e Bridgy's in America? What sense would there be in
it?'

'But why did you work for such wages?'

'Well, now,' said the younger girl, 'how could we be refusing the
Reverend Mother when she came round the town herself, and gave warning
that we'd all be wanted?'

'There's few,' continued Onny, without noticing her sister, 'that earned
as much as I did. Many a girl works there and has no more than one and
ninepence to take home at the end of the week.'

Hyacinth began to understand how it was that Mr. Quinn was being
hopelessly beaten. This was no struggle between two trade rivals, to be
won by the side with the longer purse. Nor was it simply a fight between
an independent manufacturer and a firm fed with Government bounties. Mr.
Quinn's rival could count on an unlimited supply of labour at starvation
wages, while he had to hire men and women at the market value of their
services. He had been sorry for the two girls when they got into the
train. Now he felt almost glad that they were leaving Ireland. It
appeared that they had certainly chosen the wiser part.

He arrived at home dejected, and sat down beside the fire in his room
to give himself up to complete despair. He found no hope anywhere. Irish
patriotism, so he saw it, was a matter of words and fine phrases. No one
really believed in it or would venture anything for it. Politics was a
game at which sharpers cheated each other and the people. The leaders
were bold only in sordid personal quarrels. The mass of the people were
utterly untouched by the idea of nationality, in earnest about nothing
but huckstering and petty gains. Over all was the grip of a foreign
bureaucracy and a selfish Church tightening slowly, squeezing out the
nation's life, grasping and holding fast its wealth. No man any longer
made any demand except to be allowed to earn what would buy whisky
enough to fuddle him into temporary forgetfulness of the present misery
and the imminent tyranny.

The slatternly maid-servant who brought him his meals and made his bed
tapped at the door.

'Please, sir, Jimmy Loughlin's after coming with a letter from Mr.
Quinn, and he's waiting to know if you'll go.'

Hyacinth read the note, which asked him to call on his employer that
afternoon.

'Tell him I'll be there.'

'Will you have your dinner before you go? The chops is in the pan below.
Or will I keep them till you come back?'

'Oh, I've time enough. Bring them as soon as they're cooked, and for