tools from Earth, and it'll be
lucky if we're evacuated before the planet's left abandoned."

The solicitor general's expression became one of pure hopelessness.

"Then the jig's up," he said gloomily. "I'm thinkin', Mr. President,
we'd better have a cabinet meeting on it."

"What's the use," demanded the president. "I won't leave! I'll stay
here, alone though I may be. There's nothing left in life for me
anywhere, but at least, as the only human left on Eire I'll be able to
spend the rest of my years knockin' dinies on the head for what they've
done!" Then, suddenly, he bellowed. "Who let loose the snakes! I'll
have his heart's blood----"

* * * * *

The Chancellor of the Exchequer peered around the edge of the door into
the cabinet meeting room. He saw the rest of the cabinet of Eire
assembled. Relieved, he entered. Something stirred in his pocket and he
pulled out a reproachful snake. He said:

"Don't be indignant, now! You were walkin' on the public street. If
Sean O'Donohue had seen you----" He added to the other members of the
cabinet: "The other two members of the Dail Committee seem to be good,
honest, drinkin' men. One of them now--the shipbuilder I think it
was--wanted a change of scenery from lookin' at the bottom of a glass.
I took him for a walk. I showed him a bunch of dinies playin' leapfrog
tryin' to get one of their number up to a rain spout so he could bite
off pieces and drop 'em down to the rest. They were all colors and it
was quite somethin' to look at. The committeeman--good man that he
is!--staggered a bit and looked again and said grave that whatever of
evil might be said of Eire, nobody could deny that its whisky had
imagination!"

He looked about the cabinet room. There was a hole in the baseboard
underneath the sculptured coat of arms of the colony world. He put the
snake down on the floor beside the hole. With an air of offended
dignity, the snake slithered into the dark opening.

"Now--what's the meeting for?" he demanded. "I'll tell you immediate
that if money's required it's impractical."

President O'Hanrahan said morbidly:

"'Twas called, it seems, to put the curse o' Cromwell on whoever let
the black snakes loose. But they'd been cooped up, and they knew they
were not keepin' the dinies down, and they got worried over the work
they were neglectin'. So they took turns diggin', like prisoners in a
penitentiary, and presently they brok