hink, sir,' said Hyacinth, 'that the best thing will be for me to
leave the divinity school.'

'I think so, too. But leaving our divinity school need not mean that you
give up the idea of taking Holy Orders. I have a very high opinion of
your abilities, Conneally--so high that I should not like the Church to
lose your services. At the same time, you are not at present the kind
of man whom I could possibly recommend to any Irish Bishop. Your
Nationalist principles are an absolute bar to your working in the Church
of Ireland.'

'I wonder, sir, how you can call our Church the Church of Ireland, and
in the same breath say that there is no room for a Nationalist in her.
Don't the two things contradict each other.'

Dr. Henry's eyes twinkled again. There spread over his mouth a smile of
tolerant amusement.

'My dear boy, I'm not going to let you trap me into a discussion of that
question. Theoretically, I have no doubt you would make out an excellent
case. National Church, National spirit, National politics--Irish Church,
Irish nation, Irish ideas. They all go excellently together, don't they?
And yet the facts are as I state them. A Nationalist clergyman in
the Church of Ireland would be just as impossible as an English
Nonconformist in the Court of Louis Quatorze. After all, in this life
one has got to steer one's course among facts, and they're sharp things
which knock holes in the man who disregards them. Now, what I propose
to you is this: Put off your ordination for three years or so. Take
up schoolmastaring. I will undertake to get you a post in an English
school. Your politics won't matter over there, because no one will in
the least understand what you mean. Work hard, think hard, read hard.
Mix with the bigger world across the Channel. See England and realize
what England is and what her Empire means. Don't be angry with me for
saying that, long before the three years are over, you'll have come to
see that what you call patriotism is nothing else than parochialism of
a particularly narrow and uninstructed kind. Then come back here to me,
and I'll arrange for your ordination. You'll do the best of good work
when you've grown up a bit, and I'll see you a Bishop before I die.'

'I shall always be grateful to you,' said Hyacinth. 'I shall never
forget your kindness, and the way you've treated me; but I can't do what
you ask.'

'Oh, I'm not going to take no for an answer,' said Dr. Henry. 'Go home
to the West and