here Lady Moyne and her secretary
sat over her typewriter, a military club in St. James' Street where
Malcolmson sat smoking cigars, and a small hotel in the Strand where
McNeice and Cahoon were stopping. The Dean had left London for Belfast
immediately after the meeting. I have no doubt that Sir Samuel
Clithering did his best; but diplomacy applied to men like McNeice and
Malcolmson is about as useful as children's sand dykes are in checking
the advance of flowing tides.

It is a source of regret to me that my account of what happened in
London is meagre and disjointed. I was not there myself and events
became so much more exciting afterwards that nobody has any very clear
recollection of the course of these preliminary negotiations.

My own personal narrative begins again two days after the London
meeting, that is to say on the Friday before the Belfast
demonstration.

Godfrey came up to see me at eleven o'clock with his arm in a sling.

"Excellency," he said, "the Dean has just hoisted a large flag on the
tower of the church. I'm sure you don't approve of that."

It is, I hope, unnecessary to say that Godfrey is at feud with the
Dean. The Dean is a straightforward and honourable man. He and Godfrey
live in the same town. A quarrel between them was therefore
inevitable.

As a matter of fact I do not approve of the hoisting of flags on the
church tower. In Ireland we only hoist flags with a view to irritating
our enemies, and--I am not an expert in Christian theology but it
seems to me that church towers are not the most suitable places for
flaunting defiances. The Dean and I argued the matter out years ago
and arrived at a working compromise. I agreed to make no protest
against flags on the 12th of July. The Dean promised not to hoist them
on any other day. This is fairly satisfactory to the Dean because he
can exult over his foes on the day of the year on which it is most of
all desirable to do so. It is fairly satisfactory to me because on
three hundred and sixty-four days out of every year the church
remains, in outward appearance at least, a house of prayer, and I am
not vexed by having to regard it as a den of politicians. That is as
much as can be expected of any compromise, and I was always quite
loyal to my share of the bargain. The Dean, it now appeared, was not;
and Godfrey saw his chance of stirring up strife.

"I don't think," I said, "the Dean can have anything to do with the
flag. He is in Londo