wish to warn you that your life, your
valuable life--and I never realised how valuable your life was until I
read your summing-up in the case of Mrs. Lorimer. That was, if I may
say so, masterly. Milton himself couldn't have done it better."

"Milton?" said the judge.

"I mentioned Milton," said Meldon, "because he was the most violent
misogynist I ever heard of. Read what he says about Delilah in 'Samson
Agonistes' and you'll see why I compare your remarks about Mrs. Lorimer
to the sort of way he wrote."

"I've read it," said the judge, "and I think I recollect the passages
you allude to. I don't quite see myself what connection there is
between his views and the case of Mrs. Lorimer. Still, I'm greatly
obliged to you for what you say about my summing-up. But you were
speaking of my life just before you mentioned Milton."

"The connection is obvious enough," said Meldon; "and if you've really
read the poem--"

"I have," said the judge.

"Then you ought to recognise that the strong anti-feminist bias which
Milton displays is exactly similar to the spirit in which you
attributed the worst possible motives to Mrs. Lorimer. I'm not now
entering on a discussion of the question of whether you and Milton are
right or wrong in your view of women. That would take too long, and,
besides, it hasn't anything to do with the business on hand."

"That," said the judge, "as well as I recollect, is the danger of my
losing my life."

"Your life," said Meldon, "will not be safe in Ballymoy. We met you at
the station to-day in order to warn you to go straight home again."

"Really!" said the judge. "I travelled down from London with a Member
of Parliament last night, and he gave me a description of the state of
the country which bears out what you say. He mentioned anarchy and
conspiracy as being rampant--or else rife; I forget for the moment
which word he used. He said that the west of Ireland lay at the mercy
of an organised system of terrorism, and that--"

"That must have been a Unionist," said Meldon.

"Damned lies," said O'Donoghue.

"He was a Unionist," said the judge. "But I met another man in the
steamer, also an M.P., who said that, owing to the beneficent action of
the Congested Districts Board, Connacht was rapidly becoming a happy
and contented part of the empire; that the sympathy with Irish ideas
displayed by the present Government was winning the hearts and
affections of the people, and--"

"