tude and such love as man's heart may have for the ideal
and insensible.

When there had been time for perfecting all his arrangements, I strolled
down to pay a formal visit to Father Letheby. The atmosphere of absolute
primness and neatness struck my senses when I entered. Waxed floors,
dainty rugs, shining brasses, coquettish little mirrors here and there,
a choice selection of daintily bound volumes, and on a writing desk a
large pile of virgin manuscript, spoke the scholar and the gentleman. My
heart sank, as I thought how sick of all this he will be in a few weeks,
when the days draw in, and the skies scowl, and the windows are washed,
and the house rocked under the fierce sou'westers that sweep up the
floor of the Atlantic, and throw all its dripping deluges on the little
hamlet of Kilronan. But I said:--

"You have made a cosey little nest for yourself, Father Letheby; may you
long enjoy it."

"Yes," he said, as if answering my horrible scepticism, "God has been
very good to send me here."

Now what can you do with an optimist like that?

"There is just one drawback," I said, with a faint attempt at humor, "to
all this aestheticism." I pointed to a window against which four very
dirty noses were flattened, and four pairs of delighted eyes were
wandering over this fairy-land, and a dirty finger occasionally pointed
out some particularly attractive object.

"Poor little things," he said, "it gives them pleasure, and does me no
harm."

"Then, why not bring them in?" I said.

"Oh, no," he replied, with a little laugh, "I draw the line there." He
pointed to the shining waxed floors. "Besides, it would destroy their
heaven. To touch and handle the ideal, brings it toppling down about our
ears."

We spoke long and earnestly about a lot of things. Then, looking a
little nervously at me, he made a great leap of thought.

"Would you mind my saying a serious word to you, sir?" said he.

"Certainly not," I replied, "go ahead."

"It seems to me, then," he said, deliberately, "that we are not making
all that we might out of the magnificent possibilities that lie at our
disposal. There is no doubt things are pretty backward in Ireland. Yet,
we have an intelligent people, splendid natural advantages,--an
infernally bad government, it is true,--but can we not share the blame
with the government in allowing things to remain as they are? Now, I am
not an advocate for great political designs: I go in for
decentraliza