agreeable to the 'united mothers' and the rest when they
assembled for tea-drinking. Mr. Austin asserted that these were the
methods by which the English people were being taught the Catholic
faith. Hyacinth did not doubt it, nor did he permit himself to wonder
whether it was worth while teaching them.

To Marion the new life was full of many delights. The surpliced
choir-boys gratified her aesthetic sense, and she entered herself as one
of a band of volunteers who scrubbed the chancel tiles and polished a
brass cross. She smiled, kissed, and petted Hyacinth out of the fits of
depression which came on him, managed his small income with wonderful
skill, and wrote immensely long letters home to Ballymoy.

CHAPTER XXVI

It is very hard for a poor man to travel from one side of England to the
other side of Ireland, because railway companies, even when, to allure
the public, they advertise extraordinary excursions, charge a great
deal for their tickets. The journey becomes still more difficult of
accomplishment when the poor man is married. Then there are two tickets
to be bought, and very likely most of the money which might have bought
them has been spent securing the safe arrival of a baby--a third person
who in due time will also require a railway-ticket. This was Hyacinth's
case. For two summers he had no holiday at all, and it was only by the
most fortunate of chances that he found himself during the third
summer in a position to go to Ballymoy. He sublet his house to a
freshly-arrived supervisor of Inland Revenue, who wanted six weeks
to look about for a suitable residence. With the nine pounds paid in
advance by this gentleman, Hyacinth and Marion, having with them their
baby, a perambulator, and much other luggage, set off for Ballymoy.

The journey is not a very pleasant one, because it is made over the
lines of three English railway companies, whose trains refuse to connect
with each other at junctions, and because St. George's Channel is
generally rough. The discomfort of third-class carriages is more acutely
felt when the Irish shore is reached, but the misery of having to feed
and tend a year-old child lasts the whole journey through. Therefore,
Marion arrived in Dublin dishevelled, weary, and, for all her natural
placidness, inclined to be cross. The steamer came to port at an hour
which left them just the faint hope of catching the earliest train to
Ballymoy. Disappointment followed the nervous strai