mbers of the committee nodded.

"He was headin," said the president, "for the cold-storage plant that
Sean O'Donohue had twitted me was empty of the provisions we'd had to
eat up because of the dinies. It's no matter that it's empty now
though. We can grow victuals in the fields from now on, because now the
cold rooms are packed solid with dinies that ran heedless into a
climate they are not used to an' fell--what was the word, Moira
darlin'?"

"Torpid," said Moira, gazing at him.

"Torpid," agreed the president. "From now on when there's too many
dinies we can send somebody runnin' through the streets with a hot
plate to call them into cold storage. We've pied pipers at will, to
help out the black creatures that've done so much for us. If we've
offended Eire on Earth, by havin' the black creatures to help us, we're
sorry. But we had to--till Moira and doubtless St. Patrick gave us the
answer ye saw today. If we're disowned, bedamned if we don't hang on!
We can feed ourselves now. We can feed some extra mouths. There'll be a
ship droppin' by out of curiosity now and then, and we'll trade with
'em. If were disowned--we'll be poor. But when were the Irish ever
rich?"

The committeeman who was a manufacturer of precision machinery mopped
his forehead.

"We're rich now," he said resignedly. "You'd be bound to learn it.
D'you know what the dinies' teeth are made of?"

"It's been said," said President O'Hanrahan, "that it's bor ... boron
carbide in organic form. What that means I wouldn't know, but we've got
a fine crop of it!"

"It's the next hardest substance to diamond," said the committeeman
dourly. "It's even been guessed that an organic type might be harder.
It's used for the tools for lathes and precision machinery, and it
sells at close to the price of diamonds of industrial quality--and I'll
make a deal to handle all we've got. What Earth don't need, other
planets will. You're rich."

The president stared. Then he gazed at Moira.

"It's a pity we're bein' disowned," he said mournfully. "It would be a
fine thing to be able to tell the grandfather Eire's rich and can feed
more colonists and even maybe pay back what it's cost to keep us here
so long. It would be a fine thing to hire colonists to build the houses
they'll be given free when they're finished. But since Sean O'Donohue
is a stern man----"

The ship owner scratched his head. He'd paused on the way to the
presidential mansion. He'd had restorativ