ur others in a small white-washed
iron-bound house on some bleak country side is not an exact parallel to
the Thessalian situation. It looks to be a life that is infinitely
lonely, ascetic, and barren. Two keepers of a lighthouse at a bitter end
of land in a remote sea will, if they are properly let alone, make a
murder in time. Five constables imprisoned 'mid a folk that will not
turn a face toward them, five constables planted in a populated silence,
may develop an acute and vivid economy, dwell in scowling dislike. A
religious asylum in a snow-buried mountain pass will breed conspiring
monks. A separated people will beget an egotism that is almost titanic.
A world floating distinctly in space will call itself the only world.
The progression is perfect.

But the constables take the second degree. They are next to the
lighthouse keepers. The national custom of meeting stranger and friend
alike on the road with a cheery greeting like "God save you" is too
kindly and human a habit not to be missed. But all through the South of
Ireland one sees the peasant turn his eyes pretentiously to the side of
the road at the passing of the constable. It seemed to be generally
understood that to note the presence of a constable was to make a
conventional error. None looked, nodded, or gave sign. There was a line
drawn so sternly that it reared like a fence. Of course, any police
force in any part of the world can gather at its heels a riff-raff of
people, fawning always on a hand licensed to strike that would be larger
than the army of the Potomac, but of these one ordinarily sees little.
The mass of the Irish strictly obey the stern tenet. One hears often of
the ostracism or other punishment that befell some girl who was caught
flirting with a constable.

Naturally the constable retreats to his pride. He is commonly a
soldierly-looking chap, straight, lean, long-strided, well set-up. His
little saucer of a forage cap sits obediently on his ear, as it does for
the British soldier. He swings a little cane. He takes his medicine with
a calm and hard face, and evidently stares full into every eye. But it
is singular to find in the situation of the Royal Irish Constabulary the
quality of pathos.

It is not known if these places in the South of Ireland are called
disturbed districts. Over them hangs the peace of Surrey, but the word
disturbance has an elastic arrangement by which it can be made to cover
anything. All of the villages vi