wn grief. A little
further on they came upon a cart filled with pigs. The cart broke down
suddenly, and the pigs escaped in all directions, and the efforts of a
great number of country people were directed to collecting them. Father
Oliver joined in the chase, and it proved a difficult one, owing to the
density of the wood that the pigs had taken refuge in. At last he saw
them driven along the road, for it had been found impossible to mend the
cart, and at this moment Father Oliver began to think that he would like
to be a pig-driver, or better still, a poacher like Carmody. A wandering
mood was upon him. Anything were better than to return to his parish,
and the thought of the confessions he would have to hear on Saturday
night and of the Mass he would have to say on Sunday was bitter indeed,
for he had ceased to believe in these things. To say Mass, believing the
Mass to be but a mummery, was detestable. To remain in his parish meant
a constant degradation of himself. When a parishioner sent to ask him to
attend a sick call, he could barely bring himself to anoint the dying
man. Some way out of the dilemma must be found, and stopping suddenly so
that he might think more clearly, he asked himself why he did not wander
out of the parish instead of following the path which led him back to
the lake? thinking that it was because it is hard to break with habits,
convictions, prejudices. The beautiful evening did not engage his
thoughts, and he barely listened to the cuckoo, and altogether forgot to
notice the bluebells, campions, and cow-parsley; and it was not till he
stood on the hilltop overlooking the lake that he began to recover his
self-possession.

'The hills,' he said, 'are turned hither and thither, not all seen in
profile, and that is why they are so beautiful.'

The sunlit crests and the shadow-filled valleys roused him. In the sky a
lake was forming, the very image and likeness of the lake under the
hill. One glittered like silver, the other like gold, and so wonderful
was this celestial lake that he began to think of immortals, of an
assembly of goddesses waiting for their gods, or a goddess waiting on an
island for some mortal, sending bird messengers to him. A sort of pagan
enchantment was put upon him, and he rose up from the ferns to see an
evening as fair as Nora and as fragrant. He tried to think of the colour
of her eyes, which were fervid and oracular, and of her hands, which
were long and curved, wit