crashing up into cliffs, with green 
 fields among them, I've been told ! We shall see the 
 ships passing and wonder whither they are going. I've 
 bought three neckties and some new shirts, and what good 
 will these be to me if you'll not come to Lisdoonvarna 
 with me ? The lodgings will have to be paid for, a great 
 deal of money, for I said in my letter we shall want two 
 bedrooms. But there need only be one bedroom, but 
 perhaps I shouldn't have spoken like that. Oh, don't 
 talk to me about Lisdoonvarna, Helen answered. I'm 
 not going to Lisdoonvarna with you. But what is to be- 
 come of the hat I've ordered for you ? Albert asked ; the 
 hat with the big feather in it ; and I've bought stockings 
 and shoes for you. Tell me, what shall I do with these, 
 and with the gloves ? Oh, the waste of money and the 
 heart-breaking ! What shall I do with the hat ? Albert 
 repeated. Helen didn't answer at once. Presently she 
 said : you can leave the hat with me. And the stockings ? 
 Albert asked. Yes, you can leave the stockings. And 
 the shoes ? Yes, you can leave the shoes too. Yet you 
 won't go to Lisdoonvarna with me ? No, she said, I'll 
 not go to Lisdoonvarna with you. But you'll take the 
 presents ? It was to please you I said I would take 
 them, because I thought it would be some satisfaction 
 u 
 
306 
 
 to you to know that they wouldn't be wasted. Not 
 wasted ? Albert repeated. You'll wear them when you go 
 out with Joe Mackins. Oh, well, keep your presents. 
 And then the dispute took a different turn, and was 
 continued till they stepped out of the tram at the top of 
 Dawson Street. Albert continued to plead all the way 
 down Dawson Street, and when they were within twenty 
 yards of the hotel, and she saw Helen passing away from 
 her for ever into the arms of Joe Mackins, she begged her 
 not to leave her. We cannot part like this, she cried ; let 
 us walk up and down the street from Nassau Street to 
 Clare Street, so that we may talk things over and do 
 nothing foolish. You see, Albert began, I had set my 
 heart on driving on an outside car to the Broadstone with 
 you, and catching a train, and the train going into lovely 
 country, arriving at a place we had never seen, with cliffs, 
 and the sunset behind the cliffs. You've told all that 
 before, Helen said, and, she rapped out, I'm not going to 
 Lisdoonvarna with you. And if that is all you had to say 
 to me we might have gone into the hotel. But there's 
 much more, Helen. I haven't told you about the shop 
 yet. Yes, you have told me all there is to tell about the 
 shop ; you've been talking about that shop for the last 
 three months. But, Helen, it was only yesterday that I 
 got a letter saying that they had had another offer for the 
 shop and that they could give me only till Monday morn- 
 ing to close with them ; if the lease isn't signed by then 
 we've lost the shop. But do you think, Helen asked, 
 that the shop will be a success? Many shops promise 
 well in the beginning and fade away till they don't get a 
 customer a day. 
 
 Albert welcomed this show of interest in her project 
 and, hoping to turn Helen's thoughts from Joe Mackins, 
 she began an appraisement of the shop's situation and 
 the custom it commanded in the neighbourhood and the 
 possibility of developing that custom. We shall be able 
 
807 
 
 to make a great success of that shop, and people will be 
 coming to see us, and they will be having tea with us in 
 the parlour, and they'll envy us, saying that never have 
 two people had such luck as we have had. And our 
 
 wedding will be Will be what ? Helen asked. Will 
 
 be a great wonder. A great wonder, indeed, she replied, 
 but I'm not going to wed you, Albert Nobbs, and now 1 
 see it's beginning to rain. I can't remain out any longer. 
 You're thinking of your hat ; I'll buy another. We may as 
 well say good-bye, she answered, and Albert saw her going 
 towards the doorway. She'll see Joe Mackins before she 
 goes to her bed, and lie dreaming of him ; and I shall lie 
 awake in my bed, my thoughts flying to and fro the live- 
 long night, zigzagging up and down like bats. 
 
 And then, remembering that if she went into the hotel 
 she might meet Helen and Joe Mackins, she rushed on 
 with a hope in her mind that after a long walk round 
 Dublin she might sleep. 
 
 CHAP. LII. 
 
 AT the corner of Clare Street, she met two women 
 strolling after a fare — ten shillings or a sovereign, which ? 
 she asked herself — and, terrified by the shipwreck of all 
 her hopes, she wished that she were one of them. They 
 
 at least are women, whereas I am but a perhapser 
 
 In the midst of her grief a wish to speak to them took 
 hold of her. But if I speak to them they'll expect 
 me to 
 
 All the same her steps quickened, and as she passed the 
 two street-walkers she looked round, and one woman, 
 wishing to attract her attention, said ; it was almost a love 
 dream. 
 
 Almost a love dream? Albert repeated. What are 
 you two women talking about? and the woman next to 
 
808 
 
 Albert said : my friend here was telling me of a dream 
 she had last night. A dream, and what was her dream 
 about? Albert asked. Annie was telling me that she 
 was better than a love dream, now do you think she is, 
 sir? I'll ask Annie herself, Albert replied, and Annie 
 answered him : a shade. Only a shade, Albert returned, 
 and they crossed the street together. 
 
 At the corner of Merrion Square a gallant presented 
 himself; he attached himself to Annie's companion, and 
 Albert and Annie were left together. 
 
 You haven't told me your name, Albert said, in 
 a sudden inspiration. My name is Kitty MacCan, the 
 girl replied. It's odd we've never met before, Albert 
 replied, hardly knowing what she was saying. We're not 
 often this way, was the answer. And where do you walk 
 usually — of an evening ? Albert asked. In Grafton Street 
 or down by College Green ; sometimes we cross the river. 
 To walk in Sackville Street, Albert interjected; and 
 he tried to lead the woman into a story of her life. But 
 you're not one of them, she said, that think that we 
 should wash clothes in a nunnery for nothing? Oh no, 
 Albert answered. I'm a waiter in Morrison's Hotel, and, 
 much relieved, the woman began to talk more freely. 
 As soon as the name of Morrison's Hotel passed Albert's 
 lips she began to regret having spoken about herself. 
 But what did it matter now ? and the woman didn't seem 
 to have taken heed of the name of the hotel. Is the 
 money good in your hotel? she asked; I've heard that 
 you get as much as half-a-crown for carrying up a cup 
 of tea, and Kitty's story dribbled out in remarks, a simple 
 story that Albert tried to listen to, but her attention 
 wandered, and Kitty, who was not unintelligent, began 
 to guess Albert to be in the middle of some great grief. 
 It doesn't matter about me, Albert answered her, and 
 Annie being a kind girl said to herself: if I can get him 
 to comg Jjoifte with me I'll help him out of his sorrow, if 
 
309 
 
 only for a little while. So she continued to try to interest 
 him in herself till they came to Fitzwilliam Place ; and it 
 was not till then that Annie remembered she had only 
 three and sixpence left out of the last money she had 
 received, and that her rent would be due on the morrow. 
 She daren't return home without a gentleman, her landlady 
 would be at her, and the best time of the night was going 
 by talking to a man who seemed like one who would bid 
 her a curt good-night at the door of his hotel. Where 
 did he say his hotel was? she asked herself; and then, 
 aloud, she said : you're a waiter, aren't you ? I've forgotten 
 which hotel you said. Albert didn't answer, and, troubled 
 by her companion's silence, she continued : I'm afraid I'm 
 taking you out of your way. No, you aren't ; all ways are 
 the same to me. Well, they aren't to me, she replied. I 
 must get some money to-night. I'll give you some money, 
 Albert said. But won't you come home with me? the girl 
 asked. Albert hesitated, tempted by her company. But 
 if they were to go home together her sex would be dis- 
 covered. But what did it matter if it were discovered? 
 Albert asked herself, and the temptation came again to 
 go home with this woman, to lie in her arms and tell 
 the story that had been locked up so many years. They 
 could both have a good cry together, and what matter 
 would it be to the woman as long as she got the money 
 she desired. She didn't want a man ; it was money she 
 was after, money that meant bread and board to her. 
 She seems a kind, nice girl, Albert said, and he was about 
 to risk the adventure when a man came by whom Kitty 
 knew. Excuse me, she said, and Albert saw them walk 
 away together. I'm sorry, said the woman, returning, 
 but I've just met an old friend ; another evening, perhaps. 
 Albert would have liked to put her hand in her pocket 
 and pay the woman with some silver for her company, 
 but she was already half-way back to her friend, who 
 stood waiting for her by the lamp-post. The street- 
 
310 
 
 walkers have friends, and when they meet them their 
 troubles are over for the night; but my chances have 
 gone by me ; and, checking herself in the midst of the 
 irrelevant question, whether it were better to be casual, 
 as they were, or to have a husband that you could not 
 get rid of, she plunged into her own grief, and walked 
 sobbing through street after street, taking no heed of 
 where she was going. 
 
 CHAP. LIII. 
 
 YOU can see the poor creature. Alec, walking through the 
 city back and forth, crossing the bridges, any whither, no 
 whither, distracted by grief, till at last fatigue brought 
 her to the door of Morrison's Hotel. 
 
 Why, lord, Mr Nobbs, whatever has kept you out 
 until this hour? the hall porter muttered. I'm sorry, she 
 answered, and while stumbling up the stairs she remem- 
 bered that even a guest was not received very amiably by 
 the hall porter after two ; and for a servant to come in at 
 that time ! Her thoughts broke off and she lay too tired 
 to think any more of the hall porter, of herself, of any- 
 thing ; and when the time came for her to go to her work 
 she rose indifferently. 
 
 Her work saved her from thinking, and it was not until 
 the middle of the afternoon, when the luncheon-tables had 
 been cleared, that the desire to see and to speak to Helen 
 could not be put aside ; but Helen's face wore an ugly, 
 forbidding look, and Albert returned to the second floor 
 without speaking to her. It was not long after that 
 34 rang his bell, and Albert hoped to get an order 
 that would send her to the kitchen. Are you going to 
 pass me by without speaking again, Helen ? We talked 
 enough last night, Helen retorted ; there's nothing more 
 to say, and Joe, in such disorder of dress as behooves a 
 
511 
 
 scullion, giggled as he went past, carrying a huge pile of 
 plates. I loved my old nurse, but I never thought of 
 kissing her like that, he said, turning on his heel and so 
 suddenly that some of the plates fell with a great clatter. 
 The ill luck that had befallen him seemed well deserved, 
 and Albert returned upstairs and sat in the passages 
 waiting for the sitting-rooms to ring their bells ; and the 
 housemaids, as they came about the head of the stairs 
 with their dusters, wondered how it was that they could 
 not get any intelligible conversation out of the love- 
 stricken waiter. Her lovelorn appearance checked their 
 mirth, pity entered their hearts, and they kept back the 
 words : I loved my old nurse, etc. 
 
 After all, he loves the girl, one said to the other, and a 
 moment after, they were joined by another housemaid, who, 
 after listening for a while, went away, saying : there's no 
 torment like the love torment ; and the three housemaids, 
 Mary, Alice and Dorothy, offered Albert their sympathy, 
 trying to lead her into little talks with a view to with- 
 drawing her from the contemplation of her own grief, for 
 women are always moved by a love story. Before long 
 their temper turned against Helen, and they often went 
 by asking themselves why she should have kept company 
 with Albert all these months if she didn't mean to 
 wed him. 
 
 No wonder the poor man was disappointed. He is 
 destroyed with his grief, said one ; look at him, without 
 any more colour in his face than is in my duster. 
 Another said : he doesn't swallow a bit of food. And the 
 third said : I poured out a glass of wine for him that was 
 left over, but he put it away. Isn't love awful ? But 
 what can he see in her ? another asked, a stumpy, swarthy 
 woman, a little blackthorn bush and as full of prickles ; 
 and the three women fell to thinking that Albert would 
 have done better to have chosen one of them. 
 
 The shop entered into the discussion soon after, and 
 
312 
 
 everybody was of opinion that Helen would live to regret 
 her cruelty. The word cruelty did not satisfy ; treachery 
 was mentioned, and somebody said that Helen's face was 
 full of treachery. Albert will never recover himself as long 
 as she's here, another remarked. He'll just waste away 
 unless Miss Right comes along. He put all his eggs into 
 one basket, a man said ; you see he'd never been known to 
 walk out with a girl before. And what age do you think 
 he is ? I put him down at forty-five, and when love takes a 
 man at that age it takes him badly. This is no calf love, 
 the man said, looking into the women's faces, and you'll 
 never be able to mend matters any of you ; and they all 
 declared they didn't wish to, and dispersed in different 
 directions, flicking their dusters and asking themselves if 
 Albert would ever look at another woman. 
 
 It was felt generally that he would not have the 
 courage to try again, which was indeed the case, for when 
 it was suggested to Albert that a faint heart never wins 
 a fair lady she answered that her spirit was broken. I 
 shall boil my pot and carry my can, but the spring is 
 broken in me, and it was these words that were re- 
 membered and pondered, whereas the joke — I loved 
 my old nurse, etc. —raised no laugh ; and the sympathy 
 that Albert felt to be gathering about her cheered her 
 on her way. She was no longer friendless ; almost any 
 one of the women in the hotel would have married 
 Albert out of pity for her. But there was no heart in 
 Albert for another adventure ; nor any thought in her for 
 anything but her work. She rose every morning and 
 went forth to her work, and was sorry when her work was 
 done, for she had come to dread every interval, knowing 
 that as soon as she sat down to rest the old torment would 
 begin again. Once more she would begin to think that 
 she had nothing more to look forward to : that her life 
 would be but a round of work ; a sort of treadmill. She 
 would never see Lisdoonvarna, and the shop with two 
 
313 
 
 counters, one at which tobacco, cigarettes and matches 
 were sold, and at the other counter all kinds of sweet- 
 stuffs. Like Lisdoonvarna, it had passed away, it had only 
 existed in her mind — a thought, a dream. Yet it had 
 possessed her completely ; and the parlour behind the 
 shop that she had furnished and refurnished, hanging a 
 round mirror above the mantelpiece,/ papering the walls 
 with a pretty colourful paper that she had seen in 
 Wicklow Street and had asked the man to put aside for 
 her. She had hung curtains about the windows in her 
 imagination, and had set two arm-chairs on either side 
 of the hearth, one in green and one in red velvet, for her- 
 self and Helen. The parlour too had passed away like 
 Lisdoonvarna, like the shop, a thought, a dream, no more. 
 There had never been anything in her life but a few 
 dreams, and henceforth there would be not even dreams. 
 It was strange that some people came into the world 
 lucky, and others, for no reason, unlucky ; she had been 
 unlucky from her birth ; she was a bastard ; her parents 
 were grand people whose name she did not know, who 
 paid her nurse a hundred a year to keep her, and who 
 died without making any provision for her. She and her 
 old nurse had to go and live in Temple Lane, and to go 
 out charing every morning; Mr Congreve had a French 
 mistress, and if it had not been for Bessie Lawrence she 
 might have thrown herself in the Thames : she was very 
 near to it that night, and if she had drowned herself all 
 this worry and torment would have been over. She was 
 more resolute in those days than she was now, and would 
 have faced the river, but she shrank from this Dublin 
 river, perhaps because it was not her own river. If one 
 wishes to drown oneself it had better be in one's own 
 country. It is a mistake, she said, to settle in a foreign 
 country. But why is it a mistake ? for a perhapser like 
 herself, all countries were the same ; go or stay, it didn't 
 matter. Yes, it did ; she stayed in Dublin in the hope 
 
S14 
 
 that Hubert Page would return to the hotel. Only to 
 him could she confide the misfortune that had befallen 
 her, and she'd like to tell somebody. The three might 
 set up together. A happy family they might make. Two 
 women in men's clothes and one in petticoats. If Hubert 
 were willing. But Hubert's wife might not be willing. 
 If Hubert's wife were dead ! Ah ! She had never been 
 so long away before. But she would return, and Albert 
 pondered that her own prospects of being allowed to go 
 and live with somebody depended upon the money she 
 could show. 
 
 And from that moment her life expended itself in 
 watching for tips, collecting half-crowns, crowns and half- 
 sovereigns. She felt that she must at least replace the 
 money that she had spent giving presents to Helen — and 
 as the months went by and the years, she remembered, 
 with increasing bitterness, that she had wasted nearly 
 twenty pounds — on Helen — a cruel, heartless girl that had 
 come into her life for three months and had left her for 
 Joe Mackins, and Albert thanked God that they were now 
 away in London. 
 
 She took to counting her money in her room at night. 
 The half-crowns were folded up in brown-paper packets, 
 the half-sovereigns in blue, the rare sovereigns were in 
 pink paper and all these little packets were hidden away 
 in different corners ; some were put in the chimney, some 
 under the carpet. She often thought that these hoards 
 would be safer in the Post Office Bank, but she who has 
 nothing else likes to have her money with her, and a sense 
 of almost happiness awoke in her when she discovered 
 herself to be again as rich as she was before she met 
 Helen. 
 
 It was found necessary to remove a plank from the floor ; 
 one behind the bed was chosen, and henceforth Albert 
 slept securely over her hoard, or lay awake thinking of 
 Hubert, who might return, and to whom she might confide 
 
315 
 
 the story of her misadventure ; but as Hubert did not 
 return her wish to see him faded, and she began to think 
 that it might be just as well if he stayed away, for, who 
 knows? a wandering fellow like ftim might easily run out 
 of his money and return to Morrison's Hotel to borrow 
 from her, and she wasn't going to give her money to be 
 spent for the benefit of another woman. The other 
 woman was Hubert's wife. If Hubert came back he might 
 threaten to publish her secret if she didn't give him money 
 to keep it. An ugly thought, of which she was ashamed 
 and which she tried to keep out of her mind. But as 
 time went on a dread of Hubert took possession of her. 
 After all, Hubert knew her secret, and somehow it didn't 
 occur to her that in betraying her secret Hubert would be 
 betraying his own. Albert didn't think as clearly as she 
 used to ; and one day she answered Mrs Baker in a manner 
 that Mrs Baker did not like. Whilst speaking to Albert 
 the thought crossed Mrs Baker's mind that it was a long 
 while since they had seen the painter. I cannot think, 
 she said, what has become of Hubert Page ; we've not had 
 news of him for a long time ; have you heard from him, 
 Albert ? Why should you think, ma'am, that I hear from 
 him ? I only asked, Mrs Baker replied, and she heard 
 Albert mumbling something about a wandering fellow, 
 and the tone in which the words were spoken was dis- 
 respectful, and Mrs Baker began to consider Albert ; and 
 though a better servant now than he had ever been in 
 some respects, he had developed a fault which she didn't 
 like, a way of hanging round the visitor as he was 
 preparing to leave the hotel that almost amounted to 
 persecution. Worse than that, a rumour had reached 
 her that Albert's service was measured according to the 
 tip he expected to receive. She didn't believe it, but if 
 it were true she would not hesitate to have him out of the 
 hotel in spite of the many years he had spent with them. 
 Another thing : Albert was liked, but not by everybody. 
 
Sl6 
 
 The little red-headed boy on the second floor told me, 
 Mrs Baker said (her thoughts returning to last Sunday, 
 when she had taken the child out to Bray) that he was 
 afraid of Albert, and he confided to me that Albert had 
 tried to pick him up and kiss him. Why can't he leave 
 the child alone ? Can't he see the child doesn't like 
 him ? 
 
 But the Bakers were kind-hearted proprietors, and could 
 not keep sentiment out of their business, and Albert 
 remained at Morrison's Hotel till she died. 
 
 An easy death I hope it was, your honour, for if any 
 poor creature deserved an easy one it was Albert herself. 
 You think so. Alec, meaning that the disappointed man 
 suffers less at parting with this world than the happy one ? 
 Maybe you're right. That is as it may be, your honour, 
 he answered, and I told him that Albert awoke one 
 morning hardly able to breathe, and returned to bed and 
 lay there almost speechless till the maidservant came to 
 make the bed. She ran off again to fetch a cup of tea, 
 and after sipping it Albert said that she felt better. 
 But she never roused completely, and the maidservant 
 who came up in the evening with a bowl of soup did 
 not press her to try to eat it, for it was plain that Albert 
 could not eat or drink, and it was almost plain that she 
 was dying, but the maidservant did not like to alarm 
 the hotel and contented herself with saying : he'd 
 better see the doctor to-morrow. She was up be- 
 times in the morning and on going to Albert's room 
 she found the waiter asleep, breathing heavily. An hour 
 later Albert was dead, and everybody was asking how 
 a man who was in good health on Tuesday could be a 
 corpse on Thursday morning, as if such a thing had never 
 happened before. However often it had happened, it 
 did not seem natural, and it was whispered that Albert 
 might have made away with himself. Some spoke of 
 apoplexy, but apoplexy in a long, thin man is not usual ; 
 
S17 
 
 and when the doctor came down his report that Albert 
 was a woman put all thought of the cause of death 
 out of everybody's mind. Never before or since was 
 Morrison's Hotel agog as it was that morning, every- 
 body asking the other why Albert had chosen to pass 
 herself off as a man, and how she had succeeded in 
 doing this year after year without any one of them 
 suspecting her. She would be getting better wages as 
 a man than as a woman, somebody said, but nobody 
 cared to discuss the wages question ; all knew that a 
 man is better paid than a woman. But what Albert 
 would have done with Helen if Helen hadn't gone 
 off with Joe Mackins stirred everybody's imagination. 
 What would have happened on the wedding night.? 
 Nothing, of course ; but how would she have let on ? 
 The men giggled over their glasses, and the women 
 pondered over their cups of tea; the men asked the 
 women and the women asked the men, and the interest 
 in the subject had not quite died down when Hubert 
 Page returned to Morrison's Hotel, in the spring of the 
 year, with her paint pots and brushes. How is Albert 
 Nobbs? was one of her first inquiries, and it fired the 
 train. Albert Nobbs ! Don't you know } How should 
 I know? Hubert Page replied. I've only just come back 
 to Dublin. What is there to know ? Don't you ever 
 read the papers .^^ Read the papers? Hubert repeated. 
 Then you haven't heard that Albert Nobbs is dead ? 
 No, I hadn't heard of it. I'm sorry for him, but after 
 all, men die ; there's nothing wonderful in that, is there ? 
 No; but if you had read the papers you'd have learnt 
 that Albert Nobbs wasn't a man at all. Albert Nobbs 
 was a woman. Albert Nobbs a woman ! Hubert replied, 
 putting as much surprise as she could into her voice. 
 So you never heard ? And the story began to pour out 
 from different sides, everybody striving to communicate 
 it to her, until at last she said : if you all speak 
 
318 
 
 together, I shall never understand it. Albert Nobbs a 
 woman ! A woman as much as you're a man, was the 
 answer, and the story of her courtship with Helen, and 
 Helen's preference for Joe Mackins and Albert's grief at 
 Helen's treatment of him trickled into a long relation. 
 The biggest deception in the whole world, a scullion 
 cried from his saucepans. Whatever would she have 
 done with Helen if they had married ? But the question 
 had been asked so often that it fell flat. So Helen 
 went away with Joe Mackins ? Hubert said. Yes ; and 
 they don't seem to get on over well together. Serve her 
 right for her unkindness, cried a kitchen-maid. But after 
 all, you wouldn't want her to marry a woman ? a scullion 
 answered. Of course not ; of course not. The story was 
 taken up by another voice, and the hundreds of pounds 
 that Albert had left behind in many securities were 
 multiplied ; nearly a hundred in ready money rolled up 
 in paper, half-crowns, half-sovereigns and sovereigns in 
 his bedroom ; his bedroom — her bedroom, I mean ; but 
 we're so used to thinking of her as a him that we find it 
 difficult to say her; we're always catching each other 
 up. But what I'm thinking of, said a waiter, is the waste 
 of all that money. A great scoop it was for the Govern- 
 ment, eight hundred pounds. The pair were to have 
 bought a shop and lived together, Mr Page, Annie Watts 
 rapped out, and when the discussion was carried from the 
 kitchen upstairs to the secoiyi floor : true for you, said 
 Dorothy, now you mention it, I remember, it's you that 
 should be knowing better than anybody else, Mr Page, 
 what Albert's sex was like. Didn't you sleep with her ? 
 I fell asleep the moment my head was on the pillow. Page 
 answered, for if you remember rightly I was that tired 
 Mrs Baker hadn't the heart to turn me out of the hotel. 
 I'd been working ten, twelve, fourteen hours a day, and 
 when he took me up to his room I just tore off" my clothes 
 and fell asleep and went away in the morning before he 
 
819 
 
 was awake. Isn't it wonderful ? A woman, Hubert con- 
 tinued, and a minx in the bargain, and an artful minx if 
 ever there was one in the world, and there have been a 
 good many. And now, ladies, I must be about my work. 
 I wonder what Annie Watts was thinking of when she 
 stood looking into my eyes ; does she suspect me ? Hubert 
 asked herself as she sat on her derrick. And what a piece 
 of bad luck that I shouldn't have found him alive when I 
 returned to Dublin. 
 
 You see, Alec, this is how it was. Polly, that was 
 Hubert's wife, died six months before Albert ; and Hubert 
 had been thinking ever since of going into partnership with 
 Albert. In fact Hubert had been thinking about a shop, 
 like Albert, saying to herself almost every day after the 
 death of her wife : Albert and I might set up together. 
 But it was not until she lay in bed that she fell to think- 
 ing the matter out, saying to herself : one of us would have 
 had to give up our job to attend to it. The shop was 
 Albert's idea more than mine, so perhaps she'd have given 
 up waiting, which would not have suited me, for I'm tired 
 of going up these ladders. My head isn't altogether as 
 steady as it used to be ; swinging about on a derrick isn't 
 suited to women. So perhaps it's as well that things 
 have fallen out as they have. Hubert turned herself 
 over, but sleep was far from her, and she lay a long 
 time thinking of everything and of nothing in particular, 
 as we all do in our beds, with this thought often upper- 
 most : I wonder what is going to be the end of my life. 
 What new chance do the years hold for me ? 
 
 And of what would Hubert be thinking, and she a 
 married woman ? Of what else should she be thinking but 
 of her husband, who might now be a different man from 
 the one she left behind. Fifteen years, she said, makes 
 a great difference in all of us, and perhaps it was the 
 words, fifteen years, that put the children she had left 
 behind her back into her thought. I wouldn't be saying 
 
S20 
 
 that she hadn't been thinking of them, off and on, in the 
 years gone by, but the thought of them was never such a 
 piercing thought as it was that night. She'd have liked 
 to have jumped out of her bed and run away to them ; and 
 perhaps she would have done if she only knew where they 
 were. But she didn't, so she had to keep to her bed ; 
 and she lay for an hour or more thinking of them as little 
 children, and wondering what they were like now. Lily 
 was five when she left home. She's a young woman, 
 now. Agnes was only two. She is now seventeen, still 
 a girl, Hubert said to herself; but Lily's looking 
 round, thinking of young men, and the other won't 
 be delaying much longer, for young women are much 
 more wide-awake than they used to be in the old 
 days. The rest of my life belongs to them. Their father 
 couid have looked after them till now ; but now they 
 are thinking of young men he won't be able to cope with 
 them, and maybe he's wanting me too. Bill is forty, and 
 at forty we begin to think of them as we knew them long 
 ago. He must have often thought of me, perhaps oftener 
 than I thought of him, and she was surprised to find that 
 she had forgotten all Bill's ill usage, and remembered 
 only the good time she had had with him. The rest of 
 my life belongs to him, she said, and to the girls. But 
 how am I to get back to him ? how, indeed .'*... Bill may 
 be dead ; the children too. But that isn't likely. I must 
 get news of them somehow. The house is there, and lying 
 in the darkness she recalled the pictures on the wall, the 
 chairs that she had sat in, the coverlets on the beds, 
 everything. Bill isn't a wanderer, she said ; I'll find him 
 in the same house if he isn't dead. And the children ? 
 Did they know anything about her.^ Had Bill spoken 
 ill to them of her ? She didn't think he would do that. 
 But did they want to see her.'' Well, she could never 
 find that out except by going to see. But how was she 
 going to return home? Pack up her things and go 
 
321 
 
 dressed as a man to the house and, meeting Bill on the 
 threshold, say : don't you know me. Bill ? and are you glad 
 to see your mother back, children ? No ; that wouldn't 
 do. She must return home as a woman, and none of 
 them must know the life she had been living. But what 
 story would she tell him ? It would be difficult to tell the 
 story of fifteen years, for fifteen years is a long time, and 
 sooner or later they'd find out she was lying, for they 
 would keep asking her questions. 
 
 But sure, said Alec, 'tis an easy story to tell. Well, 
 Alec, what story should she tell them ? In these parts. 
 Alec said, a woman who left her husband and returned 
 to him after fifteen years would say she was taken away 
 by the fairies whilst wandering in a wood. Do you think 
 she'd be believed ? Why shouldn't she, your honour ? 
 A woman that marries another woman, and lives happily 
 with her, isn't a natural woman ; there must be something 
 of the fairy in her. But I could see it all happening as 
 you told it, the maidservants and the serving-men going 
 their own roads, and the only fault I've to find with the 
 story is that you left out some of the best parts. I'd have 
 liked to know what the husband said when she went back 
 to him, and they separated all the years. If he liked her 
 better than he did before, or less. And there's a fine 
 story in the way the mother would be vexed by the two 
 daughters and the husband, and they at her all the time 
 with questions, and she hard set to find answers for them. 
 But mayhap the best bit of all is when Albert began to 
 think that it wouldn't do to have Joe Mackins hanging 
 round, making their home his own, eating and drinking 
 of the best, and when there was a quarrel he'd have a fine 
 threat over them, as good as the Murrigan herself when 
 she makes off of a night to the fair, whirling herself over 
 the people's heads, stirring them up agin each other, 
 making cakes of their skulls. I'm bet, fairly bet, crowed 
 down by the Ballinrobe cock. And now, your honour, 
 
 X 
 
322 
 
 you heard the Angelus ringing, and my dinner is on the 
 hob, but I'll be telling you what I think of the story 
 when I come back ; but I'm thinking already 'tis the 
 finest that ever came out of Ballinrobe, I am so. 
 
 CHAP. LIV. 
 
 ONE day Alec said, breaking a long silence : 'tis proud 
 of you they must be London for the great shanachie that 
 you are ; the greatest in all the world, I'm thinking. But 
 maybe, he continued, interpreting my silence as a con- 
 fession that London had not done justice to whatever 
 small talent may be mine, they are passing you over for 
 the bitter jealousy there is in England always of every- 
 thing that comes out of old Ireland. And didn't they 
 strip us of our lands and our laws, of our own language 
 itself? and aren't all the old houses being emptied now 
 of the fine furniture we made in Dublin ? and the pictures, 
 and the silver spoons and dishes, all our handiwork, sold 
 in London, bad cess to them ? And aren't they still at the 
 same old scheming, ferreting out our old stories, turning 
 them all into rags and tatters, for not understanding the 
 significance of anything in them. Isn't it the truth I'm 
 telling your honour ? 
 
 Before I could answer him. Alec began again : but 
 you're a Mayo man like myself, and if you should think 
 it worth your while to be writing out any of the stories 
 I've been telling you, it is meself that will be the proud 
 man, for it won't be taking back a pailful of potato skins 
 you will be doing like the lady in Galway, but fine spuds 
 in which there is a rich diet. Faith and troth that is why 
 I have opened my mind to you, for I wouldn't have our old 
 stories betrayed and destroyed any longer than I can help 
 it. 'Tis the nature of stories to be travelling ; always 
 footing it one way or the other. So 'tis no use trying to 
 
ms 
 
 keep them to ourselves, I know that, but I would like them 
 to appear in their emigrations clean and tidy, just that, so 
 that they may see over yonder that we have a shanachie 
 as good or better than their own. The stories you have 
 told me, I said, are the gift of the shanachie of Westport 
 to the shanachie of Ballinrobe. If your honour likes to 
 think of it in that way, he answered, 'tis a great honour 
 you're doing me by comparing me with yourself. Com- 
 paring myself with yourself? I rapped out. Why, Alec, we 
 have been telling stories one against the other, and the 
 best of the bunch is " The Nuns of Crith Gaille " • and by 
 far. We will never be agreed about that, your honour. 
 Well, more is the pity, I replied, and if we aren't agreed 
 among ourselves I don't know how it is to be settled 
 unless we ring the chapel bell and call a meeting with the 
 priest in the chair. 
 
 At the word priest Alec's face turned grave, and it came 
 into my mind that I was just about to lose the original 
 Alec which it had taken me a fortnight to evoke. It 
 wouldn't be fair, I said, for me to tell stories against you 
 in your own parish, and the words had no sooner passed 
 my lips than I regretted them. We should do well not to 
 be talking about the priest at all. Alec said, for the clergy 
 do not take kindly to hearing stories told against them- 
 selves, even if they be in the years back. And not 
 another word could I get from him. He sat, as it 
 were, frozen in his meditations, and was not roused out 
 of them till at last I said : there have been great shanachies 
 in this world. Alec ; greater than we. Now do you think 
 there were any greater than yourself, your honour .'* I do, 
 indeed. Alec, though I admire " The Nuns of Crith Gaille " 
 more than any of my own stories. You'll be turning my 
 head if you say any more about that story, he answered, 
 and he asked me who were the world's great shanachies. 
 Had I shaken hands with any of them ? With one, I have. 
 An Englishman ? Alec interjected, No, Alec, The 
 
824 
 
 Englishman, to my thinking, isn't a story-teller at all. He 
 tells of parsons and croquet lawns, and is home-sick when 
 he leaves them. He tells a tea-party well enough, and 
 has a quick eye to spy out the difference between one 
 woman's talk and another; whether she visits the big 
 houses and if she has the talk of the gentry tripping on 
 her tongue. But there is no diet in the Englishman's 
 stories, if I may borrow one of your own expressive 
 phrases. But there was a great shanachie over in France 
 in the years back. Was there now? Alec interjected. 
 There has been one, troth and faith, I answered, one that 
 overtops all the others, wherever you may go looking for 
 them. Now, your honour. Alec cried, you will be delight- 
 ing me, begob you will, by telling me something about the 
 great shanachie. Balzac, I said. But no sooner was the 
 name out of my mouth than I began to regret having 
 mentioned him, for it is difficult to pick a story out of the 
 great Human Comedy that would appeal to an imaginative 
 uneducated fellow and of all something that could be 
 related on a June morning in a sunny wood by an old 
 deserted mill. 
 
 But Alec was intent to hear one of Balzac's stories from 
 me, and as an earnest of Balzac's originality I began to 
 tell a half-remembered, half-forgotten story of a son that 
 acted as executioner to his family, striking off their heads, 
 one after the other ; besought. Alec, by every one of them 
 to be brave and to strike firmly and straight. You must 
 know that it fell out in Spain, when the Spaniards who 
 had been conquered by the French were conspiring to rid 
 themselves of their conquerors, and to do this it behoved 
 him on whomsoever the lot should fall to kill the sentry ; 
 the family are watching from a window : death if he fails. 
 The cry of a bird, some vague sound attracts the sentry ; 
 he turns ; all is lost. The Spaniard is seized. The 
 French general is a man of iron, and to make an end of 
 the conspiracies that were always hatching he decides 
 
S25 
 
 that not only the spy must be beheaded, but the entire 
 family. The blotting out of an ancient lineage, one 
 that was before the Arabs conquered Spain, is not easily 
 apprehended by us. A Spaniard alone could appreciate 
 the father's despair. All the same I think I under- 
 stand, Alec said, and I gathered from his tone he was 
 already interested in the story. The father beseeches, 
 he begs that one member may be spared to continue 
 the name — he asks for the life of his youngest son — that 
 is all ; if he could be spared, the rest don't matter ; for 
 individual death is nothing to a Spaniard; the name is 
 everything, and the family I am telling was, as I have 
 said, before the Arabs ; maybe fifty generations had 
 come and gone. The general, I have related, is a man 
 of iron. Yes, one member of your family shall be 
 respited, he answers, but on one condition. To the 
 agonised family, conditions are as nothing. But they 
 don't know that the man of iron is determined to make 
 a terrible example, one that will make an end of Spanish 
 conspiracy, and they cry : any conditions. He who is 
 respited must serve as executioner to the others. Great 
 is the price; but the name must be saved at all costs, 
 and in the family council the father goes to his son and 
 says : I have been a good father to you, my son ; I have 
 always been a kind father, have I not ? Answer me that. 
 You will not fail us ; you will prove yourself worthy of 
 your great ancestor who defeated the Arabs, remember ! 
 The mother goes to her son and says : my son, I have 
 been a good mother, I have always loved you ; you will 
 not desert us in this hour of our great need. The little 
 sister goes to him. One by one the whole family goes to 
 him and they kneel down and beg him to save the family 
 from death. He will not prove himself unworthy of our 
 name, they cry ; and on the fatal morning the father says : 
 take the axe firmly, do what I ask you ; courage, and strike 
 straight. The father's head falls into the sawdust, the 
 
999 
 
 blood all over the white beard. Then comes the elder 
 brother, and then another brother; and then the little 
 sister. She is almost more than he can bear, and his 
 mother has to whisper : remember your promise to your 
 dead father. Therefore he strikes off his sister's head ; his 
 mother lays her head on the block, but he cannot kill his 
 mother. Be not the first coward of our name ! Strike ; 
 remember your promise to us all. Her head is struck off. 
 The family is saved 
 
 And the son. Alec asked, what became of him ? He 
 was never seen. Alec, save at night, walking, a solitary 
 man, beneath the walls of his castle in Granada. And 
 he never married ? You've guessed rightly. Alec. He 
 never married. ' Tis a great story surely. Alec muttered. 
 We walked a few yards in silence, and finding a comfort- 
 able bank to lie upon under the tall trees overhanging the 
 torrent, I related some of the droll stories, causing Alec to 
 chuckle, but only languidly. He prefers his own, I said 
 to myself, and we passed on to the war stories, and he 
 liked Adiev, and seemed to understand the pathetic figure 
 of the retired tradesman who lived in a garret so that his 
 daughters might make rich marriages and shine in society , 
 and I might have heard the story of an Irish Lear from 
 him if I had not been eager to tell another Balzac. 
 
 But Balzac, although appreciated by Alec, did not 
 capture his imagination as the Russian writers did. 
 Dostoieffsky discovered horizons more lurid. Tolstoy's 
 moralities, I said to myself, are not easy to deal with, and I 
 passed on to Tchertkoff, who pleased him, and in much the 
 same way as he pleases me. I longed to speak of Tour- 
 guerteff but dared not, afraid that the delicate rhythms and 
 almost pallid beauty of his stories would escape a rustic ear 
 and eye. In this I was mistaken ; for every one of the 
 Tales of a Sportsman was understood, and the Dream Tales, 
 who would have thought it, were a grand success. It was 
 while telling one of these that we passed out of the wood 
 
on to the terraced walk overlooking the park, our eyes 
 fixed ; I say our eyes, for so beautiful was the airy prospect 
 that it was impossible for me to think that even Alec, who 
 had been watching it all his life, could keep his eyes from 
 the mountain range above the town — hills rising one above 
 the other, buttressing Croagh Patrick, leaving the perfect 
 outlines of the peak showing against a brilliant sky with 
 the shadowy outlines of the Connemara hills far away^ 
 shadowy and far away as the tales that I had just been 
 relating. 
 
 At the end of a long silence. Alec said : was this the 
 great shanachie your honour shook hands with ? Yes, 
 Alec, that was the one. And I told him how I had seen 
 this great man in the gardens of the Elysee Montmartre. 
 Public gardens, I said, in which a band plays, and the 
 people dance in the open air under the trees, if it be 
 fine, and in a ballroom if the weather be wet. So it must 
 have been wet on the occasion that I saw this great man, 
 for he was walking down the ballroom, a great man and 
 a big one as well — as big as Maliche Daly, standing six 
 feet four at least, and with a head on him as white 
 as Croagh Patrick's peak after a fall of snow, upright 
 as a tree, and a walk on him like a stag : a noble, 
 knowledgeable man, one that had lived a long time in 
 the world, but standing apart like a mountain among 
 hills. Like the peak, your honour, said Alec. Just so, 
 I see you understand him : and his stories, too, are 
 as beautiful in outline as the hills, sometimes a little 
 
 dimmer, like Like the Connemara hills in the gap 
 
 beyond. Alec interrupted, and I answered : precisely, 
 I see you understand. Did he speak to your honour.^ 
 Alec asked. He was kind enough to speak to me, 
 though I was but a boy in those days ; and I told 
 Alec that the great shanachie's words had remained with 
 me all my life, so wise did they seem ; but as they 
 were spoken in the French language, and about books 
 
328 
 
 that Alec had not read^ it would be useless for me to 
 try to translate the shanachie's wisdom. Alec accepted 
 my judgment as to what could be told and what should 
 be left out of a narrative, and asked me which was the 
 greater of the two, TourguenefF or Dostoieffsky. My 
 vote was given long ago to TourguenefF, Alec ; I plumped 
 for him. And myself wouldn't be saying that there 
 was anything amiss with that plump, Alec returned. 
 But would it be asking too much if I were to ask you 
 to tell me what t'other was like } 1 never saw Dostoieffsky 
 in the flesh, but in the portraits that they publish in 
 his books he appears like an unhappy, almost afflicted 
 man from the working classes. There is a good deal 
 of Tartar blood in Russia, and Dostoieffsky' s flat, shallow 
 face, with insignificant features and eyes turned up 
 at the corners, recall the Tartar or Chinese type, and 
 were it not for the agitated eyes no one would suspect 
 he was looking at the portrait of a great man. But the 
 agitated eyes tell that something awful had happened 
 to him, and something very awful did happen to him 
 in the beginning of his life ; not many years after writing 
 Poor Folk, the book we were talking about yesterday, he 
 was on his way to the scaffold, on the scaffold maybe, when 
 the reprieve came, altering the sentence of death to one of 
 banishment to Siberia. His face in the portrait tells of an 
 unfortunate man, one who was unlucky from the begin- 
 ning ; an epileptic he was, and his life was lived in great 
 poverty ; in such poverty, Alec, that there was no time 
 for him to read over his manuscripts before they went 
 
 to the printer. Tourgueneff admired his genius, but 
 
 Were they friends? Alec rapped out. They must have 
 known each other, but they couldn't be friends, for they 
 were too different, coming from different classes, and out 
 of a different tradition. Nor were they even of the same 
 race, I muttered. Two great men writing prose narrative 
 in the same language, that was all. There are stories 
 
329 
 
 going about, Alec, of a strange visit that DostoiefFsky paid 
 to Tourgueneff. DostoiefFsky had come to Paris once to 
 arrange for the publication of his works in a French trans- 
 lation^ and it is said, mind you, I don't vouch for the truth of 
 the story, but it has got about that one evening, overtaken 
 by his conscience, he rushed off to Tourgueneff to confess 
 a crime he had committed years ago in Moscow. There 
 being no priest handy, I suppose ? Alec interjected. I'm 
 afraid neither of them set much store on priests, I replied ; 
 but even those who do not believe in priests like to un- 
 burden themselves sometimes ; a man who has committed 
 a crime cannot keep his secret always ; a secret will out, 
 as you've often heard. Alec. I've heard. Alec said, that 
 murder will out. A much worse crime than many murders 
 was the crime that compelled him to seek out Tourgueneff 
 in Paris. You must know. Alec, that houses in Paris are 
 very big; and on every storey there are as many rooms 
 as in a whole house here. I suppose that this plan was 
 adopted with a view to fewer servants, for there is no 
 going up and down stairs in a flat ; the rooms open one 
 into the other, and Tourgueneff had come through the 
 folding doors from the dining-room into a white-painted, 
 low-ceilinged saloon, which would have seemed somewhat 
 finicky to Dostoieffsky if he had had eyes to see the grey silk 
 curtains and beautifully bound books. There were comely 
 little book-cases hanging from the walls and standing 
 in corners, filled with choice volumes which could not have 
 failed to attract anybody except a somnambulist, somebody 
 walking in a dream, and that was how Dostoieffsky came 
 into the room : like one in a trance. He knew Tourgueneff 
 was there, and that's about all — Tourgueneff only concern- 
 ing him. He was not aware of the hour, which, as I have 
 said, was an hour after dinner, somewhere about nine 
 o'clock. He was not aware that Tourgueneff was busy ; 
 nor of the embarrassment his name created when the 
 servant announced it ; only aware of the torture he 
 
experienced in the few minutes he had been kept waiting 
 in the ante-room. For every moment in that room was 
 terrible till the moment came for him to unburden his 
 conscience of the crime committed in Moscow years and 
 years ago. Remorse, he said, has got hold of me now as 
 it never did before, and he stood looking at TourguenefF, 
 hardly seeing him at all ; Vera's face, the girl that had 
 sent him, was much clearer to him. Didn't TourguenefF 
 offer him a chair or say something to him ? Alec asked. 
 Yes ; TourguenefF came forward with a chair, but Dos- 
 toiefFsky waved him aside and walked up and down the 
 room, finding a way through the furniture instinctively 
 without falling over any chair or table, which was won- 
 derful, for he seemed like a man without eyes, and after 
 a while he found his way back to where TourguenefF was 
 sitting. It was last night, he said : she was by me, and 
 it was she who sent me hither. The dead have a strange 
 power over us, and she is dead many years : ten years ago at 
 
 least. It was at Moscow. One night, Ivan Sergeivitch 
 
 Who is that one, Ivan Ser . . . vitch ? Alec rapped out. 
 TourguenefF, I answered. Russians who are strangers 
 
 address each other as son of Like the Irish Mac, Alec 
 
 said, and I answered that it was so. And TourguenefF 
 would address DostoiefFsky as Theodore Mikhailovitch. 'Tis 
 a terrible way of saying Mac, said Alec, and to escape 
 further questions I repeat DostoiefFsky' s last words. It was 
 one night in Moscow, at the hub of the streets, I met her, 
 after a long day's work, and so brain-weary was I that 
 I could hardly see or hear when a girl's voice awoke me. 
 I'm afraid I frightened you, the girl said. You startled 
 me a little, I answered : but my appearance must have 
 frightened you, my mind was far away. You're not even 
 awake yet, she said. Oh, but I am, I answered, and we 
 walked on together, myself listening to her story of herself, 
 glad to listen to it, to anything that took me out of myself. 
 She told me she wanted to learn English, and the only 
 
way, she said, is to get a situation in England. I'm after 
 one, but I'm not certain that I shall be able to get it, for 
 you see, I've no reference. And how is that ? You seem 
 a good little girl. I used to be, but I don't know that I 
 am any longer. How did it come about ? I was looking, she 
 said, after some children in a tradesman's family, and one 
 day in the park a dog attacked the children, and all three 
 might have been bitten if a student had not come forward 
 and driven off the dog. We met again the next day and the 
 next and the next, and all might have gone on very well 
 if one of the children hadn't walked into the pond after 
 his boat, and when I was asked to explain how I was not 
 by to prevent him doing such a foolish thing, one of the 
 children answered : Vera was talking with the student who 
 drove the dog off. The student returned again and again, 
 and the upshot of it all was that I lost my situation, 
 being deemed, so it was said, unfit to look after children. 
 As I was in love with Ivan and he with me, I went to 
 live with him, and when he left Moscow I took on 
 with his friend, a Roumanian. And what then? I said. 
 When he left there was another and then another. And 
 then ? And then, she said, I found myself obliged to go 
 out into the thoroughfare to find somebody to whom I 
 might take a fancy and who might take a fancy to me. 
 As it happened to-night, if we have taken a fancy to each 
 other. But I've only been out here once before ; my word 
 on it ; and I assured her that I believed what she had told 
 me, though it seemed to me to matter very little whether 
 she had given herself to three men or to four, for money 
 or caprice. 
 
 She had a pretty face and an engaging manner, and 
 every word she spoke revealed a beautiful mind that 
 circumstances could not defile. Now what have you 
 been doing? she said, to change the subject, which was 
 becoming a bit irksome to both of us, and I told her that 
 I was a man who wrote stories for a living, and had come 
 
3S2 
 
 out to escape from the people of my imagination. But why 
 do you wish to forget them ? I would forget them, I said, 
 to-night, so that I may remember them better to-morrow, 
 and I'm grateful to you for speaking to me, for if it hadn't 
 been for this little talk with you, perhaps I shouldn't have 
 closed my eyes to-night. And to-morrow will be a day 
 of twelve or fourteen hours. Must you work as hard as 
 that ? I must, indeed, for I have no money except the 
 few roubles that publishers pay me for my stories. And 
 I don't know if life will ever become any easier. You see 
 I've only just returned from Siberia : I worked in chains 
 for five years, because I wished to free the people from 
 the police. So you're a convict, I heard her say, and I 
 expected her to drop behind. I don't mind that, she said, 
 for it was for having a better heart than another the police 
 were down on you. Perhaps you're right, I answered, but 
 I thought it well to tell you who I am, for it may do 
 you harm to be seen walking with an ex-convict. I'm not 
 afraid of that, and I saw that my confession, instead of 
 estranging us, as I had intended, seemed to unite us, which 
 is only natural ; the outcast only can speak intimately to 
 the outcast. We walked on, discovering ourselves one to 
 the other, and when I stopped to bid her good-bye it 
 seemed to both of us that for a night at least we were 
 destined for each other. 
 
 It was then that I began to look her over, and her 
 clothes, her accent, told me she was a workgirl, the 
 typical workgirl of Moscow, and, I said, she has told 
 me the truth ; she has been a nursery-maid and needs 
 money, and I've none to give her. You need money, 
 I said, and in coming with me you are leaving money 
 behind you. Never mind ; I would sooner go hungry 
 to-morrow than lose you to-night. But I have some 
 money, very little it is true, so little, that if I were to 
 call that cab I should be ashamed to offer you what 
 remained. We can walk, she answered, and it was not 
 
sss 
 
 till we were fairly out of the city that her legs began 
 to ache. Let us rest awhile, she said. I shall be 
 able to go on presently. But your lodgings are not 
 very far off, she replied, her eyes fixed on the last 
 cab on the last rank. But I'm dead-tired, and it 
 wouldn't cost much to ride the rest of the way ; it 
 isn't more than half-a-mile. It's lucky it isn't more, I 
 answered, for the last cab looks as if it had already accom- 
 plished its last journey. The horse too. Vera said, is 
 near his end ; his head is sunk between his forelegs ; and 
 it was with a view to shortening his journey by a few 
 yards that we crossed the road. An absurd thought, 
 I remarked, and Vera agreed that the extra yards could 
 not make much difference, but like me she felt she 
 must save the horse from the labour of dragging the cab 
 across the street. And when we were in the middle 
 of the road the horse fell suddenly. He'll get up 
 when I've loosened the traces and drawn away the cab, 
 the driver muttered, as he bent over the harness. He 
 plied his whip, but the horse was dead, and we turned 
 away, frightened, myself wondering if we should accept 
 the horse's death as a warning, as an omen. I think 
 even little Vera was frightened, moved by the untoward 
 occurrence, but at fifteen one isn't given to the reading 
 of omens. You see she was only a child, and I listened 
 to her prattle, my thoughts wandering between the 
 magnitude of the universe and the accident that had 
 forced this long walk upon us, robbing me, perhaps, of 
 the love night that I looked forward to so greedily. 
 She will be too tired, I said, and that was all I thought 
 about : whether she would be too tired for love. 
 
 Vera, I'm trying to confess all. Have patience. Have 
 I not come to him to whom thou didst send me.'' Am 
 I not telling all.^ Thou knowest that I am concealing 
 nothing, not even the shameful lust that entered my 
 heart, when I heard thee say, with a smothered burst 
 
8M 
 
 of laughter, that the last candle-end had been burnt out 
 and we should have to undress in the dark. I had 
 looked forward to seeing thee unpin thy pins, and untie 
 thy bows, revealing each delicate form of thy body 
 to me, and so great was my disappointment that there 
 was no candle that I confided my disappointment to 
 thee, and having thought only for my pleasure, the 
 curtain was drawn ; it was thy hands that drew it, letting 
 the moonlight into the room. 
 
 I can see her still. Certain parts of her are before my 
 eyes, and her talk is ringing in my ears, and will ring in 
 them for ever. We may escape from the living but the 
 dead never relax their clutch, and it is more often a dead 
 hand than a living one that urges a man to his doom. 
 After all, did she not love me.'* But did I love her? 
 How could one such as I love her.^ To love one must 
 have leisure, and there was none in my life. For bare life 
 I had to sit at a writing-table for ten, twelve, fourteen 
 hours a day, and the police are always at the heels of an 
 ex-convict. My life was beset with difficulties, and as she 
 strove to detain me, her hand on the lapel of my coat, I 
 began to regret that we had met each other, for I foresaw 
 the necessity of breaking with her. When shall we meet 
 again ? she asked, in her simplicity. When shall we meet 
 again? I repeated, almost ironically. Have I not told 
 you, I said, folding her in my arms, that I am a penniless 
 convict from Siberia. Why should you wish to see me 
 again ? That I do not know, she replied, but do let me 
 come to see you ; I promise I won't disturb you while 
 you're writing. I'll sit in a corner very quiet, reading 
 the pages as you throw them aside. I could see the 
 tears trembling on her eyelids, ready to flow over them. 
 But my life was so dark, without a gleam in it at that 
 time (it has always been dark, a hopeless life) that I did 
 not dare to invite her into the danger which I knew was 
 preparing. I cannot, I said : I'm a convict ; the police 
 
8S5 
 
 are always watching me. You're a child, and If 
 
 you're afraid to let me come to see you, tell me where 
 you walk in the evenings, and, not foreseeing that we 
 should ever run up against each other in the Nikolskaya, 
 I told her that I walked there nearly every evening, and 
 bade her good-bye, going back to my garret, thinking, not 
 of her, but of the work that would have to be accom- 
 plished before the sun set again. 
 
 My work left me too tired to go out, and the next 
 day was the same, and the day after; but after several 
 days of work there came a swimming in my head, and I 
 went out to get the air, and to try to forget the people 
 my pen had been calling into life all day. It is necessary 
 to forget them sometimes so that we may not forget 
 them when the time comes for work again. The very 
 first thing that night was Vera looking into the faces 
 of the passengers, and turning away from them as soon 
 as she had scanned them, seeking somebody whom 
 she could not find, looking into their faces and turning 
 away again. She is seeking me, I said, and passed 
 up a side street, thinking to escape, for the sense that 
 she was a danger to me was stronger than ever. We're 
 a mutual danger, I said to myself, and perhaps it was 
 the sense that she was a danger to me that drew me 
 to her next day, for I walked out into the Nikolskaya, 
 asking myself if she was still looking for me. She was 
 there, and I saw her, as before, looking into the faces of 
 the passengers, turning away from them, refusing many 
 men who came and solicited her. She is refusing them, 
 I said, because I am upon her mind. My misfortunes 
 have attracted her. And then I began to argue with 
 myself, asking myself: what imagined doom can there 
 be for us ? A girl like any other girl, and, I repeated, 
 a man like any other man, but when I uttered these 
 words I knew I was speaking a lie. For I'm not like any 
 other; and, my thoughts travelling over my past life, I 
 
3S6 
 
 sought to discover if I were as different as I imagined 
 myself to be, but after scanning the terrible history that 
 every year unfolded, I closed the book, frightened, and 
 fell to thinking of Vera. A thirst was upon me to see 
 her; it was not the thirst for her body, not altogether, 
 but the thirst for companionship: my life was lonely, 
 lonelier than it had ever been in Siberia. I reasoned 
 with myself. I said : I must bear with myself, I am 
 done for, but let me not drag her down with me. And 
 I swear that I kept myself for days and weeks from 
 turning into the Nikolskaya lest we should meet. But at 
 last the day came when I began to feel that my dreams 
 were becoming me, and the hallucinations of my people 
 mine. I began to fear my people as one fears spectres. 
 I must escape from them, I cried, else I shall not be 
 able to recall them again. ... If I do not drive them 
 away to-night they may refuse to obey me to-morrow. 
 
 And as I jostled through the crowds, neither hearing 
 nor seeing, a voice awoke me suddenly. It was Vera. So 
 I have found you at last, she said. Why haven't you 
 walked here before? I looked into her eyes without 
 speaking. Aren't you glad to see me ? she said. Yes, I'm 
 glad to see you, I answered, but my mind is away, and I 
 neither see the people about me nor have I any mind left 
 to understand what is being said to me. You'll be better 
 presently, she answered. Let us walk on together. 
 Your mind will return to you presently. But if you work 
 so hard you will kill yourself, and then what shall I do ? 
 The words touched my heart and I awoke from my 
 dreams of a bastard son, an epileptic like myself; one 
 that had committed a murder and had forgotten it — 
 Smerdyakov. 
 
 I am myself again, I said, and remembering at the same 
 moment that I had money in my pockets, having sold 
 some manuscript, I said : let us go into an eating-house 
 and have some supper. I should be very glad, she 
 
337 
 
 answered, for I'm hungry. You haven't eaten to-day ? 
 and she answered : I have not. It was unwise for me 
 to take her into an eating-house, for when she had eaten 
 and drunk there was only one thing to do, to take her 
 back into my garret, and after I did that, would I be 
 strong enough to turn her out of it in the morning } I 
 knew that I should not turn her out, for reason is not 
 listened to in such moments. Were it listened to, the world 
 would have ceased long ago ; it cannot check even the 
 philosopher ; we belong to ourselves, to our instincts and 
 passions, and, forgetful of aught else, I listened to Vera, 
 who said she would be the happiest girl in the world if I 
 would share my garret with her ; and we were happy for 
 longer than I thought it possible that I could be happy — 
 for nearly three months. But all the time Vera's golden 
 ringlets and happy smiles were setting the tongues of 
 enviers and rivals wagging, and the police are adepts 
 at indirect means of compulsion. It may have been the 
 police and it may not have been the police, but objections 
 to my work began to arise. I lost some of my customers, 
 and feared that I should lose more. It was not an 
 imaginary persecution, I swear it. Every day it became 
 more intense and determined, till the old fear awoke in 
 me, and my thoughts began to talk to me again, saying 
 that I had dragged this poor child into a whirlpool of 
 misfortune, for you are that and nothing more, my thoughts 
 muttered. And I yielded to the belief that my life in the 
 world would drag on as it had begun, in disaster. Vera, 
 I said, I am as a leper ; you would do well to leave me. 
 Do you care for me no longer? she asked. And there 
 was no strength in me to answer her : Vera, we have had 
 our time of life together ; be wise and leave me, for I can 
 only bring misfortune to you. Had I spoken these words 
 she would not have understood them. She might have 
 said : you're talking to me now as the people talk in your 
 books. So I said nothing. She asked me of what I was 
 
 Y 
 
338 
 
 thinking. Of you, darling, I said, but I was really thinking, 
 though I did not dare to tell her, that it were better that 
 she should return to the streets than remain with me, for 
 on the streets she might meet any evening an honest fellow 
 who would be tempted at first by her child beauty and 
 learn to appreciate her gentle nature and marry her. 
 Many men marry off the streets. Every good girl who 
 goes on the street marries ; we must believe that goodness 
 rises above prejudices and conventions. But to remain 
 with me would be certain ruin for her ; we had entered 
 the danger zone. We had been together three months, 
 and after three months the flesh wearies a little. It may 
 be that I am wronging myself and that it was the per- 
 secution of the police that forced me to persecute Vera. 
 Persecution begets persecution, and every day the desire 
 to get rid of her became more intense. I counted her 
 steps as she descended the stairs, saying : she is farther 
 from me than she was a moment ago, and when she re- 
 turned I counted her steps as she ascended the stairs, 
 saying : she is nearer to me than she was a moment ago. 
 Something had to happen. Oh, it wasn't murder. I should 
 never have had the strength to murder, I couldn't walk 
 upon a fly on the ground, but it would have been better if 
 I had murdered her, for she would have suffered less at 
 the time, and I should not have had to come here with a 
 tale of cruelty : determined, premeditated cruelty, intended 
 to drive her away. She never got a kind look or word from 
 me, till I told her one day that she must leave me to earn 
 my living ; and you would do well, I added, to be about 
 earning yours. She made no answer but left my rooms 
 without a word, and I continued to write, for ten thousand 
 words had to be written that day ; they had been promised, 
 and when the last sentence was upon paper, I stood asking 
 myself if I should have sufficient mind to address the 
 envelope correctly that was to contain the pages. It 
 §eemed as if the racket in my brain would never cease. 
 
S89 
 
 and I said to myself: I cannot direct the envelope. But if 
 the pages do not go now, they will be laid aside, I con- 
 tinued, and it was while waiting for a moment of mental 
 calm to address the envelope that I heard her feet on the 
 staircase. She will be here in a moment, I said, and I 
 cannot look her in the face after my cruel words. I'll go 
 out. I may be able to steal away. But when I return I 
 shall find her waiting for me. There was no time to think 
 more. I listened, sitting quite still, so that she might not 
 hear me. The rooms in which we lived were divided by 
 a partition, so that I could not move without her hearing 
 me, so I sat very still, saying to myself: she thinks I 
 am out. At last I heard something drop, and what 
 dropped sounded like a coil of rope — a rope drops differ- 
 ently from any other object, and when I heard her pick 
 up the rope, I said : she has bought a rope to hang herself. 
 But, 1 said to myself, if she means to hang herself, 
 she will open the door to see if I'm out, and the 
 thought relieved my mind. • At the sight of her face 
 all misunderstandings will be wiped away; we shall fall 
 into each other's arms more truly in love than we had 
 ever been. . . . 
 
 But she has drawn a chair forward and is going to step 
 from the chair on to the table, I said, and when on the 
 table she will attach the rope — to what ? I asked myself, 
 •and tried to remember if there was a pole above the window 
 to which she could attach it. But I could no longer think 
 clearly. My thoughts slipped away as thoughts do in a 
 dream, and just as the dreamer says: I'm dreaming, I too 
 began to think I was dreaming. It must be only a dream, 
 I said, and a little time went by. She is writing a letter, 
 I said, giving the reason for her suicide, and I became 
 strangely curious, asking myself what reasons she would 
 assign, and if she would find the right words. I must 
 have lost consciousness, if not for long, for some moments, 
 for I remember a table being kicked aside. She has 
 
340 
 
 hanged herself, I said, and if I do not strive to shake 
 off this lethargy, and run to her and cut her down, she 
 will die and I shall be responsible. I cannot tell how 
 complete or how partial my possession of myself was 
 at the time. There are moments in every man's life 
 in which he is not himself, in which he loses possession 
 of his free will, if there be such a thing as free will. 
 Be this as it may, I could not move from my chair. I 
 must hasten, I said, lest I be too late, but I could not 
 move, and then the song began to sing in my ears : her 
 death will loosen her clutch upon my life, and in spite 
 of my efforts to rouse myself the time went by. I do 
 not know how it went, and when I awoke, for I felt 
 that I must have lost consciousness, I said : she is dead, 
 it is all over, and dipping the pen into the ink, I addressed 
 the envelope and walked to the office of the newspaper 
 and handed in my copy. 
 
 I said just now there was an interval between the 
 tying of the rope and the moment when she kicked the 
 table aside, and that interval was occupied in writing a 
 letter. That is so. She wrote a letter before hanging 
 herself, explaining her suicide. The porter came upstairs, 
 and the police came, and she was carried away, and 
 buried, and disappeared from every human mind except 
 mine. But in my mind she persists, becoming every 
 day clearer, more distinct, and more authoritative. I 
 feel her behind me in the streets; I wake up in the 
 night and see her in the darkness ; and last night she 
 bade me go to you : thou must go to Ivan Sergeivitch, 
 she said, and tell him all ; and I believe she sent me 
 to you, that I might get peace from her memory. But 
 it would seem that the dead do not know all, for you 
 have listened, not as she thought you would listen, but 
 as I knew you would listen, without pity, almost with 
 contempt. You are incapable, Ivan Sergeivitch, of a 
 noble action, or of a noble thought except when you 
 
341 
 
 are interpreting the souls that your imagination reveals 
 to you. You're not a Russian but a Greek — a Greek 
 from the Crimea ; and all the while I have been telling 
 you my story you have been judging me. . . . True that 
 I came for judgment, but the sympathy of a Russian 
 Mujik would have served me better ; you have submitted 
 me to the test of reason, saying : repentance is a word 
 without meaning to the philosopher, and confession 
 disgraceful and unworthy of man. Why did I come 
 here ? Did I not foresee all this ? Vera sent me, 
 and I did not dare to disobey her. She said that 
 I must unburden my conscience to you else I should 
 have no peace. Why did she send me? She sent 
 me to you, Ivan Sergeivitch, that I might learn from 
 you that there is a worse criminal than I. You, sitting 
 in your palace of art, waiting for me to leave you, 
 saying: how much longer will he keep me from my 
 manuscript, a manuscript in which, no doubt, a nightingale 
 in a wood hard by is singing her honeyed song while a 
 heart yearns in a shadowy saloon, like this one. Rich 
 furniture, vases, pictures. Very sordid and disgraceful 
 my life must seem to you. But I would not exchange 
 mine for yours. 
 
 Cold-hearted sentimentalist, were DostoiefFsky's last 
 words, and upon them he dashed into the ante-room, and 
 TourguenefF heard the clink of the latch of the door that 
 opened on to the staircase. And did TourguenefF sit 
 there letting the other fellow barge him for an hour 
 without a word in his chops ? The Murrigan should have 
 been at him, leathering him all the way down the staircase 
 to the very bottom and into the street. And what did 
 TourguenefF do then? I answered: he just dipped his 
 pen in the ink and continued revising his manuscript. 
 Are you sure you've got the story right, your honour? 
 And seeing that Alec was beginning to lean towards 
 DostoiefFsky's view of TourguenefF, I said : a man is not 
 
342 
 
 necessarily cold-hearted because he knows he cannot allay 
 another's remorse. Remorse, Alec, must burn itself out. 
 
 CHAP. LV. 
 
 ALEC had gone away to his tea, and I sat thinking of 
 the talk we had had together, for it seems strange that a 
 man who could understand a story could not appreciate 
 TourguenefTs point of view that passion and violence 
 should be avoided as not being sufficiently representative 
 of life, and as this was TourguenefTs practice in his art 
 it would be vain to expect him to treat life differently. 
 But such a comprehension of life is reached only by the 
 philosopher, and Alec is without philosophy. The Celt 
 ever was and ever will be, mayhap, evolution having 
 ceased, at least among men ; and immersed in the 
 thought of my country's failure, I sat gazing at the sun, 
 resting on the hill-side, and bethought myself of the 
 quiet change that would come when the light had gone — 
 a change within and without, I said, for the hawthorns in 
 the park will lose their shadows, and my thoughts will 
 become gentler, putting on spiritual wings. I shall live 
 for a little while detached from earthly life, as we shall 
 live when this life is done with. Never, I continued, have 
 I been so near as I am at this moment to what Christians 
 call belief: if we live it will be in a twilit valley with a 
 glow above the hills. A glow of what ? I asked myself, 
 and it was seemingly a voice from within that answered 
 me : a glow of happy aspiration. 
 
 It was in this mood that I walked towards my friend's 
 house to meet him on the greensward, with simple, 
 homely talk, for it is pleasant to enter into simple talk 
 with a friend after moments of enthusiasm or ecstasy, 
 pleasant it is to hear him say : the weather seems settled 
 at last, and to see his goodwife coming from the garden 
 
S48 
 
 laden with fruit and flowers, to hear the wheels of the 
 pony-chaise, and to meet the young girls returning from 
 their different adventures, a tennis-party or a picnic on 
 one of the islands in the Bay. Which? To watch the 
 young rooks, not yet fully fledged, flopping among the 
 high branches, waiting to receive food from their parents, 
 and, having received it, to see them return to the nests 
 for the night, in response to the impatient cawing of 
 their parents. 
 
 It is always, I said, out of meditations of what always 
 was, and is and ever shall be that the best and most 
 moving stories come, and my thoughts going back to the 
 story that I told Alec, I said to myself : Tourgueneff was 
 right to withhold words ; his silence was better than 
 absolution, for DostoiefFsky will seek to interpret his silence, 
 and will be led towards peace as day is led towards night. 
 Where have you left your new friend .f* my host asked, 
 startling me out of my meditation. He is having his tea, 
 I answered, and repeated the phrase, delighted by its 
 homeliness. He is having his tea. Could a man be about 
 any more useful business ? He is having his tea, and no 
 doubt devoutly, I said to myself, and my host asked me 
 if I was going to see Alec to-morrow. He has been a 
 delightful adventure, I replied, somewhat sententiously, 
 but the adventure has come to an end, and it doesn't 
 seem to me that anything will be gained by continuing it. 
 
 Another story from him or myself I could not bear, and 
 to escape from Alec for the next few days I remained in- 
 doors till the news came up from the town that he had 
 left Westport, and was not expected back for a week. He 
 is sometimes away for weeks at a time, my host said. I 
 shall not await his return, I remarked — a remark that 
 prompted my host to ask me if I were going to Moore Hall. 
 
 And after putting the question he stood by the fireplace 
 pulling at a cigar, still uncertain that it was fully lighted. 
 At last a huge puff of smoke cleared his doubts away, 
 
344 
 
 and he turned out of the billiard-room, thinking, perhaps, 
 that I should be left to my memories of the great square 
 Georgian house, one of those built at the end of the 
 eighteenth century in Ireland, atop of a high flight of 
 stairs, atop of a pleasant green hill with woods stretching 
 right and left down to the shore of a lake flowing round 
 headlands, past islands, and finding a passage between 
 the great oak wood of Derinrush and the Partry shore, 
 widening out in front of the great feudal fortresses of 
 Castle Carra and Castle Burke into what is almost another 
 lake, passing round Church Island, and ending in a great 
 snipe marsh under the walls of the old Abbey of Ballin- 
 tubber, built by Roderick, King of Connaught, shall we 
 say in the thirteenth century ; a crescent-shapen lake 
 with Moore Hall at one end of the crescent and Ballin- 
 tubber at the other — a lake on whose every shore is a 
 ruin, an ancient castle, a burnt or an abandoned house. 
 Even the lake's islands were once strongholds, and we 
 dream of these defended fiercely against boat-loads of 
 pursuers till portcullis and drawbridge came to be for- 
 bidden in Ireland, and later-day chieftains deserted the 
 strongholds of their ancestors for manor houses, retaining 
 their vassals under the name of tenantry, the village 
 supplying the big house with hewers of wood, drawers 
 of water, ploughmen, reapers, gardeners, gamekeepers, 
 huntsmen, jockeys, maidservants, menservants, even 
 mistresses. 
 
 As late as the sixties the Georgian house killed its own 
 mutton and beef, baked its own bread, brewed its own 
 beer, and the last brewer at Moore Hall was John 
 Malowney ; his wife, Mary Macdonald that was, and 
 her sister, Betty Macdonald, were cook and housemaid. 
 These Macdonalds were probably the descendants of 
 former chieftains, and the original owners of some of 
 the lands my great - grandfather purchased when he 
 returned from Spain. Whilom chieftains descend into 
 
845 
 
 the service of landlords, and the new landlords fought 
 duels, there being no castles to besiege ! The Irish castle 
 flourished if the cattle-raiders returned with numerous 
 beeves, and the Georgian house if the blood stock were 
 speedy; it showed signs of declension as soon as the 
 " crack " began to lift his leg when the back sinew was 
 pressed after the morning gallop. 
 
 My father, who came of the Protestant ascendancy 
 (a fact that must be borne in mind always — Irish 
 Catholics being worthless), rose at half-past six to see 
 the horses gallop, though nothing else could persuade 
 him out of his bed before ten. He was a good judge 
 of a horse, given overmuch, it is true, to partial and 
 unsatisfactory trials, but able to bring a horse fit and 
 well to the post. Wolf Dog won a great many Queen's 
 Plates, Coranna, the Cesare witch, just failing to get 
 his head first past the post in the Cesarewitch. He 
 cantered "home" in the Chester Cup, and this win 
 kept Moore Hall out of the encumbered Estate Courts. 
 Croagh Patrick won the two cups at Goodwood, and 
 Master George all his races till the suspensory ligaments 
 began to swell. I remember the day my father came 
 up from the stables, with the evil news on his face, 
 and his valet, who was fussing about the hall chairs 
 with one of my father's silk hats in his hands (in those 
 days men did not go to the stables except in silk hat 
 and gloves) confided to me in the pantry afterwards that 
 he was afraid Master George's forelegs must have shown 
 some slight puffiness. We shall have the veterinary 
 surgeon down here with his irons. Don't you believe 
 in firing ? Joseph did not answer. Back sinews and sus- 
 pensory ligaments are treated differently in these days ; 
 how, I have no knowledge, but in the sixties firing was 
 a great device, and Master George's forelegs were 
 fired ; and I believe it was the memory of this brutal 
 remedy that made it so difficult to remain on his back 
 
346 
 
 when he was put into training again. Be this as it 
 may, he had me off three times one morning. Slieve 
 Carn was the last of the Moore Hall horses that showed 
 " form/' but he was too beautiful for a race-horse, " only 
 a Harab/' as the bookies used to say at Newmarket. 
 His box still is there, and it was a sudden sight of this 
 loose-box that incited me to cry after Tom Ruttledge : 
 no, Tom, I'm not going to Moore Hall. You'd better 
 make sure that you don't want to go, he replied. . . . I'm 
 going down to the office, perhaps you'll tell me when 
 I return. 
 
 It seemed unkind to refuse to spend a few days at 
 Moore Hall, but it was impossible to commit myself 
 definitely to the visit. If a visit there was to be it should 
 come about naturally, and I told my host that I should try 
 to come to a decision whether I should visit the house 
 of my birth or go straight to Dublin in the train : I shall 
 be able to come to a decision, I said, between Westport 
 and Castlebar; not before. There's an excellent inn at 
 Castlebar, and I can get all the food I shall require for 
 a three days' visit. You will save yourself a great deal of 
 trouble, my host replied, if you decide now what your 
 journey is to be. I'll order a hamper to be packed for 
 you. No, no, I replied ; and invented on the spot some 
 specious reasons for wishing to go to Castlebar by train. 
 I should like to see the railway bridge again, I said, and 
 half-an-hour after the tall arches that spanned the valley 
 called forth my admiration once more, and I fell to thinking 
 that if both ends of the bridge disappeared into the woods 
 the bridge would be the most romantic in the dis-United 
 Kingdom. 
 
 The eastern side of the valley should be planted, and 
 while considering who should undertake this reforestation, 
 the pretty shapes of the Westport hills came into view, 
 beguiling my thoughts so completely with their pretty 
 outlines that at Castlebar my mind was not yet made up 
 
847 
 
 whether I should proceed on my journey or drive to Moore 
 Hall. The road from Castlebar is not a cheerful one; a 
 certain long stretch of bog rose up in memory, and I began 
 to think that it would suit me better to alight at the next 
 station, at Balla. But the train did not stop at Balla and 
 at Claremorris the stationmaster told me that I should not 
 be able to get a car on account of the races. 
 
 How very unfortunate, I answered ; I should have liked 
 to have seen Moore Hall. I should have gone over in 
 Mr Ruttledge's motor. That would have been better than 
 a car, the stationmaster replied, and the guard blew his 
 whistle. 
 
 CHAP. LVI. 
 
 BETWEEN Claremorris and Ballyhaunis there is no- 
 thing to attract the eye, and the people that entered 
 my carriage and left it at Castlerea were of a class un- 
 known in Mayo in its feudal days. It was vain to try to 
 decipher the markings on the shells ; the kind was unknown 
 to me, and I returned to my own thoughts, remembering 
 that when my mother lived at Moore Hall (which she did 
 to the day of her death), she used to say, when I jumped 
 off the car that brought me from the station : why that 
 gloom upon your face, George ? It would seem as if the 
 sight of your own house is displeasing to you, and not 
 wishing to distress her, I answered : you are mistaken, 
 mother. I was thinking that more trees should have been 
 planted to shut out the view of the lake. A frivolous 
 answer truly, but the best that I could find in those days 
 for a singular aversion. Why should I feel diffident? — 
 why should I feel shy, almost ashamed, among the old 
 places ? I often asked myself Yet that is what I do feel, 
 and unable to find a reason to account for a feeling that 
 seemed inveterate in me, I fell to criticising the alterations 
 that my father had made in the house, trying to persuade 
 
S48 
 
 myself that it was these alterations that prevented me 
 from feeling at home at Moore Hall. The one that pro- 
 voked me most was the raising of the roof some ten or 
 a dozen feet for practical reasons, the beams no doubt 
 having rotted under the low eighteenth-century roof. 
 But I could not forget that the small green -mortared 
 slates, like scales, were much more beautiful than the 
 modern slates ; large blue slates give a Georgian house 
 the appearance of a lord mayor's mansion-house, and only 
 look well on a high-pitched French roof. My father 
 substituted plate-glass windows for the small panes, with 
 eyes in them like grease spots on soup. . . . How lovely ! 
 and it was with such aesthetic reflections that I tried for 
 many years to account for a strange aversion ; as late as 
 last year, I said, I walked up and down the platform at 
 Athlone, seeking the reason why I was always diffident, 
 shy, ill at ease at Moore Hall ; and feeling myself nearer 
 to apprehending a reason that had till now eluded me, I 
 repeated the words : diffident, shy, ill at ease, ashamed, 
 frightened, overcome by the awe that steals over one in 
 the presence of the dead. 
 
 Moore Hall is a relic, a ruin, a corpse. Its life ceased 
 when we left it in 1870, and I am one that has no liking 
 for corpses. The wise man never looks on the face of a 
 corpse, knowing well that if he does it will come between 
 him and the living face. . . . That is why I am unwilling 
 to go to Moore Hall, and why I avoid the Quartier St 
 Georges, and the two streets leading to the Boulevard 
 Montmartre, the Rue Notre Dame de Lorette and the 
 Rue des Martyrs, for these streets are so intensely my past 
 life that I should feel shy and diffident, just as I feel at 
 Moore Hall, in intruding myself on their presence. It 
 would be painful to me to cross the Place Pigale and to 
 enter the cafe in which I used to spend my evenings of 
 long ago with Manet, with Degas, with Pissarro, with 
 Renoir, with Cabaner, with Alexis, with Duranty, with 
 
849 
 
 Mend^s. I have heard that it is now the haunt of ponces 
 and punks, and it is well that the 
 should descend into animal life, for life is always ascend- 
 ing and descending, and the ponces and punks that 
 assemble there to-day would shock me less if I were to 
 enter the cafe than a group of modern literators discussing 
 — ah, what do they discuss ? is there anything left to 
 discuss ? 
 
 I turn aside from that cafe and would not enter the 
 Rue Pigale if I could avoid doing so, for however fair 
 the moon might shine it would not shine as fairly as it 
 did the night when I walked there with Mendes, turning 
 to the right, making for the Rue Mansarde, where he 
 lived with Augusta Holmes. Nor would I enter the Rue 
 Amsterdam again, Manet forbids. Three years ago the 
 mistress of a friend of mine asked me to dine with her, 
 and I did not dare disclose the truth to her that I could not 
 venture into the Rue Amsterdam. A shameful cowardice 
 it was to accept her invitation, and my punishment 
 began almost as soon as I crossed the threshold, and it 
 continued all through dinner, for she lived in 73 Rue 
 Amsterdam. Some sense of premonition propelled me at 
 last to the window, and looking from it down into the 
 deep courtyard I cried out : we are certainly in the house 
 overlooking the courtyard in which Manet painted. She 
 said : you must be mistaken, for I could not have missed 
 hearing that so great a painter lived here once. But if 
 you think that this house is the house, go to the concierge 
 and ask him : which I did at once, you may be sure, and 
 he said he had heard that a great painter once lived in 
 the house. But that wall } I said. The wall, he answered, 
 was built a few years ago. The courtyard is changed, I 
 said ; but is there a studio yonder ? and he answered : yes, 
 and showed me into the studio in which I had seen so 
 many masterpieces painted, now, alas, an art class for 
 young women. 
 
350 
 
 Not another instant will I remain here ! I cried ; and 
 I returned to my friend's mistress with these verses on 
 my lips : 
 
 Triste sous le baiser plaintif dont tu m'effleures, 
 Oh ! combien ton baiser de jadis m'est plus cher ! 
 Les choses du passe, ma soeur, sont les meilleures. 
 
 CHAP. LVII. 
 
 WE must love for the sake of our remembrance of the 
 kiss we receive, but not for it, and of all, we must not 
 hesitate to resist whatever piercing longings rise up 
 in us to return to the things that we loved long ago.. The 
 woman may be more beautiful and more intelligent than 
 she was when we loved her; and the prospects that we 
 remember are, perchance, more romantic to-day than they 
 were when they stirred our imagination, but we must not 
 try to return to them ; we shall lose them if we do ; but 
 by our fireside we can possess them more intensely than 
 when they were poor illusive actualities. 
 
 I can see my father more clearly to-day than I could 
 when I was a child, shall we say, as he sat at the breakfast- 
 table reading the newspaper, suddenly remembering the 
 horses in the stable, and laying down the paper and going 
 into the hall, picking up his silk hat and gloves, that a 
 valet had carefully brushed and laid on the chair for him. 
 I can hear him call to the red setter that has been waiting 
 for him on the steps. I can see the great hay-ricks over 
 against the stables and the old pine in which the gold- 
 finches built their nests, and brighter than day now is the 
 day when the old servant took me out one morning and 
 showed me the nest up in a high bough. That high 
 bough may not exist to-day ; and if it hangs as it did in 
 the sixties, it would not be as clear to me at Moore Hall 
 as it is by my fireside in London. By my fireside in 
 
S51 
 
 Ebury Street I can relive the delightful life of the sixties 
 again, seeing everyone in his and her occupation, and 
 every room unchanged, unaltered; my nursery with 
 a print between window and door showing three wild 
 riders leaping a wooden fence in a forest. The school- 
 room overlooking the yard is before my eyes — the yard 
 is in ruins but its homely life lives on — the old mule 
 toiling always, bringing up water from the lake. The 
 mule is dead, and my old governess, too, may be under 
 the ground, but she lives in my memory and will live in 
 it, becoming clearer day by day. It would be a misfortune 
 truly to meet her, for no longer would I be able to go with 
 her for long walks beyond the domain out into the high- 
 road, over Anney's bridge ; through the long bog to the 
 next bridge, and to discover a crayfish in the brook. It is 
 a wonderful thing to see a crayfish and not to know it is a 
 crayfish — and to remember Primrose and Ivory, two ponies 
 dead fifty years or more, and the day my mother drove me 
 to Bally glass to see the mail coach swing round the hill-side. 
 The coachman held the reins grandly. The guard blew 
 the horn. Why should I go to Ballyglass or to Lough 
 Carra.^ The boat with sails made out of sheets stolen 
 out of the linen presses lies rotten, or has utterly passed 
 away. 
 
 But if Moore Hall lives in my mind completely and 
 independently of the house that stands on the hill-top, 
 why do I continue to refuse to accept my agent's advice 
 to sell the timber? He says that a thousand pounds 
 worth of trees can be taken out of the woods without 
 injury to them, and if he could see into my mind, he 
 would add: the trees that are growing to-day are not 
 the same trees that were your wont to climb in boyhood. 
 In fifty years a tree changes, even as a man ; for better or 
 for worse, all things change. Why, therefore, should you 
 hesitate to fell every tree on the hill-sides, to tear the lead 
 from the roof, to leave Moore Hall a ruin like Castle 
 
352 
 
 Carra? Rid yourself of Moore Hall so that you may 
 possess it more completely. 
 
 CHAP. Lvni. 
 
 THE train passes on through West Meath,and I am puzzled 
 to find an answer to Tom Ruttl edge's subtle reasoning, and 
 am forced to plead an invincible repugnance to the felling 
 of the trees, to the selling of furniture and pictures. No ; 
 I cannot, I cry, do what you ask ; to me the removal of a 
 chair from one room to another is a pain : any change 
 would hurt me almost as much as the selling of the lead 
 coffins in which my forefathers are enclosed. But even 
 if you succeed in preserving Moore Hall unchanged for a 
 few years, says my agent, whom I have cast for the part 
 of the tempter, Moore Hall will certainly fall into ruin. 
 As soon as you have gone, the trees will be felled, and 
 the lead taken from the roof; Moore Hall will be a ruin 
 within a very few years ; for not a great many years of 
 life lie in front of you. A fact that cannot be gainsaid ; 
 yet for some reason hidden in me, and which I may not 
 explore, I dare not order trees to be felled at Moore 
 Hall. You forget, Tom, that everything came out of 
 Moore Hall : if Moore Hall had not existed I should 
 not have existed, not as I know myself to-day, for it was 
 Moore Hall that enabled me to go to Paris, and to sit in 
 the with Manet and with Degas; to 
 
 gather a literary atmosphere from Hugo, Zola, Goncourt, 
 Banville, Mend^s — and Cabaner. 
 
 CHAP. LIX. 
 
 AS the train drew near to MuUingar, I said to myself: 
 Moore Hall was built with Spanish gold, and it was the 
 peasants around the house, and the peasants of Ballin- 
 
S53 
 
 tubber, and several other properties that enabled me to 
 go to Paris. It is therefore to Patsy Murphy that the 
 Carra edition of my writings should be dedicated. A 
 strange dedication it would seem to my readers, but if 
 justice were weighed out evenly the Carra edition should 
 go to Patsy Murphy, but in this world we do not get the 
 things that are due to us ; in Ireland things always take a 
 crooked turn, and instead of dedicating the Carra edition 
 to Patsy Murphy I have decided to dedicate it to my 
 agent for his good offices in obtaining from Patsy Murphy, 
 without undue coercion, the money that I so advantage- 
 ously laid out in the . Patsy Murphy 
 has been a patron of literature without knowing it. 
 
 CHAP. LX. 
 
 OUTSIDE of the circle of your own life you are 
 unconcerned with the fate of Moore Hall, my agent's 
 ghost insisted as the train passed by Maynooth, and 
 I answered to the ghost : that is not so, for I would 
 prolong the life of Moore Hall beyond my life if it 
 were possible. What is Moore Hall but one of a 
 thousand other houses built in the eighteenth century ? 
 he replied. The Nineveh into which Jonah marched 
 for three days before he began to preach passed away 
 so rapidly that the shepherds who fed their flocks 
 among the ruins could not tell Xenophon the name 
 of the bygone city. Why then, said the ghostly voice, 
 should you trouble about Moore Hall.^ nobody will live 
 there again. It is true, I answer him ; time overtakes 
 the most enduring monuments, but men continue to 
 build, for they are created with that intention, and every 
 day we strive against death. Why then should it be 
 very foolish of me to dream of Moore Hall as a hostel 
 for parsons and curates when I am among the gone? 
 z 
 
354 
 
 The Irish Protestant Church is very dear to me, and 
 Moore Hall might serve as a token of my admiration 
 of a Protestantism that has given to Ireland all our 
 great men and our Anglo-Irish literature. In conversa- 
 tion with Hugh Lane I once said : I will leave my 
 Impressionist pictures to Moore Hall, if you will include 
 some pictures ; together we might found a museum that 
 would attract pilgrims. But Hugh Lane, who was some- 
 thing of a sciolist, answered that a museum was useless 
 unless some hundreds of people visited it daily. Three 
 appreciative visitors, I said, are better than a crowd of 
 holiday starers. At this Lane giggled, but his prejudice 
 in favour of the starer did not relax. Hugh Lane was 
 undoubtedly something of a sciolist. But we are not 
 yet at the end of our imaginations. Another destiny 
 than a clerical hostel might be devised for Moore Hall ; 
 a rich American might buy my house. Ireland is nearer 
 America than England, and sooner or later Galway will 
 become a Transatlantic port. A steamer plies from Galway 
 to Cong. Cong is but a few miles away from Moore Hall, 
 why should not some rich American take the place from 
 me.'^ and may this book fall into his hands and inspire 
 him to do so. 
 
 CHAP. LXI. 
 
 THE train passes into Dublin, and I remember that if I 
 hasten I may catch the train to Kingstown, and cross to- 
 night. Why wait a day in Dublin ? Let me hurry to my 
 fireside in Ebury Street. And an hour later I am leaning 
 over the taffrail watching the wake of the ship as she 
 pierces the waveless Irish Sea. 
 
 It is the past that explains everything, I say to myself. 
 It is in our sense of the past that we find our humanity, 
 and there are no moments in our life so dear to us as 
 
> 
 
 S55 
 
 when we lean over the tafFrail and watch the waters we 
 have passed through. The past tells us whence we have 
 come and what we are, and it was well that I refused to 
 allow the trees to be felled, for sitting by my fireside in 
 Ebury Street I should hear the strokes of the axe in 
 my imagination as plainly as I should if I were living 
 in Moore Hall, and the ghosts of the felled trees would 
 gather about my arm-chair in Ebury Street. 
 
 THE RIVERSIDE PRESS LIMITED, EDINBURGH 
 
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