the facts that stare you
in the face. Why, man alive, look at me! You know the way I nag,
and worry, and carp, and cavil, and disparage, and am never
satisfied and never quiet, and try the patience of my best
friends.

BROADBENT. Oh, come, Larry! do yourself justice. You're very
amusing and agreeable to strangers.

DOYLE. Yes, to strangers. Perhaps if I was a bit stiffer to
strangers, and a bit easier at home, like an Englishman, I'd be
better company for you.

BROADBENT. We get on well enough. Of course you have the
melancholy of the Celtic race--

DOYLE [bounding out of his chair] Good God!!!

BROADBENT [slyly]--and also its habit of using strong language
when there's nothing the matter.

DOYLE. Nothing the matter! When people talk about the Celtic
race, I feel as if I could burn down London. That sort of rot
does more harm than ten Coercion Acts. Do you suppose a man need
be a Celt to feel melancholy in Rosscullen? Why, man, Ireland was
peopled just as England was; and its breed was crossed by just
the same invaders.

BROADBENT. True. All the capable people in Ireland are of English
extraction. It has often struck me as a most remarkable
circumstance that the only party in parliament which shows the
genuine old English character and spirit is the Irish party. Look
at its independence, its determination, its defiance of bad
Governments, its sympathy with oppressed nationalities all the
world over! How English!

DOYLE. Not to mention the solemnity with which it talks
old-fashioned nonsense which it knows perfectly well to be a century
behind the times. That's English, if you like.

BROADBENT. No, Larry, no. You are thinking of the modern hybrids
that now monopolize England. Hypocrites, humbugs, Germans, Jews,
Yankees, foreigners, Park Laners, cosmopolitan riffraff. Don't
call them English. They don't belong to the dear old island, but
to their confounded new empire; and by George! they're worthy of
it; and I wish them joy of it.

DOYLE [unmoved by this outburst]. There! You feel better now,
don't you?

BROADBENT [defiantly]. I do. Much better.

DOYLE. My dear Tom, you only need a touch of the Irish climate to
be as big a fool as I am myself. If all my Irish blood were
poured into your veins, you wouldn't turn a hair of your
constitution and character. Go and marry the most English
Englishwoman you can find, and then bring up your son in
Rosscullen; and that son's character will be so like mine and