initial commit of ebook 24742HEAD main

author: Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> 2025-10-15 02:14:11 -0700
committer: Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> 2025-10-15 02:14:11 -0700
commit: 85339f4151d638cd69d558b2e9551d371e057322 (patch)
tree: 55f273122dcf504e5567927003a2957db44d2aec
288 files changed, 10269 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6833f05
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.gitattributes
@@ -0,0 +1,3 @@
+* text=auto
+*.txt text
+*.md text
diff --git a/24742-h.zip b/24742-h.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..226eace
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-h.zip
diff --git a/24742-h/24742-h.htm b/24742-h/24742-h.htm
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3a3804c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-h/24742-h.htm
@@ -0,0 +1,5126 @@
+<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
+    "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
+
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
+  <head>
+    <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" />
+    <title>
+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of Mary, Mary, by James Stephens.
+    </title>
+    <style type="text/css">
+<!--
+    p {  margin-top: .75em;
+         text-align: justify;
+         margin-bottom: .75em;
+         }
+    h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 {
+         text-align: center; /* all headings centered */
+         clear: both;
+         }
+    hr { width: 33%;
+	 margin-top: 2em;
+	 margin-bottom: 2em;
+         margin-left: auto;
+         margin-right: auto;
+         clear: both;
+       }
+
+
+    body{margin-left: 10%;
+         margin-right: 10%;
+        }
+
+    .pagenum  { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */
+                visibility: hidden;
+                position: absolute;
+                left: 92%;
+                font-size: smaller;
+                text-align: right;
+              } /* page numbers */
+
+    .linenum  {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */
+    .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;}
+
+    .bb       {border-bottom: solid 2px;}
+    .bl       {border-left: solid 2px;}
+    .bt       {border-top: solid 2px;}
+    .br       {border-right: solid 2px;}
+    .bbox     {border: solid 2px;}
+
+    .center   {text-align: center;}
+    .smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
+    .u        {text-decoration: underline;}
+
+    .caption  {font-weight: bold;}
+
+    .figcenter   {margin: auto; text-align: center;}
+
+    .poem             {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;}
+    .poem br          {display: none;}
+    .poem .stanza     {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;}
+    .poem span.i0     {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;}
+    .poem span.i2     {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;}
+    .poem span.i4     {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;}
+    // -->
+    /* XML end  ]>*/
+    </style>
+  </head>
+<body>
+
+
+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mary, Mary, by James Stephens
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Mary, Mary
+
+Author: James Stephens
+
+Commentator: Padraic Colum
+
+Release Date: March 3, 2008 [EBook #24742]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARY, MARY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charlene Taylor and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+<h1>MARY, MARY</h1>
+
+<h2>BY JAMES STEPHENS</h2>
+
+<p class="center">INTRODUCTION BY PADRAIC COLUM</p>
+
+<p class="center">BONI AND LIVERIGHT, INC.</p>
+
+<p class="center">PUBLISHERS NEW YORK</p>
+
+<p class="center"><i>Printed in the
+United States of America</i></p>
+
+<p class="center">
+1912, BY
+SMALL, MAYNARD AND COMPANY
+(INCORPORATED)</p>
+
+<p class="center">TO</p>
+
+<p class="center">BETHEL SOLOMONS, M.B.</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="MARY_MARY" id="MARY_MARY"></a>MARY, MARY</h2>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="INTRODUCTION" id="INTRODUCTION"></a>INTRODUCTION</h2>
+
+
+<p>If any of James Stephens' books might be thought to have need of an
+Introduction it would be the delightful story that is called "Mary,
+Mary" on one side of the Atlantic Ocean and "The Charwoman's Daughter"
+on the other. It was written in 1910, when the author was known as the
+poet of "Insurrections" and the writer of a few of the mordant studies
+that belong to a later book, "Here Are Ladies."</p>
+
+<p>In 1911 four people came together to establish "The Irish Review."
+They were David Houston, Thomas MacDonagh, James Stephens and the
+present writer. James Stephens mentioned that he could hand over some
+stuff for publication. The "stuff" was the book in hand. It came out
+as a serial in the second number with the title "Mary, A Story," ran
+for a twelvemonth and did much to make the fortune (if a review that
+perished after a career of four years ever had its fortune made) of
+"The Irish Review."</p>
+
+<p>From the publication of its first chapters the appeal of "Mary"
+was felt in two or three countries. Mary Makebelieve was not just
+a fictional heroine&mdash;she was Cinderella and Snow-white and all
+the maidens of tradition for whom the name of heroine is big and
+burthensome. With the first words of the story James Stephens put us
+into the attitude of listeners to the household tale of folk-lore.
+"Mary, Mary" is the simplest of stories: a girl sees this and that,
+meets a Great Creature who makes advances to her, is humiliated,
+finds a young champion and comes into her fortune&mdash;that is all there
+is to it as a story. But is it not enough to go with Mary to Stephens'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[Pg x]</a></span>
+Green and watch the young ducks "pick up nothing with the greatest
+eagerness and swallow it with the greatest delight," and after that
+to notice that the ring priced One Hundred Pounds has been taken
+from the Jewellers' window, and then stand outside the theatre with
+her and her mother and make up with them the story of the plays from
+the pictures on the posters?&mdash;plays of mystery and imagination they
+must have surely been.</p>
+
+<p>Then, of course, there is always Mary's mother; and Mrs. Makebelieve,
+with her beaked nose, and her eyes like pools of ink, and her
+eagle-flights of speech would give a backbone to any story. Mrs.
+Makebelieve has and holds all the privileges of the poor and the
+lonely. Moreover, she is the eternal Charwoman. "She could not remain
+for any length of time in peoples' employment without being troubled
+by the fact that these folk had houses of their own and were actually
+employing her in a menial capacity." Mrs. Makebelieve is, I think, a
+typical figure. She is the incarnation of the pride and liveliness and
+imaginative exuberance that permit the poor to live.</p>
+
+<p>How poor are Mary and Mrs. Makebelieve? We know their lack by the
+measure of their desire. Mrs. Makebelieve, always generous, would have
+paid her servants Ten Shillings per Week each, and their Board. And we
+know that she had often observed desolate people dragging themselves
+through the streets, standing to glare through the windows of bakeries
+and confectioners' shops, with little children in some of their arms,
+and that thinking of such things every morsel she ate would have
+choked her were it not for her own hunger. By our being brought to
+desire what Mary and her mother desired we come to know the things
+they lacked.</p>
+
+<p>Yes, poverty was the state in which Mary and Mrs. Makebelieve existed,
+but freedom was the other side of that poverty. They had not to set
+the bounds of realization upon their wishes. They were not shut off,
+as too many of us are, from the adventure and the enchantment that are
+in things. A broken mirror upon the wall of a bare room! It is, after
+all, that wonder of wonders, a thing. But<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[Pg xi]</a></span> one cannot convey to those
+who have not known the wonder, how wonderful a mere thing is! A child
+who has watched and watched the face of a grandfather's clock, stopped
+before he was born, feels this wonder. To grown folk and to those
+who have many possessions the things they own are lumber, some more
+convenient, some more decorative than others. But to those who have
+few possessions things are familiars and have an intimate history.
+Hence it is only the poor or only unspoiled children that have the
+full freedom of things&mdash;who can enter into their adventure and their
+enchantment. Mary and her mother have this franchise. And for this
+reason also "Mary, Mary" has an inner resemblance to a folk-tale. For
+the folk-tale, shaped as it has been by the poor and by unspoiled
+people, reveals always the adventure and the enchantment of things.
+An old lamp may be Aladdin's. A comb might kill a false queen. A key
+may open the door of a secret chamber. A dish may be the supreme
+possession of a King. The sense of the uniqueness of things&mdash;the sense
+that the teller of the folk-tale has always, and that such a poet of
+the poor as Burns has often, is in "Mary, Mary." And there is in it
+too the zest that the hungry&mdash;not the starved but the hungry&mdash;have for
+life. James Stephens says of the young man who became Mary's champion,
+"His ally and stay was hunger, and there is no better ally for any
+man: that satisfied and the game is up; for hunger is life, ambition,
+good will and understanding, while fulness is all those negatives
+which culminate in greediness, stupidity, and decay."</p>
+
+<p>The scene of the story is that grey-colored, friendly capital&mdash;Dublin.
+It is not the tortuous, inimical, Aristotlian-minded Dublin of James
+Joyce's "Portrait of the Artist"&mdash;it is the Dublin of the
+simple-hearted Dubliner: Dublin with its great grey clouds and its
+poising sea-birds, with its hills and its bay, with its streets that
+everyone would avoid and with its other streets that everyone
+promenades; with its greens and its park and its river-walks&mdash;Dublin,
+always friendly. It is true that there are in it those who, as the
+Policeman told Mary, are born by stealth, eat by subterfuge, drink
+by dodges, get married by antics, and slide into death by strange,
+subterranean passages. Wel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[Pg xii]</a></span>l, even these would be kindly and humorous
+the reader of "Mary, Mary" knows. James Stephens has made Dublin a
+place where the heart likes to dwell.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">And would to God that I to-day<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Saw sunlight on the Hill of Howth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And sunlight on the Golden Spears,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And sunlight out on Dublin Bay.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>So one who has known Dublin might well exclaim on reading "Mary, Mary"
+east or west of Eirinn.</p>
+
+<p>James Stephens brought a fresh and distinctive element into the new
+Irish literature&mdash;an imaginative exuberance that in its rush of
+expression became extravagant, witty, picturesque and lovely. His work
+began to appear about 1906. Like the rest of the young Irish writers
+he made his appearance in the weekly journal "Sinn Fein," contributing
+to it his first poems and his mordant or extravagant essays and stories.
+At once he made a public for himself. His first poems were published
+in a volume called "Insurrections" and his public became a wide one.
+"Mary, Mary" brought out in 1912 was his first prose book. His next, the
+unclassifiable "Crock of Gold," was given the De Polignac Prize in 1914.
+Since then he has published two other prose books&mdash;"Here Are Ladies" and
+"The Demi-Gods," with three books of verse, "The Hill of Vision," "Songs
+from the Clay," and "The Rocky Road to Dublin."</p>
+
+<p>"Insurrections," written just before "Mary, Mary," has vivid
+revelations of personality. "I saw God&mdash;do you doubt it?" says Tomas
+an Buile in the "pub."&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">I saw God. Do you doubt it?<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">Do you dare to doubt it?<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I saw the Almighty Man. His hand<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Was resting on a mountain, and<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He looked upon the World and all about it:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">I saw Him plainer than you see me now,<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">You mustn't doubt it.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">He was not satisfied;<br /></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[Pg xiii]</a></span>
+<span class="i4">His look was all dissatisfied.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">His beard swung on a wind far out of sight<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Behind the world's curve, and there was light<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Most fearful from His forehead, and He sighed,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">"That star went always wrong, and from the start<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">I was dissatisfied."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">He lifted up His hand&mdash;<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">I say He heaved a dreadful hand<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Over the spinning Earth, then I said "Stay,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">You must not strike it, God; I'm in the way;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And I will never move from where I stand."<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">He said, "Dear child, I feared that you were dead,"<br /></span>
+<span class="i4">And stayed His hand.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>His God is never a lonely God&mdash;he has need of humanity, and the quick
+champion of humanity springs straight into the love of God. Such is
+the intuition that is in all James Stephens' books.</p>
+
+<p>He is the only author I have ever known whose talk is like his books.
+The prodigality of humour, intuition and searching thought that he
+puts into his pages he also puts into what he says. And he is the only
+man I ever met who can sing his stories as well as tell them. Like the
+rest of the Irish writers of to-day, what he writes has a sense of
+spiritual equality as amongst all men and women&mdash;a sense of a
+democracy that is inherent in the world.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 300px;">
+<img src="images/signature.jpg" width="300" height="94" alt="signature: Padraic Colum" title="" />
+</div>
+
+
+<p>New York, September, 1917.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>MARY, MARY</h2>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve lived with her mother in a small room at the very top
+of a big, dingy house in a Dublin back street. As long as she could
+remember she had lived in that top back room. She knew every crack in
+the ceiling, and they were numerous and of strange shapes. Every spot
+of mildew on the ancient wall-paper was familiar. She had, indeed,
+watched the growth of most from a grayish shade to a dark<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> stain, from
+a spot to a great blob, and the holes in the skirting of the walls,
+out of which at nighttime the cockroaches came rattling, she knew
+also. There was but one window in the room, and when she wished to
+look out of it she had to push the window up, because the grime of
+many years had so encrusted the glass that it was of no more than the
+demi-semi-transparency of thin horn. When she did look there was
+nothing to see but a bulky array of chimney-pots crowning a next-door
+house, and these continually hurled jays of soot against her window;
+therefore, she did not care to look out often, for each time that she
+did so she was forced to wash herself, and as water had to be carried
+from the very bottom of the five-story house up hundreds and hundreds
+of stairs to her room, she disliked having to use too much water.</p>
+
+<p>Her mother seldom washed at all. She held that washing was very
+unhealthy and took the natural gloss off the face, and that, moreover,
+soap <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span>either tightened the skin or made it wrinkle. Her own face was
+very tight in some places and very loose in others, and Mary
+Makebelieve often thought that the tight places were spots which her
+mother used to wash when she was young, and the loose parts were
+those which had never been washed at all. She thought that she would
+prefer to be either loose all over her face or tight all over it, and,
+therefore, when she washed she did it thoroughly, and when she
+abstained she allowed of no compromise.</p>
+
+<p>Her mother's face was the color of old, old ivory. Her nose was like a
+great strong beak, and on it the skin was stretched very tightly, so
+that her nose shone dully when the candle was lit. Her eyes were big
+and as black as pools of ink and as bright as the eyes of a bird. Her
+hair also was black, it was as smooth as the finest silk, and when
+unloosened it hung straightly down, shining about her ivory face. Her
+lips were thin and scarcely colored at all, and her hands were sharp,
+quick hands, seeming all knuckle when she <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span>closed them and all fingers
+when they were opened again.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve loved her mother very dearly, and her mother returned
+her affection with an overwhelming passion that sometimes surged into
+physically painful caresses. When her mother hugged her for any length
+of time she soon wept, rocking herself and her daughter to and fro,
+and her clutch became then so frantic that poor Mary Makebelieve found
+it difficult to draw her breath; but she would not for the world have
+disturbed the career of her mother's love. Indeed, she found some
+pleasure in the fierceness of those caresses, and welcomed the pain
+far more than she reprobated it.</p>
+
+<p>Her mother went out early every morning to work, and seldom returned
+home until late at night. She was a charwoman, and her work was to
+scrub out rooms and wash down staircases. She also did cooking when<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span>
+she was asked, and needlework when she got any to do. She had made
+exquisite dresses which were worn by beautiful young girls at balls
+and picnics, and fine, white shirts that great gentlemen wore when
+they were dining, and fanciful waistcoats for gay young men, and silk
+stockings for dancing in&mdash;but that was a long time ago, because these
+beautiful things used to make her very angry when they were taken from
+her, so that she cursed the people who came to take them away and
+sometimes tore up the dresses and danced on them and screamed.</p>
+
+<p>She used often to cry because she was not rich. Sometimes, when she
+came home from work, she liked to pretend that she was rich; she would
+play at imagining that some one had died and left her a great fortune,
+or that her brother Patrick had come back from America with vast
+wealth, and then she would tell Mary Makebelieve of the things she
+intended to buy and do the very next day. Mary Makebelieve liked
+that.... <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span>They were to move the first thing in the morning to a big
+house with a garden behind it full of fruit trees and flowers and
+birds. There would be a wide lawn in front of the house to play lawn
+tennis in and to walk with delicately fine young men with fair faces
+and white hands, who would speak in the French language and bow often
+with their hats almost touching the ground. There were to be twelve
+servants&mdash;six of them men servants and six of them women servants&mdash;who
+would instantly do as they were bidden and would receive ten shillings
+each per week and their board; they would also have two nights free in
+the week, and would be very well fed. There were many wonderful
+dresses to be bought, dresses for walking in the streets and dresses
+for driving in a carriage, and others again for riding on horseback
+and for traveling in. There was a dress of crimson silk with a deep
+lace collar, and a heavy, wine-colored satin dress <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span>with a gold chain
+falling down in front of it, and there was a pretty white dress of the
+finest linen, having one red rose pinned at the waist. There were
+black silken stockings with quaint designs worked on them in red silk,
+and scarves of silver gauze, and others embroidered with flowers and
+little shapes of men and women.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>When her mother was planning all these things she was very happy, but
+afterwards she used to cry bitterly and rock her daughter to and fro
+on her breast until she hurt her.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2>
+
+
+<p>Every morning about six o'clock Mary Makebelieve left her bed and lit
+the fire. It was an ugly fire to light, because the chimney had never
+been swept, and there was no draught. Also they never had any sticks
+in the house, and scraps of paper twisted tightly into balls with the
+last night's cinders placed on them and a handful of small coals
+strewn on the top were used instead. Sometimes the fire blazed up
+quickly, and that made her happy, but at other times it went out thr<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>ee
+and four, and often half a dozen times; then the little bottle of
+paraffin oil had to be squandered&mdash;a few rags well steeped in the oil
+with a newspaper stretched over the grate seldom failed to coax enough
+fire to boil the saucepan of water; generally this method smoked the
+water, and then the tea tasted so horrid that one only drank it for
+the sake of economy.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve liked to lie in bed until the last possible moment.
+As there was no table in the room, Mary used to bring the two cups of
+tea, the tin of condensed milk, and the quarter of a loaf over to the
+bed, and there she and her mother took their breakfast.</p>
+
+<p>From the time she opened her eyes in the morning her mother never
+ceased to talk. It was then she went over all the things that had
+happened on the previous day and enumerated the places she would have
+to go to on the present day, and the chances for and against the
+making of a little money. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>At this meal she used to arrange also to
+have the room re-papered and the chimney swept and the rat-holes
+stopped up&mdash;there were three of these, one was on the left-hand side
+of the fire grate, the other two were under the bed, and Mary
+Makebelieve had lain awake many a night listening to the gnawing of
+teeth on the skirting and the scamper of little feet here and there on
+the floor. Her mother further arranged to have a Turkey carpet placed
+on the floor, although she admitted that oilcloth or linoleum was
+easier to clean, but they were not so nice to the feet or the eye.
+Into all these improvements her daughter entered with the greatest
+delight. There was to be a red mahogany chest of drawers against one
+wall and a rosewood piano against the wall opposite. A fender of
+shining brass with brazen furniture, a bright, copper kettle for
+boiling water in, and an iron pot for cooking potatoes and meat; there
+was to be a life-sized picture of Mary ov<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>er the mantelpiece and a
+picture of her mother near the window in a golden frame, also a
+picture of a Newfoundland dog lying in a barrel and a little wee
+terrier crawling up to make friends with him, and a picture of a
+battle between black people and soldiers.</p>
+
+<p>Her mother knew it was time to get out of bed when she heard a heavy
+step coming from the next room and going downstairs. A laboring man
+lived there with his wife and six children. When the door banged she
+jumped up, dressed quickly, and flew from the room in a panic of
+haste. Usually then, as there was nothing to do, Mary went back to bed
+for another couple of hours. After this she arose, made the bed and
+tidied the room, and went out to walk in the streets, or to sit in the
+St. Stephen's Green Park. She knew every bird in the Park, those that
+had chickens and those that had had chickens, and those that never had
+any chickens at all&mdash;these latter were usually dr<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span>akes, and had reason
+on their side for an abstention which might otherwise have appeared
+remarkable, but they did not deserve the pity which Mary lavished on
+their childlessness, nor the extra pieces of bread with which she
+sought to recompense them. She loved to watch the ducklings swimming
+after their mothers: they were quite fearless, and would dash to the
+water's edge where one was standing and pick up nothing with the
+greatest eagnerness and swallow it with delight. The mother duck swam
+placidly close to her brood and clucked in a low voice all kinds of
+warnings and advice and reproof to the little ones. Mary Makebelieve
+thought it was very clever of the little ducklings to be able to swim
+so well. She loved them, and when nobody was looking she used to cluck
+at them like their mother, but she did not often do this because she
+did not know duck language really well, and feared that her cluck
+might mean the wrong things, and that she might be giving these
+innocents bad advice, and telling them to do something contrary to
+what their mothe<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>r had just directed.</p>
+
+<p>The bridge across the big lake was a fascinating place. On the sunny
+side lots of ducks were always standing on their heads searching for
+something in the water, so that they looked like only half ducks. On
+the shady side hundreds of eels were swimming about&mdash;they were most
+wonderful things; some of them were thin like ribbons, and others were
+round and plump like thick ropes. They never seemed to fight at all,
+and although the ducklings were so tiny the big eels never touched any
+of them, even when they dived right down amongst them. Some of the
+eels swam along very slowly, looking on this side and on that as if
+they were out of work or up from the country, and others whizzed by
+with incredible swiftness. Mary Makebelieve thought that the latter
+kind had just heard their babies crying; she wondered, when a little
+fish cried, could its mother see the tears where there was already so
+mu<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span>ch water about, and then she thought that maybe they cried hard
+lumps of something that was easily visible.</p>
+
+<p>After this she would go around the flower-beds and look at each; some
+of them were shaped like stars, and some were quite round, and others
+again were square. She liked the star-shaped flower-beds best, and
+next she liked the round ones, and last of all the square. But she
+loved all the flowers, and used to make up stories about them.</p>
+
+<p>After that, growing hungry, she would go home for her lunch. She went
+home down Grafton Street and O'Connell Street. She always went along
+the right-hand side of the street going home, and looked in every shop
+window that she passed, and then, when she had eaten her lunch, she
+came out again and walked along the left-hand side of the road,
+looking at the shops on that side, and so she knew da<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span>ily everything
+that was new in the city, and was able to tell her mother at nighttime
+that the black dress with Spanish lace was taken out of Manning's
+window and a red gown with tucks at the shoulders and Irish lace at
+the wrists put in its place; or that the diamond ring in Johnson's
+marked One Hundred Pounds was gone from the case and that a slide of
+brooches of beaten silver and blue enamel was there instead.</p>
+
+<p>In the nighttime her mother and herself went round to each of the
+theaters in turn and watched the people going in and looked at the big
+posters. When they went home afterward<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>s they had supper and used to
+try to make out the plots of the various plays from the pictures they
+had seen, so that generally they had lots to talk about before they
+went to bed. Mary Makebelieve used to talk most in the nighttime, but
+her mother talked most in the morning.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2>
+
+
+<p>Her mother spoke sometimes of matrimony as a thing remote but very
+certain; the remoteness of this adventure rather shocked Mary
+Makebelieve; she knew that a girl had to get married, that a strange,
+beautiful man would come from somewhere looking for a wife and would
+retire again with his bride to that Somewhere which is the country of
+Romance. At times (and she could easily picture it) he rode in armor
+on a great bay horse, the plume of his helmet trailing among the high
+leaves of the forest. Or he came standing on the prow of a swift ship
+with the sunlight blazing back from his golden armor. Or on a grassy
+plain, fleet a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span>s the wind, he came running, leaping, laughing.</p>
+
+<p>When the subject of matrimony was under discussion her mother planned
+minutely the person of the groom, his vast accomplishments, and yet
+vaster wealth, the magnificence of his person, and the love in which
+he was held by rich and poor alike. She also discussed, down to the
+smallest detail, the elaborate trousseau she would provide for her
+daughter, the extravagant presents the bridegroom would make to his
+bride and her maids, and those, yet more costly, which the
+bridegroom's family would send to the newly married pair. All these
+wonders could only concentrate in the person of a lord. Mary
+Makebelieve's questions as to the status and appurtenances of a lord
+were searching and minute, her mother's rejoinders were equally
+elaborate and particular.</p>
+
+<p>At his birth a lord is cradled in silver, at his death he <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>is laid in
+a golden casket, an oaken coffin, and a leaden outer coffin until,
+finally, a massy stone sarcophagus shrouds his remains forever. His
+life is a whirl of gayety and freedom. Around his castle there spread
+miles upon miles of sunny grass lands and ripened orchards and waving
+forests, and through these he hunts with his laughing companions or
+walks gently with his lady. He has servants by the thousand, each
+anxious to die for him, and his wealth, prodigious beyond the
+computation of avarice, is stored in underground chambers, whose low,
+tortuous passages lead to labyrinths of vaults, massy and impregnable.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve would have loved to wed a lord. If a lord had come to
+her when she paced softly through a forest, or stood alone on the
+seashore, or crouched among the long grass of a windy plain, she would
+have placed her hands in his and followed him and loved him truly
+forever. But she did not believe that th<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>ese things happened nowadays,
+nor did her mother. Nowadays! her mother looked on these paltry times
+with an eye whose scorn was complicated by fury. Mean, ugly days,
+mean, ugly lives, and mean, ugly people, said her mother, that's all
+one can get nowadays, and then she spoke of the people whose houses
+she washed out and whose staircases she scrubbed down, and her
+old-ivory face flamed from her black hair and her deep, dark eyes
+whirled and became hard and motionless as points of jet, and her hands
+jumped alternately into knuckles and claws.</p>
+
+<p>But it became increasingly evident to Mary Makebelieve that marriage
+was not a story but a fact, and, somehow, the romance of it did not
+drift away, although the very house wherein she lived was infested by
+these conjoints, and the streets wherein she walked were crowded with
+undistinguished couples.... Those gray-lived, dreary-natured people
+had a spark of fire smoldering somewhere in their <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span>poor economy. Six
+feet deep is scarcely deep enough to bury romance, and until that
+depth of clay has clogged our bones the fire can still smolder and be
+fanned, and, perhaps, blaze up and flare across a county or a country
+to warm the cold hands of many a shriveled person.</p>
+
+<p>How did all these people come together? She did not yet understand the
+basic necessity that drives the male to the female. Sex was not yet to
+her a physiological distinction, it was only a differentiation of
+clothing, a matter of whiskers and no whiskers: but she had begun to
+take a new and peculiar interest in men. One of these hurrying or
+loitering strangers might be the husband whom fate had ordained for
+her. She would scarcely have been surprised if one of the men who
+looked at her casually in the street had suddenly halted and asked her
+to marry him. It came on her with something like assurance that that
+was the only business these men were there for, she cou<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span>ld not discover
+any other reason or excuse for their existence, and if some man had
+been thus adventurous Mary Makebelieve would have been sadly perplexed
+to find an answer: she might, indeed, have replied, "Yes, thank you,
+sir," for when a man asks one to do a thing for him one does it
+gladly. There was an attraction about young men which she could not
+understand, something peculiarly dear and magnetic; she would have
+liked to shake hands with one to see how different he felt from a
+girl. They would, probably, shake hands quite hard and then hit one.
+She fancied she would not mind being hit by a man, and then, watching
+the vigor of their movements, she thought they could hit very hard,
+but still there was a terrible attraction about the idea of being hit
+by a man. She asked her mother (with apparent irrelevance) had a man
+ever struck her; her mother was silent for a few moments, and then
+burst into so violent a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> passion of weeping that Mary Makebelieve was
+frightened. She rushed into her mother's arms and was rocked fiercely
+against a heart almost bursting with bitter pride and recollection.
+But her mother did not then, nor did she ever afterwards, answer Mary
+Makebelieve's question.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2>
+
+
+<p>Every afternoon a troop of policemen marched in solemn and majestic
+single file from the College Green Police Station. At regular
+intervals, one by one, a policeman stepped sideways from the file,
+adjusted his belt, touched his moustache, looked up the street and
+down the street for stray criminals, and condescended to the duties
+of his beat.</p>
+
+<p>At the crossing where Nassau and Suffolk str<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span>eets intersect Grafton
+Street one of these superb creatures was wont to relinquish his
+companions, and there in the center of the road, a monument of
+solidity and law, he remained until the evening hour which released
+him again to the companionship of his peers.</p>
+
+<p>Perhaps this point is the most interesting place in Dublin. Upon one
+vista Grafton Street with its glittering shops stretches, or rather
+winds, to the St. Stephen's Green Park, terminating at the gate known
+as the Fusiliers' Arch, but which local patriotism has rechristened
+the Traitors' Gate. On the left Nassau Street, broad and clean, and a
+trifle vulgar and bourgeois in its openness, runs away to Merrion
+Square, and on with a broad ease to Blackrock and Kingstown and the
+sea. On the right hand Suffolk Street, reserved and shy, twists up to
+St. Andrew's Church, touches gingerly the South City Markets, droops
+to George's Street, and is lost in mean and dingy intersections. At
+the back <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>of the crossing Grafton Street continues again for a little
+distance down to Trinity College (at the gates whereof very
+intelligent young men flaunt very tattered gowns and smoke massive
+pipes with great skill for their years), skirting the Bank of Ireland,
+and on to the River Liffey and the street which local patriotism
+defiantly speaks of as O'Connell Street, and alien patriotism, with
+equal defiance and pertinacity, knows as Sackville Street.</p>
+
+<p>To the point where these places meet, and where the policeman stands,
+all the traffic of Dublin converges in a constant stream. The trams
+hurrying to Terenure, or Donnybrook, or Dalkey flash around this
+corner; the doctors who, in these degenerate days, concentrate in
+Merrion Square, fly up here in carriages and motor cars, the vans of
+the great firms in Grafton and O'Connell streets, or those outlying,
+never cease their exuberant progress. The ladies and gentlemen of
+leisure stroll here daily at fo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span>ur o'clock, and from all sides the
+vehicles and pedestrians, the bicycles and motor bicycles, the trams
+and the outside cars rush to the solitary policeman, who directs them
+all with his severe but tolerant eye. He knows all the tram-drivers
+who go by, and his nicely graduated wink rewards the glances of the
+rubicund, jolly drivers of the hackneys and the decayed Jehus with
+purple faces and dismal hopefulness who drive sepulchral cabs for some
+reason which has no acquaintance with profit; nor are the ladies and
+gentlemen who saunter past foreign to his encyclopedic eye. Constantly
+his great head swings a slow recognition, constantly his serene finger
+motions onwards a well-known undesirable, and his big, white teeth
+flash for an instant at young, laughing girls and the more matronly
+acquaintances who solicit the distinction of his glance.</p>
+
+<p>To this place, and about this hour, Mary Makebelieve, returning from
+her solitary lunc<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span>h, was wont to come. The figure of the massive
+policeman fascinated her. Surely everything desirable in manhood was
+concentrated in his tremendous body. What an immense, shattering blow
+that mighty fist could give! She could imagine it swinging vast as the
+buffet of a hero, high-thrown and then down irresistibly&mdash;a crashing,
+monumental hand. She delighted in his great, solid head as it swung
+slowly from side to side, and his calm, proud eye&mdash;a governing,
+compelling and determined eye. She had never met his glance yet: she
+withered away before it as a mouse withers and shrinks and falls to
+its den before a cat's huge glare. She used to look at him from the
+curbstone in front of the chemist's shop, or on the opposite side of
+the road, while pretending to wait for a tram; and at the pillar-box
+beside the optician's she found time for one furtive twinkle of a
+glance that shivered to his face and trembled away into the traffic.
+She did not think he noticed her, but there wa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>s nothing he did not
+notice. His business was noticing: he caught her in his mental
+policeman's note-book the very first day she came; he saw her each
+day beside, and at last looked for her coming and enjoyed her
+strategy. One day her shy, creeping glance was caught by his; it held
+her mesmerized for a few seconds, it looked down into her&mdash;for a
+moment the whole world seemed to have become one immense eye&mdash;she
+could scarcely get away from it.</p>
+
+<p>When she remembered again she was standing by the pond in St.
+Stephen's Green Park, with a queer frightened exaltation lightening
+through her blood. She did not go home that night by Grafton Street,
+she did not dare venture within reach of that powerful organism, but
+went a long way round, and still the way seemed very short.</p>
+
+<p>That night her mother, although very tired, was the more talkative of
+the two. She offered in exchange for her daughter's tho<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span>ughts pennies
+that only existed in her imagination. Mary Makebelieve professed that
+it was sleep and not thought obsessed her, and exhibited voucher yawns
+which were as ficti<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span>tious as her reply. When they went to bed that
+night it was a long time before she slept. She lay looking into the
+deep gloom of the chamber, and scarcely heard the fierce dreams of her
+mother, who was demanding from a sleep world the things she lacked in
+the wide-awake one.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2>
+
+
+<p>This is the appearance of Mary Makebelieve at that time:&mdash;She had fair
+hair, and it was very soft and very thick; when she unwound this it
+fell, or rather flowed, down to her waist, and when she walked about
+the room with her hair unloosened it curved beautifully about her
+head, snuggled into the hollow of her neck, ruffled out broadly again
+upon her shoulders, and swung into and out of her figure with every
+motion; surging and shrinking and dancing; the ends of her hair <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span>were
+soft and loose as foam, and it had the color and shining of pure,
+light gold. Commonly in the house she wore her hair loose, because her
+mother liked the appearance of youth imparted by hanging hair, and
+would often desire her daughter to leave off her outer skirt and walk
+only in her petticoats to heighten the illusion of girlishness. Her
+head was shaped very tenderly and softly; it was so small that when
+her hair was twisted up on it it seemed much too delicate to bear so
+great a burden. Her eyes were gray, limpidly tender and shy, drooping
+under weighty lids, so that they seldom seemed more than half opened
+and commonly sought the ground rather than the bolder excursions of
+straightforwardness; they seldom looked for longer than a glance,
+climbing and poising and eddying about the person at whom she gazed,
+and then dived away again; and always when she looked at any one she
+smiled a deprecation of her boldness. She had a small whit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span>e face, very
+like her mother's in some ways and at some angles, but the tight beak
+which was her mother's nose was absent in Mary; her nose withdrew
+timidly in the center and only snatched a hurried courage to become
+visible at the tip. It was a nose that seemed to have been snubbed
+almost out of existence. Her mother loved it because it was so little,
+and had tried so hard not to be a nose at all. They often stood
+together before the little glass that had a great crack running
+drunkenly from the right-hand top corner down to the left-hand bottom
+corner, and two small arm crosses, one a little above the other, in
+the center. When one's face looked into this glass it often appeared
+there as four faces with horrible aberrations; an ear might be curving
+around a lip or an eye leering strangely in the middle of a chin. But
+there were ways of looking into the glass which practice had discovered,
+and usage had long ago dulled the terrors of its vag<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>aries. Looking into
+this glass Mrs. Makebelieve would comment minutely upon the two faces
+therein, and, pointing to her own triumphantly genuine nose and the fact
+that her husband's nose had been of quite discernible proportions, she
+would seek in labyrinths of pedigree for a reason to justify her
+daughter's lack; she passed all her sisters in this review, with an
+army of aunts and great-aunts, rifling the tombs of grandparents and
+their remoter blood, and making long-dead noses to live again. Mary
+Makebelieve used to lift her timidly curious eye and smile in
+deprecation of her nasal shortcomings, and then her mother would kiss
+the dejected button and vow it was the dearest, loveliest bit of a nose
+that had ever been seen.</p>
+
+<p>"Big noses suit some people," said Mrs. Makebelieve, "but they do not
+suit others, and one would not suit you, dearie. They go well with
+black-haired people and very tall people, military g<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>entlemen, judges
+and apothecaries; but small, fair folk cannot support great noses. I
+like my own nose," she continued. "At school, when I was a little
+girl, the other girls used to laugh at my nose, but I always liked it,
+and after a time other people came to like it also."</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve had small, slim hands and feet: the palms of her
+hands were softer than anything in the world; there were five little,
+pink cushions on her palm: beginning at the little finger there was a
+very tiny cushion, the next one was bigger, and the next bigger again,
+until the largest ended a perfect harmony at the base of her thumb.
+Her mother used to kiss these little cushions at times, holding back
+the finger belonging to each, and naming it as she touched it. These
+are the names of Mary Makebelieve's fingers, beginning with the
+Thumb:&mdash;Tom Tumkins, Willie Winkles, Long Daniel, Bessie Bobtail and
+Little Dick-Dick.</p>
+
+<p>Her slight, girlish figure was only beginning to cr<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span>eep to the deeper
+contours of womanhood, a half curve here and there, a sudden softness
+in the youthful lines, certain angles trembling on the slightest of
+rolls, a hint, a suggestion, the shadowy prophecy of circles and half
+hoops that could not yet roll: the trip of her movements was troubled
+sometimes to a sedater motion.</p>
+
+<p>These things her mother's curiosity was continually recording,
+sometimes with happy pride, but oftener in a kind of anger to find
+that her little girl was becoming a big girl. If it had been possible
+she would have detained her daughter forever in the physique of a
+child; she feared the time when Mary would become too evidently a
+woman, when all kinds of equalities would come to hinder her
+spontaneous and active affection. A woman might object to be nursed,
+while a girl would not; Mrs. Makebelieve feared that objection, and,
+indeed, Mary, under the stimulus of an awakening body and a new,
+st<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>range warmth, was not altogether satisfied by being nursed or by
+being the passive participant in these caresses. She sometimes thought
+that she would like to take her mother on her own breast and rock her
+to and fro, crooning soft made-up words and kissing the top of a head
+or the half-hidden curve of a cheek, but she did not dare to do so
+for fear her mother would strike her. Her mother was very jealous on
+that point, she loved her daughter to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> kiss her and stroke her hands
+and her face, but she never liked her to play at being the mother, nor
+had she ever encouraged her daughter in the occupations of a doll. She
+was the mother and Mary was the baby, and she could not bear to have
+her motherhood hindered even in play.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2>
+
+
+<p>Although Mary Makebelieve was sixteen years of age she had not yet
+gone to work; her mother did not like the idea of her little girl
+stooping to the drudgery of the only employment she could have aided
+her to obtain&mdash;that was, to assist herself in the humble and arduous
+toil of charing. She had arranged that Mary was to go into a shop, a
+drapery store, or some such other, but that was to be in a sometime
+which seemed infinitely remote. "And then, too," said Mrs.
+Makebelieve, "all <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>kinds of things may happen in a year or so if we
+wait. Your uncle Patrick, who went to America twenty years ago, may
+come home, and when he does you will not have to work, dearie, nor
+will I. Or again, some one going along the street may take a fancy to
+you and marry you; things often happen like that." There were a
+thousand schemes and accidents which, in her opinion, might occur to
+the establishment of her daughter's ease and the enlargement of her
+own dignity. And so Mary Makebelieve, when her mother was at work
+(which was sometimes every day in the week), had all the day to loiter
+in and spend as best she liked. Sometimes she did not go out at all.
+She stayed in the top back room sewing or knitting, mending holes in
+the sheets or the blankets, or reading books from the Free Library in
+Capel Street: but generally she preferred, after the few hours which
+served to put the room in order, to go out and walk along the streets,
+taking new turnings as often as she fancied, and striking down strange
+roads to see the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>shops and the people.</p>
+
+<p>There were so many people whom she knew by sight; almost daily she saw
+these somewhere, and she often followed them for a short distance,
+with a feeling of friendship; for the loneliness of the long day
+often drew down upon her like a weight, so that even the distant
+companionship of these remembered faces that did not know her was
+comforting. She wished she could find out who some of them
+were.&mdash;There was a tall man with a sweeping brown beard, whose heavy
+overcoat looked as though it had been put on with a shovel; he wore
+spectacles, and his eyes were blue, and always seemed as if they were
+going to laugh; he, also, looked into the shops as he went along, and
+he seemed to know everybody. Every few paces people would halt and
+shake his hand, but these people never spoke because the big man with
+the brown beard woul<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>d instantly burst into a fury of speech which had
+no intervals, and when there was no one with him at all he would talk
+to himself. On these occasions he did not see any one, and people had
+to jump out of his way while he strode onwards swinging his big head
+from one side to the other, and with his eyes fixed on some place a
+great distance away. Once or twice, in passing, she heard him singing
+to himself the most lugubrious song in the world. There was another&mdash;a
+long, thin, black man&mdash;who looked young and was always smiling secretly
+to himself; his lips were never still for a moment, and, passing Mary
+Makebelieve a few times, she heard him buzzing like a great bee. He did
+not stop to shake hands with any one, and although many people saluted
+him he took no heed, but strode on smiling his secret smile and buzzing
+serenely. There was a third man whom she often noticed: his clothing
+seemed as if it had been put on him a long time ago and had never been
+taken of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span>f again. He had a long, pale face, with a dark moustache
+drooping over a most beautiful mouth. His eyes were very big and lazy,
+and did not look quite human; they had a trick of looking sidewards&mdash;a
+most intimate, personal look. Sometimes he saw nothing in the world but
+the pavement, and at other times he saw everything. He looked at Mary
+Makebelieve once and she got a fright; she had a queer idea that she had
+known him well hundreds of years before and that he remembered her also.
+She was afraid of that man, but she liked him because he looked so
+gentle and so&mdash;there was something else he looked which as yet she could
+not put a name to, but which her ancestry remembered dimly. There was a
+short, fair, pale-faced man, who looked like the tiredest man in the
+world. He was often preoccupied, but not in the singular way the others
+were. He seemed to be always chewing the cud of remembrance, and looked
+at people as if they reminded<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> him of other people who were dead a long
+time and whom he thought of but did not regret. He was a detached man
+even in a crowd and carried with him a cold atmosphere; even his smile
+was bleak and aloof. Mary Makebelieve noticed that many people nudged
+each other as he went by, and then they would turn and look after him
+and go away whispering.</p>
+
+<p>These and many others she saw almost daily, and used to look for with
+a feeling of friendship. At other times she walked up the long line of
+quays sentineling the Liffey, watching the swift boats of Guinness
+puffing down the river and the thousands of sea-gulls hovering above
+or swimming on the dark waters, until she came to the Ph&oelig;nix Park,
+where there was always a cricket or football match being played, or
+some young men or girls playing hurley, or children playing
+tip-and-tig, running after one another, and dancing and screaming in
+the sunshine. Her mother liked very much to go with her to t<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>he
+Ph&oelig;nix Park on days when there was no work to be done. Leaving the
+great, white main road, up which the bicycles and motor cars are
+continually whizzing, a few minutes' walk brings one to quiet alleys
+sheltered by trees and groves of hawthorn. In these passages one can
+walk for a long time without meeting a person, or lie on the grass in
+the shadow of a tree and watch the sunlight beating down on the green
+fields and shimmering between the trees. There is a deep silence to be
+found here, very strange and beautiful to one fresh from the city, and
+it is strange also to look about in the broad sunshine and see no
+person near at all, and no movement saving the roll and folding of the
+grass, the slow swinging of the branches of the trees or the noiseless
+flight of a bee, a butterfly, or a bird.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p>
+<p>These things Mary Makebelieve liked, but her mother would pine for the
+dances of the little children, the gallant hurrying of the motor cars,
+and the movement to and fro of the people with gay dresses and colored
+parasols and all the circumstance of holiday.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2>
+
+
+<p>One morning Mary Makebelieve jumped out of bed and lit the fire. For a
+wonder it lit easily: the match was scarcely applied when the flames
+were leaping up the black chimney, and this made her feel at ease with
+the world. Her mother stayed in bed chatting with something more of
+gayety than usual. It was nearly six o'clock, and the early summer sun
+was flooding against the grimy window. The previous evening's post had
+brought a post-card for Mrs. Makebelieve, requesting her to call on a
+Mrs. O'Connor, who had a house off Harcourt Stree<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span>t. This, of course,
+meant a day's work&mdash;it also meant a new client.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve's clients were always new. She could not remain for
+any length of time in people's employment without being troubled by
+the fact that these folk had houses of their own and were actually
+employing her in a menial capacity. She sometimes looked at their
+black silk aprons in a way which they never failed to observe with
+anger, and on their attempting (as they always termed it) to put her
+in her proper place, she would discuss their appearance and morals
+with such power that they at once dismissed her from their employment
+and incited their husbands to assault her.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve's mind was exercised in finding out who had
+recommended her to this new lady, and in what terms of encomium such
+recommendation had been framed. She also debated as to whether it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span>
+would be wise to ask for one shilling and ninepence per day instead of
+the customary one shilling and sixpence. If the house was a big one
+she might be required by this new customer oftener than once a week,
+and, perhaps, there were others in the house besides the lady who
+would find small jobs for her to do&mdash;needlework or messages, or some
+such which would bring in a little extra money; for she professed her
+willingness and ability to undertake with success any form of work in
+which a woman could be eminent. In a house where she had worked she
+had once been asked by a gentleman who lodged there to order in two
+dozen bottles of stout, and, on returning with the stout, the
+gentleman had thanked her and given her a shilling. Incidents parallel
+to this had kept her faith in humanity green. There must be plenty of
+these open-handed gentlemen in houses such as she worked in, and,
+perhaps, in Mrs. O'Connor's house there might be more than o<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span>ne such
+person. There were stingy people enough, heaven knew, people who would
+get one to run messages and almost expect to be paid themselves for
+allowing one to work for them. Mrs. Makebelieve anathematized such
+skinflints with a vocabulary which was quite equal to the detailing
+of their misdeeds; but she refused to dwell on them: they were not
+really important in a world where the sun was shining. In the
+nighttime she would again believe in their horrible existences, but
+until then the world must be peopled with kind-hearted folk. She
+instanced many whom she knew, people who had advanced services and
+effects without exacting or indeed expecting any return.</p>
+
+<p>When the tea was balanced insecurely on the bed, the two teacups on
+one side of her legs, the three-quarters of a loaf and the tin of
+condensed milk on the other, Mary sat down with great care, and all
+through the breakfast her mother culled from her capacious memory a
+list of kin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span>dnesses of which she had been the recipient or the witness.
+Mary supplemented the recital by incidents from her own observation.
+She had often seen a man in the street give a penny to an old woman.
+She had often seen old women give things to other old women. She knew
+many people who never looked for the halfpenny change from a newsboy.
+Mrs. Makebelieve applauded the justice of such transactions; they
+were, she admitted, the things she would do herself if she were in a
+position to be careless; but a person to whom the discovery of her
+daily bread is a daily problem, and who can scarcely keep pace with
+the ever-changing terms of the problem, is not in a position to be
+careless.&mdash;"Grind, grind, grind," said Mrs. Makebelieve, "that is life
+for me, and if I ceased to grind for an instant ..." she flickered her
+thin hand into a nowhere of terror. Her attitude was that when one had
+enough one should give the residue to some one who had not enough. It
+was her woe, it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> stabbed her to the heart, to see desolate people
+dragging through the streets, standing to glare through the windows of
+bakeries and confectioners' shops, and little children in some of
+these helpless arms! Thinking of these, she said that every morsel she
+ate would choke her were it not for her own hunger. But maybe, said
+she, catching a providential glance of the golden-tinted window, maybe
+these poor people were not as poor as they seemed: surely they had
+ways of collecting a living which other people did not know anything
+about. It might be that they got lots of money from kind-hearted
+people, and food at hospitable doors, and here and there clothing and
+oddments which, if they did not wear, they knew how to dispose of
+advantageously. What extremes of ways and means such people must be
+acquainted with! no ditch was too low to rummage in, no rat-hole too
+hidden to be ravaged; a gate represented something to be climbed over:
+an open door<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> was an invitation, a locked one a challenge. They could
+dodge under the fences of the law and climb the barbed wire of
+morality with equal impunity, and the utmost rigor of punishment
+had little terror for those whose hardships could scarcely be
+artificially worsened. The stagger of despair, the stricken, helpless
+aspect of such people, their gaunt faces and blurred eyes might
+conceivably be their stock-in-trade, the keys wherewith they unlocked
+hearts and purses and area-doors. It must be so when the sun was
+shining and birds were singing across fields not immeasurably distant,
+and children in wa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>lled gardens romped among fruits and flowers. She
+would believe this, for it was the early morning when one must
+believe, but when the nighttime came again she would laugh to scorn
+such easy beliefs, she would see the lean ribs of humanity when she
+undressed herself.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2>
+
+
+<p>After her mother had gone Mary Makebelieve occupied herself settling
+the room and performing the various offices which the keeping in order
+of even one small room involves. There were pieces of the wall-paper
+flapping loosely; these had to be gummed down with strips of
+stamp-paper. The bed had to be made, the floor scrubbed, and a
+miscellany of objects patted and tapped into order. Her few dresses
+also had to be gone over for loose buttons, and the darning of
+threadbare places was a <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>duty exercising her constant attention. Her
+clothing was always made by her mother, whose needle had once been
+noted for expertness, and, therefore, fitted more accurately than is
+customary in young girls' dresses. The arranging and rearranging of
+her beads was a frequent and enjoyable labor. She had four different
+necklaces, representing four different pennyworths of beads purchased
+at a shop whose merchandise was sold for one penny per item. One
+pennyworth of these beads was colored green, another red, a third was
+colored like pearls, and the fourth was a miscellaneous packet of many
+colors. A judicious selection of these beads could always provide a
+new and magnificent necklace at the expense of little more than a
+half-hour's easy work.</p>
+
+<p>Because the sun was shining she brought out her white dress, and for a
+time was busy on it. There had been five tucks in the dress, but one
+after one they had to be let out. This was the last tuck that
+remained,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> and it also had to go, but even with such extra lengthening
+the dress would still swing free of her ankles. Her mother had
+promised to add a false hem to it when she got time, and Mary
+determined to remind her of this promise as soon as she came in from
+work. She polished her shoes, put on the white dress, and then did up
+her hair in front of the cracked looking-glass. She always put up her
+hair very plainly. She first combed it down straight, then parted it
+in the center, and rolled it into a great ball at the back of her
+neck. She often wished to curl her hair, and, indeed, it would have
+curled with the lightest persuasion: but her mother being approached
+on the subject, said that curls were common and were seldom worn by
+respectable people, excepting very small children or actresses, both
+of whose slender mentalities were registered by these tiny
+daintinesses. Also, curls took up too much time in arranging, and the
+slightest moisture in the air was liable to draw them down into lank
+and unsightly plasters, and, therefore, saving for a dance or a
+picn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>ic, curls should not be used.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve, having arranged her hair, hesitated for some time in
+the choice of a necklace. There was the pearl-colored necklace&mdash;it was
+very pretty, but every one could tell at once that they were not
+genuine pearls. Real pearls of the bigness of these would be very
+valuable. Also there was something childish about pearls which
+latterly she wished to avoid. She had quite grown up now. The letting
+down of the last tuck in her dress marked an epoch as distinct as did
+the first rolling up of her hair. She wished her dress would go right
+down to her heels so that she might have a valid reason for holding up
+her skirts with one hand. She felt a trifle of impatience because her
+mother had delayed making the false hem; she could have stitched it on
+herself if her mother had cut it out, but for this day the dress would
+have to do. She wi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>shed she owned a string of red coral; not that round
+beady sort, but the jagged crisscross coral&mdash;a string of these long
+enough to go twice round her neck, and yet hang down in front to her
+waist. If she owned a string as long as that she might be able to cut
+enough off to make a slender wristlet. She would have loved to see
+such a wristlet sagging down to her hand.</p>
+
+<p>Red, it seemed, would have to be the color for this day, so she took
+the red beads out of a box and put them on. They looked very nice
+against her white dress, but still&mdash;she did not quite like them: they
+seemed too solid, so she put them back into the box again, and instead
+tied round her neck a narrow ribbon of black velvet, which satisfied
+her better. Next she put on her hat; it was of straw, and had been
+washed many times. There was a broad ribbon of black velvet around it.
+She wished earnestly that she had a sash of black velvet about three
+inches deep to go round <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>her waist. There was such a piece about the
+hem of her mother's Sunday skirt, but, of course, that could not be
+touched; maybe, her mother would give it to her if she asked. The
+skirt would look quite as well without it, and when her mother knew
+how nice it looked round her waist she would certainly give it to her.</p>
+
+<p>She gave a last look at herself in the glass and went out, turning up
+to the quays in the direction of the Ph&oelig;nix Park. The sun was
+shining gloriously, and the streets seemed wonderfully clean in the
+sunlight. The horses under the heavy drays pulled their loads as if
+they were not heavy. The big, red-faced drivers leaned back at ease,
+with their hard hats pushed back from their foreheads and their eyes
+puckered at the sunshine. The tram-cars whizzed by like great jewels.
+The outside cars went spanking down the broad road, and every
+jolly-faced jarvey winked at her as he jolted by. The people going up
+and down th<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span>e street seemed contented and happy. It was one o'clock,
+and from all kinds of offices and shops young men and women were
+darting forth for their lunch; none of the young men were so hurried
+but they had a moment to glance admiringly at Mary Makebelieve before
+diving into a cheap restaurant or cheaper public-house for their
+food. The gulls in the river were flying in long, lazy curves, dipping
+down to the water, skimming it an instant, and then wheeling up again
+with easy, slanting wings. Every few minutes a boat laden with barrels
+puffed swiftly from beneath a bridge. All these boats had pretty
+names&mdash;there was the <i>Shannon</i>, the <i>Suir</i>, the <i>Nore</i>, the <i>Lagan</i>,
+and many others. The men on board sat contentedly on the barrels and
+smoked and made slow remarks to one another; and overhead the sky was
+blue and wonderful, immeasurably distant, filled from horizon to
+horizon with sparkle and warmth. Mary Makebelieve went slowly on
+to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>wards the Park. She felt very happy. Now and then a darker spot
+flitted through her mind, not at all obscuring, but toning the
+brightness of her thoughts to a realizable serenity. She wished her
+skirts were long enough to be held up languidly like the lady walking
+in front: the hand holding up the skirt had a golden curb-chain on
+the wrist which drooped down to the neatly gloved hand, and between
+each link of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> chain was set a blue turquoise, and upon this jewel
+the sun danced splendidly. Mary Makebelieve wished she had a slender
+red coral wristlet; it also would have hung down to her palm and been
+lovely in the sunlight, and it would, she thought, have been far nicer
+than the bangle.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2>
+
+
+<p>She walked along for some time in the Park. Through the railings
+flanking the great road many beds of flowers could be seen. These were
+laid out in a great variety of forms&mdash;of stars and squares and crosses
+and circles, and the flowers were arranged in exquisite patterns.
+There was a great star which flamed with red flowers at the deep
+points, and in its heart a heavier mass of yellow blossom glared
+suddenly. There were circles wherein each ring was a differently
+colored flower, and others where three rings alternated&mdash;three ri<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span>ngs
+white, three purple, and three orange, and so on in slenderer circles
+to the tiniest diminishing. Mary Makebelieve wished she knew the names
+of all the flowers, but the only ones she recognized by sight were the
+geraniums, some species of roses, violets, and forget-me-nots and
+pansies. The more exotic sorts she did not know, and, while she
+admired them greatly, she had not the same degree of affection for
+them as for the commoner, friendly varieties.</p>
+
+<p>Leaving the big road she wandered into wider fields. In a few moments
+the path was hidden, the outside cars, motor cars and bicycles had
+vanished as completely as though there were no such things in the
+world. Great numbers of children were playing about in distinct bands;
+each troop was accompanied by one and sometimes two older people,
+girls or women who lay stretched out on the warm grass or leaned
+against the tree-trunks reading novelettes, and around them the
+children whi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>rled and screamed and laughed. It was a world of waving
+pinafores and thin black-stockinged legs and shrill, sweet voices. In
+the great spaces the children's voices had a strangely remote quality;
+the sweet, high tones were not such as one heard in the streets or in
+houses. In a house or a street these voices thudded upon the air and
+beat sonorously back again from the walls, the houses, or the
+pavements; but out here the slender sounds sang to a higher tenuity
+and disappeared out and up and away into the tree-tops and the clouds
+and the wide, windy reaches. The little figures partook also of this
+diminuendo effect; against the great grassy curves they seemed smaller
+than they really were; the trees stirred hugely above them, the grass
+waved vast beneath them, and the sky ringed them in from immensity.
+Their forms scarcely disturbed the big outline of nature, their
+laughter only whispered against the silence, as ineffectual to disturb
+that gigantic serenity as a gnat's wing fluttered against <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span>a precipice.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve wandered on; a few cows lifted solemnly curious faces
+as she passed and swung their heavy heads behind her. Once or twice
+half a dozen deer came trotting from beyond the trees, and were
+shocked to a halt on seeing her&mdash;a moment's gaze, and away like the
+wind, bounding in a delicious freedom. Now a butterfly came twisting
+on some eccentric journey&mdash;ten wing-beats to the left, twenty to the
+right, and then back to the left, or, with a sudden twist, returning
+on the path which it had already traversed, jerking carelessly through
+the sunlight. Across the sky very far up a troop of birds sailed
+definitely&mdash;they knew where they were going; momently one would detach
+itself from the others in a burst of joyous energy and sweep a great
+circle and back again to its comrades, and then away, away, away to
+the skyline.&mdash;Ye swift ones! O, freedom and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span>sweetness! A song falling
+from the heavens! A lilt through deep sunshine! Happy wanderers! How
+fast ye fly and how bravely&mdash;up and up, till the earth has fallen away
+and the immeasurable heavens and the deep loneliness of the sunlight
+and the silence of great spaces receive you!</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve came to a tree around which a circular wooden seat
+had been placed. Here for a time she sat looking out on the wide
+fields. Far away in front the ground rolled down into valleys and up
+into little hills, and from the valleys the green heads of trees
+emerged, and on the farther hills, in slender, distinct silhouette,
+and in great masses, entire trees could be seen. Nearer were single
+trees, each with its separate shadow and a stream of sunlight flooding
+between; and everywhere the greenery of leaves and of grass and the
+gold of myriad buttercups and multitudes of white daisies.</p>
+
+<p>She had been sitting for some time when a shadow came from behind her.
+She watched its lengthening and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>its queer bobbing motion. When it grew
+to its greatest length it ceased to move. She felt that some one had
+stopped. From the shape of the shadow she knew it was a man, but being
+so close she did not like to look. Then a voice spoke. It was a voice
+as deep as the rolling of a sea.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello," said the voice; "what are you doing here all alone, young
+lady?"</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve's heart suddenly spurted to full speed. It seemed to
+want more space than her bosom could afford. She looked up. Besi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>de her
+stood a prodigious man: one lifted hand curled his moustache, the
+other carelessly twirled a long cane. He was dressed in ordinary
+clothing, but Mary Makebelieve knew him at once for that great
+policeman who guided the traffic at the Grafton Street crossing.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2>
+
+
+<p>The policeman told her wonderful things. He informed her why the
+Ph&oelig;nix Park was called the Ph&oelig;nix Park. He did not believe there
+was a ph&oelig;nix in the Zo&ouml;logical Gardens, although they probably had
+every kind of bird in the world there. It had never struck him, now he
+came to think of it, to look definitely for that bird, but he would do
+so the next time he went into the Gardens. Perhaps the young lady
+would allow him (it would be a much-appreciated privilege) to escort
+her through the G<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>ardens some fine day, the following day for
+instance.... He rather inclined to the belief that the ph&oelig;nix was
+extinct&mdash;that is, died out; and then, again, when he called to mind
+the singular habits with which this bird was credited, he conceived
+that it had never had a real but only a mythical existence&mdash;that is,
+it was a makebelieve bird, a kind of fairy tale.</p>
+
+<p>He further informed Mary Makebelieve that this Park was the third
+largest in the world, but the most beautiful. His evidence for this
+statement was not only the local newspapers, whose opinion might be
+biased by patriotism&mdash;that is, led away from the exact truth&mdash;but in
+the more stable testimony of reputable English journals, such as
+<i>Answers</i> and <i>Tit-Bits</i> and <i>Pearson's Weekly</i>, he found an
+authoritative and gratifying confirmation&mdash;that is, they agreed. He
+cited for Mary Makebelieve's incredulity the exact immensity of the
+Park in miles, in yards, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span>in acres, and the number of head of
+cattle which could be accommodated therein if it were to be utilized
+for grazing&mdash;that is, turned into grass lands; or, if transformed into
+tillage, the number of small farmers who would be the proprietors of
+economic holdings&mdash;that is, a recondite&mdash;that is, an abstruse and a
+difficult scientific and sociological term.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve scarcely dared lift her glance to his face. An
+uncontrollable shyness had taken possession of her. Her eyes could not
+lift without an effort: they fluttered vainly upwards, but before
+reaching any height they flinched aside and drooped again to her lap.
+The astounding thought that she was sitting beside a man warmed and
+affrighted her blood so that it rushed burningly to her cheeks and
+went shuddering back again coldly. Her downcast eyes were almost
+mesmerized by the huge tweed-clad knees which towered like monoliths
+beside her. They rose much higher than her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> knees did, and extended far
+out more than a foot and a half beyond her own modest stretch. Her
+knees slanted gently downwards as she sat, but his jagged straightly
+forward, like the immovable knees of a god which she had seen once in
+the Museum. On one of these great knees an equally great hand rested.
+Automatically she placed her own hand on her lap and, awe-stricken,
+tried to measure the difference. Her hand was very tiny and as white
+as snow: it seemed so light that the breathing of a wind might have
+fluttered it. The wrist was slender and delicate, and through its
+milky covering faint blue veins glimmered. A sudden and passionate
+wish came to her as she watched her wrist. She wished she had a red
+coral bracelet on it, or a chain of silver beaten into flat discs, or
+even two twists of little green beads. The hand that rested on the
+neighboring knee was bigger by three times than her own, the skin on
+it was tanned to the color of ripe mahogany-wood<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>, and the heat of the
+day had caused great purple veins to grow in knots and ridges across
+the back and running in big twists down to the wrists. The specific
+gravity of that hand seemed tremendous; she could imagine it holding
+down the strong neck of a bull. It moved continually while he spoke
+to her, closing in a tense strong grip that changed the mahogany color
+to a dull whiteness and opening again to a ponderous, inert width.</p>
+
+<p>She was ashamed that she could find nothing to say. Her vocabulary had
+suddenly and miserably diminished to a "yes" and "no," only tolerably
+varied by a timid "indeed" and "I did not know that." Against the easy
+clamor of his speech she could find nothing to oppose, and ordinarily
+her tongue tripped and eddied and veered as easily and nonchalantly as
+a feather in a wind. But he did not mind silence. He interpreted it
+rightly as the natural homage of a girl to a policeman. He liked this
+homage because it helped him to feel as big as he looked, and he had
+every belief in his ability to conduc<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>t a polite and interesting
+conversation with any lady for an indefinite time.</p>
+
+<p>After a while Mary Makebelieve arose and was about bidding him a timid
+good-by. She wished to go away to her own little room where she could
+look at herself and ask herself questions. She wanted to visualize
+herself sitting under a tree beside a man. She knew that she could
+reconstruct him to the smallest detail, but feared that she might not
+be able to reconstruct herself. When she arose he also stood up and
+fell so naturally into step beside her that there was nothing to do
+but to walk straight on. He still withstood the burden of conversation
+easily and pleasantly and very learnedly. He discussed matters of high
+political and social moment, explaining generously the more unusual
+and learned words that bristled from his vocabulary. Soon they came to
+a more populous part of the Park. The chil<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span>dren ceased from their play
+to gaze round-eyed at the little girl and the big man, their
+attendants looked and giggled and envied. Under these eyes Mary
+Makebelieve's walk became afflicted with a sideward bias which jolted
+her against her companion. She was furious with herself and ashamed.
+She set her teeth to walk easily and straightly, but constantly the
+jog of his elbow on her shoulder or the swing of his hand against her
+blouse sent her ambling wretchedly arms-length from him. When this had
+occurred half a dozen times she could have plumped down on the grass
+and wept loudly and without restraint. At the Park gate she stopped
+suddenly and with the courage of despair bade him good-by. He begged
+courteously to be allowed to see her a little way to her home, but she
+would not permit it, and so he lifted his hat to her. (Through her
+distress she could still note in a subterranean and half-conscious
+fashion the fact that this was the firs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span>t time a man had ever uncovered
+before her.) As she went away down the road she felt that his eyes
+were following her and her tripping walk hurried almost to a run. She
+wished frantically that her dress was longer than it was&mdash;that false
+hem! If she could have gathered a skirt in her hand the mere holding
+on to something would have given her self-possession, but she feared
+he was looking critically at her short skirt and immodest ankles.</p>
+
+<p>He stood for a time gazing after her with a smile on his great face.
+He knew that she knew he was watching, and as he stood he drew h<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span>is
+hand from his pocket and tapped and smoothed his moustache. He had a
+red moustache; it grew very thickly, but was cropped short and square,
+and its fiber was so strong that it stood out above his lip like wire.
+One expected it to crackle when he touched it, but it never did.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2>
+
+
+<p>When Mrs. Makebelieve came home that night she seemed very tired, and
+complained that her work at Mrs. O'Connor's house was arduous beyond
+any which she has yet engaged in. She enumerated the many rooms that
+were in the house: those that were covered with carpets, the margins
+whereof had to be beeswaxed: those others, only partially covered with
+rugs, which had to be entirely waxed: the upper rooms were uncarpeted
+and unrugged, and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span>had, therefore, to be scrubbed: the basement,
+consisting of two red-flagged kitchens and a scullery, had also to be
+scoured out. The lady was very particular about the scouring of
+wainscotings and doors. The upper part of the staircase was bare and
+had to be scrubbed down, and the part down to the hall had a thin
+strip of carpet on it secured by brazen rods; the margins on either
+side of this carpet had to be beeswaxed and the brass rods polished.
+There was a great deal of unnecessary and vexatious brass of one kind
+or another scattered about the house, and as there were four children
+in the family, besides Mrs. O'Connor and her two sisters, the amount
+of washing which had constantly to be done was enormous and terrifying.</p>
+
+<p>During their tea Mrs. Makebelieve called to mind the different
+ornaments which stood on the parlor mantelpiece and on the top of the
+piano. There was a china shepherdess with a basket of flowers at one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>
+end of the mantelpiece and an exact duplicate on the other. In the
+center a big clock of speckled marble was surmounted by a little domed
+edifice with Corinthian pillars in front, and this again was topped by
+the figure of an archer with a bent bow&mdash;there was nothing on top of
+this figure because there was not any room. Between each of these
+articles there stood little framed photographs of members of Mrs.
+O'Connor's family, and behind all there was a carved looking-glass
+with beveled edges having many shelves. Each shelf had a cup or a
+saucer or a china bowl on it. On the left-hand side of the fireplace
+there was a plaque whereon a young lady dressed in a sky-blue robe
+crossed by means of well-defined stepping-stones a thin but furious
+stream; the middle distance was embellished by a cow, and the horizon
+sustained two white lambs, a brown dog, a fountain and a sun-dial. On
+the right-hand side a young gentleman clad in a crimson coat and
+yellow k<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span>nee-breeches carried a three-cornered hat under his arm, and
+he also crossed a stream which seemed the exact counterpart of the
+other one and whose perspective was similarly complicated. There were
+three pictures on each wall&mdash;nine in all; three of these were
+pictures of ships, three were pictures of battles: two portrayed
+saintly but emaciated personages sitting in peculiarly disheartening
+wildernesses (each wilderness contained one cactus plant and a camel).
+One of these personages stared fixedly at a skull, the other personage
+looked with intense firmness away from a lady of scant charms in a
+white and all too insufficient robe: above the robe a segment of the
+lady's bosom was hinted at bashfully&mdash;it was probably this the
+personage looked firmly away from. The remaining picture showed a
+little girl seated in a big armchair and reading with profound culture
+the most massive of bibles: she had her grandmother's mutch cap and
+spectacles on, and looked very sweet and solemn; a doll sat bolt
+upright beside her, and on the floor a kitte<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span>n hunted a ball of wool
+with great earnestness.</p>
+
+<p>All these things Mrs. Makebelieve discussed to her daughter, as also
+of the carpet which might have been woven in Turkey or elsewhere,
+the sideboard that possibly was not mahogany, and the chairs and
+occasional tables whose legs had attained to rickets through
+convulsions; the curtains of cream-colored lace which were reinforced
+by rep hangings and guarded shutters from Venice, also the deer's head
+which stood on a shelf over the door and was probably shot by a member
+of the family in a dream, and the splendid silver tankards which
+flanked this trophy and were possibly made of tin.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve further spoke of the personal characteristics of the
+householder with an asperity which was still restrained. She had a
+hairy chin, said Mrs. Makebelieve: she had buck teeth and a solid
+smi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>le, and was given to telling people who knew their business how
+things ought to be done. Beyond this she would not say anything.&mdash;The
+amount of soap the lady allowed to wash out five rooms and a lengthy
+staircase was not as generous as one was accustomed to, but, possibly,
+she was well-meaning enough when one came to know her better.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve, apropos of nothing, asked her mother did she ever
+know a girl who got married to a policeman, and did she think that
+policemen were good men?</p>
+
+<p>Her mother replied that policemen were greatly sought after as
+husbands for several reasons&mdash;firstly, they were big men, and big men
+are always good to look upon; secondly, their social standing was very
+high and their respectability undoubted; thirdly, a policeman's pay
+was such as would bring comfort to any household which was not
+needlessly and criminally extravagant; and this was often supplemented
+in a variety of ways which rumor only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> hinted at: there was also the
+safe prospect of a pension and the possibility of a sergeantship,
+where the emoluments were very great: and fourthly, a policeman, being
+subjected for many years to a rigorous discipline, would likely make a
+nice and obedient husband. Personally Mrs. Makebelieve did not admire
+policemen&mdash;they thought too much of themselves, and their continual
+pursuit of and intercourse with criminals tended to deteriorate their
+moral tone; also, being much admired by a certain type of woman, their
+morals were subjected to so continuous an assault that the wife of
+such a one would be worn to a shadow in striving to preserve her
+husband from designing and persistent females.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve said she thought it would be nice to have other women
+dying for love of one's husband, but her mother opposed this with the
+reflection that such people did not die for love at all, they were
+merely anxious to gratify a foolish and <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span>excessive pride or to inflict
+pain on respectable married women. On the whole, a policeman was not
+an ideal person to marry. The hours at which he came home were liable
+to constant and vexatious changes, so that there was a continual
+feeling of insecurity, which was bad for housekeeping; and if one had
+not stability in one's home all discipline and all real home life was
+at an end. There was this to be said for them&mdash;that they all loved
+little children. But, all things considered, a clerk made a better
+husband: his hours were regular and, knowing where he was at any
+moment, one's mind was at ease.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve was burning to tell some one of her adventure during
+the day, but although she had never before kept a secret from her
+mother she was unable to tell her this one. Something&mdash;perhaps the
+mere difference of age, and also a kind of shyness&mdash;kept her silent.
+She wished she knew a nice girl of her own age, or even a little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span>
+younger, to whose enraptured ear she might have confided her story.
+They would have hugged each other during the recital, and she would
+have been able to enlarge upon a hundred trivialities of moustache and
+hair and eyes the wonder of which older minds can seldom appreciate.</p>
+
+<p>Her mother said she did not feel at all well. She did not know what
+was the matter with her, but she was more tired than she could
+remember being for a long time. There was a dull aching in all her
+bones, a coldness in her limbs, and when she pressed her hair
+backwards it hurt her head; so she went to bed much earlier than was
+usual. But long after her regular time for sleep had passed Mary
+Makebelieve crouched on the floor before the few warm co<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>als. She was
+looking into the redness, seeing visions of rapture, strange things
+which could not possibly be true; but these visions warmed her blood
+and lifted her heart on light and tremulous wings; there was a singing
+in her ears to which she could never be tired listening.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve felt much better the next morning after the extra
+sleep which she had. She still confessed to a slight pain in her scalp
+when she brushed her hair and was a little languid, but not so much as
+to call for complaint. She sat up in bed while her daughter prepared
+the breakfast and her tongue sped as rapidly as heretofore. She said
+she had a sort of feeling that her brother Patrick must come back from
+America some time, and she was sure that when he did return he would
+lose n<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span>o time in finding out his relatives and sharing with them the
+wealth which he had amassed in that rich country. She had memories of
+his generosity even as a mere infant when he would always say "no" if
+only half a potato remained in the dish or a solitary slice of bread
+was on the platter. She delighted to talk of his good looks and high
+spirits and of the amazingly funny things he had said and done. There
+was always, of course, the chance that Patrick had got married and
+settled down in America, and, if so, that would account for so prolonged
+a silence. Wives always came between a man and his friends, and this
+woman would do all she could to prevent Patrick benefiting his own
+sister and her child. Even in Ireland there were people like that, and
+the more one heard of America the less one knew what to expect from
+the strange people who were native to that place. She had often thought
+she would like to go out there herself, and, indeed, if she had a li<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span>ttle
+money she would think nothing of packing up her things to-morrow and
+setting out for the States. There were fine livings to be made there,
+and women were greatly in request, both as servants and wives. It was
+well known, too, that the Americans loved Irish people, and so there
+would be no difficulty at all in getting a start. The more she thought
+of Mrs. O'Connor the more favorably she pondered on emigration. She
+would say nothing against Mrs. O'Connor yet, but the fact remained that
+she had a wen on her cheek and buck teeth. Either of these afflictions
+taken separately were excusable, but together she fancied they betoken
+a bad, sour nature; but maybe the woman was to be pitied: she might be
+a nice person in herself, but, then, there was the matter of the soap,
+and she was very fond of giving unnecessary orders. However, time would
+show, and, clients being as scarce as they were, one could not quarrel
+with one's bread and butter.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span></p>
+<p>The opening of a door and the stamping downstairs of heavy feet shot
+Mrs. Makebelieve from her bed and into her clothing with furious speed.
+Within five minutes she was dressed, and after kissing her daughter
+three times she fled down the stairs and away to her business.</p>
+
+<p>Mary had obtained her mother's consent to do as she pleased with the
+piece of black velvet on the hem of her Sunday skirt, so she passed
+some time in ripping this off and cleaning it. It would not come as
+fresh as she desired, and there were some parts of it frayed and
+rubbed so that the velvet was nearly lost, but other portions were
+quite good, and by cutting out the worn parts and neatly joining the
+good pieces she at last evolved a quite passable sash. Having the sash
+ready she dressed herself to see how it looked, and was delighted.
+Then becoming dissatisfied with the severe method of doing her hair
+she manipulated it gently for a few minutes until a curl depended by
+both ears and two or three very tiny ones f<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>luttered above her
+forehead. She put on her hat and stole out, walking very gently for
+fear any of the other people in the house would peep through their
+doors as she went by. Walk as gently as she could these bare, solid
+stairs rang loudly to each footfall, and so she ended in a rush and
+was out and away without daring to look if she was observed. She had a
+sort of guilty feeling as she walked, which she tried to allay by
+saying very definitely that she was not doing anything wrong. She said
+to herself with determined candor that she would walk up to the St.
+Stephen's Green Park and look at the ducks and the flower-beds and the
+eels, but when she reached the quays she blushed deeply, and turning
+towards the right went rapidly in the direction of the Ph&oelig;nix Park.
+She told herself that she was not going in there, but would merely
+take a walk by the river, cross at Island Bridge, and go back on the
+opposite side of the Liffey to the Green. But when she sa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>w the broad
+sunlit road gleaming through the big gates she thought she would go
+for a little way up there to look at the flowers behind the railings.
+As she went in a great figure came from behind the newspaper kiosk
+outside the gates and followed Mary up the road. When she paused to
+look at the flowers the great figure halted also, and when she went on
+again it followed. Mary walked past the Gough Statue and turned away
+into the fields and the trees, and here the figure lengthened its
+stride. In the middle of the field a big shadow bobbed past her
+shoulder, and she walked on holding her breath and watching the shadow
+growing by queer forward jerks. In a moment the dull beat of feet on
+grass banished all thought of the shadow, and then there came a
+cheerful voice in her ears, and the big policeman was standing by her
+side. For a few moments they were stationary, making salutation and
+excuse and explanation, and then they walked slowly on throug<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span>h the
+sunshine. Wherever there was a bush there were flowers on it. Every
+tree was thronged with birds that sang shrilly and sweetly in sudden
+thrills and clear sustained melodies, but in the open spaces the
+silence was more wonderful;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> there was no bird note to come between
+Mary and that deep voice, no shadow of a tree to swallow up their own
+two shadows; and the sunlight was so mildly warm, the air was so sweet
+and pure, and the little wind that hushed by from the mountains was a
+tender and a peaceful wind.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XIII" id="XIII"></a>XIII</h2>
+
+
+<p>After that day Mary Makebelieve met her new friend frequently.
+Somehow, wherever she went, he was not far away; he seemed to spring
+out of space&mdash;one moment she was alone watching the people passing and
+the hurrying cars and the thronged and splendid shop windows, and then
+a big voice was booming down to her and a big form was pacing
+deliberately by her side. Twice he took her into a restaurant and gave
+her lunch. She had never been in a restaurant before, and it seemed to
+her like a place in fairyland. The semi-darkness of the ret<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span>ired rooms
+faintly colored by tiny electric lights, the beautifully clean tables
+and the strange foods, the neatly dressed waitresses with quick, deft
+movements and gravely attentive faces&mdash;these things thrilled her. She
+noticed that the girls in the restaurant, in spite of their gravity
+and industry, observed both herself and the big man with the minutest
+inspection, and she felt that they all envied her the attentions of so
+superb a companion. In the street also she found that many people
+looked at them, but, listening to his constant and easy speech, she
+could not give these people the attention they deserved.</p>
+
+<p>When they did not go to the Park they sought the most reserved streets
+or walked out to the confines of the town and up by the River Dodder.
+There are exquisitely beautiful places along the side of the Dodder:
+shy little harbors and backwaters, and now and then a miniature
+waterfall or a broad placid reach upon which the sun beats <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span>down like
+silver. Along the river bank the grass grows rank and wildly
+luxurious, and at this season, warmed by the sun, it was a splendid
+place to sit. She thought she could sit there forever watching the
+shining river and listening to the great voice by her side.</p>
+
+<p>He told her many things about himself and about his comrades&mdash;those
+equally huge men. She could see them walking with slow vigor through
+their barrack-yard, falling in for exercise or gymnastics or for
+school. She wondered what they were taught, and who had sufficient
+impertinence to teach giants, and were they ever slapped for not
+knowing their lessons? He told her of his daily work, the hours when
+he was on and off duty, the hours when he rose in the morning and when
+he went to bed. He told her of night duty, and drew a picture of the
+blank deserted streets which thrilled and frightened her ... the tense
+darkness, and how through the silence the sound of a footstep was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span>
+magnified a thousandfold, ringing down the desolate pathways away and
+away to the smallest shrill distinctness, and she saw also the alleys
+and lane-ways hooded in blackness, and the one or two human fragments
+who drifted aimless and frantic along the lonely streets, striving to
+walk easily for fear of their own thundering footsteps, cowering in
+the vastness of the city, dwarfed and shivering beside the gaunt
+houses; the thousands upon thousands of black houses, each deadly
+silent, each seeming to wait and listen for the morning, and each
+teeming with men and women who slept in peace because he was walking
+up and down outside, flashing his lantern on shop windows and feeling
+doors to see if they were by any chance open. Now and again a step
+from a great distance would tap-tap-tap, a far-off delicacy of sound,
+and either die away down echoing side streets or come clanking on to
+where he stood, growing louder and clearer and more resonant, ringing
+again and again in double<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>d and trebled echoes; while he, standing far
+back in a doorway, watched to see who was abroad at the dead of
+night&mdash;and then that person went away on his strange errand, his
+footsteps tramping down immense distances, till the last echo and the
+last faint tremble of his feet eddied into the stillness. Now and
+again a cat dodged gingerly along a railing, or a strayed dog slunk
+fearfully down the pathway, nosing everywhere in and out of the
+lamplight, silent and hungry and desperately eager. He told her
+stories also, wonderful tales of great fights and cunning tricks, of
+men and women whose whole lives were tricks, of people who did not
+know how to live except by theft and violence; people who were born by
+stealth, who ate by subterfuge, drank by dodges, got married in antics
+and slid into death by strange, subterranean passages. He told her the
+story of the Two Hungry Men, and of The Sailor Who Had Been Robbed,
+and a funny tale about the Barber Wh<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span>o Had Two Mothers. He also told
+her the stories of The Eight Tinkers, and of the Old Women Who Steal
+Fish at Nighttime, and the story of The Man He Let Off, and he told
+her a terrible story of how he fought five men in a little room, and
+he showed her a great livid scar hidden by his cap, and the marks in
+his neck where he had been stabbed with a jagged bottle, and his wrist
+which an Italian mad-man had thrust through and through with a dagger.</p>
+
+<p>But though he was always talking he was not always talking of himself.
+Through his conversation there ran a succession of queries&mdash;tiny
+slender questions which ran out of his stories and into her life.
+Questions so skillful and natural and spontaneous that only a girl
+could discover the curiosity which prompted them. He wanted her name,
+her address, her mother's name, her father's name; had she other
+relatives, did she go to work yet, what was her religion, was it a
+long time since sh<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span>e left school, and what was her mother's business?
+To all of these Mary Makebelieve answered with glad candor. She saw
+each question coming, and the personal curiosity lying behind it she
+divined and was glad of. She would have loved to ask him personal and
+intimate questions about his parents, his brothers and sisters, and
+what he said when he said his prayers, and had he walked with other
+girls, and, if so, what had he said to them, and what did he really
+and truly think of her? Her curiosity on all these points was abundant
+and eager, but she did not dare to even hint a question.</p>
+
+<p>One of the queries often touched upon by him she eluded&mdash;she shrank
+from it with something like terror&mdash;it was, "What was her mother's
+business?" She could not bear to say that her mother was a charwoman.
+It did not seem fitting. She suddenly hated and was ashamed of this
+occupation. It took on an aspect of i<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>ncredible baseness. It seemed to
+be the meanest employment wherein any one could be engaged; and so
+when the question, conveyed in a variety of ways, had to be answered
+it was answered with reservations&mdash;Mary Makebelieve told him a lie.
+She said her mother was a dressmaker.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XIV" id="XIV"></a>XIV</h2>
+
+
+<p>One night when Mrs. Makebelieve came home she was very low-spirited
+indeed. She complained once more of a headache and of a languor which
+she could not account for. She said it gave her all the trouble in the
+world to lift a bucket. It was not exactly that she could not lift a
+bucket, but that she could scarcely close her mind down to the fact
+that a bucket had to be lifted. Some spring of willingness seemed to
+be temporarily absent. To close her two hands on a floor-cloth and
+twist it into a spiral in order to wring it <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span>thoroughly was a thing
+which she found herself imagining she could do if she liked, but had
+not the least wish to do. These duties, even when she was engaged in
+them, had a curious quality of remoteness. The bucket into which her
+hand had been plunged a moment before seemed somehow incredibly
+distant. To lift the soap lying beside the bucket one would require an
+arm of more than human reach, and having washed, or rather dabbed, at
+a square of flooring, it was a matter of grave concern how to reach
+the unwashed part just beyond without moving herself. This languor
+alarmed her. The pain in her head, while it was severe, did not really
+matter. Every one had pains and aches, sores and sprains, but this
+unknown weariness and disinclination for the very slightest exertion
+gave her a fright.</p>
+
+<p>Mary tempted her to come out and watch the people going into the
+Gayety Theater. She said a certain actor was playing whom all the
+women of Dublin make pi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>lgrimages, even from distant places, to look
+at; and by going at once they might be in time to see him arriving in
+a motor car at the stage door, when they could have a good look at him
+getting out of the car and going into the theater. At these tidings
+Mrs. Makebelieve roused for a moment from her strange apathy. Since
+tea-time she had sat (not as usual upright and gesticulating, but
+humped up and flaccid) staring at a blob of condensed milk on the
+outside of the tin. She said she thought she would go out and see the
+great actor, although what all the women saw in him to go mad about
+she did not know, but in another moment she settled back to her
+humped-up position and restored her gaze to the condensed milk tin.
+With a little trouble Mary got her to bed, where, after being hugged
+for one moment, she went swiftly and soundly to sleep.</p>
+
+<p>Mary was troubled because of her mother's illness, but, as it is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>
+always difficult to believe in the serious illness of another person
+until death has demonstrated its gravity, she soon dismissed the
+matter from her mind. This was the more easily done because her mind
+was teeming with impressions and pictures and scraps of dialogue.</p>
+
+<p>As her mother was sleeping peacefully, Mary put on her hat and went
+out. She wanted, in her then state of mind, to walk in the solitude
+which can only be found in crowded places, and also she wanted some
+kind of distraction. Her days had lately been so filled with adventure
+that the placid immobility of the top back room was not only irksome,
+but maddening, and her mother's hasty and troubled breathing came
+between her and her thoughts. The poor furniture of the room was
+hideous to her eyes, the uncarpeted floor and bleak, stained walls
+dulled her.</p>
+
+<p>She went out, and in a few moments was part of the crowd which passes
+and repasses nightly from the Rotunda up the broad <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>pathways of
+Sackville Street, across O'Connell Bridge, up Westmoreland Street,
+past Trinity College, and on through the brilliant lights of Grafton
+Street to the Fusiliers' Arch at the entrance to St. Stephen's Green
+Park. Here from half-past seven o'clock in the evening youthful
+Dublin marches in joyous procession. Sometimes bevies of young girls
+dance by, each a giggle incarnate. A little distance behind these a
+troop of young men follow stealthily and critically. They will be
+acquainted and more or less happily paired before the Bridge is
+reached. But generally the movement is in couples. Appointments,
+dating from the previous night, have filled the streets with happy and
+careless boys and girls&mdash;they are not exactly courting, they are
+enjoying the excitement of fresh acquaintance; old conversation is
+here poured into new bottles, old jokes have the freshness of infancy,
+every one is animated, and polite to no one but his partner; the
+people they me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span>et and pass and those who overtake and pass them are all
+subjects for their wit and scorn, while they, in turn, furnish a
+moment's amusement and conversation to each succeeding couple.
+Constantly there are stoppages when very high-bred introductions
+result in a redistribution of the youngsters. As they move apart the
+words "To-morrow night," or "Thursday," or "Friday," are called
+laughingly back, showing that the late partner is not to be lost sight
+of utterly; and then the procession begins anew.</p>
+
+<p>Among these folk Mary Makebelieve passed rapidly. She knew that if she
+walked slowly some partially elaborate gentleman would ask suddenly
+what she had been doing with herself since last Thursday? and would
+introduce her as Kate Ellen to six precisely similar young gentlemen,
+who smiled blandly in a semi-circle six feet distant. This had
+happened to her once before, and as she fled the six young gentlemen
+had roared "bow, wow, wow" after her, while the seventh mewed
+earnestly and with noise.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p>
+<p>She stood for a time watching the people thronging into the Gayety
+Theater. Some came in motor cars, others in carriages. Many
+hearse-like cabs deposited weighty and respectable solemnities under
+the glass-roofed vestibule. Swift outside cars buzzed on rubber tires
+with gentlemen clad in evening dress, and ladies whose silken wraps
+blew gently from their shoulders, and, in addition, a constant
+pedestrian stream surged along the pathway. From the shelter of an
+opposite doorway Mary watched these gayly animated people. She envied
+them all innocently enough, and wondered would the big policeman ever
+ask her to go to the theater with him, and if he did, would her mother
+let her go. She thought her mother would refuse, but was dimly certain
+that in some way she would manage to get out if such a delightful
+invitation were given her. She was dreaming of the alterations she
+wou<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>ld make in her best frock in anticipation of such a treat when,
+half-consciously, she saw a big figure appear round the corner of
+Grafton Street and walk towards the theater. It was he, and her heart
+jumped with delight. She prayed that he would not see her, and then
+she prayed that he would, and then, with a sudden, sickening coldness,
+she saw that he was not alone. A young, plump, rosy-cheeked girl was
+at his side. As they came nearer the girl put her arm into his and said
+something. He bent down to her and replied, and she flashed a laugh up
+at him. There was a swift interchange of sentences, and they both
+laughed together, then they disappeared into the half-crown door.</p>
+
+<p>Mary shrank back into the shadow of the doorway. She had a strange
+notion that everybody was trying to look at her, and that they were
+all laughing maliciously. After a few moments she s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span>tepped out on the
+path and walked homewards quickly. She did not hear the noises of the
+streets, nor see the promenading crowds. Her face was bent down as she
+walked, and beneath the big brim of her straw hat her eyes were
+blinded with the bitterest tears she had ever shed.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XV" id="XV"></a>XV</h2>
+
+
+<p>Next morning her mother was no better. She made no attempt to get out
+of bed, and listened with absolute indifference when the morning feet
+of the next-door man pounded the stairs. Mary awakened her again and
+again, but each time, after saying "All right, dearie," she relapsed
+to a slumber which was more torpor than sleep. Her yellow, old-ivory
+face was faintly tinged with color; her thin lips were relaxed, and
+seemed a trifle fuller, so that Mary thought she looked better in
+sickness than in health; but the limp arm lying on the patchwork quilt
+seemed <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span>to be more skinny than thin, and the hand was more waxen and
+claw-like than heretofore.</p>
+
+<p>Mary laid the breakfast on the bed as usual, and again awakened her
+mother, who, after staring into vacancy for a few moments, forced
+herself to her elbow, and then, with sudden determination, sat up in
+the bed and bent her mind inflexibly on her breakfast. She drank two
+cups of tea greedily, but the bread had no taste in her mouth, and
+after swallowing a morsel she laid it aside.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know what's up with me at all, at all," said she.</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe it's a cold, mother," replied Mary.</p>
+
+<p>"Do I look bad, now?"</p>
+
+<p>Mary scrutinized her narrowly.</p>
+
+<p>"No," she answered, "your face is redder than it does be, and your eyes
+are shiny. I think you look splendid and well. What way do you feel?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't feel at all, except that I'm sleepy. Give me the glass in my
+hand, dearie, till I see what I'm like."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Mary took the glass from the wall and handed it to her.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't look bad at all. A bit of color always suited me. Look at my
+tongue, though, it's very, very dirty; it's a bad tongue altogether.
+My mother had a tongue like that, Mary, when she died."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you any pain?" said her daughter.</p>
+
+<p>"No, dearie; there is a buzz in the front of my head as if something
+was spinning round and round very quickly, and that makes my eyes
+tired, and there's a sort of feeling as if my head was twice as heavy
+as it should be. Hang up the glass again. I'll try and get a sleep,
+and maybe I'll be better when I waken up. Run you out and get a bit of
+steak, and we'll stew it down and make beef tea, and maybe that will
+do me good. Give me my purse out of the pocket of my skirt."</p>
+
+<p>Mary found the purse and brought it to th<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span>e bed. Her mother opened it
+and brought out a thimble, a bootlace, five buttons, one sixpenny
+piece and a penny. She gave Mary the sixpence.</p>
+
+<p>"Get half a pound of leg beef," said she, "and then we'll have
+fourpence left for bread and tea; no, take the other penny, too, and
+get half a pound of pieces at the butcher's for twopence and a
+twopenny tin of condensed milk, that's fourpence, and a three ha'penny
+loaf and one penny for tea, that's sixpence ha'penny, and get onions
+with the odd ha'penny, and we'll put them in the beef tea. Don't
+forget, dearie, to pick lean bits of meat; them fellows do be always
+trying to stick bits of bone and gristle on a body. Tell him it's for
+beef tea for your mother, and that I'm not well at all, and ask how
+Mrs. Quinn is; she hasn't been down in the shop for a long time. I'll
+go to sleep now. I'll have to go to work in the morning whatever
+happens, because there isn't any money in the house at all. Come home
+as quick as you can, de<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span>arie."</p>
+
+<p>Mary dressed herself and went out for the provisions, but she did not
+buy them at once. As she went down the street she turned suddenly,
+clasping her hands in a desperate movement, and walked very quickly
+in the opposite direction. She turned up the side streets to the
+quays, and along these to the Park Gates. Her hands were clasping and
+unclasping in an agony of impatience, and her eyes roved busily here
+and there, flying among the few pedestrians like lanterns. She went
+through the gates and up the broad central path, and here she walked
+more slowly: but she did not see the flowers behind the railings, or
+even the sunshine that bathed the world in glory. At the monument she
+sped a furtive glance down the road she had traveled&mdash;there was nobody
+behind her. She turned into the fields, walking under trees which she
+did not see, and up hills and down valleys <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span>without noticing the
+incline of either. At times, through the tatter of her mind there
+blazed a memory of her mother lying sick at home, waiting for her
+daughter to return with food, and at such memories she gripped her
+hands together frightfully and banished the thought.&mdash;A moment's
+reflection and she could have hated her mother.</p>
+
+<p>It was nearly five o'clock before she left the Park. She walked in a
+fog of depression. For hours she had gone hither and thither in the
+well-remembered circle, every step becoming more wayward and aimless.
+The sun had disappeared, and a gray evening bowed down upon the
+fields; the little wind that whispered along the grass or swung the
+light branches of the trees had a bleak edge to it. As she left the
+big gates she was chilled through and through, but the memory of her
+mother now set her running homewards. For the time she forgot her
+quest among the trees and thought only,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> with shame and fear, of what
+her mother would say, and of the reproachful, amazed eyes which would
+be turned on her when she went in. What could she say? She could not
+imagine anything. How could she justify a neglect which must appear
+gratuitous, cold-blooded, inexplicable?</p>
+
+<p>When she had brought the food and climbed the resonant stairs she
+stood outside the door crying softly to herself. She hated to open the
+door. She could imagine her mother sitting up in the bed dazed and
+unbelieving, angry and frightened, imagining accidents and terrors,
+and when she would go in ... she had an impulse to open the door
+gently, leave the food just inside and run down the stairs out into
+the world anywhere and never come back again. At last in desperation
+she turned the handle and stepped inside. Her face flamed, the blood
+burned her eyes physically so that she could not see through them. She
+did not look at the bed, but went direct to the fireplace, and with a
+dog<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span>ged patience began mending the fire. After a few stubborn moments
+she twisted violently to face whatever might come, ready to break into
+angry reproaches and impertinences, but her mother was lying very
+still. She was fast asleep, and a weight, an absolutely real pressure,
+was lifted from Mary's heart. Her fingers flew about the prepa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>ration
+of the beef tea. She forgot the man whom she had gone to meet. Her
+arms were tired and hungry to close around her mother. She wanted to
+whisper little childish words to her, to rock her to and fro on her
+breast, and croon little songs and kiss her, and pat her face.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XVI" id="XVI"></a>XVI</h2>
+
+
+<p>Her mother did not get better. Indeed, she got worse. In addition to
+the lassitude of which she had complained she suffered also from great
+heat and great cold, and, furthermore, sharp pains darted so swiftly
+through her brows that at times she was both dizzy and sightless. A
+twirling movement in her head prevented her from standing up. Her
+center of gravity seemed destroyed, for when she did stand and
+attempted to walk she had a strange bearing away on one side, so that
+on striving<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> to walk towards the door she veered irresistibly at least
+four feet to the left-hand side of that point. Mary Makebelieve helped
+her back to bed, where she lay for a time watching horizontal lines
+spinning violently in front of her face, and these lines after a time
+crossed and recrossed each other in so mazy and intricate a pattern
+that she became violently sick from the mere looking at them.</p>
+
+<p>All of these things she described to her daughter, tracing the queer
+patterns which were spinning about her with such fidelity that Mary
+was almost able to see them. She also theorized about the cause and
+ultimate effect of these symptoms, and explained the degrees of heat
+and cold which burned or chilled her, and the growth of a pain to its
+exquisite startling apex, its subsequent slow recession, and the thud
+of an india-rubber hammer which ensued when the pain had ebbed to its
+easiest level. It did not occur to either of them to send for a
+doctor. Doctors in such cases are seldom sent for,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> seldom even thought
+of. One falls sick according to some severely definite, implacable law
+with which it is foolish to quarrel, and one gets well again for no
+other reason than that it is impossible to be sick forever. As the
+night struggles slowly into day so sickness climbs stealthily into
+health, and nature has a system of medicining her ailments which might
+only be thwarted by the ministrations of a mere doctor. Doctors also
+expect payment for their services&mdash;an expectation so wildly beyond the
+range of common sense as to be ludicrous. Those who can scarcely fee a
+baker when they are in health can certainly not remunerate a physician
+when they are ill.</p>
+
+<p>But, despite her sickness, Mrs. Makebelieve was worried with the
+practical common politics of existence. The food purchased with her
+last sevenpence was eaten beyond remembrance. The vital requirements
+of the next day and the following day and of all subsequent d<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span>ays
+thronged upon her, clamoring for instant attention. The wraith of a
+landlord sat on her bed demanding rent and threatening grisly
+alternatives. Goblins that were bakers and butchers and grocers
+grinned and leered and jabbered from the corners of the room.</p>
+
+<p>Each day Mary Makebelieve went to the pawn office with something. They
+lived for a time on the only capital they had&mdash;the poor furniture of
+their room. Everything which had even the narrowest margin of value
+was sold. Mary's dresses kept them for six days. Her mother's Sunday
+skirt fed them for another day. They held famine at bay with a patchwork
+quilt and a crazy washstand. A water-jug and a strip of oilcloth tinkled
+momentarily against the teeth of the wolf and disappeared. The maw of
+hunger was not incommoded by the window curtain.</p>
+
+<p>At last the room was as bare as a desert and almost as uninhabitable.
+A room without furniture is a ghostly pla<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span>ce. Sounds made therein are
+uncanny, even the voice puts off its humanity and rings back with a
+bleak and hollow note, an empty resonance tinged with the frost of
+winter. There is no other sound so deadly, so barren and dispiriting
+as the echoes of an empty room. The gaunt woman in the bed seemed
+less gaunt than her residence, and there was nothing more to be sent
+to the pawnbroker or the secondhand dealer.</p>
+
+<p>A post-card came from Mrs. O'Connor requesting, in a peremptory
+language customary to such communications, that Mrs. Makebelieve would
+please call on her the following morning before eight o'clock. Mrs.
+Makebelieve groaned as she read it. It meant work and food and the
+repurchase of her household goods, and she knew that on the following
+morning she would not be able to get up. She lay a while thinking, and
+then called her daughter.</p>
+
+<p>"Deary," said she, "you will have to go to this place in the morning
+and try what you can do. Tell Mrs. O'Connor that I am sick, and that
+you are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> my daughter and will do the work, and try and do the best you
+can for a while."</p>
+
+<p>She caught her daughter's head down to her bosom and wept over her,
+for she saw in this work a beginning and an end, the end of the
+little daughter who could be petted and rocked and advised, the
+beginning of a womanhood which would grow up to and beyond her, which
+would collect and secrete emotions and aspirations and adventures not
+to be shared even by a mother, and she saw the failure which this work
+meant, the expanding of her daughter's life ripples to a bleak and
+miserable horizon where the clouds were soapsuds and floor cloths, and
+the beyond a blank resignation only made energetic by hunger.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Oh, my dear," said she, "I hate to think of you having to do such
+work, but it will only be for a while, a week, and then I will be well
+again. Only a little week, my love, my sweetheart, my heart's darling."</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XVII" id="XVII"></a>XVII</h2>
+
+
+<p>Early on the following morning Mary Makebelieve awakened with a start.
+She felt as if some one had called her, and lay for a few moments to
+see had her mother spoken. But her mother was still asleep. Her
+slumber was at all times almost as energetic as her wakening hours.
+She twisted constantly and moved her hands and spoke ramblingly. Odd
+interjections, such as "ah, well, no matter, certainly not, and indeed
+aye," shot from her lips like bullets, and at intervals a sarcastic
+sniff fretted or astonished her bedfellow into wakefulness. But now as
+she lay none of these strenuous eja<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>culations were audible. Sighs only,
+weighty and deep drawn and very tired, broke on her lips and lapsed
+sadly into the desolate room.</p>
+
+<p>Mary Makebelieve lay for a time wondering idly what had awakened her
+so completely, for her eyes were wide open and every vestige of sleep
+was gone from her brain; and then she remembered that on this morning,
+and for the first time in her life, she had to go to work. That
+knowledge had gone to bed with her and had awakened her with an
+imperious urgency. In an instant she sprang out of bed, huddled on
+sufficient clothing for warmth, and set about lighting the fire. She
+was far too early awake, but could not compose herself to lie for
+another moment in bed. She did not at all welcome the idea of going to
+work, but the interest attaching to a new thing, the freshness which
+vitalizes for a time even the dreariest undertaking, prevented <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span>her
+from rueing with any bitterness her first day's work. To a young
+person even work is an adventure, and anything which changes the usual
+current of life is welcome. The fire also went with her; in quite a
+short time the flames had gathered to a blaze, and matured, and
+concentrated to the glowing redness of perfect combustion, then, when
+the smoke had disappeared with the flames, she put on the saucepan of
+water. Quickly the saucepan boiled, and she wet the tea. She cut the
+bread into slices, put a spoonful of condensed milk into each cup, and
+awakened her mother.</p>
+
+<p>All through the breakfast her mother advised her on the doing of her
+work. She cautioned her daughter when scrubbing woodwork always to
+scrub against the grain, for this gave a greater purchase to the brush,
+and removed the dirt twice as quickly as the seemingly easy opposite
+movement. She told her never to save soap. Little soap meant much
+rubbing, and advi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span>sed that she should scrub two minutes with one hand
+and then two minutes with the other hand, and she was urgent on the
+necessity of thoroughness in the wringing out of one's floor cloth,
+because a dry floor cloth takes up twice as much water as a wet one,
+and thus lightens labor; also she advised Mary to change her positions
+as frequently as possible to avoid cramp when scrubbing, and to kneel
+up or stand up when wringing her cloths, as this would give her a rest,
+and the change of movement would relieve her very greatly, and above
+all to take her time about the business, because haste seldom resulted
+in clean work, and was never appreciated by one's employer.</p>
+
+<p>Before going out Mary Makebelieve had to arrange for some one to look
+after her mother during the day. This is an arrangement which, among
+poor people, is never difficult of accomplishment. The first to whom
+she applied was the laboring man's wife in the next room; she was a
+vast woman with six children and a laugh like the rolling of a great
+wind<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span>, and when Mary Makebelieve advanced her request she shook six
+children off her like toys and came out on the landing.</p>
+
+<p>"Run off to your work now, honey," said she, "and let you be easy in
+your mind about your mother, for I'll go up to her this minute, and when
+I'm not there myself I'll leave one of the children with her to call me
+if she wants anything, and don't you be fretting at all, God help you!
+for she'll be as safe and as comfortable with me as if she was in Jervis
+Street Hospital or the Rotunda itself. What's wrong with her now? Is it
+a pain in her head she has or a sick stomach, God help her?"</p>
+
+<p>Mary explained briefly, and as she went down the stairs she saw the
+big woman going into her mother's room.</p>
+
+<p>She had not been out in the streets so early before, and had never
+known the wonder and beauty of the sun in the early morning. The
+streets were almost deserted, and the sunli<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span>ght&mdash;a most delicate and
+nearly colorless radiance&mdash;fell gently on the long silent paths.
+Missing the customary throng of people and traffic she seemed almost
+in a strange country, and had to look twice for turnings which she
+could easily have found with her eyes shut. The shutters were up in
+all the shops and the blinds were down in most of the windows. Now and
+again a milk cart came clattering and rattling down a street, and now
+and again a big red-painted baker's cart dashed along the road. Such
+few pedestrians as she met were poorly dressed men, who carried tommy
+cans and tools, and they were all walking at a great pace, as if they
+feared they were late for somewhere. Three or four boys passed her
+running; one of these had a great lump of bread in his hand, and as he
+ran he tore pieces off the bread with his teeth and ate them. The
+streets looked cleaner than she had thought they could look, and the
+houses seemed very quiet and beautiful. When she <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span>came near a policeman
+she looked at him keenly from a distance, hoping and fearing that it
+might be her friend, but she did not see him. She had a sinking
+feeling at the thought that maybe he would be in the Ph&oelig;nix Park
+this day looking for her, and might, indeed, have been there for the
+past few days, and the thought that he might be seeking for her
+unavailingly stabbed through her mind like a pain. It did not seem
+right, it was not in proportion, that so big a man should seek for a
+mere woman and not find one instantly to hand. It was pitiful to think
+of the huge man looking on this side and on that, peering behind trees
+and through distances, and thinking that maybe he was forgotten or
+scorned. Mary Makebelieve almost wept at the idea that he should fancy
+she scorned him. She wondered how, under such circumstances, a small
+girl can comfort a big man. One may fondle his hand, but that is
+miserably inadequate. She wished she was twice as big as he was, so
+that she might lift him bodily to her breast and snuggle and hug him
+lik<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span>e a kitten. So comprehensive an embrace alone could atone for
+injury to a big man's feelings.</p>
+
+<p>In about twenty minutes she reached Mrs. O'Connor's house and knocked.
+She had to knock half a dozen times before she was admitted, and on
+being admitted had a great deal of trouble explaining who she was, and
+why her mother had not come, and that she was quite competent to
+undertake the work. She knew the person who opened the door for h<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span>er
+was not Mrs. O'Connor, because she had not a hairy wart on her chin,
+nor had she buck teeth. After a little delay she was brought to the
+scullery and given a great pile of children's clothing to wash, and
+after starting this work she was left to herself for a long time.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XVIII" id="XVIII"></a>XVIII</h2>
+
+
+<p>It was a dark house. The windows were all withered away behind stiff
+curtains, and the light that labored between these was chastened to
+the last degree of respectability. The doors skulked behind heavy
+plush hangings. The floors hid themselves decently under thick red and
+black carpets, and the margins which were uncarpeted were disguised by
+beeswax, so that no one knew they were there at all. The narrow hall
+was steeped in shadow, for there two black velvet portieres, at
+distances of six feet apart, depended from rods in the ceiling.
+Similar palls flopped on each landing of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> the staircase, and no sound
+was heard in the house at all, except dim voices that droned from
+somewhere, muffled and sepulchral and bodyless.</p>
+
+<p>At ten o'clock, having finished the washing, Mary was visited by Mrs.
+O'Connor, whom she knew at once by the signs she had been warned of.
+The lady subjected each article that had been washed to a particular
+scrutiny, and, with the shadowy gallop of a smile that dashed into and
+out of sight in an instant, said they would do. She then conducted
+Mary to the kitchen and, pointing to a cup of tea and two slices of
+bread, invited her to breakfast, and left her for six minutes, when
+she reappeared with the suddenness of a marionette and directed her to
+wash her cup and saucer, and then to wash the kitchen, and these
+things also Mary did.</p>
+
+<p>She got weary very soon, but not dispirited, because there were many
+things to loo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span>k at in the kitchen. There were pots of various sizes and
+metals, saucepans little and big, jugs of all shapes, and a regiment
+of tea things were ranged on the dresser; on the walls were hung great
+pot lids like the shields of barbarous warriors which she had seen in
+a story book. Under the kitchen table there was a row of boots all
+wrinkled by usage, and each wearing a human and almost intelligent
+aspect&mdash;a well-wrinkled boot has often an appearance of mad humanity
+which can chain and almost hypnotize the observer. As she lifted the
+boots out of her way she named each by its face. There was Grubtoes,
+Sloucher, Thump-thump, Hoppit, Twitter, Hide-away, and Fairybell.</p>
+
+<p>While she was working a young girl came into the kitchen and took up
+the boots called Fairybell. Mary just tossed a look at her as she
+entered and bent again to her washing. Then with an extreme
+perturbation she stole another look. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> girl was young and as trim as
+a sunny garden. Her face was packed with laughter and freedom, like a
+young morning when tender rosy clouds sail in the sky. She walked with
+a light spring of happiness; each step seemed the beginning of a
+dance, light and swift and certain. Mary knew her in a pang, and her
+bent face grew redder than the tiles she was scrubbing. Like lightning
+she knew her. Her brain swung in a clamor of "where, where?" and even
+in the question she had the answer, for this was the girl she had seen
+going into the Gayety Theater swinging on the arm of her big
+policeman. The girl said good morning to her in a kindly voice, and
+Mary with a swift, frightened glance, whispered back good morning,
+then the girl went upstairs again, and Mary continued to scrub the
+floor.</p>
+
+<p>When the kitchen was finished and inspected and approved of, she was
+instructed to wash out the front hall, and set about the work at once.</p>
+
+<p>"Get it done as quickly as you can," said t<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span>he mistress, "I am
+expecting my nephew here soon, and he dislikes washing."</p>
+
+<p>So Mary bent quickly to her work. She was not tired now. Her hands
+moved swiftly up and down the floor without effort. Indeed, her
+actions were almost mechanical. The self that was thinking and probing
+seemed somehow apart from the body bending over the bucket, and the
+hands that scrubbed and dipped and wrung. She had finished about three
+quarters of the hall when a couple of sharp raps came to the door.
+Mrs. O'Connor flew noiselessly up from the kitchen.</p>
+
+<p>"I knew," said she, bitterly, "that you would not be finished before
+he came. Dry that puddle at once, so that he can walk in, and take the
+soap out of the way."</p>
+
+<p>She stood with her hand on the door while Mary followed these
+directions, then, when a couple of hasty movements had removed the
+surplus water, Mrs. O'Connor drew the bolt and her nephew entered.
+Mary knew him on the doorstep, and her blood froze in terror and
+boiled again in shame.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Mrs. O'Connor drew the big policeman inside and kissed him.</p>
+
+<p>"I can't get these people to do things in time," said she. "They are
+that slow. Hang up your hat and coat and come into the parlor."</p>
+
+<p>The policeman, with his eyes fixed steadily on Mary, began to take off
+his coat. His eyes, his moustache, all his face and figure seemed to
+be looking at her. He was an enormous and terrifying interrogation. He
+tapped his tough moustache and stepped over the bucket; at the entrance
+to the parlor he stood again and hung his monstrous look on her. He
+seemed about to speak, but it was to Mrs. O'Connor his words went.</p>
+
+<p>"How's everything?" said he, and then the door closed behind him.</p>
+
+<p>Mary, with extraordinary slowness, <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span>knelt down again beside the bucket
+and began to scrub. She worked very deliberately, sometimes cleaning
+the same place two or three times. Now and again she sighed, but
+without any consciousness of trouble. These were sighs which did not
+seem to belong to her. She knew she was sighing, but could not
+exactly see how the dull sounds came from her lips when she had no
+desire to sigh and did not make any conscious effort to do so. Her
+mind was an absolute blank, she could think of nothing but the bubbles
+which broke on the floor and in the bucket, and the way the water
+squeezed down from the cloth. There was something she could have
+thought about if she wanted to, but she did not want to.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. O'Connor came out in, a few minutes, inspected the hall and said
+it would do. She paid Mary her wages and told her to come again the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span>
+next day, and Mary went home. As she walked along she was very careful
+not to step on any of the lines on the pavement; she walked between
+these, and was distressed because these lines were not equally distant
+from each other, so that she had to make unequal paces as she went.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XIX" id="XIX"></a>XIX</h2>
+
+
+<p>The name of the woman from next door was Mrs. Cafferty. She was big
+and round, and when she walked her dress whirled about her like a
+tempest. She seemed to be always turning round; when she was going
+straight forward in any direction, say towards a press, she would turn
+aside midway so sharply that her clothing spun gustily in her
+wake&mdash;This probably came from having many children. A mother is
+continually driving in oblique directions from her household employments
+to rescu<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span>e her children from a multitude of perils. An infant and a
+fireplace act upon each other like magnets; a small boy is always trying
+to eat a kettle or a piece of coal or the backbone of a herring; a
+little girl and a slop bucket are in immediate contact; the baby has a
+knife in its mouth; the twin is on the point of swallowing a marble, or
+is trying to wash itself in the butter, or the cat is about to take a
+nap on its face. Indeed, the woman who has six children never knows in
+what direction her next step must be, and the continual strain of
+preserving her progeny converts many a one into regular cyclones of
+eyes and arms and legs. It also induces in some a perpetual good-humored
+irritability wherein one can slap and cuddle a child in the same
+instant, or shout threateningly or lovingly, call warningly and murmur
+encouragingly in an astonishing sequence. The woman with six children
+must both physically and mentally travel at a tangent, and when a
+husband has to be badgered or humored into the bargain, then the life
+of such a woman is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span>more complex than is readily understood.</p>
+
+<p>When Mary came home Mrs. Cafferty was sitting on her mother's bed, two
+small children and a cat were also on the bed, two slightly bigger
+children were under the bed, and two others were galloping furiously
+up and down the room. At one moment these latter twain were runaway
+horses, at another they were express trains. When they were horses
+they snorted and neighed and kicked, when they were trains they backed
+and shunted, blew whistles and blew off steam. The children under the
+bed were tigers in a jungle, and they made the noises proper to such
+beasts and such a place; they bit each other furiously, and howled and
+growled precisely as tigers do. The pair of infants on the bed were
+playing the game of bump; they would stand upright, then spring high
+into the air and come crashing down on the bed, which then sprung the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span>m
+partly up again. Each time they jumped they screamed loudly, each time
+they fell they roared delighted congratulations to each other, and
+when they fell together they fought with strong good humor. Sometimes
+they fell on Mrs. Makebelieve; always they bumped her. At the side of
+the bed their mother sat telling with a gigantic voice a story wherein
+her husband's sister figured as the despicable person she was to the
+eye of discernment, and this story was punctuated and shot through and
+dislocuted by objurgations, threats, pleadings, admirations, alarms
+and despairs addressed to the children separately and en masse, by
+name, nickname, and hastily created epithet.</p>
+
+<p>Mary halted in amazement in the doorway. She could not grasp all the
+pandemonium at once, and while she stood Mrs. Cafferty saw her.</p>
+
+<p>"Come on in, honey," said she. "Your ma's as right as a trivet. All
+she wanted was a bit of good company and some children<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> to play with.
+Deed," she continued, "children are the best medicine for a woman that
+I know of. They don't give you time to be sick, the creatures! Patrick
+John, I'll give you a smack on the side of the head if you don't let
+your little sister alone, and don't you, Norah, be vexing him or
+you'll deserve all you get. Run inside, Julia Elizabeth, cut a slice
+of bread for the twins, and put a bit of sugar on it, honey. Yes,
+alanna, you can have a slice for yourself, too, you poor child you,
+well you deserve it."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve was sitting up in the bed with two pillows propping
+up her back. One of her long thin arms was stretched out to preserve
+the twins from being bruised against the wall in their play. Plainly
+they had become great friends with her, for every now and then they
+swarmed over her, and a hugging match of extreme complexity ensued.
+She looked almost her usual self, and all the animation that had been
+so marked a feature of her personality had returned to her.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you better, mother?" said Mary.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p>
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve took her daughter's head in her hands and kissed her
+until the twins butted them apart clamoring for caresses.</p>
+
+<p>"I am, honey," said she. "Those children done me good. I could have
+got up at one o'clock, I felt so well, but Mrs. Cafferty thought I'd
+better not."</p>
+
+<p>"I did so," said Mrs. Cafferty. "Not a foot do you stir out of that
+bed till your daughter comes home, ma'am, said I. For do you see,
+child, many's the time you'd be thinking you were well and feeling as
+fit as a fiddle, and nothing would be doing you but to be up and
+gallivanting about, and then the next day you'd have a relapse, and
+the next day you'd be twice as bad, and the day after that they'd be
+measuring you for your coffin maybe. I knew a woman was taken like
+that&mdash;up she got; I'm as well as ever I was, said she, and she ate a
+feed of pig's cheek and cabbage and finished her washing, and they
+buried her in a week. It's the quare thing, sickness. What I say is
+when you're sick get into bed and s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span>top there."</p>
+
+<p>"It's easy saying that," said Mrs. Makebelieve.</p>
+
+<p>"Sure, don't I know, you poor thing you," said Mrs. Cafferty, "but
+you should stay in bed as long as you are able to anyhow."</p>
+
+<p>"How did you get on with Mrs. O'Connor?" said Mrs. Makebelieve.</p>
+
+<p>"That's the mistress, isn't it?" queried Mrs. Cafferty; "an ould
+devil, I'll bet you."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve rapidly and lightly sketched Mrs. O'Connor's leading
+peculiarities.</p>
+
+<p>"It's queer the people one has to work for, God knows it is," said
+Mrs. Cafferty.</p>
+
+<p>At this point a grave controversy on work might have arisen, but the
+children, caring little for conversation, broke into so tumultuous
+play that talk could not be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> proceeded with. Mary was enticed into a
+game composed in part of pussy-four-corners and tip-an-tig, with a
+general flavor of leap-frog working through. In five minutes her hair
+and her stockings were both down, and the back of her skir<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>t had crawled
+three-quarters round to the front. The twins shouted and bumped on the
+bed, upon which and on Mrs. Makebelieve they rubbed bread and butter
+and sugar, while their mother roared an anecdote at Mrs. Makebelieve
+in tones that ruled the din as a fog horn rules the waves.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XX" id="XX"></a>XX</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mary had lavished the entire of her first day's wages on delicate
+foods wherewith to tempt her mother's languid appetite, and when the
+morning dawned she arose silently, lit the fire, wet the tea and
+spread her purchases out on the side of the bed. There was a slice of
+brawn, two pork sausages, two eggs, three rashers of bacon, a bun, a
+pennyworth of sweets and a pig's foot. These, with bread, and butter,
+and tea, made a collection amid which an invalid might browse with
+some satisfaction<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>. Mary then awakened her, and sat by in a dream of
+happiness watching her mother's eye roll slowly and unbelievingly from
+item to item. Mrs. Makebelieve tipped each article with her first
+finger and put its right name on it unerringly. Then she picked out an
+important looking sweet that had four colors and shone like the sun,
+and put it in her mouth.</p>
+
+<p>"I never saw anything like it, you good child you," said she.</p>
+
+<p>Mary rocked herself to and fro and laughed loudly for delight, and
+then they ate a bit of everything, and were very happy.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve said that she felt altogether better that morning.
+She had slept like a top all through the night, and, moreover, had a
+dream wherein she saw her brother Patrick standing on the remotest sea
+point of distant America, from whence he had shouted loudly across the
+ocean that he was coming back to Ireland soon, that he had succeeded
+very well <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span>indeed, and that he was not married. He had not changed in
+the slightest degree, said Mrs. Makebelieve, and he looked as young
+and as jolly as when he was at home with her father and herself in the
+County Meath twenty-two years before. This mollifying dream and the
+easy sleep which followed it had completely restored her health and
+spirits. Mrs. Makebelieve further intimated that she intended to go to
+work that day. It did not fit in with her ideas of propriety that her
+child should turn into a charwoman, the more particularly as there was
+a strong&mdash;an almost certain&mdash;possibility of an early betterment of her
+own and her daughter's fortunes.</p>
+
+<p>Dreams, said Mrs. Makebelieve, did not come for nothing. There was
+more in dreams than was generally understood. Many and many were the
+dreams which she herself had been visited by, and they had come true
+so often that she could no longer disregard their promises,
+admon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span>ishments or threats. Of course many people had dreams which were
+of no consequence, and these could usually be traced to gluttony or a
+flighty inconstant imagination. Drunken people, for instance, often
+dreamed strange and terrible things, but, even while they were awake,
+these people were liable to imaginary enemies whom their clouded eyes
+and intellects magnified beyond any thoughtful proportions, and when
+they were asleep their dreams would also be subject to this haze and
+whirl of unreality and hallucination.</p>
+
+<p>Mary said that sometimes she did not dream at all, and at other times
+she dreamed very vividly, but usually could not remember what the
+dream had been about when she awakened, and once she had dreamed that
+some one gave her a shilling which she placed carefully under her
+pillow, and this dream was so real that in the morning she put her
+hand under the pillow to see if the shilling was there, but it was
+not. The very next night she <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span>dreamed the same dream, and as she put
+the phantom money under her pillow she said out loudly to herself, "I
+am dreaming this, and I dreamt it last night also." Her mother said if
+she had dreamt it for the third time some one would have given her a
+shilling surely. To this Mary agreed, and admitted that she had tried
+very hard to dream it on the third night, but somehow could not do it.</p>
+
+<p>"When my brother comes home from America," said Mrs. Makebelieve,
+"we'll go away from this part of the city at once. I suppose he'd want
+a rather big house on the south side&mdash;Rathfarnham or Terenure way, or,
+maybe, Donnybrook. Of course he'll ask me to mind the house for him
+and keep the servants in order, and provide a different dinner every
+day, and all that; while you could go out to the neighbors' places to
+play lawn tennis or cricket, and have lunch. It will be a very great
+responsibility."</p>
+
+<p>"What kind of dinners would you have?" said Mary.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p>
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve's eyes glistened, and she leaned forward in the bed;
+but just as she was about to reply the laboring man in the next room
+slammed his door, and went thundering down the stairs. In an instant
+Mrs. Makebelieve bounded from her bed; three wide twists put up her
+hair, eight strange billow-like movements put on her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> clothes; as each
+article of clothing reached a definite point on her person Mary
+stabbed it swiftly with a pin&mdash;four ordinary pins in this place, two
+safety pins in that: then Mrs. Makebelieve kissed her daughter sixteen
+times and fled down the stairs and away to her work.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXI" id="XXI"></a>XXI</h2>
+
+
+<p>In a few minutes Mrs. Cafferty came into the room. She was, as every
+woman is in the morning, primed with conversation about husbands, for
+in the morning husbands are unwieldy, morose creatures without joy,
+without lightness, lacking even the common, elemental interest in
+their own children, and capable of detestably misinterpreting the
+conversation of their wives. It is only by mixing amongst other men
+that this malignant humor may be dispelled. To them<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> the company of men
+is like a great bath into which a husband will plunge wildly, renouncing
+as he dives wives and children, all anchors and securities of hearth and
+roof, and from which he again emerges singularly refreshed and capable
+of being interested by a wife, a family, and a home until the next
+morning. To many women this is a grievance amounting often to an
+affront, and although they endeavor, even by cooking, to heal the
+singular breach, they are utterly unable to do so, and perpetually seek
+the counsel of each other on the subject. Mrs. Cafferty had merely asked
+her husband would he hold the baby while she poured out his stirabout,
+and he had incredibly threatened to pour the stirabout down the back of
+her neck if she didn't leave him alone.</p>
+
+<p>It was upon this morning madness she had desired to consult her
+friend, and when she saw that Mrs. Makebelieve had gone away her
+disappointment was quite evident. But this was only for a moment.
+Almost all w<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span>omen are possessed of a fine social sense in relation to
+other women. They are always on their best behavior towards one
+another. Indeed, it often seems as if they feared and must by all
+possible means placate each other by flattery, humor or a serious
+tactfulness. There is very little freedom between them, because there
+is no real freedom or acquaintance but between things polar. There is
+nothing but a superficial resemblance between like and like, but
+between like and unlike there is space wherein both curiosity and
+spirit may go adventuring. Extremes must meet, it is their urgent
+necessity; the reason for their distance, and the greater the distance
+between them, the swifter will be their return and the warmer their
+impact: they may shatter each other to fragments or they may fuse and
+become indissoluble and new and wonderful, but there is no other
+fertility. Between the sexes there is a really extraordinary freedom
+of intercourse. They m<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span>eet each other something more than half way. A
+man and a woman may become quite intimate in a quarter of an hour.
+Almost certainly they will endeavor to explain themselves to each
+other before many minutes have elapsed; but a man and a man will not
+do this, and even less so will a woman and a woman, for these are the
+parallel lines which never meet. The acquaintanceship of the latter,
+in particular, often begins and ends in an armed and calculating
+neutrality. They preserve their distances and each others' suffrage by
+the exercise of a grave social tact which never deserts them, and
+which more than anything else has contributed to build the ceremonials
+which are nearly one-half of our civilization. It is a common belief
+amongst men that women cannot live together without quarreling, and
+that they are unable to get work done by other women with any of the
+good will which men display in the same occupations. If this is true,
+the reason should not be looked for in any intersexual compli<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span>cations,
+such as fear or an acrid rivalry, but only in the perpetually
+recurring physical disturbances to which, as a sex, they are
+subjected; and as the ability and willingness of a man to use his
+fists in response to an affront has imposed sobriety and good humor
+towards each other in almost all their relations, so women have placed
+barriers of politeness and ceremonial between their fellow-women and
+their own excoriated sensibilities.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty, therefore, dissembled her disappointment, and with an
+increased cordiality addressed herself towards Mary. Sitting down on
+the bedside she discoursed on almost every subject upon which a woman
+may discourse. It is considered that the conversation of women, while
+incessant in its use, is rigorously bounded between the parlor and the
+kitchen, or, to be more precise, between the attic and the scullery,
+but these extremes are more inclusive than is imagined, for the attic
+has an outlook on the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span>stars while the scullery usually opens on the
+kitchen garden or the dust heap&mdash;vistas equal to horizons. The
+mysteries of death and birth occupy women far more than is the case
+with men, to whom political and mercantile speculations are more
+congenial. With immediate buying and selling, and all the absolute
+forms of exchange and barter, women are deeply engaged, so that the
+realities of trade are often more intelligent to them than to many
+merchants. If men understood domestic economy half as well as women
+do, then their political economy and their entire consequent
+statecraft would not be the futile muddle which it is.</p>
+
+<p>It was all very interesting to Mary, and, moreover, she had a great
+desire for companionship at the moment. If she had been left alone it
+might have become necessary to confront certain thoughts, memories,
+pictures, from which she had a dim idea it would be wise to keep her
+distance. Her work on the previous day, the girl she had me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span>t in the
+house, the policeman&mdash;from all or any of these recollections she
+swerved mentally. She steadily rejected all impressions that touched
+upon these. The policeman floated vaguely on her consciousness not as
+a desirable person, not even as a person but as a distance, as an
+hour of her childhood, as a half-forgotten quaintness, a memory which
+it would be better should never be revived. Indeed her faint thought
+shadowed him as a person who was dead, and would never again be
+visible to her anywhere. So, resolutely, she let him drop down into
+her mind to some uncomfortable oubliette from whence he threatened
+with feeble insistence to pop up at any moment like a strange question
+or a sudden shame. She hid him in a rosy flush which a breath could
+have made flame unbearably, and she hid from him behind the light
+garrulity of Mrs. Cafferty, through which now and again, as through a
+veil, she saw the <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>spike of his helmet, a wiry bristling moustache, a
+surge of great shoulders. On these ghostly indications she heaped a
+tornado of words which swamped the wraith, but she knew he was waiting
+to catch her alone, and would certainly catch her, and the knowledge
+made her hate him.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXII" id="XXII"></a>XXII</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty suggested that she and Mary should go out together to
+purchase that day's dinner, and by the time she had draped her
+shoulders in a shawl, buried her head in a bonnet, cautioned all her
+brood against going near the fireplace, the coal box and the slop
+bucket, cut a slice of bread for each of them, and placed each of them
+in charge of all the rest, Mary's more elaborate dressing was within
+two stages of her hat.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait until you have children, my dear,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span>" said Mrs. Cafferty, "you
+won't be so pernickety then." She further told Mary that when she was
+herself younger she had often spent an hour and a half doing up her
+hair, and she had been so particular that the putting on of a blouse
+or the pinning of a skirt to a belt had tormented her happily for two
+hours. "But, bless you," she roared, "you get out of all that when you
+get children. Wait till you have six of them to be dressed every
+morning, and they with some of their boots lost and the rest of them
+mixed up, and each of them wriggling like an eel on a pan until you
+have to slap the devil out of them before their stocking can be got
+on: the way they screw their toes up in the wrong places! and the way
+they squeal that you're pinching them! and the way that they say
+you've rubbed soap in their eyes!"&mdash;Mrs. Cafferty lifted her eyes and
+her hands to the ceiling in a dumb remonstrance with Providence, and
+dropped them again forlornly as one in whom Providence had never been
+really in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>terested&mdash;"You'll have all the dressing you want and a bit
+over for luck," said she.</p>
+
+<p>She complimented Mary on her hair, her complexion, the smallness of
+her feet, the largeness of her eyes, the slenderness of her waist,
+the width of her hat and of her shoe strings: so impartially and
+inclusively did she compliment her that by the time they went out Mary
+was rosy with appreciation and as self-confident as a young girl is
+entitled to be.</p>
+
+<p>It was a beautiful gray day with a massy sky which seemed as if it
+never could move again or change, and, as often happens in Ireland in
+cloudy weather, the air was so very clear that one could see to a
+great distance. On such days everything stands out in sharp outline. A
+street is no longer a congery of houses huddling shamefully together
+and terrified lest any one should look at them and laugh. Each hou<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span>se
+then recaptures its individuality. The very roadways are aware of
+themselves and bear their horses, and cars, and trams in a competent
+spirit, adorned with modesty as with a garland. It has a beauty beyond
+sunshine, for sunshine is only youth and carelessness. The impress of
+a thousand memories, the historic visage becomes apparent: the quiet
+face which experience has ripened into knowledge and mellowed into the
+wisdom of charity is seen then: the great social beauty shines from
+the streets under this sky that broods like a thoughtful forehead.</p>
+
+<p>While they walked Mrs. Cafferty planned, as a general might, her
+campaign of shopping. Her shopping differed greatly from Mrs.
+Makebelieve's, and the difference was probably caused by her necessity
+to feed and clothe eight people as against Mrs. Makebelieve's two.
+Mrs. Makebelieve went to the shop nearest her house, and there entered
+into a stanch personal friendship with the proprietor. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>When she was
+given anything of doubtful value or material she instantly returned
+and handed it back, and the prices which were first quoted to her and
+settled upon became to Mrs. Makebelieve an unalterable standard from
+which no departure would be tolerated. Eggs might go up in price for
+the remainder of the world, but not for her. A change of price threw
+Mrs. Makebelieve into so wide-eyed, so galvanic, so power fully-verbal
+and friendship-shattering an anger that her terms were accepted and
+registered as Median exactitudes. Mrs. Cafferty, on the other hand,
+knew shopkeepers as personal enemies and as foes to the human race,
+who were bent on despoiling the poor, and against whom a remorseless
+warfare should be conducted by all decent people. Her knowledge of
+material, of quality, of degrees of freshness, of local and distant
+prices was profound. In Clanbrassil Street she would quote the prices
+of Moore Street with shattering effect, and if the shopkee<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span>per declined
+to revise his tariff her good-humored voice toned so huge a
+disapproval that other intending purchasers left the shop impressed by
+the unmasking of a swindler. Her method was abrupt. She seized an
+article, placed it on the counter and uttered these words, "Sixpence
+and not a penny more; I can get it in Moore Street for five pence half
+penny." She knew all the shops having a cheap line in some special
+article, and, therefore, her shopping was of a very extended
+description, not that she went from point to point, for she
+continually departed from the line of battle with the remark "Let's
+try what they have here," and when inside the shop her large eye took
+in at a glance a thousand details of stock and price which were never
+afterwards forgotten.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty's daughter, Norah, was going to celebrate her first
+Communion in a few days. This is a very important ceremony for a young
+girl and for her mother. A whi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span>te muslin dress and a blue sash, a white
+muslin hat with blue ribbons, tan shoes, and stockings as germane to
+the color of tan as may be&mdash;these all have to be provided. It is a
+time of grave concern for everybody intimately connected with the
+event. Every girl in the world has performed this ceremony: they have
+all been clad in these garments and shoes, and for a day or so all
+women, of whatever age, are in love with the little girl making her
+first Communion. Perhaps more than anything else it swings the passing
+stranger back to the time when she was not a woman but a child with
+present gayety and curiosity, and a future all expectation and
+adventure. Therefore, the suitable appareling of one's daughter is a
+public duty, and every mother endeavors to do the thing that is right,
+and live, if only for one day, up to the admiration of her
+fellow-creatures.</p>
+
+<p>It was a trial, but an enjoyable one, to Mrs. Cafferty and Mary, this
+matching<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> of tan stockings with tan shoes. The shoes were bought, and
+then an almost impossible quest began to find stockings which would
+exactly go with them. Thousands of boxes were opened, ransacked and
+waved aside without the absolute color being discovered. From shop to
+shop and from street to street they went, and the quest led them
+through Grafton Street en route to a shop where months before Mrs.
+Cafferty had seen stockings of a color so nearly approximating to tan
+that they almost might be suitable.</p>
+
+<p>As they went past the College and entered the winding street Mary's
+heart began to beat. She did not see any of the traffic flowing up and
+down, or the jostling, busy foot passengers, nor did she hear the
+eager lectures of her companion. Her eyes were straining up the street
+towards the crossing. She dared not turn back or give any explanation
+to Mrs. Cafferty, and in a few seconds she saw him, gigantic, calm,
+adequate, the monarch of his world. His back was turned to her, and
+the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> great sweep of his shoulders, his solid legs, his red neck and
+close-cropped, wiry hair were visible to her strangely. She had a
+peculiar feeling of acquaintedness and of aloofness, intimate
+knowledge and a separation of sharp finality caused her to stare at
+him with so intent a curiosity that Mrs. Cafferty noticed it.</p>
+
+<p>"That's a fine man," said she, "he won't have to go about looking for
+girls."</p>
+
+<p>As she spoke they passed by the policeman, and Mary knew that when her
+eyes left him his gaze almost automatically fell upon her. She was
+glad that he could not see her face. She was glad that Mrs. Cafferty
+was beside her: had she been alone she would have been tempted to walk
+away very quickly, almost to run, but her companion gave her courage
+and self-possession, so that she walked gallantly. But her mind wa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span>s a
+fever. She could feel his eyes raking her from head to foot, she could
+see his great hand going up to tap his crinkly moustache. These things
+she could see in her terrified mind, but she could not think, she
+could only give thanks to God because she had her best clothes on.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXIII" id="XXIII"></a>XXIII</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve was planning to get back such of her furniture and
+effects as had been pawned during her illness. Some of these things
+she had carried away from her father's house many years before when
+she got married. They had been amongst the earliest objects on which
+her eyes had rested when she was born, and around them her whole life
+of memories revolved. A chair in which her father had sat and on the
+edge whereof her husband had timidly balanced himself when he came
+court<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span>ing her, and into which her daughter had been tied when she was a
+baby. A strip of carpet and some knives and forks had formed portion
+of her wedding presents. She loved these things, and had determined
+that if work could retrieve them they should not be lost forever.
+Therefore, she had to suffer people like Mrs. O'Connor, not gladly,
+but with the resignation due to the hests of Providence which one must
+obey but may legitimately criticise. Mrs. Makebelieve said definitely
+that she detested the woman. She was a cold-eyed person whose only
+ability was to order about other people who were much better than she
+was. It distressed Mrs. Makebelieve to have to work for such a person,
+to be subject to her commands and liable to her reproofs or advice;
+these were things which seemed to her to be out of all due proportion.
+She did not wish the woman any harm, but some day or other she would
+undoubtedly have to put her in her proper place. <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span>It was a day to which
+she looked forward. Any one who had a sufficient income could have a
+house and could employ and pay for outside help without any particular
+reason for being proud, and many people, having such an income, would
+certainly have a better appointed house and would be more generous
+and civil to those who came to work for them. Everybody, of course,
+could not have a policeman for a nephew, and there were a great many
+people who would rather not have anything to do with a policeman at
+all. Overbearing rough creatures to whom everybody is a thief! If Mrs.
+Makebelieve had such a nephew she would certainly have wrecked his
+pride&mdash;the great beast! Here Mrs. Makebelieve grew very angry: her
+black eyes blazed, her great nose grew thin and white and her hands
+went leaping in fury. "You're not in Court now, you jackanapes
+you,&mdash;said I, with his whiskers and his baton, and his feet that were
+bigger than anything in the world<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> except his ignorant self-conceit.
+'Have you a daughter, mam, said he, what's her age, mam, said he, is
+she a good girl, mam, said he?'&mdash;but she had settled him,&mdash;and that
+woman was prouder of him than a king would be of his crown! never
+mind," said Mrs. Makebelieve, and she darted fiercely up and down the
+room, tearing pieces off the atmosphere and throwing them behind her.</p>
+
+<p>In a few minutes, however, she sat down on the floor and drew her
+daughter's head to her breast, and then, staring into the scrap of
+fire, she counseled Mary wisely on many affairs of life and the
+conduct of a girl under all kinds of circumstances&mdash;to be adequate in
+spirit if not in physique: that was her theme. Never be a servant in
+your heart, said she. To work is nothing; the king on his throne, the
+priest kneeling before the Holy Altar, all people in all places had to
+work, but no person at all need be a servant. One worked and was paid,
+and went<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> away keeping the integrity of one's soul unspotted and
+serene. If an employer was wise or good or kind Mrs. Makebelieve was
+prepared to accord such a person instant and humble reverence. She
+would work for such a one until the nails dropped off her fingers and
+her feet crumpled up under her body; but a policeman or a rich
+person, or a person who ordered one about...! until she died and was
+buried in the depths of the world, she would never give in to such a
+person or admit anything but their thievishness and ill-breeding. Bad
+manners to the like of them, said she, and might have sailed
+boisterously away upon an ocean of curses but that Mary turned her
+face closer to her breast and began to speak.</p>
+
+<p>For suddenly there had come to Mary a vision of peace: like a green
+island in the sea it was, like a white cloud on a broiling day; the
+sheltered life where all mundane preoccupations were far away, where
+ambition and hope and struggle were inc<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>redibly distant foolishness.
+Lowly and peaceful and unjaded was that life: she could see the nuns
+pacing quietly in their enclosed gardens, fingering their beads as
+they went to and fro and praying noiselessly for the sins of the
+world, or walking with solemn happiness to the Chapel to praise God
+in their own small companies, or going with hidden feet through the
+great City to nurse the sick and to comfort those who had no other
+comforter than God&mdash;to pray in a quiet place, and not to be afraid any
+more or doubtful or despised...! These things she saw and her heart
+leaped to them, and of these things she spoke to her mother, who
+listened with a tender smile and stroked her hair and hands. But her
+mother did not approve of these things. She spoke of nuns with
+reverence and affection. Many a gentle, sweet woman had she known of
+that sisterhood, many a one before whom she could have abased herself
+with tears and love, but such a life of shelter and restraint <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span>could
+never have been hers, nor did she believe it could be Mary's. For her
+a woman's business was life, the turmoil and strife of it was good to
+be in, it was a cleansing and a bracing. God did not need any
+assistance, but man did, bitterly he wanted it, and the giving of
+such assistance was the proper business of a woman. Everywhere there
+was a man to be helped, and the quest of a woman was to find the man
+who most needed her aid, and having found him to cleave to him
+forever. In most of the trouble of life she divined men and women not
+knowing or not doing their duty, which was to love one another and to
+be neighborly and obliging to their fellows. A partner, a home and
+children&mdash;through the loyal co-operation of these she saw happiness
+and, dimly, a design of so vast an architecture as scarcely to be
+discussed. The bad and good of humanity moved her to an equal ecstasy
+of displeasure and approbation, but her God was Freed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>om and her
+religion Love. Freedom! even the last rags of it that remain to a
+regimented world! That was a passion with her. She must order her
+personal life without any ghostly or bodily supervision. She would
+oppose an encroachment on that with her nails and her teeth; and this
+last fringe of freedom was what nuns had sacrificed and all servants
+and other people had bartered away. One must work, but one must never
+be a slave&mdash;these laws seemed to her equally imperative; the structure
+of the world swung upon them, and whoever violated these laws was a
+traitor to both God and man.</p>
+
+<p>But Mary did not say a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>nything. Her mother's arms were around her, and
+suddenly she commenced to cry upon a bosom that was not strange. There
+was surely healing in that breast of love, a rampart of tenderness
+against the world, a door which would never be closed against her or
+opened to her enemies.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXIV" id="XXIV"></a>XXIV</h2>
+
+
+<p>In a little city like Dublin one meets every person whom one knows
+within a few days. Around each bend in the road there is a friend, an
+enemy, or a bore striding towards you, so that, with a piety which is
+almost religious, one says "touch wood" before turning any corner. It
+was not long, therefore, until Mary again met the big policeman. He
+came up behind her and walked by her side, chatting with a pleasant
+ease, in which, however, her curious mind could discover some obscure
+distinctions. On looking backwards it seemed to Mary t<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span>hat he had
+always come from behind her, and the retrospect dulled his glory to
+the diminishing point. For indeed his approach was too consistently
+policemanlike, it was too crafty; his advent hinted at a gross
+espionage, at a mind which was no longer a man's but a detective's
+who tracked everybody by instinct, and arrested his friends instead of
+saluting them.</p>
+
+<p>As they walked along Mary was in a fever of discomfort. She wished
+dumbly that the man would go away, but for the wealth of the world she
+could not have brought herself to hurt the feelings of so big a man.
+To endanger the very natural dignity of a big man was a thing which no
+woman could do without a pang; the shame of it made her feel hot: he
+might have blushed or stammered, and the memory of that would sting her
+miserably for weeks as though she had insulted an elephant or a baby.</p>
+
+<p>She could not get away from him. She had <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span>neither the courage nor the
+experience which enables a woman to dismiss a man without wounding
+him, and so, perforce, she continued walking by his side while he
+treated her to an intelligent dissertation on current political events
+and the topography of the city of Dublin.</p>
+
+<p>But, undoubtedly, there was a change in the policeman, and it was not
+difficult to account for. He was more easy and familiar in his speech:
+while formerly he had bowed as from the peaks of manly intellect to
+the pleasant valleys of girlish incompetence he now condescended from
+the loftiness of a policeman and a person of quality to the quaint
+gutters of social inferiority. To many people mental inferiority in a
+companion has a charm, for it induces in one's proper person a feeling
+of philosophic detachment, a fine effect of personal individuality and
+superiority which is both bracing and uplifting&mdash;there is not any
+particular harm in this: progress can be, and is, accelerated by the
+hyp<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span>ocrisies and snobbishness, all the minor, unpleasant adjuncts of
+mediocrity. Snobbishness is a puling infant, but it may grow to a
+deeply whiskered ambition, and most virtues are, on examination, the
+amalgam of many vices. But while intellectual poverty may be forgiven
+and loved, social inequality can only be utilized. Our fellows,
+however addled, are our friends, our inferiors are our prey, and since
+the policeman had discovered Mary publicly washing out an alien hall
+his respect for her had withered and dropped to death almost in an
+instant; whence it appears that there is really only one grave and
+debasing vice in the world, and that is poverty.</p>
+
+<p>In many little ways the distinction and the difference was apparent to
+Mary. The dignity of a gentleman and a man of the world was partly
+shorn away: the gentleman portion, which comprised kindness and
+reticence, had vanished, the man of the world remained, typified by a
+familiarity<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> which assumed that this and that, understood but not to be
+mentioned, shall be taken for granted: a spurious equalization perched
+jauntily but insecurely on a non-committal, and that base flattery
+which is the only coin wherewith a thief can balance his depredations.
+For as they went pacing down a lonely road towards the Dodder the
+policeman diversified his entertaining lore by a succession of
+compliments which ravaged the heavens and the earth and the deep sea
+for a fitting symbology. Mary's eyes and the gay heavens were placed
+in juxtaposition and the heavens were censured, the vegetable, animal
+and mineral worlds were discomfited, the deep sea sustained a reproof
+and the by-products of nature and of art drooped into a nothingness
+too vast even for laughter. Mary had not the slightest objection to
+hearing that all the other women in the world seemed cripples and
+gargoyles when viewed against her own transcendent splendor, and she
+was prepared<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> to love the person who said this innocently and happily.
+She would have agreed to be an angel or a queen to a man demanding
+potentates and powers in his sweetheart, and would joyfully have
+equalized matters by discovering the buried god in her lover and
+believing in it as sincerely as he permitted.&mdash;But this man was not
+saying the truth. She could see him making the things up as he talked.
+There was eagerness in him, but no spontaneity. It was not even
+eagerness, it was greediness: he wanted to eat her up and go away with
+her bones sticking out of his mouth as the horns of a deer protrude
+from the jaws of an anaconda, veritable evidence to it and his fellows
+of a victory and an orgy to command respect and envy. But he was
+familiar, he was complacent and&mdash;amazedly she discovered it&mdash;he was
+big. Her vocabulary could not furnish her with the qualifying word,
+or, rather, epithet for his bigness. Horrible was suggested <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span>and
+retained, but her instinct clamored that there was a fat, oozy word
+somewhere which would have brought comfort to her brains and her hands
+and feet. He did not keep his arms quiet, but tapped his remarks into
+her blouse and her shoulder. Each time his hands touched her they
+remained a trifle longer. They seemed to be great red spiders, they
+would grip her all round and squeeze her clammily while his face
+spiked her to death with its moustache.... And he smiled also, he
+giggled and cut capers; his language now was a perpetual witticism at
+which he laughed in jerks, and at which she laughed tightly like an
+obedient, quick echo: and then, suddenly, without a word, in a dazing
+flash, his arms were about her. There was nobody in sight at al<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span>l, and
+he was holding her like a great spider, and his bristly moustache
+darted forward to spike her to death, and then, somehow, she was free,
+away from him, scudding down the road lightly and fearfully and very
+swiftly. "Wait, wait," he called, "wait," but she did not wait.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXV" id="XXV"></a>XXV</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty came in that evening for a chat with Mrs. Makebelieve.
+There were traces of worry on the lady's face, and she hushed the
+children who trooped in her wake with less of good humor than they
+were accustomed to. Instead of threatening to smack them on the head
+as was usual she did smack them, and she walked surrounded by
+lamentations as by a sea.</p>
+
+<p>Things were not going at all well with her. There was a slackness in
+her husband's t<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span>rade so that for days together he was idle, and
+although the big woman amended her expenditure in every direction she
+could not by any means adjust eight robust appetites to a shrunken
+income. She explained her position to Mrs. Makebelieve:&mdash;Children
+would not, they could not, consent to go on shorter rations than they
+had been accustomed to, and it seemed to her that daily, almost
+hourly, their appetites grew larger and more terrible. She showed her
+right hand whereon the mere usage of a bread-knife had scored a ridge
+which was now a permanent disfigurement.</p>
+
+<p>"God bless me," she shouted angrily, "what right have I to ask the
+creatures to go hungry? Am I to beat them when they cry? It's not
+their fault that they want food, and it's not my poor man's fault that
+they haven't any. He's ready to work at his trade if anybody wants him
+to do so, and if he can't get work and if the children are hungry
+whose fault is it?"</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span></p>
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty held that there was something wrong somewhere, but
+whether the blame was to be allocated to the weather, the employer,
+the government or the Deity, she did not know, nor did Mrs.
+Makebelieve know; but they were agreed that there was an error
+somewhere, a lack of adjustment with which they had nothing to do, but
+the effects whereof were grievously visible in their privations.
+Meantime it had become necessary that Mrs. Cafferty should adjust
+herself to a changing environment. A rise or fall in wages is
+automatically followed by a similar enlargement or shrinkage of one's
+necessities, and the consequent difference is registered at all points
+of one's life-contact. The physical and mental activities of a
+well-to-do person can reach out to a horizon, while those of very poor
+people are limited to their immediate, stagnant atmosphere, and so the
+lives of a vast portion of society are liable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> to a ceaseless change, a
+flux swinging from good to bad forever, an expansion and constriction
+against which they have no safeguards and not even any warning. In
+free nature this problem is paralleled by the shrinking and expansion
+of the seasons; the summer with its wealth of food, the winter
+following after with its famine, but many wild creatures are able to
+make a thrifty provision against the bad time which they know comes as
+certainly and periodically as the good time. Bees and squirrels and
+many others fill their barns with the plentiful overplus of the summer
+fields, birds can migrate and find sunshine and sustenance elsewhere,
+and others again can store during their good season a life energy by
+means whereof they may sleep healthily through their hard times. These
+organizations can be adjusted to their environments because the
+changes of the latter are known and can be more or less accurately
+predicted from any point. But the human worker has no suc<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span>h regularity.
+His food period does not ebb and recur with the seasons. There is no
+periodicity in their changes and, therefore, no possibility for
+defensive or protective action. His physical structure uses and
+excretes energy so rapidly that he cannot store it up and go to sleep
+on his savings, and his harvests are usually so lean and disconnected
+that the exercise of thrift is equally an impossibility and a mockery.
+The life, therefore, of such a person is composed of a constant series
+of adjustments and readjustments, and the stern ability wherewith
+these changes are met and combated are more admirably ingenious than
+the much-praised virtues of ants and bees to which they are constantly
+directed as to exemplars.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty had now less money than she had been used to, but she
+had still the same rent to pay, the same number of children to feed,
+and the same personal dignity to support as in her better da<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span>ys, and
+her problem was to make up, by some means to which she was a stranger,
+the money which had drifted beyond the reach of her husband. The
+methods by which she could do this were very much restricted. Children
+require an attention which occupies the entire of a mother's time,
+and, consequently, she was prevented from seeking abroad any
+mitigation of her hardships. The occupations which might be engaged in
+at home were closed to her by mere overwhelming competition. The
+number of women who are prepared to make ten million shirts for a
+penny are already far in excess of the demand, and so, except by a
+severe under-cutting such as a contract to make twenty million shirts
+for a halfpenny, work of this description is very difficult to obtain.</p>
+
+<p>Under these circumstances nothing remained for Mrs. Cafferty but to
+take in a lodger. This is a form of co-operation much practiced among
+the poorer people. The margin of direct profit accruing from suc<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span>h a
+venture is very small, but this is compensated for by the extra
+spending power achieved. A number of people pooling their money in
+this way can buy to greater advantage and in a cheaper market than is
+<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>possible to the solitary purchaser, and a moderate toll for wear and
+tear and usage, or, as it is usually put, for rent and attendance,
+gives the small personal profit at which such services are reckoned.</p>
+
+<p>Through the good offices of a neighboring shopkeeper Mrs. Cafferty
+had secured a lodger, and, with the courage which is never separate
+from despair, she had rented a small room beside her own. This room,
+by an amazing economy of construction, contained a fireplace and a
+window: it was about one square inch in diameter, and was undoubtedly
+a fine room. The lodger was to enter into possession on the following
+day, and Mrs. Cafferty said he was a very nice young man indeed and
+did not drink.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXVI" id="XXVI"></a>XXVI</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty's lodger duly arrived. He was young and as thin as a
+lath, and he moved with fury. He was seldom in the place at all: he
+fled into the house for his food, and, having eaten it, he fled away
+from the house again, and did not reappear until it was time to go to
+bed. What he did with himself in the interval Mrs. Cafferty did not
+know, but she was prepared to wager her soul, the value of which she
+believed was high, on the fact that he was a good young man who never
+gave the sl<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span>ightest trouble, saving that his bedclothes were always
+lying on the floor in the morning, that there was candle grease on one
+corner of his pillow, and that he cleaned his boots on a chair. But
+these were things which one expected a young man to do, and the
+omission of them might have caused one to look curiously at the
+creature and to doubt his masculinity.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve replied that habits of order and neatness were rarely
+to be found in young people of either sex; more especially were these
+absent in boys who are released in early youth by their mothers from
+all purely domestic employments. A great many people believed, and she
+believed herself, that it was not desirable a man or boy should
+conform too rigidly to household rules. She had observed that the
+comfort of a home was lost to many men if they were expected to take
+their boots off when they came into the house or to hang their hats up
+in a special pla<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span>ce. The women of a household, being so constantly
+indoors, find it easy and businesslike to obey the small rules which
+comprise household legislation, but as the entire policy of a house
+was to make it habitable and comfortable for its men folk all domestic
+ordinances might be strained to the uttermost until the compromise
+was found to mollify even exceptional idiosyncrasies. A man, she held,
+bowed to quite sufficient discipline during his working hours, and his
+home should be a place free from every vexatious restraint and wherein
+he might enjoy as wide a liberty as was good for him.</p>
+
+<p>These ideas were applauded by Mrs. Cafferty, and she supplemented them
+by a recital of how she managed her own husband, and of the ridiculous
+ease whereby any man may be governed; for she had observed that men
+were very susceptible to control if only the control was not too
+apparent. If a man did a thing twice the doing of that thing became a
+habit a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span>nd a passion, any interference with which provoked him to an
+unreasoning bull-like wrath wherein both wives and crockery were
+equally shattered; and, therefore, a woman had only to observe the
+personal habits of her beloved and fashion her restrictions according
+to that standard. This meant that men made the laws and women
+administered them&mdash;a wise allocation of prerogatives, for she
+conceived that the executive female function was every whit as
+important as the creative faculty which brought these laws into being.
+She was quite prepared to leave the creative powers in male hands if
+they would equally abstain from interference with the subsequent
+working details, for she was of opinion that in the pursuit of comfort
+(not entirely to their credit was it said) men were far more anxiously
+concerned than were women, and they flew to their bourne with an
+instinct for short cuts wherewith women were totally unacquainted.</p>
+
+<p>But in <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span>the young man who had come to lodge with her Mrs. Cafferty
+discerned a being in whom virtue had concentrated to a degree that
+almost amounted to a congestion. He had instantly played with the
+children on their being presented to him: this was the sign of a good
+nature. Before he was acquainted with her ten minutes he had made
+four jokes: this was the sign of a pleasant nature; and he sang loudly
+and unceasingly when he awoke in the morning, which was the unfailing
+index to a happy nature. Moreover, he ate the meals provided for him
+without any of that particular, tedious examination which is so
+insulting, and had complimented Mrs. Cafferty on an ability to put a
+taste on food which she was pleased to obtain recognition of.</p>
+
+<p>Both Mary and her mother remarked on these details with an admiration
+which was as much as either politeness or friendship could expect.
+Mrs. Makebelieve's solitary method of life had removed her so
+dista<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span>ntly from youth that information about a young man was almost
+tonic to her. She had never wished for a second husband, but had often
+fancied that a son would have been a wonderful joy to her. She
+considered that a house which had no young man growing up in it was
+not a house at all, and she believed that a boy would love his
+mother, if not more than a daughter could, at least with a difference
+which would be strangely sweet&mdash;a rash, impulsive, unquiet love: a
+love which would continually prove her love to the breaking point; a
+love that demanded, and demanded with careless assurance, that
+accepted her goodness as unquestioningly as she accepted the fertility
+of the earth, and used her knowing blindly and flatteringly how
+inexhaustively rich her depths were.... She could have wept for this:
+it was priceless beyond kingdoms: the smile on a boy's face lifted her
+to an exaltation. Her girl was inexpressibly sweet, surely an island
+in her wide heart, but a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> little boy ... her breasts could have filled
+with milk for him, him she could have nourished in the rocks and in
+desert places: he would have been life to her and adventure, a barrier
+against old age, an incantation against sorrow, a fragrance and a
+grief and a defiance....</p>
+
+<p>It was quite plain that Mrs. Cafferty was satisfied with this addition
+to her household, but the profit which she had expected to accrue from
+his presence was not the liberal one she had in mind when making the
+preliminary arrangements. For it appeared that the young man had an
+appetite of which Mrs. Cafferty spoke with the respect proper to
+something colossal and awesome. A half-loaf did not more than break
+the back of a hunger which could wriggle disastrously over another
+half-loaf: so that, instead of being relieved by his advent, she was
+confronted by a more immediate and desolating bankruptcy than that
+from which she had attempted to escape. Exactly how to deal with this
+sit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span>uation she did not know, and it was really in order to discuss her
+peculiar case that she had visited Mrs. Makebelieve. She could, of
+course, have approached the young man and demanded from him an
+increase of money that would still be equitable to both parties, but
+she confessed a repugnance to this course. She did not like to
+upbraid or trouble any one on account of an appetite which was so
+noteworthy. She disliked, in any event, to raise a question about
+food: her instinct for hospitality was outraged at the thought, and as
+she was herself the victim, or the owner, of an appetite which had
+often placed a strain on her revenues, a fellow-feeling operated still
+further in mitigation of his disqualification.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve's advice was that she should stifle the first fierce
+and indiscriminate cravings of the young man's hunger by a liberal
+allowance of stirabout, which was a cheap, wholesome and very
+sati<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span>sfying food, and in that way his destruction of more costly
+victuals would be kept within reasonable limits. Appetite, she held,
+was largely a matter of youth, and as a boy who was scarcely done
+growing had no way of modifying his passion for nourishment, it would
+be a lapse from decency to insult him on so legitimate a failing.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Cafferty thought that this might be done, and thanked her friend
+for the counsel; but Mary, listening to these political matters,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span>
+conceived Mrs. Cafferty as a person who had no longer any claim to
+honor, and she pitied the young man whose appetite was thus publicly
+canvassed, and who might at any moment be turned out of house and home
+on account of a hunger against which he had no safeguard and no remedy.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXVII" id="XXVII"></a>XXVII</h2>
+
+
+<p>It was not long until Mary and Mrs. Cafferty's lodger met. As he came
+in by the hall door one day Mary was carrying upstairs a large water
+bucket, the portage of which two or three times a day is so heavy a
+strain on the dweller in tenements. The youth instantly seized the
+bucket and, despite her protestations and appeals, he carried it
+upstairs. He walked a few steps in advance of Mary, whistling
+cheerfully as he went, so she was able to get a good view of him. He
+was so thin that he nearly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> made her laugh, but he carried the bucket,
+the weight of which she had often bowed under, with an ease
+astonishing in so slight a man, and there was a spring in his walk
+which was pleasant to see. He laid the bucket down outside her room,
+and requested her urgently to knock at his door whenever she required
+more water fetched, because he would be only too delighted to do it
+for her, and it was not the slightest trouble in the world. While he
+spoke he was stealing glances at her face and Mary was stealing
+glances at his face, and when they caught one another doing this at
+the same moment they both looked hurriedly away, and the young man
+departed to his own place.</p>
+
+<p>But Mary was very angry with this young man. She had gone downstairs
+in her house attire, which was not resplendent, and she objected to
+being discovered by any youth in raiment not suitable to such an
+occasion. She could not visualize herself speaking to a man unless she
+was <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span>adorned as for a festivity. The gentlemen and ladies of whom her
+mother sometimes spoke, and of whom she had often dreamt, were never
+mean in their habiliments. The gentlemen frequently had green silken
+jackets with a foam of lace at the wrists and a cascade of the same
+rich material brawling upon their breasts, and the ladies were
+attired in a magnificent scarcity of clothing, the fundamental
+principle whereof, although she was quite assured of its
+righteousness, she did not yet understand.</p>
+
+<p>Indeed, at this period Mary's interest in dress far transcended any
+interest she had ever known before. She knew intimately the window
+contents of every costumier's shop in Grafton and Wicklow and Dawson
+streets, and could follow with intelligent amazement the apparently
+trifling, but exceedingly important, differences of line or seam or
+flounce which ranked one garment as a creation and its neighbor as a
+dress. She and her mother often dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span>cussed the gowns wherein the
+native dignity of their souls might be adequately caparisoned. Mrs.
+Makebelieve, with a humility which had still a trace of anger,
+admitted that the period when she could have been expressed in color
+had expired, and she decided that a black silk dress, with a heavy
+gold chain falling along the bosom, was as much as her soul was now
+entitled to. She had an impatience, amounting to contempt, for those
+florid flamboyant souls whose outer physical integument so grievously
+misrepresented them. She thought that after a certain time one should
+dress the body and not the soul, and, discovering an inseparability
+between the two, she held that the mean shrine must hold a very
+trifling deity and that an ill-made or time-worn body should never
+dress gloriously under pain of an accusation of hypocrisy or
+foolishness.</p>
+
+<p>But for Mary she planned garments with a freedom and bravery which
+astonis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span>hed while it delighted her daughter. She combined twenty styles
+into one style of terrifying originality. She conceived dresses of a
+complexity beyond the labor of any but a divinely inspired needle, and
+others again whose simplicity was almost too tenuous for human speech.
+She discussed robes whose trailing and voluminous richness could with
+difficulty be supported by ten strong attendants, and she had heard of
+a dress the fabric whereof was of such gossamer and ethereal
+insubstancy that it might be packed into a walnut more conveniently
+than an ordinary dress could be impressed into a portmanteau. Mary's
+exclamations of delight and longing ranged from every possible dress
+to every impossible one, and then Mrs. Makebelieve reviewed all the
+dresses she had worn from the age of three years to the present day,
+including wedding and mourning dresses, those which were worn at
+picnics and dances and for traveling, with an occasional divergence
+which comprehended the cl<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span>othing of her friends and her enemies during
+the like period. She explained the basic principles of dress to her
+daughter, showing that in this art, as in all else, order cannot be
+dispensed with. There were things a tall person might wear, but which
+a short person might not, and the draperies which adorned a portly
+lady were but pitiable weeds when trailed by her attenuated sister.
+The effect of long thin lines in a fabric will make a short woman
+appear tall, while round, thick lines can reduce the altitude of
+people whose height is a trouble to be combated. She illustrated the
+usage of large and small checks and plaids and all the mazy
+interweaving of other cloths, and she elucidated the mystery of color,
+tone, half-tone, light and shade so interestingly that Mary could
+scarcely hear enough of her lore. She was acquainted with the colors
+which a dark person may wear and those which are suitable to a fair
+person, and the shades proper to be used b<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span>y the wide class ranging
+between these extremes she knew also, with a special provision for
+red-haired and sandy folk and those who have no complexion at all.
+Certain laws which she formulated were cherished by her daughter as
+oracular utterances&mdash;that one should match one's eyes in the house
+and one's hair in the street, was one; that one's hat and gloves and
+shoes were of vastly more importance than all the rest of one's
+clothing, was another; that one's hair and stockings sho<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span>uld tone as
+nearly as possible, was a third. Following these rules, she assured
+her daughter, a woman could never be other than well dressed, and all
+of these things Mary learned by heart and asked her mother to tell her
+more, which her mother was quite able and willing to do.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXVIII" id="XXVIII"></a>XXVIII</h2>
+
+
+<p>When the sexual instinct is aroused men and dogs and frogs and
+beetles, and such other creatures as are inside or outside of this
+catalogue, are very tenacious in the pursuit of their ambition. We can
+seldom get away from that which attracts or repels us. Love and hate
+are equally magnetic and compelling, and each, being supernormal,
+drags us willingly or woefully in their wake, until at last our blind
+persistency is either routed or appeased and we advance our lauds or
+gnash our teeth a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span>s the occasion bids us. There is no tragedy more
+woeful than the victory of hate, nor any attainment so hopelessly
+barren as the sterility of that achievement; for hate is finality, and
+finality is the greatest evil which can happen in a world of movement.
+Love is an inaugurator displaying his banners on captured peaks and
+pressing forever to a new and more gracious enterprise, but the
+victories of hate are gained in a ditch from which there is no horizon
+visible and whence there does not go even one limping courier.</p>
+
+<p>After Mary fled from the embrace of the great policeman he came to
+think more closely of her than he had been used; but her image was
+throned now in anger: she came to him like a dull brightness wherefrom
+desolate thunder might roll at an instant. Indeed, she began to obsess
+him so that not even the ministrations of his aunt nor the obeisances
+of that pleasant girl, the name of whose boots was Fairybell, could
+give him any comfort or wean him from a c<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>ontemplation which sprawled
+gloomily between him and his duties to the traffic. If he had not
+discovered the lowliness of her quality his course might have been
+simple and straightforward: the issue, in such an event, would have
+narrowed to every man's poser&mdash;whether he should marry this girl or
+that girl? but the arithmetic whereby such matters are elucidated
+would at the last have eased his perplexity, and the path indicated
+could have been followed with the fullest freedom on his part and
+without any disaster to his self-love. If, whichever way his
+inclination wavered, there was any pang of regret (and there was bound
+to be) such a feeling would be ultimately waived by his reason or
+retained as a memorial which had a gratifying savor. But the knowledge
+of Mary's social inferiority complicated matters, for, although this
+automatically put her out of the question as his wife, her subsequent
+ill-treatment of himself had injected a virus to his blood which was
+one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>-half a passion for her body and one-half a frenzy for vengeance.
+He could have let her go easily enough if she had not first let him
+go; for he read dismissal in her action and resented it as a trespass
+on his own just prerogative.&mdash;He had but to stretch out his hand and
+she would have dropped to it as tamely as a kitten, whereas now she
+eluded his hand, would, indeed, have nothing to do with it; and this
+could not be forgiven. He would gladly have beaten her into
+submission, for what right has a slip of a girl to withstand the
+advances of a man and a policeman? That is a crooked spirit demanding
+to be straightened with a truncheon: but as we cannot decently, or
+even peaceably, beat a girl until she is married to us he had to
+relinquish that dear idea. He would have dismissed her from his mind
+with the contempt she deserved, but, alas! he could not: she clung
+there like a burr not to be dislodged saving by possession or a
+beating&mdash;two sh<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span>uddering alternatives&mdash;for she had become detestably
+dear to him. His senses and his self-esteem conspired to heave her to
+a pedestal where his eye strained upwards in bewilderment&mdash;that she
+who was below him could be above him! This was astounding: she must be
+pulled from her eminence and stamped back to her native depths by his
+own indignant hoofs; thence she might be gloriously lifted again with
+a calm, benignant, masculine hand shedding pardons and favors, and
+perhaps a mollifying unguent for her bruises. Bruises! a knee, an
+elbow&mdash;they were nothing; little damages which to kiss was to make
+well again. Will not women cherish a bruise that it may be medicined
+by male kisses? Nature and precedent have both sworn to it.... But she
+was out of reach; his hand, high-flung as it might be, could not get
+to her. He went furiously to the Ph&oelig;nix Park, to St. Stephen's
+Green, to outlying leafy spots and sheltered lanes, but she w<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span>as in
+none of these places. He even prowled about the neighborhood of her
+home and could not meet her. Once he had seen Mary as she came along
+the road, and he drew back into a doorway. A young man was marching by
+her side, a young man who gabbled without ceasing and to whom Mary
+chattered again with an equal volubility. As they passed by Mary
+caught sight of him, and her face went flaming. She caught her
+companion's arm, and they hurried down the road at a great pace....
+She had never chattered to him. Always he had done the talking, and
+she had been an obedient grateful listener. Nor did he quarrel with
+her silence, but her reserve shocked him&mdash;it was a pretense, worse, a
+lie, a masked and hooded falsehood. She had surrendered to him
+willingly, and yet drew about her a protective armor of reserve
+wherein she skulked immune to the arms which were lawfully victorious.
+Is there, then, no loot for a conqueror? We demand the keys of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span>
+City Walls and unrestricted entry, or our torches shall blaze again.
+This chattering Mary was a girl whom he had never caught sight of at
+all. She had been hiding from him even in his presence. In every
+aspect she was an anger. But she could talk to the fellow with her
+... a skinny whipper-snapper, whom the breath of a man could shred
+into remote, eyeless vacuity. Was this man another insult? Did she not
+even wait to bury her dead? Pah! she was not value for his thought. A
+girl so lightly facile might be blown from here to there and she would
+scarcely notice the difference. Here and there were the same places to
+her, and him and him were the same person. A girl of that type comes
+to a bad end: he had seen it often, the type and the end, and never
+separate. Can one not prophesy from facts? He saw a slut in a slum, a
+drab hovering by a dark entry, and the vision cheered him mightily for
+one glowing minute and left him unoccupied for the next, into which
+she thronged with the flutter of wings and the sound of a great
+mocking.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>His aunt tracked his brows back to the responsible duties of his
+employment and commiserated with him, and made a lamentation about
+matters with which he never had been occupied, so that the last tag
+of his good manners departed from him, and he damned her unswervingly
+into consternation. That other pleasant girl, whose sweetness he had
+not so much tasted as sampled, had taken to brooding in his presence:
+she sometimes drooped an eye upon him like a question.... Let her look
+out or maybe he'd blaze into her teeth: howl menace down her throat
+until she swooned. Some one should yield to him a visible and tangible
+agony to balance his. Does law probe no deeper than the pillage of a
+watch? Can one filch our self-respect and escape free? Shall not our
+souls also sue for damages against its aggressor? Some person rich
+enough must pay for his la<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span>cerations or there was less justice in
+heaven than in the Police Courts; and it might be that girl's lot to
+expiate the sins of Mary. It would be a pleasure, if a sour one, to
+make somebody wriggle as he had, and somebody should wriggle; of that
+he was blackly determined.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXIX" id="XXIX"></a>XXIX</h2>
+
+
+<p>Indeed, Mrs. Cafferty's lodger and Mary had become quite intimate, and
+it was not through the machinations of either that this had happened.
+Ever since Mrs. Makebelieve had heard of that young man's appetite and
+the miseries through which he had to follow it she had been deeply
+concerned on his behalf. She declined to believe that the boy ever got
+sufficient to eat, and she enlarged to her daughter on the seriousness
+of this privation to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span>a young man. Disabilities, such as a young girl
+could not comprehend, followed in the train of insufficient
+nourishment. Mrs. Cafferty was her friend, and was, moreover, a good
+decent woman against whom the tongue of rumor might wag in vain; but
+Mrs. Cafferty was the mother of six children and her natural
+kindliness dared not expand to their detriment. Furthermore, the fact
+of her husband being out of work tended to still further circumscribe
+the limits of her generosity. She divined a lean pot in the Cafferty
+household, and she saw the young man getting only as much food as Mrs.
+Cafferty dared to give him, so that the pangs of his hunger almost
+gnawed at her own vitals. Under these circumstances she had sought for
+an opportunity to become better acquainted with him, and had very
+easily succeeded; so when Mary found him seated on their bed and
+eating violently of their half-loaf if she was astonished at first she
+was also very glad. Her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> mother watched the demolition of their food
+with a calm happiness, for, although the amount she could contribute
+was small, every little helped, and not alone were his wants assisted,
+but her friend, Mrs. Cafferty, and her children were also aided by
+this dulling of an appetite which might have endangered their
+household peace.</p>
+
+<p>The young man repaid their hospitality by an easy generosity of speech
+covering affairs which neither Mrs. Makebelieve nor her daughter had
+many opportunities for studying. He spoke of those very interesting
+matters with which a young man is concerned, and his speculations on
+various subjects, while often quite ignorant, were sufficiently vivid
+to be interesting and were wrong in a boyish fashion which was not
+unpleasant. He was very argumentative, but was still open to reason;
+therefore, Mrs. Makebelieve had opportunities for discussion which
+were seldom granted to her. Insensibly she adopted the position of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span>
+guide, philosopher and friend to him, and Mary also found new
+interests in speech, for, although the young man thought very
+differently from her, he did think upon her own plane, and the things
+which secretly engrossed him were also the things wherewith she was
+deeply preoccupied. A community of ignorances may be as binding as a
+community of interests. We have a dull suspicion of that him or her
+who knows more than we do, but the person who is prepared to go out
+adventuring with us with surmise only for a chart and enjoyment for a
+guide may use our hand as his own and our pockets as his treasury.</p>
+
+<p>As the young man had no more shyness than a cat it soon fell out that
+he and Mary took their evening walks together. He was a clerk in a
+large retail establishment, and had many things to tell Mary which
+were of great interest to both of them. For in his place of business
+he had both friends and enemies of whom he was able to spe<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>ak with the
+fluency which was their due. Mary knew, for instance, that the chief
+was bald but decent (she could not believe that the connection was
+natural), and that the second in command had neither virtues nor
+whiskers. (She saw him as a codfish with a malignant eye.) He
+epitomized the vices which belonged in detail to the world, but were
+peculiar to himself in bulk. (He must be hairy in that event.)
+Language, even the young man's, could not describe him adequately. (He
+ate boys for breakfast and girls for tea.) With this person the young
+man was in eternal conflict (a bear with little ears and big teeth);
+not open conflict, for that would have meant instant dismissal (not
+hairy at all&mdash;a long slimy eel with a lot of sense), but a veiled
+unremitting warfare which occupied all their spare attention. The
+young man knew for an actual fact that some day he would be compelled
+to hit that chap, and it would be a sorry day for the fellow, because
+his ability to <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span>hit was startling. He told Mary of the evil results
+which had followed some of his blows, and Mary's incredulity was only
+heightened by a display of the young man's muscles. She extolled these
+because she thought it was her duty to do so, but preserved some
+doubts of their unique destructiveness. Once she asked him could he
+fight a policeman, and he assured her that policemen are not able to
+fight at all singly, but only in squads, when their warfare is callous
+and ugly and conducted mainly with their boots; so that decent people
+have no respect for their fighting qualities or their private
+characters. He assured her that not only could he fight a policeman,
+but he could also tyrannize over the seed, breed and generation of
+such a one, and, moreover, he could accomplish this without real
+exertion. Against all policemen and soldiers the young man professed
+an eager hostility, and with these bad people he included landlords
+and many employers of labor. His <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span>denunciation of these folk might be
+traced back to the belief that none of them treated one fairly. A
+policeman, he averred, would arrest a man for next door to nothing,
+and any resistance offered to their spleen rendered the unfortunate
+prisoner liable to be man-handled in his cell until their outraged
+dignity was appeased. The three capital crimes upon which a man is
+liable to arrest is for being drunk, or disorderly, or for refusing to
+fight, and to these perils a young man is peculiarly susceptible and
+is, to that extent, interested in the Force, and critical of their
+behavior. The sight of a soldier annoyed him, for he saw a conqueror,
+trampling vaingloriously through the capital of his country, and the
+inability of his land to eject the braggart astonished and mortified
+him. Landlords had no bowels of compassion. There was no kindliness of
+heart among them, nor any wish to assist those whose whole existence
+was engaged on their behalf. He saw<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> them as lazy unproductive gluttons
+who cried forever "Give, give," and who gave nothing in return but an
+increased insolent tyranny. Many employers came into the same black
+category. They were people who had disowned all duty to humanity, and
+who saw in themselves the beginning and the end of all things. They
+gratified their acquisitiveness not in order that they might become
+benefactors of their kind (the only righteous freedom of which we
+know) but merely to indulge a petty exercise of power and to attain
+that approval which is granted to wealth and the giving of which is
+the great foolishness of mankind. These people used their helpers and
+threw them away, they exploited and bought and sold their fellow-men
+while their arrogant self-assurance and the monstrous power which they
+had gathered for their security shocked him like a thing unbelievable
+in spite of its reality. That such things could be fretted him into
+clamor. He wanted to point them out to all p<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span>eople. He saw his
+neighbors' ears clogged, and he was prepared to die howling if only he
+could pierce those encrusted auditories. That what was so simple to
+him should not be understood by everybody! He could see plainly and
+others could not, although their eyes looked straightly forward and
+veritably rolled with intent and consciousness! Did their eyes and
+ears and brains act differently to his, or was he a singular monster
+cursed from his birth with madness? At times he was prepared to let
+humanity and Ireland go to the devil their own way, he being well
+assured that without him they were bound quickly for deep perdition.
+Of Ireland he sometimes spoke with a fervor of passion which would be
+outrageous if addressed to a woman. Surely he saw her as a woman,
+queenly and distressed and very proud. He was physically anguished for
+her, and the man who loved her was the very brother of his bones.
+There were some words the e<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span>ffect of which were almost hypnotic on
+him&mdash;The Isle of the Blest, The Little Dark Rose, The Poor Old Woman
+and Caitlin the Daughter of Holohan. The mere repetition of these
+phrases lifted him to an ecstasy; they had hidden, magical meanings
+which pricked deeply to his heartstrings and thrilled him to a
+tempest of pity and love. He yearned to do deeds of valor, violent,
+grandiose feats which would redound to her credit and make the name of
+Irishmen synonymous with either greatness or singularity: for, as yet,
+the distinction between these words was no more clear to him than it
+is to any other young man who reads violence as heroism and
+eccentricity as genius. Of England he spoke with something like
+stupefaction&mdash;as a child cowering in a dark wood tells of the ogre who
+has slain his father and carried his mother away to a drear captivity
+in his castle built of bones&mdash;so he spoke of England. He saw an
+English-man stalking hideous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span>ly forward with a princess tucked under
+each arm, while their brothers and their knights were netted in
+enchantment and slept heedless of the wrongs done to their ladies and
+of the defacement of their shields.... "Alas, alas and alas, for the
+once-proud people of Banba!"</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXX" id="XXX"></a>XXX</h2>
+
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve was astonished when the policeman knocked at her
+door. A knock at her door was a rare sound, for many years had gone by
+since any one had come to visit her. Of late Mrs. Cafferty often came
+to talk to her, but she never knocked: she usually shouted, "Can I
+come in?" and then she came in. But this was a ceremonious knock which
+startled her, and the spectacle of the great man bending through the
+doorway almost stopped her <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span>breath. Mary also was so shocked into
+terror that she stood still, forgetful of all good manners, and stared
+at the visitor open-eyed. She knew and did not know what he had come
+for; but that, in some way, his appearance related to her she was
+instantly assured, although she could not even dimly guess at a
+closer explanation of his visit. His eyes stayed on her for an instant
+and then passed to her mother, and, following her rather tremulous
+invitation, he came into the room. There was no chair to sit on, so
+Mrs. Makebelieve requested him to sit down on the bed, which he did.
+She fancied he had come on some errand from Mrs. O'Connor, and was
+inclined to be angry at a visit which she construed as an intrusion,
+so, when he was seated, she waited to hear what he might have to say.</p>
+
+<p>Even to her it was evident that the big man was perplexed and abashed;
+his hat was in his way and so were his hands, and when he spoke his
+voice was so husky as to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> be distressful. On Mary, who had withdrawn to
+the very end of the room, this discomfort of speech had a peculiar
+effect: the unsteady voice touched her breast to a kindred fluttering,
+and her throat grew parched and so irritated that a violent fit of
+coughing could not be restrained, and this, with the nervousness and
+alarm which his appearance had thronged upon her, drove her to a very
+fever of distress. But she could not take her eyes away from him, and
+she wondered and was afraid of what he might say. She knew there were
+a great many things he might discuss which she would be loath to hear
+in her mother's presence, and which her mother would not be gratified
+to hear either.</p>
+
+<p>He spoke for a few moments about the weather, and Mrs. Makebelieve
+hearkened to his remarks with a perplexity which she made no effort to
+conceal. She was quite certain he had not called to speak about the
+weather, and she was prepar<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span>ed to tell him so if a suitable opportunity
+should occur. She was also satisfied that he had not come on a formal,
+friendly visit&mdash;the memory of her last interview with him forbade such
+a conjecture, for on that occasion politeness had been deposed from
+her throne and acrimony had reigned in her stead. If his aunt had
+desired him to undertake an embassy to her he would surely have
+delivered his message without preamble, and would not have been thrown
+by so trifling a duty into the state of agitation in which he was. It
+was obvious, therefore, that he had not come with a message relating
+to her work. Something of fear touched Mrs. Makebelieve as she looked
+at him, and her voice had an uneasy note when she requested to know
+what she could do for him.</p>
+
+<p>The policeman suddenly, with the gesture of one throwing away anchors,
+plunged into the heart of his matter, and as he spoke the look on Mrs.
+Makebelieve's face changed quickly from bewilderm<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span>ent to curiosity and
+dulled again to a blank amazement. After the first few sentences she
+half turned to Mary, but an obscure shame prevented her from searching
+out her daughter's eyes. It was borne quickly and painfully to her
+that Mary had not treated her fairly: there was a secret here with
+which a mother ought to have been trusted, and one which she could not
+believe Mary would have withheld from her; and so, gauging her child's
+feelings by her own, she steadfastly refused to look at her lest the
+shocked surprise in her eyes might lacerate the girl she loved, and
+who she knew must at the instant be in a sufficient agony&mdash;&mdash;
+Undoubtedly the man was suggesting that he wanted to marry her
+daughter, and the unexpectedness of such a proposal left her mentally
+gaping; but that there must have been some preliminaries of meeting
+and courtship became obvious to her. Mary also listened to his remarks
+in a stupor. Was there no possibility at all of getting away from th<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>e
+man? A tenacity such as this seemed to her malignant. She had the
+feeling of one being pursued by some relentless and unscrupulous
+hunter. She heard him speaking through a cloud, and the only things
+really clear to her were the thoughts which she knew her mother must
+be thinking. She was frightened and ashamed, and the sullenness which
+is the refuge of most young people descended upon her like a darkness.
+Her face grew heavy and vacant, and she stared in front of her in the
+attitude of one who had nothing to do with what was passing. She did
+not believe altogether that he was in earnest: her immediate
+discomfort showed him as one who was merely seeking to get her into
+trouble with her mother in order to gratify an impotent rage. Twice or
+three times she flamed suddenly, went tiptoe to run from the room. A
+flash, and she would be gone from the place, down the stairs, into the
+streets and away anywhere, and she tingled with the very speed of her
+vision; but she knew that one word from her mother would halt her like
+a barrier, and s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span>he hated the thought that he should be a witness to
+her obedience.</p>
+
+<p>While he was speaking he did not look at Mary. He told Mrs.
+Makebelieve that he loved her daughter very much, and he begged her
+permission and favor for his suit. He gave her to understand that he
+and Mary had many opportunities of becoming acquainted, and were at
+one in this desire for matrimony&mdash;&mdash; To Mrs. Makebelieve's mind there
+recurred a conversation which she had once held with her daughter,
+when Mary was curious to know if a policeman was a desirable person
+for a girl to marry? She saw this question now, not as being prompted
+by a laudable, an almost scientific curiosity, but as the interested,
+sly speculation of a schemer hideously accomplished in deceit. Mary
+could see that memory flitting back through her mother's brain, and it
+torm<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span>ented her. Nor was her mother at ease&mdash;there was no chair to sit
+upon, she had to stand and listen to all this while he spoke, more or
+less at his ease, from the bed. If she also had been sitting down she
+might have been mistress of her thoughts and able to deal naturally
+with the situation; but an easy pose is difficult when standing: her
+hands would fold in front of her and the schoolgirl attitude annoyed
+and restrained her. Also, the man appeared to be in earnest in what he
+said. His words at the least and the intention which drove them seemed
+honorable. She could not give rein to her feelings without lapsing to
+a barbarity which she might not justify to herself even in anger and
+might, indeed, blush to remember. Perhaps his chief disqualification
+consisted in a relationship to Mrs. O'Connor for which he could not
+justly be held to blame, and for which she sincerely pitied him. But
+this certainly was a disqualification never to be redeemed. He might
+leave h<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span>is work, or his religion, or his country, but he could never
+quit his aunt, because he carried her with him under his skin; he was
+her with additions, and at times Mrs. Makebelieve could see Mrs.
+O'Connor looking cautiously at her through the policeman's eyes; a
+turn of his forehead and she was there like a thin wraith that
+vanished and appeared again. The man was spoiled for her. He did not
+altogether lack sense, and the fact that he wished to marry her
+daughter showed that he was not so utterly beyond the reach of
+redemption as she had fancied.</p>
+
+<p>Meanwhile, he had finished his statement as regarded the affection
+which he bore to her daughter and the suitability of their
+temperaments, and had hurled himself into an explanation of his
+worldly affairs, comprising his salary as a policeman, the possibility
+of promotion and the increased emoluments which would follow it, and
+the certain pension which would sustain his age.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> There was,
+furthermore, his parents, from whose decease he would reap certain
+monetary increments, and the deaths of other relatives from which an
+additional enlargement of his revenues might reasonably be expected.
+Indeed, he had not desired to speak of these matters at all, but the
+stony demeanor of Mrs. Makebelieve and the sullen aloofness of her
+daughter forced him, however reluctantly, to draw even ignoble weapons
+from his armory. He had not conceived they would be so obdurate: he
+had, in fact, imagined that the elder woman must be flattered by his
+offer to marry her daughter, and when no evidence to support this was
+forthcoming he was driven to appeal to the cupidity which he believed
+occupies the heart of every middle-aged, hard-worked woman. But these
+statements also were received with a dreadful composure. He could have
+smashed Mrs. Makebelieve where she stood. Now and again his body
+strained to a wild, physical out<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span>burst, a passionate, red fury that
+would have terrified these women to their knees, while he roared their
+screams into thin whimpers as a man should. He did not even dare to
+stop speaking, and his efforts at an easy, good-humored, half-careless
+presentation of his case was bitterly painful to him as it was to his
+auditors. The fact that they were both standing up unnerved him
+also&mdash;the pleasant equality which should have formed the atmosphere of
+such an interview was destroyed from the first moment, and, having
+once sat down, he did not like to stand up again. He felt glued to the
+bed on which he sat, and he felt also that if he stood up the tension
+in the room would so relax that Mrs. Makebelieve would at once break
+out into speech sarcastic and final, or her daughter might scream
+reproaches and disclaimers of an equal finality. At her he did not
+dare to look, but the corner of his eye could see her shape stiffened
+against the fireplace, an attitude<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> so different from the pliable
+contours to which he was accustomed in her as almost to be repellant.
+He would have thanked God to find himself outside the room, but how to
+get out of it he did not know: his self-esteem forbade anything like a
+retreat without honor, his nervousness did not permit him to move at
+all, the anger which prickled the surface of his body and mind was
+held in check only by an instinct of fear as to what he might do if he
+moved, and so, with dreadful jocularity, he commenced to speak of
+himself, his personal character, his sobriety and steadiness&mdash;of all
+those safe negations on which many women place reliance he spoke, and
+also of certain small vices which he magnified merely for the sake of
+talking, such as smoking, an odd glass of porter and the shilling
+which, now and again, he had ventured upon a race horse.</p>
+
+<p>Mary listened to him for a while with angry intentness. The fact that
+she was the subject of his extraordinary discourse qu<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span>ickened at the
+first all her apprehensions. Had the matter been less important she
+would have been glad to look at herself in this strange position, and
+to savor, with as much detachment as was possible, the whole spirit of
+the adventure. But when she heard him, as she put it, "telling on
+her," laying bare to her mother all the walks they had taken together,
+visits to restaurants and rambles through the streets and the parks,
+what he had said to her on this occasion and on that, and her remarks
+on such and such a matter, she could not visualize him save as a
+malignant and uncultivated person; and when he tacitly suggested that
+she was as eager for matrimony as he was, and so put upon her the
+horrible onus of rejecting him before a second person, she closed her
+mind and her ears against him. She refused to listen, although her
+perceptions admitted the trend of his speech. His words droned heavily
+and monotonously to her as through dull ban<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span>ks of fog. She made up her
+mind that if she were asked any questions by either of them she would
+not reply, and that she would not look at either of them, and then she
+thought that she would snap and stamp her feet and say that she hated
+him, that he had looked down on her because she worked for his aunt,
+that he had meanly been ashamed of and cut her because she was poor,
+that he had been going with another girl all the time he was going
+with her and that he only pursued her in order to annoy her, that she
+didn't love him, that she didn't even like him, that, in fact, she
+disliked him heartily. She wished to say all these things in one
+whirling outcry, but feared that before she had rightly begun she might
+become abashed, or, worse, might burst into tears and lose all the
+dignity  which she meant to preserve in his presence for the purpose of
+showing to him in the best light exactly what he was losing.</p>
+
+<p>But the big man had come to the end of his s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span>peech. He made a few
+attempts to begin anew on the desirability of such a union for both of
+them, and the happiness it would give him if Mrs. Makebelieve would
+come to live with them when they were married. He refused to let it
+appear that there was any doubt as to Mary's attitude in the matter,
+for up to the moment he came to their door he had not doubted her
+willingness himself. Her late avoidance of him he had put down to mere
+feminine tactics which leads on by holding off. The unwilling person
+he had been assured was himself&mdash;he stooped to her, and it was only
+after a severe battle that he had been able to do it. The astonishment
+and disapproval of his relatives and friends at such a step was very
+evident to him, for to a man of his position and figure girls were
+cheap creatures, the best of them to be had for the mere asking.
+Therefore, the fact that this girl could be seriously rejecting his
+offer of marriage came upon him like red astonishment. He had no more
+to say, however, and he blundered and fumbled into silence.</p>
+
+<p>For a moment or two the little room w<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span>as so still that the quietness
+seemed to hum and buzz like an eternity. Then, with a sigh, Mrs.
+Makebelieve spoke.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know at all," said she, "why you should speak to me about
+this, for neither my daughter nor yourself have ever even hinted to me
+before that you were courting one another. Why Mary should keep such a
+secret from her own mother I don't know. Maybe I've been cruel and
+frightened her, although I don't remember doing anything that she
+could have against me of that sort: or, maybe, she didn't think I was
+wise enough to advise her about a particular thing like her marriage,
+for, God knows, old women are foolish enough in their notions, or else
+they wouldn't be slaving and grinding for the sake of their children
+the way they do be doing year in and year out, every day in the week,
+and every hour of the day. It <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span>isn't any wonder at all that a child
+would be a liar and a sleeveen and a trampler of the roads with the
+first man that nods to her when her mother is a foolish person that
+she can't trust. Of course, I wouldn't be looking for a gentleman like
+yourself to mention the matter to me when I might be scrubbing out
+your aunt's kitchen or her hall door maybe, and you sitting in the
+parlor with the company. Sure, I'm only an old charwoman, and what
+does it matter at all what I'd be thinking, or whether I'd be agreeing
+or not to anything? Don't I get my wages for my work, and what more
+does anybody want in the world? As for me going to live with you when
+you are married&mdash;it was kind of you to ask me that; but it's not the
+sort of thing I'm likely to do, for if I didn't care for you as a
+stranger I'm not going to like you any better as my daughter's
+husband. You'll excuse me saying one thing, Sir, but while we are
+talking we may as well be talking out, and it's this, that I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> never did
+like you, and I never will like you, and I'd sooner see my daughter
+married to any one at all than to yourself. But, sure, I needn't be
+talking about it; isn't it Mary's business altogether, and she'll be
+settling it with you nicely I don't doubt. She's a practiced hand now
+at arranging things, like you are yourself, and it will do me good to
+be learning something from her."</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve took a cloth in her hand and walked over to the
+fireplace, which she commenced to polish.</p>
+
+<p>The big man looked at Mary. It was incumbent on him to say something.
+Twice he attempted to speak, and each time, on finding himself about
+to say something regarding the weather, he stopped. Mary did not look
+at him; her eyes were fixed stubbornly on a part of the wall well away
+from his neighborhood, and it seemed to him that she had made a vow to
+herself never to look at him again. But the utter silence of the room
+was un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span>bearable. He knew that he ought to get up and go out, but he
+could not bring himself to do so. His self-love, his very physical
+strength, rebelled against so tame a surrender. One thought he
+gathered in from swaying vacuity&mdash;that the timid little creature whom
+he had patronized would not find the harsh courage to refuse him
+point-blank if he charged her straightly with the question, and so he
+again assayed speech.</p>
+
+<p>"Your mother is angry with us, Mary," said he, "and I suppose she has
+good right to be angry; but the reason I did not speak to her before,
+as I admit I should have if I had done the right thing, was that I had
+very few chances of meeting her, and never did meet her without some
+other person being there at the same time. I suppose the reason you
+did not say anything was that you wanted to be quite sure of yourself
+and of me too before you mentioned it. We have both done the wrong
+thing in not being open, but maybe your moth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span>er will forgive us when
+she knows we had no intention of hurting her, or of doing anything
+behind her back. Your mother seems to hate me: I don't know why,
+because she hardly knows me at all, and I've never done her any harm
+or said a word against her. Perhaps when she knows me as well as you
+do she'll change her mind: but you know I love you better than any one
+else, and that I'd do anything I could to please you and be a good
+husband to you. What I want to ask you before your mother is,&mdash;will
+you marry me?"</p>
+
+<p>Mary made no reply. She did not look or give the slightest sign that
+she had heard. But now it was that she did not dare to look at him.
+The spectacle of this big man badgered by her and by her mother,
+pleading to her, and pleading, as he and she well knew, hopelessly,
+would have broken her heart if she looked at him. She had to admire
+the good masculine fight he made of it. Even his tricks of w<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span>ord and
+tactic, which she instantly divined, moved her almost to tears; but
+she feared terribly that if she met his gaze she might not be able to
+resist his huge helplessness, and that she might be compelled to do
+whatever he begged of her even in despite of her own wishes.</p>
+
+<p>The interval which followed his question weighed heavily upon them
+all. It was only broken by Mrs. Makebelieve, who began to hum a song
+as she polished the fire grate. She meant to show her careless
+detachment from the whole matter, but in the face of Mary's silence
+she could not keep it up. After a few moments she moved around and
+said:&mdash;</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you answer the gentleman, Mary?"</p>
+
+<p>Mary turned and looked at her, and the tears which she had resisted so
+long swam in her eyes: although she could keep her features composed
+she had no further command over her tears.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll answer whatever you ask me, mother," she whispered.</p>
+
+<p>"Then, tell the gentleman whether you will marry him or not."</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span></p>
+<p>"I don't want to marry any one at all," said Mary.</p>
+
+<p>"You are not asked to marry any one, darling," said Mrs. Makebelieve,
+"but some one&mdash;this gentleman here whose name I don't happen to know.
+Do you know his name?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Mary.</p>
+
+<p>"My name...." began the policeman.</p>
+
+<p>"It doesn't matter, Sir," said Mrs. Makebelieve. "Do you want to marry
+this gentleman, Mary?"</p>
+
+<p>"No," whispered Mary.</p>
+
+<p>"Are you in love with him?"</p>
+
+<p>Mary turned completely away from him.</p>
+
+<p>"No," she whispered again.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think you ever will be in love with him?"</p>
+
+<p>She felt as a rat might when hunted to a corner. But the end must be
+very near; this could not last forever because <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span>nothing can. Her lips
+were parched, her eyes were burning. She wanted to lie down and go
+asleep and waken again laughing to say&mdash;"it was a dream."</p>
+
+<p>Her reply was almost inaudible. "No," she said.</p>
+
+<p>"You are quite sure? It is always better to be quite sure."</p>
+
+<p>She did not answer any more, but the faint droop of her head gave the
+reply her mother needed.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, Sir," said Mrs. Makebelieve, "that you were mistaken in your
+opinion. My daughter is not old enough yet to be thinking of marriage
+and such like. Children do be thoughtless. I am sorry for all the
+trouble she has given you, and"&mdash;a sudden compunction stirred her, for
+the man was standing up now, and there was no trace of Mrs. O'Connor
+visible in him: his face was as massive and harsh as a piece of wall.
+"Don't you be thinking too badly of us now," said Mrs. Makebelieve
+with some agitation; "the child is too young altogether to be asking
+her to marry. Maybe in a year or two&mdash;I said things I know, but I was
+vexed, and...."</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The big man nodded his head and marched out.</p><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Mary ran to her mother moaning like a sick person, but Mrs.
+Makebelieve did not look at her. She lay down on the bed and turned
+her face to the wall, and she did not speak to Mary for a long time.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXXI" id="XXXI"></a>XXXI</h2>
+
+
+<p>When the young man who lodged with Mrs. Cafferty came in on the
+following day he presented a deplorable appearance. His clothes were
+torn and his face had several large strips of sticking-plaster on it,
+but he seemed to be in a mood of extraordinary happiness
+notwithstanding, and proclaimed that he had participated in the one
+really great fight of his life-time, that he wasn't injured at all,
+and that he wouldn't have missed it for a pension.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span>. Cafferty was wild with indignation, and marched him into Mrs.
+Makebelieve's room, where he had to again tell his story and have his
+injuries inspected and commiserated. Even Mr. Cafferty came into the
+room on this occasion. He was a large, slow man dressed very
+comfortably in a red beard&mdash;his beard was so red and so persistent
+that it quite overshadowed the rest of his wrappings and did, indeed,
+seem to clothe him. As he stood the six children walked in and out of
+his legs, and stood on his feet in their proper turns without causing
+him any apparent discomfort. During the young man's recital Mr.
+Cafferty every now and then solemnly and powerfully smote his left
+hand with his right fist, and requested that the aggressor should be
+produced to him.</p>
+
+<p>The young man said that as he was coming home the biggest man in the
+world walked up to him. He had never set eyes on the man before in his
+life, and thought at f<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span>irst he wanted to borrow a match or ask the way
+to somewhere, or something like that, and, accordingly, he halted; but
+the big man gripped him by the shoulder and said "You damned young
+whelp," and then he laughed and hit him a tremendous blow with his
+other hand. He twisted himself free at that, and said "What's that
+for?" and then the big man made another desperate clout at him. A
+fellow wasn't going to stand that kind of thing, so he let out at him
+with his left and then jumped in with two short-arm jabs that must
+have tickled the chap; that fellow didn't have it all his own way
+anyhow.... The young man exhibited his knuckles, which were skinned
+and bleeding, as evidence of some exchange; but, he averred, you might
+as well be punching a sack of coal as that man's face. In another
+minute they both slipped and rolled over and over in the road, hitting
+and kicking as they sprawled: then a crowd of people ran forward and
+pulled them asunder. Wh<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span>en they were separated he saw the big man lift
+his fist, and the person who was holding him ducked suddenly and ran
+for his life: the other folk got out of the way too, and the big man
+walked over to where he stood and stared into his face. His jaw was
+stuck out like the seat of a chair and his moustache was like a
+bristle of barbed wire. The young man said to him, "What the hell's
+wrong with you to go bashing a man for nothing at all?" and all of a
+sudden the big fellow turned and walked away. It was a grand fight
+altogether, said the youth, but the other man was a mile and a half
+too big for him.</p>
+
+<p>As this story proceeded Mrs. Makebelieve looked once or twice at her
+daughter. Mary's face had gone very pale, and she nodded back a
+confirmation of her mother's conjecture; but it did not seem necessary
+or wise to either of them that they should explain their thoughts. The
+young man did not require either condolences <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span>or revenge. He was well
+pleased at an opportunity to measure his hardihood against a worthy
+opponent. He had found that his courage exceeded his strength, as it
+always should, for how could we face the gods and demons of existence
+if our puny arms were not backed up by our invincible eyes? and he
+displayed his contentment at the issue as one does a banner emblazoned
+with merits. Mrs. Makebelieve understood also that the big man's
+action was merely his energetic surrender, as of one who, instead of
+tendering his sword courteously to the victor, hurls it at him with a
+malediction; and that in assaulting their friend he was bidding them
+farewell as heartily and impressively as he was able. So they fed the
+young man and extolled him, applauding to the shrill winding of his
+trumpet until he glowed again in the full satisfaction of heroism.</p>
+
+<p>He and Mary did not discontinue their evening walks. Of these Mrs.
+Makebelieve was fully c<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span>ognizant, and, although she did not remark on
+the fact, she had been observing the growth of their intimacy with a
+care which was one part approval and one part pain; for it was very
+evident to her that her daughter was no longer a child to be
+controlled and directed by authority. Her little girl was a big girl;
+she had grown up and was eager to undertake the business of life on
+her own behalf. But the period of Mrs. Makebelieve's motherhood had
+drawn to a close, and her arms were empty. She was too used now to
+being a mother to relinquish easily the prerogatives of that status,
+and her discontent had this justification and assistance that it could
+be put into definite words, fronted and approved or rejected as reason
+urged. By knowledge and thought we will look through a stone wall if
+we look long enough, for we see less through eyes than through Time.
+Time is the clarifying perspective whereby myopia of any kind is
+adjusted, and a thought emerge<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span>s in its field as visibly as a tree does
+in nature's. Mrs. Makebelieve saw seventeen years' apprenticeship to
+maternity canceled automatically without an explanation or a courtesy,
+and for a little time her world was in ruins, the ashes of existence
+powdered her hair and her forehead. Then she discovered that the
+debris was valuable in known currency; the dust was golden: her love
+remained to her undisturbed and unlikely to be disturbed by whatever
+event. And she discovered further that parentage is neither a game nor
+a privilege but a duty; it is, astounding thought, the care of the
+young until the young can take care of itself. It was for this freedom
+only that her elaborate care had been necessary; her bud had blossomed
+and she could add no more to its bloom or fragrance. Nothing had
+happened that was not natural, and whoso opposes his brow against that
+imperious urgency is thereby renouncing his kind and claiming a
+kinship with the wild boar and th<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span>e goat, which they, too, may
+repudiate with leaden foreheads. There remained also the common human
+equality, not alone of blood, but of sex also, which might be fostered
+and grow to an intimacy more dear and enduring, more lovely and loving
+than the necessarily one-sided devotions of parentage. Her duties in
+that relationship having been performed, it was her daughter's turn to
+take up her's and prove her rearing by repaying to her mother the
+conscious love which intelligence and a good heart dictates. This
+given, Mrs. Makebelieve could smile happily again, for her arms would
+be empty only for a little time. The continuity of nature does not
+fail saving fo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span>r extraordinary instances. She sees to it that a breast
+and an arm shall not very long be unoccupied, and, consequently, as
+Mrs. Makebelieve sat contemplating that futurity which is nothing more
+than a prolongation of experience she could smile contentedly, for all
+was very well.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="XXXII" id="XXXII"></a>XXXII</h2>
+
+
+<p>If the unexpected did not often happen life would be a logical,
+scientific progression which might become dispirited and repudiate its
+goal for very boredom, but nature has cunningly diversified the
+methods whereby she coaxes or coerces us to prosecute, not our own,
+but her own adventure. Beyond every corner there may be a tavern or a
+church wherein both the saint and the sinner may be entrapped and
+remolded. Beyond the skyline you may find a dynamite cartridge, a
+drunken tinker, a mad dog,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> or a shilling which some person has
+dropped; and any one of these unexpectednesses may be potent to urge
+the traveler down a side street and put a crook in the straight line
+which had been his life, and to which he had become miserably
+reconciled. The element of surprise being, accordingly, one of the
+commonest things in the world we ought not to be hypercritical in our
+review of singularities, or say&mdash;"These things do not
+happen,"&mdash;because it is indisputable that they do happen. That
+combination which comprises a dark night, a highwayman armed and
+hatted to the teeth, and myself, may be a purely fortuitous one, but
+will such a criticism bring any comfort to the highwayman? And the
+concourse of three benevolent millionaires with the person to whom
+poverty can do no more is so pleasant and possible that I marvel it
+does not occur more frequently. I am prepared to believe on the very
+lightest assurance that these things do happen, but are hushed up for
+reasons which would be c<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span>ogent enough if they were available.</p>
+
+<p>Mrs. Makebelieve opened the letter which the evening's post had
+brought to her. She had pondered well before opening it, and had
+discussed with her daughter all the possible people who could have
+written it. The envelope was long and narrow, it was addressed in a
+swift emphatic hand, the tail of the letter M enjoying a career
+distinguished beyond any of its fellows by length and beauty. The
+envelope, moreover, was sealed by a brilliant red lion with jagged
+whiskers and a simper, who threatened the person daring to open a
+missive not addressed to him with the vengeance of a battle-axe which
+was balanced lightly but truculently on his right claw.</p>
+
+<p>This envelope contained several documents purporting to be copies of
+extraordinary originals, and amongst them a letter which was read by
+Mrs. M<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span>akebelieve more than ten thousand times or ever she went to bed
+that night. It related that more than two years previously one Patrick
+Joseph Brady had departed this life, and that his will, dated from a
+multitudinous address in New York, devised and bequeathed to his
+dearly beloved sister Mary Eileen Makebelieve, otherwise Brady, the
+following shares and securities for shares, to wit:&mdash;and the
+thereinafter mentioned houses and messuages, lands, tenements,
+hereditaments and premises, that was to say:&mdash;and all household
+furniture, books, pictures, prints, plate, linen, glass and objects of
+vertu, carriages, wines, liquors and all consumable stores and effects
+whatsoever then in the house so and so, and all money then in the Bank
+and thereafter to accrue due upon the thereinbefore mentioned stocks,
+funds, shares and securities.... Mrs. Makebelieve wept and besought
+God not to make a fool of a woman who was not only poor but old. The
+letter requested he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span>r to call on the following day, or at her earliest
+convenience, to "the above address," and desired that she should bring
+with her such letters or other documents as would establish her
+relationship to the deceased and assist in extracting the necessary
+Grant of Probate to the said Will, and it was subscribed by Messrs.
+Platitude &amp; Glambe, Solicitors, Commissioners for Oaths and Protectors
+of the Poor.</p>
+
+<p>To the Chambers of these gentlemen Mrs. Makebelieve and Mary repaired
+on the following day, and, having produced the letters and other
+documents for inspection, the philanthropists, Platitude and Glambe,
+professed themselves to be entirely satisfied as to their bona fides,
+and exhibited an eagerness to be of immediate service to the ladies in
+whatever capacity might be conceived. Mrs. Makebelieve instantly
+invoked the Pragmatic Sanction; she put the entire matter to the
+touchstone of absolute verity by demandin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span>g an advance of fifty pounds.
+Her mind reeled as she said the astounding amount, but her voice did
+not. A check was signed and a clerk dispatched, who returned with
+eight five-pound notes and ten sovereigns of massy gold. Mrs.
+Makebelieve secreted these, and went home marveling to find that she
+was yet alive. No trams ran over her. The motor cars pursued her, and
+were evaded. She put her hope in God, and explained so breathlessly to
+the furious street. One cyclist who took corners on trust she cursed
+by the Ineffable Name, but instantly withdrew the malediction for
+luck, and addressed his dwindling back with an eye of misery and a
+voice of benediction. For a little time neither she nor her daughter
+spoke of the change in their fortunes saving in terms of allusion;
+they feared that, notwithstanding their trust, God might hear and
+shatter them with His rolling laughter. They went out again that day
+furtively and feverishly and bought....</p>
+
+<p>But on t<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span>he following morning Mrs. Makebelieve returned again to her
+labor. She intended finishing her week's work with Mrs. O'Connor (it
+might not last for a week). She wished to observe that lady with the
+exact particularity, the singleness of eye, the true, candid, critical
+scrutiny which had hitherto been impossible to her. It was, she said
+to Mary, just possible that Mrs. O'Connor might make some remarks
+about soap. It was possible that the lady might advance theories as to
+how this or that particular kind of labor ought to be conducted....
+Mrs. Makebelieve's black eye shone upon her child with a calm peace, a
+benevolent happiness rare indeed to human regard.</p>
+
+<p>In the evening of that day Mary and the young man who lodged with
+their neighbor went out for the walk which had become customary with
+them. The young man had been fed with an amplitude which he had never
+known before, so that not even the remotest slim thread, shred, hint,
+ech<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span>o or memory of hunger remained with him: he tried but could not
+make a dint in himself anywhere, and, consequently, he was as sad as
+only a well-fed person can be. Now that his hunger was gone he deemed
+that all else was gone also. His hunger, his sweetheart, his hopes,
+his good looks (for his injuries had matured to the ripe purple of
+the perfect bruise) all were gone, gone, gone. He told it to Mary, but
+she did not listen to him; to the rolling sky he announced it and it
+paid no heed. He walked beside Mary at last in silence, listening to
+her plans and caprices, the things she would do and buy, the people to
+whom gifts should be made and the species of gift uniquely suitable to
+this person and to that person, the people to whom money might be
+given and the amounts, and the methods whereby such largesse could be
+distributed. Hats were mentioned and dresses, and the new house
+somewhere&mdash;a space-embracing-somewhere, beyond surmise, beyond
+ge<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span>ography. They walked onwards for a long time, so long that at last a
+familiar feeling stole upon the youth. The word "food" seemed suddenly
+a topic worthy of the most spirited conversation. His spirits arose.
+He was no longer solid, space belonged to him also, it was in him and
+of him, and so there was a song in his heart. He was hungry and the
+friend of man again. Now everything was possible. The girl? Was she
+not by his side? The regeneration of Ireland and of Man? That could be
+done also; a little leisure and everything that can be thought can be
+done: even his good looks might be returned to him: he felt the sting
+and tightness of his bruises and was reassured, exultant. He was a man
+predestined to bruises; they would be his meat and drink and
+happiness, his refuge and sanctuary forever. Let us leave him, then,
+pacing volubly by the side of Mary, and exploring with a delicate
+finger his half-closed eye, which, until it was closed entirely, would
+always be half-closed by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> the decent buffet of misfortune. His ally and
+stay was hunger, and there is no better ally for any man: that
+satisfied and the game is up; for hunger is life, ambition, good-will
+and understanding, while fullness is all those negatives which
+culminate in greediness, stupidity and decay; so his bruises troubled
+him no further than as they affected the eyes of a lady wherein he
+prayed to be comely.</p>
+
+<p>Bruises, unless they are desperate indeed, will heal at the last for
+no other reason than that they must. The inexorable compulsion of all
+things is towards health or destruction, life or death, and we hasten
+our joys or our woes to the logical extreme. It is urgent, therefore,
+that we be joyous if we wish to live. Our heads may be as solid as is
+possible, but our hearts and our heels shall be light or we are
+ruined. As to the golden mean&mdash;let us have nothing to do with that
+thing at all; it may only be gilded, it is very likely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> made of tin of
+a dull color and a lamentable sound, unworthy even of being stolen;
+and unless our treasures may be stolen they are of no use to us. It is
+contrary to the laws of life to possess that which other people do not
+want; therefore, your beer shall foam, your wife shall be pretty, and
+your little truth shall have a plum in it&mdash;for this is so; that your
+beer can only taste of your company, you can only know your wife when
+some one else does, and your little truth shall be savored or perish.
+Do you demand a big truth? Then, Oh Ambitious! you must turn aside
+from all your companions and sit very quietly, and if you sit long
+enough and quiet enough it may come to you; but this thing alone of
+all things you cannot steal, nor can it be given to you by the County
+Council. It cannot be communicated, and yet you may get it. It is
+unspeakable but not unthinkable, and it is born as certainly and
+unaccountably as you were yourself, and is of just as little imme<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span>diate
+consequence. Long, long ago in the dim beginnings of the world there
+was a careless and gay young man who said&mdash;"Let truth go to hell"&mdash;and
+it went there. It was his misfortune that he had to follow it; it is
+ours that we are his descendants. An evil will either kill you or be
+killed by you, and (the reflection is comforting) the odds are with us
+in every fight waged against humanity by the dark or elemental beings.
+But humanity is timid and lazy, a believer in golden means and
+subterfuges and compromises, loath to address itself to any combat
+until its frontiers are virtually overrun and its cities and granaries
+and places of refuge are in jeopardy from those gloomy marauders. In
+that wide struggle which we call Progress, evil is always the
+aggressor and the vanquished, and it is right that this should be so,
+for without its onslaughts and depredations humanity might fall to a
+fat slumber upon its corn sacks and die snoring: or, alternatively,
+lacking these valorous alarms and excursions it migh<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span>t become
+self-satisfied and formularized, and be crushed to death by the mere
+dull density of virtue. Next to good the most valuable factor in life
+is evil. By the interaction of these all things are possible, and,
+therefore (or for any other reason that pleases you) let us wave a
+friendly hand in the direction of that bold, bad policeman whose
+thoughts were not governed by the Book of Regulations which is issued
+to all recruits, and who, in despite of the fact that he was enrolled
+among the very legions of order, had that chaos in his soul which may
+"give birth to a Dancing Star."</p>
+
+<p>As to Mary&mdash;even ordinary, workaday politeness frowns on too abrupt a
+departure from a lady, particularly one whom we have companioned thus
+distantly from the careless simplicity of girlhood to the equally
+careless but complex businesses of adolescence. The world is all before
+her, and her chronicler may not be her guide. She will have adventures,
+for everybody ha<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span>s. She will win through with them, for everybody does.
+She may even meet bolder and badder men than the policeman&mdash;Shall we
+then detain her? I, for one, having urgent calls elsewhere, will salute
+her fingers and raise my hat and stand aside, and you will do likewise,
+because it is my pleasure that you should. She will go forward, then,
+to do that which is pleasing to the gods, for less than that she cannot
+do, and more is not to be expected of any one.</p>
+
+
+<h4>THUS FAR THE STORY OF MARY MAKEBELIEVE</h4>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>On the following pages will be found the complete list of
+titles in "The Modern Library," including those published
+during the Fall of Nineteen Hundred and Twenty-one. New
+titles are added in the Spring and Fall of every year.</p></div>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="THE_MODERN_LIBRARY_OF_THE_WORLDS_BEST_BOOKS" id="THE_MODERN_LIBRARY_OF_THE_WORLDS_BEST_BOOKS"></a>THE MODERN LIBRARY OF THE WORLD'S BEST BOOKS</h2>
+
+<p class="center">Hand Bound in Limp Binding, Stained Tops, Gold Decorations, only 95c.
+per copy</p>
+
+<p class="center">Postage 5c. per copy extra</p>
+
+
+<p>Six years ago, the Modern Library of the World's Best Books made its
+appearance with twelve titles. It was immediately recognized, to quote
+the New York Times, "as filling a need that is not quite covered by
+any other publication in the field just now." The Dial hastened to say
+"The moderns put their best foot forward in the Modern Library. There
+is scarcely a title that fails to awaken interest and the series is
+doubly welcome at this time." A week or so after the publication of
+the first titles, The Independent wrote: "The Modern Library is
+another step in the very right direction of putting good books into
+inexpensive form," and the clever Editor of the Chicago Daily News, in
+a long review, concluded: "The Modern Library astonishes the cynical
+with the excellence of its choice of titles. You could stand before a
+stack of these books, shut your eyes and pick out the right one every
+time." Despite this enthusiasm, in publishing circles it was
+considered impossible to continue the sale of these attractive Hand
+Bound Limp books, printed in large clear type on good paper, at any
+price under the usual and prevailing price charged for the more
+cheaply made current fiction, which is now about Two Dollars a volume.
+But the large number of intelligent book buyers, a much larger group
+than is generally supposed has not only made possible the continuation
+of this fine series at the low price of Ninety-five Cents a volume,
+but has enabled us progressively to make it a better and more
+comprehensive collection. There are now over a hundred titles in the
+series and a new one is added each month except during the three
+Summer months. And in mechanical excellence, too, the books have been
+constantly improved.</p>
+
+<p>Many distinguished American and foreign authors have said that the
+Modern Library is one of the most stimulating factors in American
+intellectual life. Practically everybody who knows anything about good
+books owns a number of copies and generally promises himself to own
+them all.... One of the largest book stores in the country reports
+that more copies of the Modern Library are purchased for gifts than
+any other books now being issued.</p>
+
+<p>The sweep of world events has, of course, been a contributing
+influence to our success. Purposeful reading is taking the place of
+miscellaneous dabbling in literature, and the Modern Library is being
+daily recommended by notable educators as a representative library of
+modern thought. Many of our titles are being placed on college lists
+for supplementary reading and they are being continuously purchased by
+the American Library Association for Government camps and schools. The
+list of titles on the following six pages (together with the list of
+introductions written especially for the Modern Library), indicates
+that our use of the term "Modern" does not necessarily mean written
+within the last few years. Voltaire is certainly a modern of moderns,
+as are Samuel Butler, Francois Villon, Theophile Gautier and
+Dostoyevsky.</p>
+
+<p>Many of the books in the Modern Library are not reprints, but are new
+books which cannot be found in any other edition. None of them can be
+had in any such convenient and attractive form. It would be difficult
+to find any other editions of any of these books at double the price.
+They can be purchased wherever books are sold or you can get them from
+the publishers.</p>
+
+<p>
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">BONI AND LIVERIGHT</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">61 West 48th Street</span><br />
+<span style="margin-left: 1em;">New York</span><br />
+</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Complete_List_of_Titles" id="Complete_List_of_Titles"></a><b>Complete List of Titles</b></h2>
+
+
+<p class="center"><i>For convenience in ordering please use number at right of title</i><br/></p>
+
+
+<p><b>A MODERN BOOK OF CRITICISMS (81)</b> Edited with an Introduction by
+LUDWIG LEWISOHN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>ANDERSON, SHERWOOD</b> (1876-)<br />
+<b>Winesburg, Ohio, (104)</b></p>
+
+
+<p><b>ANDREYEV, LEONID</b> (1871-)<br />
+<b>The Seven That Were Hanged and The Red Laugh (45)</b> Introduction by
+THOMAS SELTZER</p>
+
+
+<p><b>ATHERTON, GERTRUDE</b> (1859-)<br />
+<b>Rezanov (71)</b> Introduction by WILLIAM MARION REEDY<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BALZAC, HONORE DE</b> (1799-1850)<br />
+<b>Short Stories (40)</b></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BAUDELAIRE, PIERRE CHARLES</b> (1821-1867)<br />
+<b>His Prose and Poetry (70)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BEARDSLEY, THE ART OF AUBREY</b> (1872-1898)<br />
+<b>64 Black and White Reproductions (42)</b> Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BEERBOHM, MAX</b> (1872-)<br />
+<b>Zuleika Dobson (50)</b> Introduction by FRANCIS HACKETT<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BEST GHOST STORIES (73)</b><br />
+Introduction by ARTHUR B. REEVE<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BEST HUMOROUS AMERICAN SHORT STORIES (87)</b><br />
+Edited with an Introduction by ALEXANDER JESSUP<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BEST RUSSIAN SHORT STORIES (18)</b><br />
+Edited with an Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BLAKE, WILLIAM</b> (1757-1827)<br />
+<b>Poems (91)</b> Edited with notes by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>BUTLER, SAMUEL</b> (1835-1902)<br />
+<b>The Way of All Flesh (13)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>CABELL, JAMES BRANCH</b><br />
+<b>Beyond Life (25)</b> Introduction by GUY HOLT<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>CARPENTER, EDWARD</b> (1844-)<br />
+<b>Love's Coming of Age (51)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>CHEKHOV, ANTON</b> (1860-1904)<br />
+<b>Rothschild's Fiddle and Thirteen Other Stories (31)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>CHESTERTON, G. K.</b> (1874-)<br />
+<b>The Man Who Was Thursday (35)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>CONTEMPORARY SCIENCE (99)</b><br />
+Edited with an Introduction by Dr. BENJ. HARROW<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>CRANE, STEPHEN</b> (1870-)<br />
+<b>Men, Women and Boats (102)</b> Introduction by VINCENT STARRETT<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>D'ANNUNZIO, GABRIELE</b> (1864-)<br />
+<b>The Flame of Life (65)</b><br />
+<b>The Triumph of Death (112)</b> Introduction by BURTON RASCOE<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>DAVIDSON, JOHN</b><br />
+<b>Poems (60)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>DAUDET, ALPHONSE</b> (1840-1897)<br />
+<b>Sapho (85)</b> In same volume Prevost's <b>"Manon Lescaut"</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>DOSTOYEVSKY, FEDOR</b> (1821-1881)<br />
+<b>Poor People (10)</b> Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>DOWSON, ERNEST</b> (1867-1900)<br />
+<b>Poems and Prose (74)</b> Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>DREISER, THEODORE</b><br />
+<b>Free and Other Stories (50)</b> Introduction by H. L. MENCKEN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>DUNSANY, LORD (Edward John Plunkett)</b> (1878-)<br />
+<b>A Dreamer's Tales (34)</b> Introduction by PADRIAC COLUM<br />
+<b>Book of Wonder (43)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>ELLIS, HAVELOCK</b> (1859-)<br />
+<b>The New Spirit (95)</b> Introduction by the author<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>EVOLUTION IN MODERN THOUGHT (37)</b><br />
+<b>A Symposium, including Essays by Haeckel, Thomson, Weismann, etc.</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>FLAUBERT, GUSTAVE</b> (1821-1880)<br />
+<b>Madame Bovary (28)</b><br />
+<b>The Temptation of St. Anthony (92)</b> Translated by LAFCADIO HEARN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>FLEMING, MARJORIE</b> (1803-1811)<br />
+<b>Marjorie Fleming's Book (93)</b> Introduction by CLIFFORD SMYTH<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>FRANCE, ANATOLE</b> (1844-)<br />
+<b>The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard (22)</b> Introduction by LAFCADIO HEARN<br />
+<b>The Queen Pedauque (110)</b> Introduction by JAMES BRANCH CABELL<br />
+<b>The Red Lily (7)</b><br />
+<b>Thais (67)</b> Introduction by HENDRIK W. VAN LOON<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>FRENSSEN, GUSTAV</b> (1863-)<br />
+<b>John Uhl (101)</b> Introduction by LUDWIG LEWISOHN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>GAUTIER, THEOPHILE</b> (1811-1872)<br />
+<b>Mlle. de Maupin (53)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>GEORGE, W. L.</b> (1882-)<br />
+<b>A Bed of Roses (75)</b> Introduction by EDGAR SALTUS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>GILBERT, W. S.</b> (1836-1911)<br />
+<b>The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance, Iolanthe, The Gondoliers, (26)</b>
+Introduction by CLARENCE DAY, <span class="smcap">Jr</span>.<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>GISSING, GEORGE,</b> (1857-1903)<br />
+<b>The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft (46)</b> Introduction by PAUL ELMER
+MORE<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>De GONCOURT, E. and J.</b> (1822-1896) (1830-1870)<br />
+<b>Ren&eacute;e Mauperin (76)</b> Introduction by EMILE ZOLA<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>GORKY, MAXIM</b> (1868-)<br />
+<b>Creatures That Once Were Men and Four Other Stories (48)</b>
+Introduction by G. K. CHESTERTON<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>HARDY, THOMAS</b> (1840-)<br />
+<b>The Mayor of Casterbridge (17)</b> Introduction by JOYCE KILMER<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>HECHT, BEN</b><br />
+<b>Erik Dorn (29)</b> Introduction by BURTON RASCOE<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>HUDSON, W. H.</b> (1862-)<br />
+<b>Green Mansions (89)</b> Introduction by JOHN GALSWORTHY<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>IBANEZ, VICENTE BLASCO</b> (1867-)<br />
+<b>The Cabin (69)</b> Introduction by JOHN GARRETT UNDERHILL<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>IBSEN, HENRIK</b> (1828-1906)<br />
+<b>A Doll's House, Ghosts, An Enemy of the People (6);</b><br />
+<b>Hedda Gabler, Pillars of Society, The Master Builder (36)</b> Introduction by H. L.
+MENCKEN<br />
+<b>The Wild Duck, Rosmersholm, The League of Youth (54)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>JAMES, HENRY</b> (1843-1916)<br />
+<b>Daisy Miller and An International Episode (63)</b> Introduction by
+WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>KIPLING, RUDYARD</b> (1865-)<br />
+<b>Soldiers Three (3)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>LATZKO, ANDREAS</b> (1876-)<br />
+<b>Men in War (88)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>LAWRENCE, D. H.</b> (1887-)<br />
+<b>Sons and Lovers (109)</b> Introduction by JOHN MACY<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>LE GALLIENNE, ANTHOLOGY OF AMERICAN POETRY (107)</b> Edited with an
+introduction by RICHARD LE GALLIENNE<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>LOTI, PIERRE</b> (1850-)<br />
+<b>Madame Chrysanth&egrave;me (94)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>MACY, JOHN</b> (1877-)<br />
+<b>The Spirit of American Literature (56)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>MAETERLINCK, MAURICE</b> (1862-)<br />
+<b>A Miracle of St. Antony, Pelleas and Melisande, The Death of
+Tintagiles, Alladine and Palomides, Interior, The Intruder (11)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>DeMAUPASSANT, GUY</b> (1850-1893)<br />
+<b>Love and Other Stories (72)</b> Edited and translated with an
+Introduction by MICHAEL MONAHAN<br />
+<b>Mademoiselle Fifi, and Twelve Other Stories (8);</b><br />
+<b> Une Vie (57)</b> Introduction by HENRY JAMES<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>MEREDITH, GEORGE</b> (1828-1909)<br />
+<b>Diana of the Crossways (14)</b> Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>MOLIERE</b><br />
+<b>Plays (78)</b> Introduction by WALDO FRANK<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>MOORE, GEORGE</b> (1853-)<br />
+<b>Confessions of a Young Man (16)</b> Introduction by FLOYD DELL<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>MORRISON, ARTHUR</b> (1863-)<br />
+<b>Tales of Mean Streets (100)</b> Introduction by H. L. MENCKEN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICH</b> (1844-1900)<br />
+<b>Thus Spake Zarathustra (9)</b> Introduction by FRAU FOERSTER-NIETZSCHE<br />
+<b>Beyond Good and Evil (20)</b> Introduction by WILLARD HUNTINGTON WRIGHT<br />
+<b>Genealogy of Morals (62)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>O'NEILL, EUGENE</b> (1888-)<br />
+<b>The Moon of the Carribbees and Six Other Plays of the Sea (111)</b>
+Introduction by GEORGE JEAN NATHAN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>OUIDA</b><br />
+<b>In a Winter City (24)</b> Introduction by CARL VAN VECHTEN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>PAINE, THOMAS</b> (1737-1809)<br />
+<b>Selections from the Writings of Thomas Paine (108)</b> Edited with an
+Introduction by CARL VAN DOREN<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>PATER, WALTER</b> (1839-1894)<br />
+<b>Marius the Epicurean (90)</b><br />
+<b>The Renaissance (86)</b> Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>PEPYS', SAMUEL; DIARY (103)</b><br />
+Condensed. Introduction by RICHARD LE GALLIENNE<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>PREVOST, ANTOINE FRANCOIS</b> (1697-1763)<br />
+<b>Manon Lescaut (85)</b> In same volume with <b>Daudet's Sapho</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>PSYCHOANALYSIS, AN OUTLINE OF (66)</b><br />
+<b>A Symposium of the latest expressions by the leaders of the various
+schools of the new psychology.</b> Edited by J. S. VAN TESLAAR<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>RODIN, THE ART OF</b> (1840-1917)<br />
+<b>64 Black and White Reproductions (41)</b> Introduction by LOUIS WEINBERG<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>SCHNITZLER, ARTHUR</b> (1862-)<br />
+<b>Anatol, Living Hours, The Green Cockatoo (32)</b> Introduction by ASHLEY
+DUKES<br />
+<b>Bertha Garlan (39)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>SCHOPENHAUER, ARTHUR</b> (1788-1860)<br />
+<b>Studies in Pessimism (12)</b> Introduction by T. B. SAUNDERS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>SHAW, G. B.</b> (1856-)<br />
+<b>An Unsocial Socialist (15)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>SINCLAIR, MAY</b><br />
+<b>The Belfry (68)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>STEPHENS, JAMES</b><br />
+<b>Mary, Mary (30)</b> Introduction by PADRIAC COLUM<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>STEVENSON, ROBERT LOUIS</b> (1850-1894)<br />
+<b>Treasure Island (4)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>STIRNER, MAX</b> (Johann Caspar Schmidt) (1806-1859)<br />
+<b>The Ego and His Own (49)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>STRINDBERG, AUGUST</b> (1849-1912)<br />
+<b>Married (2)</b> Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER<br />
+<b>Miss Julie, The Creditor, The Stronger Woman, Motherly Love, Paria,
+Simoon (52)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>SUDERMANN, HERMANN</b> (1857-)<br />
+<b>Dame Care (33)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>SWINBURNE, ALGERNON CHARLES</b> (1837-1909)<br />
+<b>Poems (23)</b> Introduction by ERNEST RHYS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>THOMPSON, FRANCIS</b> (1859-1907)<br />
+<b>Complete Poems (38)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>TOLSTOY, LEO</b> (1828-1910)<br />
+<b>Redemption and Two Other Plays (77)</b> Introduction by ARTHUR HOPKINS<br />
+<b>The Death of Ivan Ilyitch and Four Other Stories (64)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>TURGENEV, IVAN</b> (1818-1883)<br />
+<b>Fathers and Sons (21)</b> Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER<br />
+<b>Smoke (80)</b> Introduction by JOHN REED<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>VAN LOON, HENDRIK WILLEM</b> (1882-)<br />
+<b>Ancient Man (105)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>VILLON FRANCOIS</b> (1431-1461)<br />
+<b>Poems (58)</b> Introduction by JOHN PAYNE<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>VOLTAIRE, (FRANCOIS MARIE AROUET)</b> (1694-1778)<br />
+<b>Candide (47)</b> Introduction by PHILIP LITTELL<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>WELLS, H. G.</b> (1866-)<br />
+<b>Ann Veronica (27)</b><br />
+<b>The War in the Air (5)</b> New Preface by H. G. Wells for this edition<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>WHITMAN, WALT</b> (1819-)<br />
+<b>Poems (97)</b> Introduction by CARL SANDBURG<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>WILDE, OSCAR</b> (1859-1900)<br />
+<b>An Ideal Husband, A Woman of No Importance (84)</b><br />
+<b>Dorian Gray (1)</b><br />
+<b>Fairy Tales and Poems in Prose (61)</b><br />
+<b>Intentions (96)</b><br />
+<b>Poems (19)</b><br />
+<b>Salome, The Importance of Being Earnest, Lady Windermere's Fan (83)</b>
+Introduction by EDGAR SALTUS<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>WILSON, WOODROW</b> (1856-)<br />
+<b>Selected Addresses and Public Papers (55)</b> Edited with an
+introduction by ALBERT BUSHNELL HART<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>WOMAN QUESTION, THE (59)</b><br />
+<b>A Symposium, including Essays by Ellen Key, Havelock Ellis, G. Lowes
+Dickinson, etc.</b> Edited by T. R. SMITH<br /></p>
+
+
+<p><b>YEATS, W. B.</b> (1865-)<br/>
+<b>Irish Fairy and Folk Tales (44)</b><br /></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="Transcribers_Notes" id="Transcribers_Notes"></a><b>Transcriber's Notes:</b></h2>
+
+<p>There are several misspellings in the text, such as eagnerness, Padriac.</p>
+
+<p>&#8220;deary&#8221; &amp; &#8220;dearie&#8221; are both used.</p>
+
+<p>There are instances of missing capitals, such as &#8220;alanna&#8221; and several
+first words of sentences.</p>
+
+<p>There are several instances of missing punctuation.</p>
+
+<p>Mary's room is described as being &#8220;one square inch&#8221; in size in
+original text.</p>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mary, Mary, by James Stephens
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARY, MARY ***
+
+***** This file should be named 24742-h.htm or 24742-h.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        http://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/7/4/24742/
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charlene Taylor and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
+
+</pre>
+
+</body>
+</html>
diff --git a/24742-h/images/signature.jpg b/24742-h/images/signature.jpg
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..14fa00b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-h/images/signature.jpg
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0003.png b/24742-page-images/f0003.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e3d54a1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0003.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0004.png b/24742-page-images/f0004.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..648a0b2
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0004.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0005.png b/24742-page-images/f0005.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..af03cdb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0005.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0007.png b/24742-page-images/f0007.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a481838
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0007.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0009.png b/24742-page-images/f0009.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e3860bd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0009.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0010.png b/24742-page-images/f0010.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5ff7f6f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0010.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0011.png b/24742-page-images/f0011.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..cc6336f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0011.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0012.png b/24742-page-images/f0012.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b6a0e99
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0012.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/f0013.png b/24742-page-images/f0013.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3e702fb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/f0013.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0001.png b/24742-page-images/p0001.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..58f4bfc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0001.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0002.png b/24742-page-images/p0002.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8c94936
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0002.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0003.png b/24742-page-images/p0003.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..31dd7ca
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0003.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0004.png b/24742-page-images/p0004.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d6a92e9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0004.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0005.png b/24742-page-images/p0005.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f9788ea
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0005.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0006.png b/24742-page-images/p0006.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a4a6226
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0006.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0007.png b/24742-page-images/p0007.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4649b3c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0007.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0008.png b/24742-page-images/p0008.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3d8fe75
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0008.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0009.png b/24742-page-images/p0009.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5b6bdac
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0009.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0010.png b/24742-page-images/p0010.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..082c398
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0010.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0011.png b/24742-page-images/p0011.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4334682
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0011.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0012.png b/24742-page-images/p0012.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2baca18
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0012.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0013.png b/24742-page-images/p0013.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..581ff31
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0013.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0014.png b/24742-page-images/p0014.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e95e95d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0014.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0015.png b/24742-page-images/p0015.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..643c98a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0015.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0016.png b/24742-page-images/p0016.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e3f2e9e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0016.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0017.png b/24742-page-images/p0017.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7106c88
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0017.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0018.png b/24742-page-images/p0018.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..391f73c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0018.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0019.png b/24742-page-images/p0019.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8e0918b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0019.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0020.png b/24742-page-images/p0020.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6e846a5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0020.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0021.png b/24742-page-images/p0021.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c72839d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0021.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0022.png b/24742-page-images/p0022.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7a7d318
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0022.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0023.png b/24742-page-images/p0023.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3167304
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0023.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0024.png b/24742-page-images/p0024.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8184fab
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0024.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0025.png b/24742-page-images/p0025.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..258034a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0025.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0026.png b/24742-page-images/p0026.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f466d6a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0026.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0027.png b/24742-page-images/p0027.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8af6b6e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0027.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0028.png b/24742-page-images/p0028.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4a0db58
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0028.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0029.png b/24742-page-images/p0029.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..73d8c90
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0029.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0030.png b/24742-page-images/p0030.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2c83558
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0030.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0031.png b/24742-page-images/p0031.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7f87a0d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0031.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0032.png b/24742-page-images/p0032.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d1b28e9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0032.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0033.png b/24742-page-images/p0033.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c7ee570
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0033.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0034.png b/24742-page-images/p0034.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a2615f1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0034.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0035.png b/24742-page-images/p0035.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..dc15c84
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0035.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0036.png b/24742-page-images/p0036.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c79e899
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0036.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0037.png b/24742-page-images/p0037.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4d458f4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0037.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0038.png b/24742-page-images/p0038.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..606b962
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0038.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0039.png b/24742-page-images/p0039.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..27e7b79
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0039.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0040.png b/24742-page-images/p0040.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6f9cbab
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0040.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0041.png b/24742-page-images/p0041.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f08bb88
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0041.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0042.png b/24742-page-images/p0042.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..72712d1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0042.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0043.png b/24742-page-images/p0043.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1e81399
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0043.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0044.png b/24742-page-images/p0044.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..199168f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0044.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0045.png b/24742-page-images/p0045.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..db4750e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0045.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0046.png b/24742-page-images/p0046.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a5170e8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0046.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0047.png b/24742-page-images/p0047.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3c87b0e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0047.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0048.png b/24742-page-images/p0048.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ae55c8b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0048.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0049.png b/24742-page-images/p0049.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9026ab1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0049.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0050.png b/24742-page-images/p0050.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..96592e7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0050.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0051.png b/24742-page-images/p0051.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2e1a2e2
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0051.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0052.png b/24742-page-images/p0052.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..15b53c4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0052.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0053.png b/24742-page-images/p0053.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1df1e2e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0053.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0054.png b/24742-page-images/p0054.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..fa69e8f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0054.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0055.png b/24742-page-images/p0055.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9d412a8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0055.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0056.png b/24742-page-images/p0056.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9ca5468
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0056.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0057.png b/24742-page-images/p0057.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2351987
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0057.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0058.png b/24742-page-images/p0058.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9aa79f5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0058.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0059.png b/24742-page-images/p0059.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2673c95
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0059.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0060.png b/24742-page-images/p0060.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..650ff32
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0060.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0061.png b/24742-page-images/p0061.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1e238b1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0061.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0062.png b/24742-page-images/p0062.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..dae892a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0062.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0063.png b/24742-page-images/p0063.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..aa4d049
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0063.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0064.png b/24742-page-images/p0064.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bc8d563
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0064.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0065.png b/24742-page-images/p0065.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..52b2079
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0065.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0066.png b/24742-page-images/p0066.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..69f9198
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0066.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0067.png b/24742-page-images/p0067.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ef4d2ef
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0067.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0068.png b/24742-page-images/p0068.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a19c91c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0068.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0069.png b/24742-page-images/p0069.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8e74f6f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0069.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0070.png b/24742-page-images/p0070.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..529cabb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0070.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0071.png b/24742-page-images/p0071.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..29f025c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0071.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0072.png b/24742-page-images/p0072.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..860d788
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0072.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0073.png b/24742-page-images/p0073.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..23910df
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0073.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0074.png b/24742-page-images/p0074.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3148cdf
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0074.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0075.png b/24742-page-images/p0075.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c51f89c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0075.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0076.png b/24742-page-images/p0076.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b70632a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0076.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0077.png b/24742-page-images/p0077.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..06a9479
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0077.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0078.png b/24742-page-images/p0078.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4999d6b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0078.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0079.png b/24742-page-images/p0079.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7bc755e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0079.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0080.png b/24742-page-images/p0080.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c83435b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0080.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0081.png b/24742-page-images/p0081.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8f6d89b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0081.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0082.png b/24742-page-images/p0082.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8af0c56
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0082.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0083.png b/24742-page-images/p0083.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d913544
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0083.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0084.png b/24742-page-images/p0084.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..25e0b47
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0084.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0085.png b/24742-page-images/p0085.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5dc5afb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0085.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0086.png b/24742-page-images/p0086.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f09c7bc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0086.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0087.png b/24742-page-images/p0087.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..228a20a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0087.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0088.png b/24742-page-images/p0088.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0874967
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0088.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0089.png b/24742-page-images/p0089.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5415eca
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0089.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0090.png b/24742-page-images/p0090.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..afd5285
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0090.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0091.png b/24742-page-images/p0091.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..adf14e7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0091.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0092.png b/24742-page-images/p0092.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8c16cd2
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0092.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0093.png b/24742-page-images/p0093.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6876f57
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0093.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0094.png b/24742-page-images/p0094.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..eabb1bb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0094.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0095.png b/24742-page-images/p0095.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8f4253f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0095.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0096.png b/24742-page-images/p0096.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0a7b925
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0096.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0097.png b/24742-page-images/p0097.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c852f62
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0097.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0098.png b/24742-page-images/p0098.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ef8472d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0098.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0099.png b/24742-page-images/p0099.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5c3f4d7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0099.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0100.png b/24742-page-images/p0100.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9cae8c0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0100.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0101.png b/24742-page-images/p0101.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..21605e7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0101.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0102.png b/24742-page-images/p0102.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..809d7c1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0102.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0103.png b/24742-page-images/p0103.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..61aa1a0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0103.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0104.png b/24742-page-images/p0104.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9c73de6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0104.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0105.png b/24742-page-images/p0105.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..09d8b26
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0105.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0106.png b/24742-page-images/p0106.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..db08235
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0106.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0107.png b/24742-page-images/p0107.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..692e4c9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0107.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0108.png b/24742-page-images/p0108.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..365b228
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0108.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0109.png b/24742-page-images/p0109.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1cd7625
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0109.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0110.png b/24742-page-images/p0110.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7b9e936
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0110.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0111.png b/24742-page-images/p0111.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0940e1c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0111.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0112.png b/24742-page-images/p0112.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6557297
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0112.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0113.png b/24742-page-images/p0113.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..06a69c9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0113.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0114.png b/24742-page-images/p0114.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..10b5255
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0114.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0115.png b/24742-page-images/p0115.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..52e423d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0115.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0116.png b/24742-page-images/p0116.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..766ba6c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0116.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0117.png b/24742-page-images/p0117.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ed322a6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0117.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0118.png b/24742-page-images/p0118.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..edfb29d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0118.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0119.png b/24742-page-images/p0119.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8439510
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0119.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0120.png b/24742-page-images/p0120.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e620afc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0120.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0121.png b/24742-page-images/p0121.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..638dae6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0121.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0122.png b/24742-page-images/p0122.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..240a27b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0122.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0123.png b/24742-page-images/p0123.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ab464f0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0123.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0124.png b/24742-page-images/p0124.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5540eed
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0124.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0125.png b/24742-page-images/p0125.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6749c01
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0125.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0126.png b/24742-page-images/p0126.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ee185f1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0126.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0127.png b/24742-page-images/p0127.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ac2e211
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0127.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0128.png b/24742-page-images/p0128.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6547e80
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0128.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0129.png b/24742-page-images/p0129.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f2ed2a6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0129.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0130.png b/24742-page-images/p0130.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d299164
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0130.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0131.png b/24742-page-images/p0131.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..11c5b32
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0131.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0132.png b/24742-page-images/p0132.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e710202
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0132.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0133.png b/24742-page-images/p0133.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1f7469b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0133.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0134.png b/24742-page-images/p0134.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..33ecbf8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0134.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0135.png b/24742-page-images/p0135.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8ad6fcb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0135.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0136.png b/24742-page-images/p0136.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f768ada
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0136.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0137.png b/24742-page-images/p0137.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3d7ffb2
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0137.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0138.png b/24742-page-images/p0138.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0746c59
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0138.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0139.png b/24742-page-images/p0139.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f806fe0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0139.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0140.png b/24742-page-images/p0140.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..680881e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0140.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0141.png b/24742-page-images/p0141.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d7239dd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0141.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0142.png b/24742-page-images/p0142.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..72d3bb7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0142.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0143.png b/24742-page-images/p0143.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9493749
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0143.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0144.png b/24742-page-images/p0144.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..93c9565
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0144.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0145.png b/24742-page-images/p0145.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..026b553
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0145.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0146.png b/24742-page-images/p0146.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..55b3279
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0146.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0147.png b/24742-page-images/p0147.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..05e32b0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0147.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0148.png b/24742-page-images/p0148.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..dee023a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0148.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0149.png b/24742-page-images/p0149.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5b6da9f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0149.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0150.png b/24742-page-images/p0150.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..da8065a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0150.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0151.png b/24742-page-images/p0151.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..df6f95f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0151.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0152.png b/24742-page-images/p0152.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..701c653
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0152.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0153.png b/24742-page-images/p0153.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..42bfe90
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0153.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0154.png b/24742-page-images/p0154.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5ceae58
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0154.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0155.png b/24742-page-images/p0155.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6dad297
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0155.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0156.png b/24742-page-images/p0156.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7d46cd5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0156.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0157.png b/24742-page-images/p0157.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e83ae52
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0157.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0158.png b/24742-page-images/p0158.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ca47749
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0158.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0159.png b/24742-page-images/p0159.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bc98fc6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0159.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0160.png b/24742-page-images/p0160.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e5d075e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0160.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0161.png b/24742-page-images/p0161.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b9739e9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0161.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0162.png b/24742-page-images/p0162.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2a9baa7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0162.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0163.png b/24742-page-images/p0163.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9cc43b6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0163.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0164.png b/24742-page-images/p0164.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f8825b4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0164.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0165.png b/24742-page-images/p0165.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2e2fe02
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0165.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0166.png b/24742-page-images/p0166.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f181c85
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0166.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0167.png b/24742-page-images/p0167.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..63d6b08
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0167.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0168.png b/24742-page-images/p0168.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4c7e791
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0168.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0169.png b/24742-page-images/p0169.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8db5aed
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0169.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0170.png b/24742-page-images/p0170.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ff1c32b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0170.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0171.png b/24742-page-images/p0171.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..409f48a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0171.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0172.png b/24742-page-images/p0172.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b324736
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0172.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0173.png b/24742-page-images/p0173.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ff83821
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0173.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0174.png b/24742-page-images/p0174.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..13c9349
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0174.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0175.png b/24742-page-images/p0175.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..27c39a0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0175.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0176.png b/24742-page-images/p0176.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c51f129
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0176.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0177.png b/24742-page-images/p0177.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4bea616
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0177.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0178.png b/24742-page-images/p0178.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..31af96e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0178.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0179.png b/24742-page-images/p0179.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..28e3813
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0179.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0180.png b/24742-page-images/p0180.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..538f27b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0180.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0181.png b/24742-page-images/p0181.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..57f81b0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0181.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0182.png b/24742-page-images/p0182.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1f4b81f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0182.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0183.png b/24742-page-images/p0183.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8f8e5e9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0183.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0184.png b/24742-page-images/p0184.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2680a97
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0184.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0185.png b/24742-page-images/p0185.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..891baf9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0185.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0186.png b/24742-page-images/p0186.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..150ffb0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0186.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0187.png b/24742-page-images/p0187.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bc9d736
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0187.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0188.png b/24742-page-images/p0188.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e385e4b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0188.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0189.png b/24742-page-images/p0189.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5695f1f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0189.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0190.png b/24742-page-images/p0190.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d1dafe7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0190.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0191.png b/24742-page-images/p0191.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..799b0e6
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0191.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0192.png b/24742-page-images/p0192.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4aa248e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0192.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0193.png b/24742-page-images/p0193.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0ee3c3f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0193.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0194.png b/24742-page-images/p0194.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3d80c21
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0194.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0195.png b/24742-page-images/p0195.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..982aab4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0195.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0196.png b/24742-page-images/p0196.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..70eb358
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0196.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0197.png b/24742-page-images/p0197.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ba09081
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0197.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0198.png b/24742-page-images/p0198.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8408391
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0198.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0199.png b/24742-page-images/p0199.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5250a4a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0199.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0200.png b/24742-page-images/p0200.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7033911
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0200.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0201.png b/24742-page-images/p0201.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8ea4199
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0201.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0202.png b/24742-page-images/p0202.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..334cad3
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0202.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0203.png b/24742-page-images/p0203.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9530d8d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0203.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0204.png b/24742-page-images/p0204.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2499dce
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0204.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0205.png b/24742-page-images/p0205.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ad94ded
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0205.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0206.png b/24742-page-images/p0206.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..09e2360
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0206.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0207.png b/24742-page-images/p0207.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..68099ce
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0207.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0208.png b/24742-page-images/p0208.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9c04f80
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0208.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0209.png b/24742-page-images/p0209.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9dd6b10
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0209.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0210.png b/24742-page-images/p0210.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..bda71e5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0210.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0211.png b/24742-page-images/p0211.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..52deeb1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0211.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0212.png b/24742-page-images/p0212.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8b472ca
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0212.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0213.png b/24742-page-images/p0213.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4413de4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0213.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0214.png b/24742-page-images/p0214.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e525f2b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0214.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0215.png b/24742-page-images/p0215.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5711c9a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0215.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0216.png b/24742-page-images/p0216.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f44dd51
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0216.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0217.png b/24742-page-images/p0217.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5688209
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0217.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0218.png b/24742-page-images/p0218.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..930950b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0218.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0219.png b/24742-page-images/p0219.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6d7d8b1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0219.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0220.png b/24742-page-images/p0220.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9c5ecbb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0220.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0221.png b/24742-page-images/p0221.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b4ce579
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0221.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0222.png b/24742-page-images/p0222.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6166528
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0222.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0223.png b/24742-page-images/p0223.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3693a08
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0223.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0224.png b/24742-page-images/p0224.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1ede1f4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0224.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0225.png b/24742-page-images/p0225.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1e77287
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0225.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0226.png b/24742-page-images/p0226.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1b87be1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0226.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0227.png b/24742-page-images/p0227.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..55f8f24
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0227.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0228.png b/24742-page-images/p0228.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c644517
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0228.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0229.png b/24742-page-images/p0229.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b843394
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0229.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0230.png b/24742-page-images/p0230.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5f14d30
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0230.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0231.png b/24742-page-images/p0231.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1b5a1bd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0231.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0232.png b/24742-page-images/p0232.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6ef2e57
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0232.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0233.png b/24742-page-images/p0233.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e29b9c4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0233.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0234.png b/24742-page-images/p0234.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3e69cc3
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0234.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0235.png b/24742-page-images/p0235.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f443e02
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0235.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0236.png b/24742-page-images/p0236.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..40ccc37
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0236.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0237.png b/24742-page-images/p0237.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d24cc47
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0237.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0238.png b/24742-page-images/p0238.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..363c5ad
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0238.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0239.png b/24742-page-images/p0239.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d77ab33
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0239.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0240.png b/24742-page-images/p0240.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..fdadcd1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0240.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0241.png b/24742-page-images/p0241.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..3cba0ee
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0241.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0242.png b/24742-page-images/p0242.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..a77cf43
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0242.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0243.png b/24742-page-images/p0243.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f00f8d1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0243.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0244.png b/24742-page-images/p0244.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1426af0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0244.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0245.png b/24742-page-images/p0245.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b7049e0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0245.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0246.png b/24742-page-images/p0246.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1a99909
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0246.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0247.png b/24742-page-images/p0247.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..5fc8c5c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0247.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0248.png b/24742-page-images/p0248.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..c921238
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0248.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0249.png b/24742-page-images/p0249.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7e31646
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0249.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0250.png b/24742-page-images/p0250.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0a5ece9
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0250.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0251.png b/24742-page-images/p0251.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..153c248
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0251.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0252.png b/24742-page-images/p0252.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1832795
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0252.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0253.png b/24742-page-images/p0253.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..cb724b0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0253.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0254.png b/24742-page-images/p0254.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..f7ba519
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0254.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0255.png b/24742-page-images/p0255.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ba22234
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0255.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0256.png b/24742-page-images/p0256.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..86e8b8e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0256.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0257.png b/24742-page-images/p0257.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0818e72
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0257.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0258.png b/24742-page-images/p0258.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7772c8f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0258.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0259.png b/24742-page-images/p0259.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..15d6cad
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0259.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0260.png b/24742-page-images/p0260.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..001c1cc
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0260.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0261.png b/24742-page-images/p0261.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..dcd66ad
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0261.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0262.png b/24742-page-images/p0262.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d3a416d
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0262.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/p0263.png b/24742-page-images/p0263.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8abdba0
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/p0263.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0001.png b/24742-page-images/q0001.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..7381133
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0001.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0002.png b/24742-page-images/q0002.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4b82fc2
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0002.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0003.png b/24742-page-images/q0003.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..4e348a3
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0003.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0004.png b/24742-page-images/q0004.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..923d1fb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0004.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0005.png b/24742-page-images/q0005.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6b4f22c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0005.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0006.png b/24742-page-images/q0006.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8916f1c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0006.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0007.png b/24742-page-images/q0007.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..0fb625b
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0007.png
diff --git a/24742-page-images/q0008.png b/24742-page-images/q0008.png
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..2f6083a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742-page-images/q0008.png
diff --git a/24742.txt b/24742.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..729ce11
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,5127 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Mary, Mary, by James Stephens
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Mary, Mary
+
+Author: James Stephens
+
+Commentator: Padraic Colum
+
+Release Date: March 3, 2008 [EBook #24742]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARY, MARY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charlene Taylor and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                            MARY, MARY
+
+                         BY JAMES STEPHENS
+
+
+
+                    INTRODUCTION BY PADRAIC COLUM
+
+
+
+
+                      BONI AND LIVERIGHT, INC.
+                        PUBLISHERS NEW YORK
+
+               _Printed in the United States of America_
+
+           1912, BY SMALL, MAYNARD AND COMPANY (INCORPORATED)
+
+
+
+
+                                 TO
+
+                         BETHEL SOLOMONS, M.B.
+
+
+
+
+
+                             MARY, MARY
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+If any of James Stephens' books might be thought to have need of an
+Introduction it would be the delightful story that is called "Mary,
+Mary" on one side of the Atlantic Ocean and "The Charwoman's Daughter"
+on the other. It was written in 1910, when the author was known as the
+poet of "Insurrections" and the writer of a few of the mordant studies
+that belong to a later book, "Here Are Ladies."
+
+In 1911 four people came together to establish "The Irish Review."
+They were David Houston, Thomas MacDonagh, James Stephens and the
+present writer. James Stephens mentioned that he could hand over some
+stuff for publication. The "stuff" was the book in hand. It came out
+as a serial in the second number with the title "Mary, A Story," ran
+for a twelvemonth and did much to make the fortune (if a review that
+perished after a career of four years ever had its fortune made) of
+"The Irish Review."
+
+From the publication of its first chapters the appeal of "Mary"
+was felt in two or three countries. Mary Makebelieve was not just
+a fictional heroine--she was Cinderella and Snow-white and all
+the maidens of tradition for whom the name of heroine is big and
+burthensome. With the first words of the story James Stephens put us
+into the attitude of listeners to the household tale of folk-lore.
+"Mary, Mary" is the simplest of stories: a girl sees this and that,
+meets a Great Creature who makes advances to her, is humiliated,
+finds a young champion and comes into her fortune--that is all there
+is to it as a story. But is it not enough to go with Mary to Stephens'
+Green and watch the young ducks "pick up nothing with the greatest
+eagerness and swallow it with the greatest delight," and after that
+to notice that the ring priced One Hundred Pounds has been taken
+from the Jewellers' window, and then stand outside the theatre with
+her and her mother and make up with them the story of the plays from
+the pictures on the posters?--plays of mystery and imagination they
+must have surely been.
+
+Then, of course, there is always Mary's mother; and Mrs. Makebelieve,
+with her beaked nose, and her eyes like pools of ink, and her
+eagle-flights of speech would give a backbone to any story. Mrs.
+Makebelieve has and holds all the privileges of the poor and the
+lonely. Moreover, she is the eternal Charwoman. "She could not remain
+for any length of time in peoples' employment without being troubled
+by the fact that these folk had houses of their own and were actually
+employing her in a menial capacity." Mrs. Makebelieve is, I think, a
+typical figure. She is the incarnation of the pride and liveliness and
+imaginative exuberance that permit the poor to live.
+
+How poor are Mary and Mrs. Makebelieve? We know their lack by the
+measure of their desire. Mrs. Makebelieve, always generous, would have
+paid her servants Ten Shillings per Week each, and their Board. And we
+know that she had often observed desolate people dragging themselves
+through the streets, standing to glare through the windows of bakeries
+and confectioners' shops, with little children in some of their arms,
+and that thinking of such things every morsel she ate would have
+choked her were it not for her own hunger. By our being brought to
+desire what Mary and her mother desired we come to know the things
+they lacked.
+
+Yes, poverty was the state in which Mary and Mrs. Makebelieve existed,
+but freedom was the other side of that poverty. They had not to set
+the bounds of realization upon their wishes. They were not shut off,
+as too many of us are, from the adventure and the enchantment that are
+in things. A broken mirror upon the wall of a bare room! It is, after
+all, that wonder of wonders, a thing. But one cannot convey to those
+who have not known the wonder, how wonderful a mere thing is! A child
+who has watched and watched the face of a grandfather's clock, stopped
+before he was born, feels this wonder. To grown folk and to those
+who have many possessions the things they own are lumber, some more
+convenient, some more decorative than others. But to those who have
+few possessions things are familiars and have an intimate history.
+Hence it is only the poor or only unspoiled children that have the
+full freedom of things--who can enter into their adventure and their
+enchantment. Mary and her mother have this franchise. And for this
+reason also "Mary, Mary" has an inner resemblance to a folk-tale. For
+the folk-tale, shaped as it has been by the poor and by unspoiled
+people, reveals always the adventure and the enchantment of things.
+An old lamp may be Aladdin's. A comb might kill a false queen. A key
+may open the door of a secret chamber. A dish may be the supreme
+possession of a King. The sense of the uniqueness of things--the sense
+that the teller of the folk-tale has always, and that such a poet of
+the poor as Burns has often, is in "Mary, Mary." And there is in it
+too the zest that the hungry--not the starved but the hungry--have for
+life. James Stephens says of the young man who became Mary's champion,
+"His ally and stay was hunger, and there is no better ally for any
+man: that satisfied and the game is up; for hunger is life, ambition,
+good will and understanding, while fulness is all those negatives
+which culminate in greediness, stupidity, and decay."
+
+The scene of the story is that grey-colored, friendly capital--Dublin.
+It is not the tortuous, inimical, Aristotlian-minded Dublin of James
+Joyce's "Portrait of the Artist"--it is the Dublin of the
+simple-hearted Dubliner: Dublin with its great grey clouds and its
+poising sea-birds, with its hills and its bay, with its streets that
+everyone would avoid and with its other streets that everyone
+promenades; with its greens and its park and its river-walks--Dublin,
+always friendly. It is true that there are in it those who, as the
+Policeman told Mary, are born by stealth, eat by subterfuge, drink
+by dodges, get married by antics, and slide into death by strange,
+subterranean passages. Well, even these would be kindly and humorous
+the reader of "Mary, Mary" knows. James Stephens has made Dublin a
+place where the heart likes to dwell.
+
+    And would to God that I to-day
+    Saw sunlight on the Hill of Howth,
+    And sunlight on the Golden Spears,
+    And sunlight out on Dublin Bay.
+
+So one who has known Dublin might well exclaim on reading "Mary, Mary"
+east or west of Eirinn.
+
+James Stephens brought a fresh and distinctive element into the new
+Irish literature--an imaginative exuberance that in its rush of
+expression became extravagant, witty, picturesque and lovely. His work
+began to appear about 1906. Like the rest of the young Irish writers
+he made his appearance in the weekly journal "Sinn Fein," contributing
+to it his first poems and his mordant or extravagant essays and stories.
+At once he made a public for himself. His first poems were published
+in a volume called "Insurrections" and his public became a wide one.
+"Mary, Mary" brought out in 1912 was his first prose book. His next, the
+unclassifiable "Crock of Gold," was given the De Polignac Prize in 1914.
+Since then he has published two other prose books--"Here Are Ladies" and
+"The Demi-Gods," with three books of verse, "The Hill of Vision," "Songs
+from the Clay," and "The Rocky Road to Dublin."
+
+"Insurrections," written just before "Mary, Mary," has vivid
+revelations of personality. "I saw God--do you doubt it?" says Tomas
+an Buile in the "pub."--
+
+    I saw God. Do you doubt it?
+        Do you dare to doubt it?
+    I saw the Almighty Man. His hand
+    Was resting on a mountain, and
+    He looked upon the World and all about it:
+    I saw Him plainer than you see me now,
+        You mustn't doubt it.
+
+    He was not satisfied;
+        His look was all dissatisfied.
+    His beard swung on a wind far out of sight
+    Behind the world's curve, and there was light
+    Most fearful from His forehead, and He sighed,
+    "That star went always wrong, and from the start
+        I was dissatisfied."
+
+    He lifted up His hand--
+        I say He heaved a dreadful hand
+    Over the spinning Earth, then I said "Stay,
+    You must not strike it, God; I'm in the way;
+    And I will never move from where I stand."
+    He said, "Dear child, I feared that you were dead,"
+        And stayed His hand.
+
+His God is never a lonely God--he has need of humanity, and the quick
+champion of humanity springs straight into the love of God. Such is
+the intuition that is in all James Stephens' books.
+
+He is the only author I have ever known whose talk is like his books.
+The prodigality of humour, intuition and searching thought that he
+puts into his pages he also puts into what he says. And he is the only
+man I ever met who can sing his stories as well as tell them. Like the
+rest of the Irish writers of to-day, what he writes has a sense of
+spiritual equality as amongst all men and women--a sense of a
+democracy that is inherent in the world.
+
+[Illustration: signature: Padraic Colum]
+
+New York, September, 1917.
+
+
+
+
+
+MARY, MARY
+
+I
+
+
+Mary Makebelieve lived with her mother in a small room at the very top
+of a big, dingy house in a Dublin back street. As long as she could
+remember she had lived in that top back room. She knew every crack in
+the ceiling, and they were numerous and of strange shapes. Every spot
+of mildew on the ancient wall-paper was familiar. She had, indeed,
+watched the growth of most from a grayish shade to a dark stain, from
+a spot to a great blob, and the holes in the skirting of the walls,
+out of which at nighttime the cockroaches came rattling, she knew
+also. There was but one window in the room, and when she wished to
+look out of it she had to push the window up, because the grime of
+many years had so encrusted the glass that it was of no more than the
+demi-semi-transparency of thin horn. When she did look there was
+nothing to see but a bulky array of chimney-pots crowning a next-door
+house, and these continually hurled jays of soot against her window;
+therefore, she did not care to look out often, for each time that she
+did so she was forced to wash herself, and as water had to be carried
+from the very bottom of the five-story house up hundreds and hundreds
+of stairs to her room, she disliked having to use too much water.
+
+Her mother seldom washed at all. She held that washing was very
+unhealthy and took the natural gloss off the face, and that, moreover,
+soap either tightened the skin or made it wrinkle. Her own face was
+very tight in some places and very loose in others, and Mary
+Makebelieve often thought that the tight places were spots which her
+mother used to wash when she was young, and the loose parts were
+those which had never been washed at all. She thought that she would
+prefer to be either loose all over her face or tight all over it, and,
+therefore, when she washed she did it thoroughly, and when she
+abstained she allowed of no compromise.
+
+Her mother's face was the color of old, old ivory. Her nose was like a
+great strong beak, and on it the skin was stretched very tightly, so
+that her nose shone dully when the candle was lit. Her eyes were big
+and as black as pools of ink and as bright as the eyes of a bird. Her
+hair also was black, it was as smooth as the finest silk, and when
+unloosened it hung straightly down, shining about her ivory face. Her
+lips were thin and scarcely colored at all, and her hands were sharp,
+quick hands, seeming all knuckle when she closed them and all fingers
+when they were opened again.
+
+Mary Makebelieve loved her mother very dearly, and her mother returned
+her affection with an overwhelming passion that sometimes surged into
+physically painful caresses. When her mother hugged her for any length
+of time she soon wept, rocking herself and her daughter to and fro,
+and her clutch became then so frantic that poor Mary Makebelieve found
+it difficult to draw her breath; but she would not for the world have
+disturbed the career of her mother's love. Indeed, she found some
+pleasure in the fierceness of those caresses, and welcomed the pain
+far more than she reprobated it.
+
+Her mother went out early every morning to work, and seldom returned
+home until late at night. She was a charwoman, and her work was to
+scrub out rooms and wash down staircases. She also did cooking when
+she was asked, and needlework when she got any to do. She had made
+exquisite dresses which were worn by beautiful young girls at balls
+and picnics, and fine, white shirts that great gentlemen wore when
+they were dining, and fanciful waistcoats for gay young men, and silk
+stockings for dancing in--but that was a long time ago, because these
+beautiful things used to make her very angry when they were taken from
+her, so that she cursed the people who came to take them away and
+sometimes tore up the dresses and danced on them and screamed.
+
+She used often to cry because she was not rich. Sometimes, when she
+came home from work, she liked to pretend that she was rich; she would
+play at imagining that some one had died and left her a great fortune,
+or that her brother Patrick had come back from America with vast
+wealth, and then she would tell Mary Makebelieve of the things she
+intended to buy and do the very next day. Mary Makebelieve liked
+that.... They were to move the first thing in the morning to a big
+house with a garden behind it full of fruit trees and flowers and
+birds. There would be a wide lawn in front of the house to play lawn
+tennis in and to walk with delicately fine young men with fair faces
+and white hands, who would speak in the French language and bow often
+with their hats almost touching the ground. There were to be twelve
+servants--six of them men servants and six of them women servants--who
+would instantly do as they were bidden and would receive ten shillings
+each per week and their board; they would also have two nights free in
+the week, and would be very well fed. There were many wonderful
+dresses to be bought, dresses for walking in the streets and dresses
+for driving in a carriage, and others again for riding on horseback
+and for traveling in. There was a dress of crimson silk with a deep
+lace collar, and a heavy, wine-colored satin dress with a gold chain
+falling down in front of it, and there was a pretty white dress of the
+finest linen, having one red rose pinned at the waist. There were
+black silken stockings with quaint designs worked on them in red silk,
+and scarves of silver gauze, and others embroidered with flowers and
+little shapes of men and women.
+
+When her mother was planning all these things she was very happy, but
+afterwards she used to cry bitterly and rock her daughter to and fro
+on her breast until she hurt her.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+Every morning about six o'clock Mary Makebelieve left her bed and lit
+the fire. It was an ugly fire to light, because the chimney had never
+been swept, and there was no draught. Also they never had any sticks
+in the house, and scraps of paper twisted tightly into balls with the
+last night's cinders placed on them and a handful of small coals
+strewn on the top were used instead. Sometimes the fire blazed up
+quickly, and that made her happy, but at other times it went out three
+and four, and often half a dozen times; then the little bottle of
+paraffin oil had to be squandered--a few rags well steeped in the oil
+with a newspaper stretched over the grate seldom failed to coax enough
+fire to boil the saucepan of water; generally this method smoked the
+water, and then the tea tasted so horrid that one only drank it for
+the sake of economy.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve liked to lie in bed until the last possible moment.
+As there was no table in the room, Mary used to bring the two cups of
+tea, the tin of condensed milk, and the quarter of a loaf over to the
+bed, and there she and her mother took their breakfast.
+
+From the time she opened her eyes in the morning her mother never
+ceased to talk. It was then she went over all the things that had
+happened on the previous day and enumerated the places she would have
+to go to on the present day, and the chances for and against the
+making of a little money. At this meal she used to arrange also to
+have the room re-papered and the chimney swept and the rat-holes
+stopped up--there were three of these, one was on the left-hand side
+of the fire grate, the other two were under the bed, and Mary
+Makebelieve had lain awake many a night listening to the gnawing of
+teeth on the skirting and the scamper of little feet here and there on
+the floor. Her mother further arranged to have a Turkey carpet placed
+on the floor, although she admitted that oilcloth or linoleum was
+easier to clean, but they were not so nice to the feet or the eye.
+Into all these improvements her daughter entered with the greatest
+delight. There was to be a red mahogany chest of drawers against one
+wall and a rosewood piano against the wall opposite. A fender of
+shining brass with brazen furniture, a bright, copper kettle for
+boiling water in, and an iron pot for cooking potatoes and meat; there
+was to be a life-sized picture of Mary over the mantelpiece and a
+picture of her mother near the window in a golden frame, also a
+picture of a Newfoundland dog lying in a barrel and a little wee
+terrier crawling up to make friends with him, and a picture of a
+battle between black people and soldiers.
+
+Her mother knew it was time to get out of bed when she heard a heavy
+step coming from the next room and going downstairs. A laboring man
+lived there with his wife and six children. When the door banged she
+jumped up, dressed quickly, and flew from the room in a panic of
+haste. Usually then, as there was nothing to do, Mary went back to bed
+for another couple of hours. After this she arose, made the bed and
+tidied the room, and went out to walk in the streets, or to sit in the
+St. Stephen's Green Park. She knew every bird in the Park, those that
+had chickens and those that had had chickens, and those that never had
+any chickens at all--these latter were usually drakes, and had reason
+on their side for an abstention which might otherwise have appeared
+remarkable, but they did not deserve the pity which Mary lavished on
+their childlessness, nor the extra pieces of bread with which she
+sought to recompense them. She loved to watch the ducklings swimming
+after their mothers: they were quite fearless, and would dash to the
+water's edge where one was standing and pick up nothing with the
+greatest eagnerness and swallow it with delight. The mother duck swam
+placidly close to her brood and clucked in a low voice all kinds of
+warnings and advice and reproof to the little ones. Mary Makebelieve
+thought it was very clever of the little ducklings to be able to swim
+so well. She loved them, and when nobody was looking she used to cluck
+at them like their mother, but she did not often do this because she
+did not know duck language really well, and feared that her cluck
+might mean the wrong things, and that she might be giving these
+innocents bad advice, and telling them to do something contrary to
+what their mother had just directed.
+
+The bridge across the big lake was a fascinating place. On the sunny
+side lots of ducks were always standing on their heads searching for
+something in the water, so that they looked like only half ducks. On
+the shady side hundreds of eels were swimming about--they were most
+wonderful things; some of them were thin like ribbons, and others were
+round and plump like thick ropes. They never seemed to fight at all,
+and although the ducklings were so tiny the big eels never touched any
+of them, even when they dived right down amongst them. Some of the
+eels swam along very slowly, looking on this side and on that as if
+they were out of work or up from the country, and others whizzed by
+with incredible swiftness. Mary Makebelieve thought that the latter
+kind had just heard their babies crying; she wondered, when a little
+fish cried, could its mother see the tears where there was already so
+much water about, and then she thought that maybe they cried hard
+lumps of something that was easily visible.
+
+After this she would go around the flower-beds and look at each; some
+of them were shaped like stars, and some were quite round, and others
+again were square. She liked the star-shaped flower-beds best, and
+next she liked the round ones, and last of all the square. But she
+loved all the flowers, and used to make up stories about them.
+
+After that, growing hungry, she would go home for her lunch. She went
+home down Grafton Street and O'Connell Street. She always went along
+the right-hand side of the street going home, and looked in every shop
+window that she passed, and then, when she had eaten her lunch, she
+came out again and walked along the left-hand side of the road,
+looking at the shops on that side, and so she knew daily everything
+that was new in the city, and was able to tell her mother at nighttime
+that the black dress with Spanish lace was taken out of Manning's
+window and a red gown with tucks at the shoulders and Irish lace at
+the wrists put in its place; or that the diamond ring in Johnson's
+marked One Hundred Pounds was gone from the case and that a slide of
+brooches of beaten silver and blue enamel was there instead.
+
+In the nighttime her mother and herself went round to each of the
+theaters in turn and watched the people going in and looked at the big
+posters. When they went home afterwards they had supper and used to
+try to make out the plots of the various plays from the pictures they
+had seen, so that generally they had lots to talk about before they
+went to bed. Mary Makebelieve used to talk most in the nighttime, but
+her mother talked most in the morning.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+
+Her mother spoke sometimes of matrimony as a thing remote but very
+certain; the remoteness of this adventure rather shocked Mary
+Makebelieve; she knew that a girl had to get married, that a strange,
+beautiful man would come from somewhere looking for a wife and would
+retire again with his bride to that Somewhere which is the country of
+Romance. At times (and she could easily picture it) he rode in armor
+on a great bay horse, the plume of his helmet trailing among the high
+leaves of the forest. Or he came standing on the prow of a swift ship
+with the sunlight blazing back from his golden armor. Or on a grassy
+plain, fleet as the wind, he came running, leaping, laughing.
+
+When the subject of matrimony was under discussion her mother planned
+minutely the person of the groom, his vast accomplishments, and yet
+vaster wealth, the magnificence of his person, and the love in which
+he was held by rich and poor alike. She also discussed, down to the
+smallest detail, the elaborate trousseau she would provide for her
+daughter, the extravagant presents the bridegroom would make to his
+bride and her maids, and those, yet more costly, which the
+bridegroom's family would send to the newly married pair. All these
+wonders could only concentrate in the person of a lord. Mary
+Makebelieve's questions as to the status and appurtenances of a lord
+were searching and minute, her mother's rejoinders were equally
+elaborate and particular.
+
+At his birth a lord is cradled in silver, at his death he is laid in
+a golden casket, an oaken coffin, and a leaden outer coffin until,
+finally, a massy stone sarcophagus shrouds his remains forever. His
+life is a whirl of gayety and freedom. Around his castle there spread
+miles upon miles of sunny grass lands and ripened orchards and waving
+forests, and through these he hunts with his laughing companions or
+walks gently with his lady. He has servants by the thousand, each
+anxious to die for him, and his wealth, prodigious beyond the
+computation of avarice, is stored in underground chambers, whose low,
+tortuous passages lead to labyrinths of vaults, massy and impregnable.
+
+Mary Makebelieve would have loved to wed a lord. If a lord had come to
+her when she paced softly through a forest, or stood alone on the
+seashore, or crouched among the long grass of a windy plain, she would
+have placed her hands in his and followed him and loved him truly
+forever. But she did not believe that these things happened nowadays,
+nor did her mother. Nowadays! her mother looked on these paltry times
+with an eye whose scorn was complicated by fury. Mean, ugly days,
+mean, ugly lives, and mean, ugly people, said her mother, that's all
+one can get nowadays, and then she spoke of the people whose houses
+she washed out and whose staircases she scrubbed down, and her
+old-ivory face flamed from her black hair and her deep, dark eyes
+whirled and became hard and motionless as points of jet, and her hands
+jumped alternately into knuckles and claws.
+
+But it became increasingly evident to Mary Makebelieve that marriage
+was not a story but a fact, and, somehow, the romance of it did not
+drift away, although the very house wherein she lived was infested by
+these conjoints, and the streets wherein she walked were crowded with
+undistinguished couples.... Those gray-lived, dreary-natured people
+had a spark of fire smoldering somewhere in their poor economy. Six
+feet deep is scarcely deep enough to bury romance, and until that
+depth of clay has clogged our bones the fire can still smolder and be
+fanned, and, perhaps, blaze up and flare across a county or a country
+to warm the cold hands of many a shriveled person.
+
+How did all these people come together? She did not yet understand the
+basic necessity that drives the male to the female. Sex was not yet to
+her a physiological distinction, it was only a differentiation of
+clothing, a matter of whiskers and no whiskers: but she had begun to
+take a new and peculiar interest in men. One of these hurrying or
+loitering strangers might be the husband whom fate had ordained for
+her. She would scarcely have been surprised if one of the men who
+looked at her casually in the street had suddenly halted and asked her
+to marry him. It came on her with something like assurance that that
+was the only business these men were there for, she could not discover
+any other reason or excuse for their existence, and if some man had
+been thus adventurous Mary Makebelieve would have been sadly perplexed
+to find an answer: she might, indeed, have replied, "Yes, thank you,
+sir," for when a man asks one to do a thing for him one does it
+gladly. There was an attraction about young men which she could not
+understand, something peculiarly dear and magnetic; she would have
+liked to shake hands with one to see how different he felt from a
+girl. They would, probably, shake hands quite hard and then hit one.
+She fancied she would not mind being hit by a man, and then, watching
+the vigor of their movements, she thought they could hit very hard,
+but still there was a terrible attraction about the idea of being hit
+by a man. She asked her mother (with apparent irrelevance) had a man
+ever struck her; her mother was silent for a few moments, and then
+burst into so violent a passion of weeping that Mary Makebelieve was
+frightened. She rushed into her mother's arms and was rocked fiercely
+against a heart almost bursting with bitter pride and recollection.
+But her mother did not then, nor did she ever afterwards, answer Mary
+Makebelieve's question.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+
+Every afternoon a troop of policemen marched in solemn and majestic
+single file from the College Green Police Station. At regular
+intervals, one by one, a policeman stepped sideways from the file,
+adjusted his belt, touched his moustache, looked up the street and
+down the street for stray criminals, and condescended to the duties
+of his beat.
+
+At the crossing where Nassau and Suffolk streets intersect Grafton
+Street one of these superb creatures was wont to relinquish his
+companions, and there in the center of the road, a monument of
+solidity and law, he remained until the evening hour which released
+him again to the companionship of his peers.
+
+Perhaps this point is the most interesting place in Dublin. Upon one
+vista Grafton Street with its glittering shops stretches, or rather
+winds, to the St. Stephen's Green Park, terminating at the gate known
+as the Fusiliers' Arch, but which local patriotism has rechristened
+the Traitors' Gate. On the left Nassau Street, broad and clean, and a
+trifle vulgar and bourgeois in its openness, runs away to Merrion
+Square, and on with a broad ease to Blackrock and Kingstown and the
+sea. On the right hand Suffolk Street, reserved and shy, twists up to
+St. Andrew's Church, touches gingerly the South City Markets, droops
+to George's Street, and is lost in mean and dingy intersections. At
+the back of the crossing Grafton Street continues again for a little
+distance down to Trinity College (at the gates whereof very
+intelligent young men flaunt very tattered gowns and smoke massive
+pipes with great skill for their years), skirting the Bank of Ireland,
+and on to the River Liffey and the street which local patriotism
+defiantly speaks of as O'Connell Street, and alien patriotism, with
+equal defiance and pertinacity, knows as Sackville Street.
+
+To the point where these places meet, and where the policeman stands,
+all the traffic of Dublin converges in a constant stream. The trams
+hurrying to Terenure, or Donnybrook, or Dalkey flash around this
+corner; the doctors who, in these degenerate days, concentrate in
+Merrion Square, fly up here in carriages and motor cars, the vans of
+the great firms in Grafton and O'Connell streets, or those outlying,
+never cease their exuberant progress. The ladies and gentlemen of
+leisure stroll here daily at four o'clock, and from all sides the
+vehicles and pedestrians, the bicycles and motor bicycles, the trams
+and the outside cars rush to the solitary policeman, who directs them
+all with his severe but tolerant eye. He knows all the tram-drivers
+who go by, and his nicely graduated wink rewards the glances of the
+rubicund, jolly drivers of the hackneys and the decayed Jehus with
+purple faces and dismal hopefulness who drive sepulchral cabs for some
+reason which has no acquaintance with profit; nor are the ladies and
+gentlemen who saunter past foreign to his encyclopedic eye. Constantly
+his great head swings a slow recognition, constantly his serene finger
+motions onwards a well-known undesirable, and his big, white teeth
+flash for an instant at young, laughing girls and the more matronly
+acquaintances who solicit the distinction of his glance.
+
+To this place, and about this hour, Mary Makebelieve, returning from
+her solitary lunch, was wont to come. The figure of the massive
+policeman fascinated her. Surely everything desirable in manhood was
+concentrated in his tremendous body. What an immense, shattering blow
+that mighty fist could give! She could imagine it swinging vast as the
+buffet of a hero, high-thrown and then down irresistibly--a crashing,
+monumental hand. She delighted in his great, solid head as it swung
+slowly from side to side, and his calm, proud eye--a governing,
+compelling and determined eye. She had never met his glance yet: she
+withered away before it as a mouse withers and shrinks and falls to
+its den before a cat's huge glare. She used to look at him from the
+curbstone in front of the chemist's shop, or on the opposite side of
+the road, while pretending to wait for a tram; and at the pillar-box
+beside the optician's she found time for one furtive twinkle of a
+glance that shivered to his face and trembled away into the traffic.
+She did not think he noticed her, but there was nothing he did not
+notice. His business was noticing: he caught her in his mental
+policeman's note-book the very first day she came; he saw her each
+day beside, and at last looked for her coming and enjoyed her
+strategy. One day her shy, creeping glance was caught by his; it held
+her mesmerized for a few seconds, it looked down into her--for a
+moment the whole world seemed to have become one immense eye--she
+could scarcely get away from it.
+
+When she remembered again she was standing by the pond in St.
+Stephen's Green Park, with a queer frightened exaltation lightening
+through her blood. She did not go home that night by Grafton Street,
+she did not dare venture within reach of that powerful organism, but
+went a long way round, and still the way seemed very short.
+
+That night her mother, although very tired, was the more talkative of
+the two. She offered in exchange for her daughter's thoughts pennies
+that only existed in her imagination. Mary Makebelieve professed that
+it was sleep and not thought obsessed her, and exhibited voucher yawns
+which were as fictitious as her reply. When they went to bed that
+night it was a long time before she slept. She lay looking into the
+deep gloom of the chamber, and scarcely heard the fierce dreams of her
+mother, who was demanding from a sleep world the things she lacked in
+the wide-awake one.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+
+This is the appearance of Mary Makebelieve at that time:--She had fair
+hair, and it was very soft and very thick; when she unwound this it
+fell, or rather flowed, down to her waist, and when she walked about
+the room with her hair unloosened it curved beautifully about her
+head, snuggled into the hollow of her neck, ruffled out broadly again
+upon her shoulders, and swung into and out of her figure with every
+motion; surging and shrinking and dancing; the ends of her hair were
+soft and loose as foam, and it had the color and shining of pure,
+light gold. Commonly in the house she wore her hair loose, because her
+mother liked the appearance of youth imparted by hanging hair, and
+would often desire her daughter to leave off her outer skirt and walk
+only in her petticoats to heighten the illusion of girlishness. Her
+head was shaped very tenderly and softly; it was so small that when
+her hair was twisted up on it it seemed much too delicate to bear so
+great a burden. Her eyes were gray, limpidly tender and shy, drooping
+under weighty lids, so that they seldom seemed more than half opened
+and commonly sought the ground rather than the bolder excursions of
+straightforwardness; they seldom looked for longer than a glance,
+climbing and poising and eddying about the person at whom she gazed,
+and then dived away again; and always when she looked at any one she
+smiled a deprecation of her boldness. She had a small white face, very
+like her mother's in some ways and at some angles, but the tight beak
+which was her mother's nose was absent in Mary; her nose withdrew
+timidly in the center and only snatched a hurried courage to become
+visible at the tip. It was a nose that seemed to have been snubbed
+almost out of existence. Her mother loved it because it was so little,
+and had tried so hard not to be a nose at all. They often stood
+together before the little glass that had a great crack running
+drunkenly from the right-hand top corner down to the left-hand bottom
+corner, and two small arm crosses, one a little above the other, in
+the center. When one's face looked into this glass it often appeared
+there as four faces with horrible aberrations; an ear might be curving
+around a lip or an eye leering strangely in the middle of a chin. But
+there were ways of looking into the glass which practice had discovered,
+and usage had long ago dulled the terrors of its vagaries. Looking into
+this glass Mrs. Makebelieve would comment minutely upon the two faces
+therein, and, pointing to her own triumphantly genuine nose and the fact
+that her husband's nose had been of quite discernible proportions, she
+would seek in labyrinths of pedigree for a reason to justify her
+daughter's lack; she passed all her sisters in this review, with an
+army of aunts and great-aunts, rifling the tombs of grandparents and
+their remoter blood, and making long-dead noses to live again. Mary
+Makebelieve used to lift her timidly curious eye and smile in
+deprecation of her nasal shortcomings, and then her mother would kiss
+the dejected button and vow it was the dearest, loveliest bit of a nose
+that had ever been seen.
+
+"Big noses suit some people," said Mrs. Makebelieve, "but they do not
+suit others, and one would not suit you, dearie. They go well with
+black-haired people and very tall people, military gentlemen, judges
+and apothecaries; but small, fair folk cannot support great noses. I
+like my own nose," she continued. "At school, when I was a little
+girl, the other girls used to laugh at my nose, but I always liked it,
+and after a time other people came to like it also."
+
+Mary Makebelieve had small, slim hands and feet: the palms of her
+hands were softer than anything in the world; there were five little,
+pink cushions on her palm: beginning at the little finger there was a
+very tiny cushion, the next one was bigger, and the next bigger again,
+until the largest ended a perfect harmony at the base of her thumb.
+Her mother used to kiss these little cushions at times, holding back
+the finger belonging to each, and naming it as she touched it. These
+are the names of Mary Makebelieve's fingers, beginning with the
+Thumb:--Tom Tumkins, Willie Winkles, Long Daniel, Bessie Bobtail and
+Little Dick-Dick.
+
+Her slight, girlish figure was only beginning to creep to the deeper
+contours of womanhood, a half curve here and there, a sudden softness
+in the youthful lines, certain angles trembling on the slightest of
+rolls, a hint, a suggestion, the shadowy prophecy of circles and half
+hoops that could not yet roll: the trip of her movements was troubled
+sometimes to a sedater motion.
+
+These things her mother's curiosity was continually recording,
+sometimes with happy pride, but oftener in a kind of anger to find
+that her little girl was becoming a big girl. If it had been possible
+she would have detained her daughter forever in the physique of a
+child; she feared the time when Mary would become too evidently a
+woman, when all kinds of equalities would come to hinder her
+spontaneous and active affection. A woman might object to be nursed,
+while a girl would not; Mrs. Makebelieve feared that objection, and,
+indeed, Mary, under the stimulus of an awakening body and a new,
+strange warmth, was not altogether satisfied by being nursed or by
+being the passive participant in these caresses. She sometimes thought
+that she would like to take her mother on her own breast and rock her
+to and fro, crooning soft made-up words and kissing the top of a head
+or the half-hidden curve of a cheek, but she did not dare to do so
+for fear her mother would strike her. Her mother was very jealous on
+that point, she loved her daughter to kiss her and stroke her hands
+and her face, but she never liked her to play at being the mother, nor
+had she ever encouraged her daughter in the occupations of a doll. She
+was the mother and Mary was the baby, and she could not bear to have
+her motherhood hindered even in play.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+
+Although Mary Makebelieve was sixteen years of age she had not yet
+gone to work; her mother did not like the idea of her little girl
+stooping to the drudgery of the only employment she could have aided
+her to obtain--that was, to assist herself in the humble and arduous
+toil of charing. She had arranged that Mary was to go into a shop, a
+drapery store, or some such other, but that was to be in a sometime
+which seemed infinitely remote. "And then, too," said Mrs.
+Makebelieve, "all kinds of things may happen in a year or so if we
+wait. Your uncle Patrick, who went to America twenty years ago, may
+come home, and when he does you will not have to work, dearie, nor
+will I. Or again, some one going along the street may take a fancy to
+you and marry you; things often happen like that." There were a
+thousand schemes and accidents which, in her opinion, might occur to
+the establishment of her daughter's ease and the enlargement of her
+own dignity. And so Mary Makebelieve, when her mother was at work
+(which was sometimes every day in the week), had all the day to loiter
+in and spend as best she liked. Sometimes she did not go out at all.
+She stayed in the top back room sewing or knitting, mending holes in
+the sheets or the blankets, or reading books from the Free Library in
+Capel Street: but generally she preferred, after the few hours which
+served to put the room in order, to go out and walk along the streets,
+taking new turnings as often as she fancied, and striking down strange
+roads to see the shops and the people.
+
+There were so many people whom she knew by sight; almost daily she saw
+these somewhere, and she often followed them for a short distance,
+with a feeling of friendship; for the loneliness of the long day
+often drew down upon her like a weight, so that even the distant
+companionship of these remembered faces that did not know her was
+comforting. She wished she could find out who some of them
+were.--There was a tall man with a sweeping brown beard, whose heavy
+overcoat looked as though it had been put on with a shovel; he wore
+spectacles, and his eyes were blue, and always seemed as if they were
+going to laugh; he, also, looked into the shops as he went along, and
+he seemed to know everybody. Every few paces people would halt and
+shake his hand, but these people never spoke because the big man with
+the brown beard would instantly burst into a fury of speech which had
+no intervals, and when there was no one with him at all he would talk
+to himself. On these occasions he did not see any one, and people had
+to jump out of his way while he strode onwards swinging his big head
+from one side to the other, and with his eyes fixed on some place a
+great distance away. Once or twice, in passing, she heard him singing
+to himself the most lugubrious song in the world. There was another--a
+long, thin, black man--who looked young and was always smiling secretly
+to himself; his lips were never still for a moment, and, passing Mary
+Makebelieve a few times, she heard him buzzing like a great bee. He did
+not stop to shake hands with any one, and although many people saluted
+him he took no heed, but strode on smiling his secret smile and buzzing
+serenely. There was a third man whom she often noticed: his clothing
+seemed as if it had been put on him a long time ago and had never been
+taken off again. He had a long, pale face, with a dark moustache
+drooping over a most beautiful mouth. His eyes were very big and lazy,
+and did not look quite human; they had a trick of looking sidewards--a
+most intimate, personal look. Sometimes he saw nothing in the world but
+the pavement, and at other times he saw everything. He looked at Mary
+Makebelieve once and she got a fright; she had a queer idea that she had
+known him well hundreds of years before and that he remembered her also.
+She was afraid of that man, but she liked him because he looked so
+gentle and so--there was something else he looked which as yet she could
+not put a name to, but which her ancestry remembered dimly. There was a
+short, fair, pale-faced man, who looked like the tiredest man in the
+world. He was often preoccupied, but not in the singular way the others
+were. He seemed to be always chewing the cud of remembrance, and looked
+at people as if they reminded him of other people who were dead a long
+time and whom he thought of but did not regret. He was a detached man
+even in a crowd and carried with him a cold atmosphere; even his smile
+was bleak and aloof. Mary Makebelieve noticed that many people nudged
+each other as he went by, and then they would turn and look after him
+and go away whispering.
+
+These and many others she saw almost daily, and used to look for with
+a feeling of friendship. At other times she walked up the long line of
+quays sentineling the Liffey, watching the swift boats of Guinness
+puffing down the river and the thousands of sea-gulls hovering above
+or swimming on the dark waters, until she came to the Phoenix Park,
+where there was always a cricket or football match being played, or
+some young men or girls playing hurley, or children playing
+tip-and-tig, running after one another, and dancing and screaming in
+the sunshine. Her mother liked very much to go with her to the
+Phoenix Park on days when there was no work to be done. Leaving the
+great, white main road, up which the bicycles and motor cars are
+continually whizzing, a few minutes' walk brings one to quiet alleys
+sheltered by trees and groves of hawthorn. In these passages one can
+walk for a long time without meeting a person, or lie on the grass in
+the shadow of a tree and watch the sunlight beating down on the green
+fields and shimmering between the trees. There is a deep silence to be
+found here, very strange and beautiful to one fresh from the city, and
+it is strange also to look about in the broad sunshine and see no
+person near at all, and no movement saving the roll and folding of the
+grass, the slow swinging of the branches of the trees or the noiseless
+flight of a bee, a butterfly, or a bird.
+
+These things Mary Makebelieve liked, but her mother would pine for the
+dances of the little children, the gallant hurrying of the motor cars,
+and the movement to and fro of the people with gay dresses and colored
+parasols and all the circumstance of holiday.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+
+One morning Mary Makebelieve jumped out of bed and lit the fire. For a
+wonder it lit easily: the match was scarcely applied when the flames
+were leaping up the black chimney, and this made her feel at ease with
+the world. Her mother stayed in bed chatting with something more of
+gayety than usual. It was nearly six o'clock, and the early summer sun
+was flooding against the grimy window. The previous evening's post had
+brought a post-card for Mrs. Makebelieve, requesting her to call on a
+Mrs. O'Connor, who had a house off Harcourt Street. This, of course,
+meant a day's work--it also meant a new client.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve's clients were always new. She could not remain for
+any length of time in people's employment without being troubled by
+the fact that these folk had houses of their own and were actually
+employing her in a menial capacity. She sometimes looked at their
+black silk aprons in a way which they never failed to observe with
+anger, and on their attempting (as they always termed it) to put her
+in her proper place, she would discuss their appearance and morals
+with such power that they at once dismissed her from their employment
+and incited their husbands to assault her.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve's mind was exercised in finding out who had
+recommended her to this new lady, and in what terms of encomium such
+recommendation had been framed. She also debated as to whether it
+would be wise to ask for one shilling and ninepence per day instead of
+the customary one shilling and sixpence. If the house was a big one
+she might be required by this new customer oftener than once a week,
+and, perhaps, there were others in the house besides the lady who
+would find small jobs for her to do--needlework or messages, or some
+such which would bring in a little extra money; for she professed her
+willingness and ability to undertake with success any form of work in
+which a woman could be eminent. In a house where she had worked she
+had once been asked by a gentleman who lodged there to order in two
+dozen bottles of stout, and, on returning with the stout, the
+gentleman had thanked her and given her a shilling. Incidents parallel
+to this had kept her faith in humanity green. There must be plenty of
+these open-handed gentlemen in houses such as she worked in, and,
+perhaps, in Mrs. O'Connor's house there might be more than one such
+person. There were stingy people enough, heaven knew, people who would
+get one to run messages and almost expect to be paid themselves for
+allowing one to work for them. Mrs. Makebelieve anathematized such
+skinflints with a vocabulary which was quite equal to the detailing
+of their misdeeds; but she refused to dwell on them: they were not
+really important in a world where the sun was shining. In the
+nighttime she would again believe in their horrible existences, but
+until then the world must be peopled with kind-hearted folk. She
+instanced many whom she knew, people who had advanced services and
+effects without exacting or indeed expecting any return.
+
+When the tea was balanced insecurely on the bed, the two teacups on
+one side of her legs, the three-quarters of a loaf and the tin of
+condensed milk on the other, Mary sat down with great care, and all
+through the breakfast her mother culled from her capacious memory a
+list of kindnesses of which she had been the recipient or the witness.
+Mary supplemented the recital by incidents from her own observation.
+She had often seen a man in the street give a penny to an old woman.
+She had often seen old women give things to other old women. She knew
+many people who never looked for the halfpenny change from a newsboy.
+Mrs. Makebelieve applauded the justice of such transactions; they
+were, she admitted, the things she would do herself if she were in a
+position to be careless; but a person to whom the discovery of her
+daily bread is a daily problem, and who can scarcely keep pace with
+the ever-changing terms of the problem, is not in a position to be
+careless.--"Grind, grind, grind," said Mrs. Makebelieve, "that is life
+for me, and if I ceased to grind for an instant ..." she flickered her
+thin hand into a nowhere of terror. Her attitude was that when one had
+enough one should give the residue to some one who had not enough. It
+was her woe, it stabbed her to the heart, to see desolate people
+dragging through the streets, standing to glare through the windows of
+bakeries and confectioners' shops, and little children in some of
+these helpless arms! Thinking of these, she said that every morsel she
+ate would choke her were it not for her own hunger. But maybe, said
+she, catching a providential glance of the golden-tinted window, maybe
+these poor people were not as poor as they seemed: surely they had
+ways of collecting a living which other people did not know anything
+about. It might be that they got lots of money from kind-hearted
+people, and food at hospitable doors, and here and there clothing and
+oddments which, if they did not wear, they knew how to dispose of
+advantageously. What extremes of ways and means such people must be
+acquainted with! no ditch was too low to rummage in, no rat-hole too
+hidden to be ravaged; a gate represented something to be climbed over:
+an open door was an invitation, a locked one a challenge. They could
+dodge under the fences of the law and climb the barbed wire of
+morality with equal impunity, and the utmost rigor of punishment
+had little terror for those whose hardships could scarcely be
+artificially worsened. The stagger of despair, the stricken, helpless
+aspect of such people, their gaunt faces and blurred eyes might
+conceivably be their stock-in-trade, the keys wherewith they unlocked
+hearts and purses and area-doors. It must be so when the sun was
+shining and birds were singing across fields not immeasurably distant,
+and children in walled gardens romped among fruits and flowers. She
+would believe this, for it was the early morning when one must
+believe, but when the nighttime came again she would laugh to scorn
+such easy beliefs, she would see the lean ribs of humanity when she
+undressed herself.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+
+After her mother had gone Mary Makebelieve occupied herself settling
+the room and performing the various offices which the keeping in order
+of even one small room involves. There were pieces of the wall-paper
+flapping loosely; these had to be gummed down with strips of
+stamp-paper. The bed had to be made, the floor scrubbed, and a
+miscellany of objects patted and tapped into order. Her few dresses
+also had to be gone over for loose buttons, and the darning of
+threadbare places was a duty exercising her constant attention. Her
+clothing was always made by her mother, whose needle had once been
+noted for expertness, and, therefore, fitted more accurately than is
+customary in young girls' dresses. The arranging and rearranging of
+her beads was a frequent and enjoyable labor. She had four different
+necklaces, representing four different pennyworths of beads purchased
+at a shop whose merchandise was sold for one penny per item. One
+pennyworth of these beads was colored green, another red, a third was
+colored like pearls, and the fourth was a miscellaneous packet of many
+colors. A judicious selection of these beads could always provide a
+new and magnificent necklace at the expense of little more than a
+half-hour's easy work.
+
+Because the sun was shining she brought out her white dress, and for a
+time was busy on it. There had been five tucks in the dress, but one
+after one they had to be let out. This was the last tuck that
+remained, and it also had to go, but even with such extra lengthening
+the dress would still swing free of her ankles. Her mother had
+promised to add a false hem to it when she got time, and Mary
+determined to remind her of this promise as soon as she came in from
+work. She polished her shoes, put on the white dress, and then did up
+her hair in front of the cracked looking-glass. She always put up her
+hair very plainly. She first combed it down straight, then parted it
+in the center, and rolled it into a great ball at the back of her
+neck. She often wished to curl her hair, and, indeed, it would have
+curled with the lightest persuasion: but her mother being approached
+on the subject, said that curls were common and were seldom worn by
+respectable people, excepting very small children or actresses, both
+of whose slender mentalities were registered by these tiny
+daintinesses. Also, curls took up too much time in arranging, and the
+slightest moisture in the air was liable to draw them down into lank
+and unsightly plasters, and, therefore, saving for a dance or a
+picnic, curls should not be used.
+
+Mary Makebelieve, having arranged her hair, hesitated for some time in
+the choice of a necklace. There was the pearl-colored necklace--it was
+very pretty, but every one could tell at once that they were not
+genuine pearls. Real pearls of the bigness of these would be very
+valuable. Also there was something childish about pearls which
+latterly she wished to avoid. She had quite grown up now. The letting
+down of the last tuck in her dress marked an epoch as distinct as did
+the first rolling up of her hair. She wished her dress would go right
+down to her heels so that she might have a valid reason for holding up
+her skirts with one hand. She felt a trifle of impatience because her
+mother had delayed making the false hem; she could have stitched it on
+herself if her mother had cut it out, but for this day the dress would
+have to do. She wished she owned a string of red coral; not that round
+beady sort, but the jagged crisscross coral--a string of these long
+enough to go twice round her neck, and yet hang down in front to her
+waist. If she owned a string as long as that she might be able to cut
+enough off to make a slender wristlet. She would have loved to see
+such a wristlet sagging down to her hand.
+
+Red, it seemed, would have to be the color for this day, so she took
+the red beads out of a box and put them on. They looked very nice
+against her white dress, but still--she did not quite like them: they
+seemed too solid, so she put them back into the box again, and instead
+tied round her neck a narrow ribbon of black velvet, which satisfied
+her better. Next she put on her hat; it was of straw, and had been
+washed many times. There was a broad ribbon of black velvet around it.
+She wished earnestly that she had a sash of black velvet about three
+inches deep to go round her waist. There was such a piece about the
+hem of her mother's Sunday skirt, but, of course, that could not be
+touched; maybe, her mother would give it to her if she asked. The
+skirt would look quite as well without it, and when her mother knew
+how nice it looked round her waist she would certainly give it to her.
+
+She gave a last look at herself in the glass and went out, turning up
+to the quays in the direction of the Phoenix Park. The sun was
+shining gloriously, and the streets seemed wonderfully clean in the
+sunlight. The horses under the heavy drays pulled their loads as if
+they were not heavy. The big, red-faced drivers leaned back at ease,
+with their hard hats pushed back from their foreheads and their eyes
+puckered at the sunshine. The tram-cars whizzed by like great jewels.
+The outside cars went spanking down the broad road, and every
+jolly-faced jarvey winked at her as he jolted by. The people going up
+and down the street seemed contented and happy. It was one o'clock,
+and from all kinds of offices and shops young men and women were
+darting forth for their lunch; none of the young men were so hurried
+but they had a moment to glance admiringly at Mary Makebelieve before
+diving into a cheap restaurant or cheaper public-house for their
+food. The gulls in the river were flying in long, lazy curves, dipping
+down to the water, skimming it an instant, and then wheeling up again
+with easy, slanting wings. Every few minutes a boat laden with barrels
+puffed swiftly from beneath a bridge. All these boats had pretty
+names--there was the _Shannon_, the _Suir_, the _Nore_, the _Lagan_,
+and many others. The men on board sat contentedly on the barrels and
+smoked and made slow remarks to one another; and overhead the sky was
+blue and wonderful, immeasurably distant, filled from horizon to
+horizon with sparkle and warmth. Mary Makebelieve went slowly on
+towards the Park. She felt very happy. Now and then a darker spot
+flitted through her mind, not at all obscuring, but toning the
+brightness of her thoughts to a realizable serenity. She wished her
+skirts were long enough to be held up languidly like the lady walking
+in front: the hand holding up the skirt had a golden curb-chain on
+the wrist which drooped down to the neatly gloved hand, and between
+each link of the chain was set a blue turquoise, and upon this jewel
+the sun danced splendidly. Mary Makebelieve wished she had a slender
+red coral wristlet; it also would have hung down to her palm and been
+lovely in the sunlight, and it would, she thought, have been far nicer
+than the bangle.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+
+She walked along for some time in the Park. Through the railings
+flanking the great road many beds of flowers could be seen. These were
+laid out in a great variety of forms--of stars and squares and crosses
+and circles, and the flowers were arranged in exquisite patterns.
+There was a great star which flamed with red flowers at the deep
+points, and in its heart a heavier mass of yellow blossom glared
+suddenly. There were circles wherein each ring was a differently
+colored flower, and others where three rings alternated--three rings
+white, three purple, and three orange, and so on in slenderer circles
+to the tiniest diminishing. Mary Makebelieve wished she knew the names
+of all the flowers, but the only ones she recognized by sight were the
+geraniums, some species of roses, violets, and forget-me-nots and
+pansies. The more exotic sorts she did not know, and, while she
+admired them greatly, she had not the same degree of affection for
+them as for the commoner, friendly varieties.
+
+Leaving the big road she wandered into wider fields. In a few moments
+the path was hidden, the outside cars, motor cars and bicycles had
+vanished as completely as though there were no such things in the
+world. Great numbers of children were playing about in distinct bands;
+each troop was accompanied by one and sometimes two older people,
+girls or women who lay stretched out on the warm grass or leaned
+against the tree-trunks reading novelettes, and around them the
+children whirled and screamed and laughed. It was a world of waving
+pinafores and thin black-stockinged legs and shrill, sweet voices. In
+the great spaces the children's voices had a strangely remote quality;
+the sweet, high tones were not such as one heard in the streets or in
+houses. In a house or a street these voices thudded upon the air and
+beat sonorously back again from the walls, the houses, or the
+pavements; but out here the slender sounds sang to a higher tenuity
+and disappeared out and up and away into the tree-tops and the clouds
+and the wide, windy reaches. The little figures partook also of this
+diminuendo effect; against the great grassy curves they seemed smaller
+than they really were; the trees stirred hugely above them, the grass
+waved vast beneath them, and the sky ringed them in from immensity.
+Their forms scarcely disturbed the big outline of nature, their
+laughter only whispered against the silence, as ineffectual to disturb
+that gigantic serenity as a gnat's wing fluttered against a precipice.
+
+Mary Makebelieve wandered on; a few cows lifted solemnly curious faces
+as she passed and swung their heavy heads behind her. Once or twice
+half a dozen deer came trotting from beyond the trees, and were
+shocked to a halt on seeing her--a moment's gaze, and away like the
+wind, bounding in a delicious freedom. Now a butterfly came twisting
+on some eccentric journey--ten wing-beats to the left, twenty to the
+right, and then back to the left, or, with a sudden twist, returning
+on the path which it had already traversed, jerking carelessly through
+the sunlight. Across the sky very far up a troop of birds sailed
+definitely--they knew where they were going; momently one would detach
+itself from the others in a burst of joyous energy and sweep a great
+circle and back again to its comrades, and then away, away, away to
+the skyline.--Ye swift ones! O, freedom and sweetness! A song falling
+from the heavens! A lilt through deep sunshine! Happy wanderers! How
+fast ye fly and how bravely--up and up, till the earth has fallen away
+and the immeasurable heavens and the deep loneliness of the sunlight
+and the silence of great spaces receive you!
+
+Mary Makebelieve came to a tree around which a circular wooden seat
+had been placed. Here for a time she sat looking out on the wide
+fields. Far away in front the ground rolled down into valleys and up
+into little hills, and from the valleys the green heads of trees
+emerged, and on the farther hills, in slender, distinct silhouette,
+and in great masses, entire trees could be seen. Nearer were single
+trees, each with its separate shadow and a stream of sunlight flooding
+between; and everywhere the greenery of leaves and of grass and the
+gold of myriad buttercups and multitudes of white daisies.
+
+She had been sitting for some time when a shadow came from behind her.
+She watched its lengthening and its queer bobbing motion. When it grew
+to its greatest length it ceased to move. She felt that some one had
+stopped. From the shape of the shadow she knew it was a man, but being
+so close she did not like to look. Then a voice spoke. It was a voice
+as deep as the rolling of a sea.
+
+"Hello," said the voice; "what are you doing here all alone, young
+lady?"
+
+Mary Makebelieve's heart suddenly spurted to full speed. It seemed to
+want more space than her bosom could afford. She looked up. Beside her
+stood a prodigious man: one lifted hand curled his moustache, the
+other carelessly twirled a long cane. He was dressed in ordinary
+clothing, but Mary Makebelieve knew him at once for that great
+policeman who guided the traffic at the Grafton Street crossing.
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+
+The policeman told her wonderful things. He informed her why the
+Phoenix Park was called the Phoenix Park. He did not believe there
+was a phoenix in the Zoological Gardens, although they probably had
+every kind of bird in the world there. It had never struck him, now he
+came to think of it, to look definitely for that bird, but he would do
+so the next time he went into the Gardens. Perhaps the young lady
+would allow him (it would be a much-appreciated privilege) to escort
+her through the Gardens some fine day, the following day for
+instance.... He rather inclined to the belief that the phoenix was
+extinct--that is, died out; and then, again, when he called to mind
+the singular habits with which this bird was credited, he conceived
+that it had never had a real but only a mythical existence--that is,
+it was a makebelieve bird, a kind of fairy tale.
+
+He further informed Mary Makebelieve that this Park was the third
+largest in the world, but the most beautiful. His evidence for this
+statement was not only the local newspapers, whose opinion might be
+biased by patriotism--that is, led away from the exact truth--but in
+the more stable testimony of reputable English journals, such as
+_Answers_ and _Tit-Bits_ and _Pearson's Weekly_, he found an
+authoritative and gratifying confirmation--that is, they agreed. He
+cited for Mary Makebelieve's incredulity the exact immensity of the
+Park in miles, in yards, and in acres, and the number of head of
+cattle which could be accommodated therein if it were to be utilized
+for grazing--that is, turned into grass lands; or, if transformed into
+tillage, the number of small farmers who would be the proprietors of
+economic holdings--that is, a recondite--that is, an abstruse and a
+difficult scientific and sociological term.
+
+Mary Makebelieve scarcely dared lift her glance to his face. An
+uncontrollable shyness had taken possession of her. Her eyes could not
+lift without an effort: they fluttered vainly upwards, but before
+reaching any height they flinched aside and drooped again to her lap.
+The astounding thought that she was sitting beside a man warmed and
+affrighted her blood so that it rushed burningly to her cheeks and
+went shuddering back again coldly. Her downcast eyes were almost
+mesmerized by the huge tweed-clad knees which towered like monoliths
+beside her. They rose much higher than her knees did, and extended far
+out more than a foot and a half beyond her own modest stretch. Her
+knees slanted gently downwards as she sat, but his jagged straightly
+forward, like the immovable knees of a god which she had seen once in
+the Museum. On one of these great knees an equally great hand rested.
+Automatically she placed her own hand on her lap and, awe-stricken,
+tried to measure the difference. Her hand was very tiny and as white
+as snow: it seemed so light that the breathing of a wind might have
+fluttered it. The wrist was slender and delicate, and through its
+milky covering faint blue veins glimmered. A sudden and passionate
+wish came to her as she watched her wrist. She wished she had a red
+coral bracelet on it, or a chain of silver beaten into flat discs, or
+even two twists of little green beads. The hand that rested on the
+neighboring knee was bigger by three times than her own, the skin on
+it was tanned to the color of ripe mahogany-wood, and the heat of the
+day had caused great purple veins to grow in knots and ridges across
+the back and running in big twists down to the wrists. The specific
+gravity of that hand seemed tremendous; she could imagine it holding
+down the strong neck of a bull. It moved continually while he spoke
+to her, closing in a tense strong grip that changed the mahogany color
+to a dull whiteness and opening again to a ponderous, inert width.
+
+She was ashamed that she could find nothing to say. Her vocabulary had
+suddenly and miserably diminished to a "yes" and "no," only tolerably
+varied by a timid "indeed" and "I did not know that." Against the easy
+clamor of his speech she could find nothing to oppose, and ordinarily
+her tongue tripped and eddied and veered as easily and nonchalantly as
+a feather in a wind. But he did not mind silence. He interpreted it
+rightly as the natural homage of a girl to a policeman. He liked this
+homage because it helped him to feel as big as he looked, and he had
+every belief in his ability to conduct a polite and interesting
+conversation with any lady for an indefinite time.
+
+After a while Mary Makebelieve arose and was about bidding him a timid
+good-by. She wished to go away to her own little room where she could
+look at herself and ask herself questions. She wanted to visualize
+herself sitting under a tree beside a man. She knew that she could
+reconstruct him to the smallest detail, but feared that she might not
+be able to reconstruct herself. When she arose he also stood up and
+fell so naturally into step beside her that there was nothing to do
+but to walk straight on. He still withstood the burden of conversation
+easily and pleasantly and very learnedly. He discussed matters of high
+political and social moment, explaining generously the more unusual
+and learned words that bristled from his vocabulary. Soon they came to
+a more populous part of the Park. The children ceased from their play
+to gaze round-eyed at the little girl and the big man, their
+attendants looked and giggled and envied. Under these eyes Mary
+Makebelieve's walk became afflicted with a sideward bias which jolted
+her against her companion. She was furious with herself and ashamed.
+She set her teeth to walk easily and straightly, but constantly the
+jog of his elbow on her shoulder or the swing of his hand against her
+blouse sent her ambling wretchedly arms-length from him. When this had
+occurred half a dozen times she could have plumped down on the grass
+and wept loudly and without restraint. At the Park gate she stopped
+suddenly and with the courage of despair bade him good-by. He begged
+courteously to be allowed to see her a little way to her home, but she
+would not permit it, and so he lifted his hat to her. (Through her
+distress she could still note in a subterranean and half-conscious
+fashion the fact that this was the first time a man had ever uncovered
+before her.) As she went away down the road she felt that his eyes
+were following her and her tripping walk hurried almost to a run. She
+wished frantically that her dress was longer than it was--that false
+hem! If she could have gathered a skirt in her hand the mere holding
+on to something would have given her self-possession, but she feared
+he was looking critically at her short skirt and immodest ankles.
+
+He stood for a time gazing after her with a smile on his great face.
+He knew that she knew he was watching, and as he stood he drew his
+hand from his pocket and tapped and smoothed his moustache. He had a
+red moustache; it grew very thickly, but was cropped short and square,
+and its fiber was so strong that it stood out above his lip like wire.
+One expected it to crackle when he touched it, but it never did.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+
+When Mrs. Makebelieve came home that night she seemed very tired, and
+complained that her work at Mrs. O'Connor's house was arduous beyond
+any which she has yet engaged in. She enumerated the many rooms that
+were in the house: those that were covered with carpets, the margins
+whereof had to be beeswaxed: those others, only partially covered with
+rugs, which had to be entirely waxed: the upper rooms were uncarpeted
+and unrugged, and had, therefore, to be scrubbed: the basement,
+consisting of two red-flagged kitchens and a scullery, had also to be
+scoured out. The lady was very particular about the scouring of
+wainscotings and doors. The upper part of the staircase was bare and
+had to be scrubbed down, and the part down to the hall had a thin
+strip of carpet on it secured by brazen rods; the margins on either
+side of this carpet had to be beeswaxed and the brass rods polished.
+There was a great deal of unnecessary and vexatious brass of one kind
+or another scattered about the house, and as there were four children
+in the family, besides Mrs. O'Connor and her two sisters, the amount
+of washing which had constantly to be done was enormous and terrifying.
+
+During their tea Mrs. Makebelieve called to mind the different
+ornaments which stood on the parlor mantelpiece and on the top of the
+piano. There was a china shepherdess with a basket of flowers at one
+end of the mantelpiece and an exact duplicate on the other. In the
+center a big clock of speckled marble was surmounted by a little domed
+edifice with Corinthian pillars in front, and this again was topped by
+the figure of an archer with a bent bow--there was nothing on top of
+this figure because there was not any room. Between each of these
+articles there stood little framed photographs of members of Mrs.
+O'Connor's family, and behind all there was a carved looking-glass
+with beveled edges having many shelves. Each shelf had a cup or a
+saucer or a china bowl on it. On the left-hand side of the fireplace
+there was a plaque whereon a young lady dressed in a sky-blue robe
+crossed by means of well-defined stepping-stones a thin but furious
+stream; the middle distance was embellished by a cow, and the horizon
+sustained two white lambs, a brown dog, a fountain and a sun-dial. On
+the right-hand side a young gentleman clad in a crimson coat and
+yellow knee-breeches carried a three-cornered hat under his arm, and
+he also crossed a stream which seemed the exact counterpart of the
+other one and whose perspective was similarly complicated. There were
+three pictures on each wall--nine in all; three of these were
+pictures of ships, three were pictures of battles: two portrayed
+saintly but emaciated personages sitting in peculiarly disheartening
+wildernesses (each wilderness contained one cactus plant and a camel).
+One of these personages stared fixedly at a skull, the other personage
+looked with intense firmness away from a lady of scant charms in a
+white and all too insufficient robe: above the robe a segment of the
+lady's bosom was hinted at bashfully--it was probably this the
+personage looked firmly away from. The remaining picture showed a
+little girl seated in a big armchair and reading with profound culture
+the most massive of bibles: she had her grandmother's mutch cap and
+spectacles on, and looked very sweet and solemn; a doll sat bolt
+upright beside her, and on the floor a kitten hunted a ball of wool
+with great earnestness.
+
+All these things Mrs. Makebelieve discussed to her daughter, as also
+of the carpet which might have been woven in Turkey or elsewhere,
+the sideboard that possibly was not mahogany, and the chairs and
+occasional tables whose legs had attained to rickets through
+convulsions; the curtains of cream-colored lace which were reinforced
+by rep hangings and guarded shutters from Venice, also the deer's head
+which stood on a shelf over the door and was probably shot by a member
+of the family in a dream, and the splendid silver tankards which
+flanked this trophy and were possibly made of tin.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve further spoke of the personal characteristics of the
+householder with an asperity which was still restrained. She had a
+hairy chin, said Mrs. Makebelieve: she had buck teeth and a solid
+smile, and was given to telling people who knew their business how
+things ought to be done. Beyond this she would not say anything.--The
+amount of soap the lady allowed to wash out five rooms and a lengthy
+staircase was not as generous as one was accustomed to, but, possibly,
+she was well-meaning enough when one came to know her better.
+
+Mary Makebelieve, apropos of nothing, asked her mother did she ever
+know a girl who got married to a policeman, and did she think that
+policemen were good men?
+
+Her mother replied that policemen were greatly sought after as
+husbands for several reasons--firstly, they were big men, and big men
+are always good to look upon; secondly, their social standing was very
+high and their respectability undoubted; thirdly, a policeman's pay
+was such as would bring comfort to any household which was not
+needlessly and criminally extravagant; and this was often supplemented
+in a variety of ways which rumor only hinted at: there was also the
+safe prospect of a pension and the possibility of a sergeantship,
+where the emoluments were very great: and fourthly, a policeman, being
+subjected for many years to a rigorous discipline, would likely make a
+nice and obedient husband. Personally Mrs. Makebelieve did not admire
+policemen--they thought too much of themselves, and their continual
+pursuit of and intercourse with criminals tended to deteriorate their
+moral tone; also, being much admired by a certain type of woman, their
+morals were subjected to so continuous an assault that the wife of
+such a one would be worn to a shadow in striving to preserve her
+husband from designing and persistent females.
+
+Mary Makebelieve said she thought it would be nice to have other women
+dying for love of one's husband, but her mother opposed this with the
+reflection that such people did not die for love at all, they were
+merely anxious to gratify a foolish and excessive pride or to inflict
+pain on respectable married women. On the whole, a policeman was not
+an ideal person to marry. The hours at which he came home were liable
+to constant and vexatious changes, so that there was a continual
+feeling of insecurity, which was bad for housekeeping; and if one had
+not stability in one's home all discipline and all real home life was
+at an end. There was this to be said for them--that they all loved
+little children. But, all things considered, a clerk made a better
+husband: his hours were regular and, knowing where he was at any
+moment, one's mind was at ease.
+
+Mary Makebelieve was burning to tell some one of her adventure during
+the day, but although she had never before kept a secret from her
+mother she was unable to tell her this one. Something--perhaps the
+mere difference of age, and also a kind of shyness--kept her silent.
+She wished she knew a nice girl of her own age, or even a little
+younger, to whose enraptured ear she might have confided her story.
+They would have hugged each other during the recital, and she would
+have been able to enlarge upon a hundred trivialities of moustache and
+hair and eyes the wonder of which older minds can seldom appreciate.
+
+Her mother said she did not feel at all well. She did not know what
+was the matter with her, but she was more tired than she could
+remember being for a long time. There was a dull aching in all her
+bones, a coldness in her limbs, and when she pressed her hair
+backwards it hurt her head; so she went to bed much earlier than was
+usual. But long after her regular time for sleep had passed Mary
+Makebelieve crouched on the floor before the few warm coals. She was
+looking into the redness, seeing visions of rapture, strange things
+which could not possibly be true; but these visions warmed her blood
+and lifted her heart on light and tremulous wings; there was a singing
+in her ears to which she could never be tired listening.
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve felt much better the next morning after the extra
+sleep which she had. She still confessed to a slight pain in her scalp
+when she brushed her hair and was a little languid, but not so much as
+to call for complaint. She sat up in bed while her daughter prepared
+the breakfast and her tongue sped as rapidly as heretofore. She said
+she had a sort of feeling that her brother Patrick must come back from
+America some time, and she was sure that when he did return he would
+lose no time in finding out his relatives and sharing with them the
+wealth which he had amassed in that rich country. She had memories of
+his generosity even as a mere infant when he would always say "no" if
+only half a potato remained in the dish or a solitary slice of bread
+was on the platter. She delighted to talk of his good looks and high
+spirits and of the amazingly funny things he had said and done. There
+was always, of course, the chance that Patrick had got married and
+settled down in America, and, if so, that would account for so prolonged
+a silence. Wives always came between a man and his friends, and this
+woman would do all she could to prevent Patrick benefiting his own
+sister and her child. Even in Ireland there were people like that, and
+the more one heard of America the less one knew what to expect from
+the strange people who were native to that place. She had often thought
+she would like to go out there herself, and, indeed, if she had a little
+money she would think nothing of packing up her things to-morrow and
+setting out for the States. There were fine livings to be made there,
+and women were greatly in request, both as servants and wives. It was
+well known, too, that the Americans loved Irish people, and so there
+would be no difficulty at all in getting a start. The more she thought
+of Mrs. O'Connor the more favorably she pondered on emigration. She
+would say nothing against Mrs. O'Connor yet, but the fact remained that
+she had a wen on her cheek and buck teeth. Either of these afflictions
+taken separately were excusable, but together she fancied they betoken
+a bad, sour nature; but maybe the woman was to be pitied: she might be
+a nice person in herself, but, then, there was the matter of the soap,
+and she was very fond of giving unnecessary orders. However, time would
+show, and, clients being as scarce as they were, one could not quarrel
+with one's bread and butter.
+
+The opening of a door and the stamping downstairs of heavy feet shot
+Mrs. Makebelieve from her bed and into her clothing with furious speed.
+Within five minutes she was dressed, and after kissing her daughter
+three times she fled down the stairs and away to her business.
+
+Mary had obtained her mother's consent to do as she pleased with the
+piece of black velvet on the hem of her Sunday skirt, so she passed
+some time in ripping this off and cleaning it. It would not come as
+fresh as she desired, and there were some parts of it frayed and
+rubbed so that the velvet was nearly lost, but other portions were
+quite good, and by cutting out the worn parts and neatly joining the
+good pieces she at last evolved a quite passable sash. Having the sash
+ready she dressed herself to see how it looked, and was delighted.
+Then becoming dissatisfied with the severe method of doing her hair
+she manipulated it gently for a few minutes until a curl depended by
+both ears and two or three very tiny ones fluttered above her
+forehead. She put on her hat and stole out, walking very gently for
+fear any of the other people in the house would peep through their
+doors as she went by. Walk as gently as she could these bare, solid
+stairs rang loudly to each footfall, and so she ended in a rush and
+was out and away without daring to look if she was observed. She had a
+sort of guilty feeling as she walked, which she tried to allay by
+saying very definitely that she was not doing anything wrong. She said
+to herself with determined candor that she would walk up to the St.
+Stephen's Green Park and look at the ducks and the flower-beds and the
+eels, but when she reached the quays she blushed deeply, and turning
+towards the right went rapidly in the direction of the Phoenix Park.
+She told herself that she was not going in there, but would merely
+take a walk by the river, cross at Island Bridge, and go back on the
+opposite side of the Liffey to the Green. But when she saw the broad
+sunlit road gleaming through the big gates she thought she would go
+for a little way up there to look at the flowers behind the railings.
+As she went in a great figure came from behind the newspaper kiosk
+outside the gates and followed Mary up the road. When she paused to
+look at the flowers the great figure halted also, and when she went on
+again it followed. Mary walked past the Gough Statue and turned away
+into the fields and the trees, and here the figure lengthened its
+stride. In the middle of the field a big shadow bobbed past her
+shoulder, and she walked on holding her breath and watching the shadow
+growing by queer forward jerks. In a moment the dull beat of feet on
+grass banished all thought of the shadow, and then there came a
+cheerful voice in her ears, and the big policeman was standing by her
+side. For a few moments they were stationary, making salutation and
+excuse and explanation, and then they walked slowly on through the
+sunshine. Wherever there was a bush there were flowers on it. Every
+tree was thronged with birds that sang shrilly and sweetly in sudden
+thrills and clear sustained melodies, but in the open spaces the
+silence was more wonderful; there was no bird note to come between
+Mary and that deep voice, no shadow of a tree to swallow up their own
+two shadows; and the sunlight was so mildly warm, the air was so sweet
+and pure, and the little wind that hushed by from the mountains was a
+tender and a peaceful wind.
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+
+After that day Mary Makebelieve met her new friend frequently.
+Somehow, wherever she went, he was not far away; he seemed to spring
+out of space--one moment she was alone watching the people passing and
+the hurrying cars and the thronged and splendid shop windows, and then
+a big voice was booming down to her and a big form was pacing
+deliberately by her side. Twice he took her into a restaurant and gave
+her lunch. She had never been in a restaurant before, and it seemed to
+her like a place in fairyland. The semi-darkness of the retired rooms
+faintly colored by tiny electric lights, the beautifully clean tables
+and the strange foods, the neatly dressed waitresses with quick, deft
+movements and gravely attentive faces--these things thrilled her. She
+noticed that the girls in the restaurant, in spite of their gravity
+and industry, observed both herself and the big man with the minutest
+inspection, and she felt that they all envied her the attentions of so
+superb a companion. In the street also she found that many people
+looked at them, but, listening to his constant and easy speech, she
+could not give these people the attention they deserved.
+
+When they did not go to the Park they sought the most reserved streets
+or walked out to the confines of the town and up by the River Dodder.
+There are exquisitely beautiful places along the side of the Dodder:
+shy little harbors and backwaters, and now and then a miniature
+waterfall or a broad placid reach upon which the sun beats down like
+silver. Along the river bank the grass grows rank and wildly
+luxurious, and at this season, warmed by the sun, it was a splendid
+place to sit. She thought she could sit there forever watching the
+shining river and listening to the great voice by her side.
+
+He told her many things about himself and about his comrades--those
+equally huge men. She could see them walking with slow vigor through
+their barrack-yard, falling in for exercise or gymnastics or for
+school. She wondered what they were taught, and who had sufficient
+impertinence to teach giants, and were they ever slapped for not
+knowing their lessons? He told her of his daily work, the hours when
+he was on and off duty, the hours when he rose in the morning and when
+he went to bed. He told her of night duty, and drew a picture of the
+blank deserted streets which thrilled and frightened her ... the tense
+darkness, and how through the silence the sound of a footstep was
+magnified a thousandfold, ringing down the desolate pathways away and
+away to the smallest shrill distinctness, and she saw also the alleys
+and lane-ways hooded in blackness, and the one or two human fragments
+who drifted aimless and frantic along the lonely streets, striving to
+walk easily for fear of their own thundering footsteps, cowering in
+the vastness of the city, dwarfed and shivering beside the gaunt
+houses; the thousands upon thousands of black houses, each deadly
+silent, each seeming to wait and listen for the morning, and each
+teeming with men and women who slept in peace because he was walking
+up and down outside, flashing his lantern on shop windows and feeling
+doors to see if they were by any chance open. Now and again a step
+from a great distance would tap-tap-tap, a far-off delicacy of sound,
+and either die away down echoing side streets or come clanking on to
+where he stood, growing louder and clearer and more resonant, ringing
+again and again in doubled and trebled echoes; while he, standing far
+back in a doorway, watched to see who was abroad at the dead of
+night--and then that person went away on his strange errand, his
+footsteps tramping down immense distances, till the last echo and the
+last faint tremble of his feet eddied into the stillness. Now and
+again a cat dodged gingerly along a railing, or a strayed dog slunk
+fearfully down the pathway, nosing everywhere in and out of the
+lamplight, silent and hungry and desperately eager. He told her
+stories also, wonderful tales of great fights and cunning tricks, of
+men and women whose whole lives were tricks, of people who did not
+know how to live except by theft and violence; people who were born by
+stealth, who ate by subterfuge, drank by dodges, got married in antics
+and slid into death by strange, subterranean passages. He told her the
+story of the Two Hungry Men, and of The Sailor Who Had Been Robbed,
+and a funny tale about the Barber Who Had Two Mothers. He also told
+her the stories of The Eight Tinkers, and of the Old Women Who Steal
+Fish at Nighttime, and the story of The Man He Let Off, and he told
+her a terrible story of how he fought five men in a little room, and
+he showed her a great livid scar hidden by his cap, and the marks in
+his neck where he had been stabbed with a jagged bottle, and his wrist
+which an Italian mad-man had thrust through and through with a dagger.
+
+But though he was always talking he was not always talking of himself.
+Through his conversation there ran a succession of queries--tiny
+slender questions which ran out of his stories and into her life.
+Questions so skillful and natural and spontaneous that only a girl
+could discover the curiosity which prompted them. He wanted her name,
+her address, her mother's name, her father's name; had she other
+relatives, did she go to work yet, what was her religion, was it a
+long time since she left school, and what was her mother's business?
+To all of these Mary Makebelieve answered with glad candor. She saw
+each question coming, and the personal curiosity lying behind it she
+divined and was glad of. She would have loved to ask him personal and
+intimate questions about his parents, his brothers and sisters, and
+what he said when he said his prayers, and had he walked with other
+girls, and, if so, what had he said to them, and what did he really
+and truly think of her? Her curiosity on all these points was abundant
+and eager, but she did not dare to even hint a question.
+
+One of the queries often touched upon by him she eluded--she shrank
+from it with something like terror--it was, "What was her mother's
+business?" She could not bear to say that her mother was a charwoman.
+It did not seem fitting. She suddenly hated and was ashamed of this
+occupation. It took on an aspect of incredible baseness. It seemed to
+be the meanest employment wherein any one could be engaged; and so
+when the question, conveyed in a variety of ways, had to be answered
+it was answered with reservations--Mary Makebelieve told him a lie.
+She said her mother was a dressmaker.
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+
+One night when Mrs. Makebelieve came home she was very low-spirited
+indeed. She complained once more of a headache and of a languor which
+she could not account for. She said it gave her all the trouble in the
+world to lift a bucket. It was not exactly that she could not lift a
+bucket, but that she could scarcely close her mind down to the fact
+that a bucket had to be lifted. Some spring of willingness seemed to
+be temporarily absent. To close her two hands on a floor-cloth and
+twist it into a spiral in order to wring it thoroughly was a thing
+which she found herself imagining she could do if she liked, but had
+not the least wish to do. These duties, even when she was engaged in
+them, had a curious quality of remoteness. The bucket into which her
+hand had been plunged a moment before seemed somehow incredibly
+distant. To lift the soap lying beside the bucket one would require an
+arm of more than human reach, and having washed, or rather dabbed, at
+a square of flooring, it was a matter of grave concern how to reach
+the unwashed part just beyond without moving herself. This languor
+alarmed her. The pain in her head, while it was severe, did not really
+matter. Every one had pains and aches, sores and sprains, but this
+unknown weariness and disinclination for the very slightest exertion
+gave her a fright.
+
+Mary tempted her to come out and watch the people going into the
+Gayety Theater. She said a certain actor was playing whom all the
+women of Dublin make pilgrimages, even from distant places, to look
+at; and by going at once they might be in time to see him arriving in
+a motor car at the stage door, when they could have a good look at him
+getting out of the car and going into the theater. At these tidings
+Mrs. Makebelieve roused for a moment from her strange apathy. Since
+tea-time she had sat (not as usual upright and gesticulating, but
+humped up and flaccid) staring at a blob of condensed milk on the
+outside of the tin. She said she thought she would go out and see the
+great actor, although what all the women saw in him to go mad about
+she did not know, but in another moment she settled back to her
+humped-up position and restored her gaze to the condensed milk tin.
+With a little trouble Mary got her to bed, where, after being hugged
+for one moment, she went swiftly and soundly to sleep.
+
+Mary was troubled because of her mother's illness, but, as it is
+always difficult to believe in the serious illness of another person
+until death has demonstrated its gravity, she soon dismissed the
+matter from her mind. This was the more easily done because her mind
+was teeming with impressions and pictures and scraps of dialogue.
+
+As her mother was sleeping peacefully, Mary put on her hat and went
+out. She wanted, in her then state of mind, to walk in the solitude
+which can only be found in crowded places, and also she wanted some
+kind of distraction. Her days had lately been so filled with adventure
+that the placid immobility of the top back room was not only irksome,
+but maddening, and her mother's hasty and troubled breathing came
+between her and her thoughts. The poor furniture of the room was
+hideous to her eyes, the uncarpeted floor and bleak, stained walls
+dulled her.
+
+She went out, and in a few moments was part of the crowd which passes
+and repasses nightly from the Rotunda up the broad pathways of
+Sackville Street, across O'Connell Bridge, up Westmoreland Street,
+past Trinity College, and on through the brilliant lights of Grafton
+Street to the Fusiliers' Arch at the entrance to St. Stephen's Green
+Park. Here from half-past seven o'clock in the evening youthful
+Dublin marches in joyous procession. Sometimes bevies of young girls
+dance by, each a giggle incarnate. A little distance behind these a
+troop of young men follow stealthily and critically. They will be
+acquainted and more or less happily paired before the Bridge is
+reached. But generally the movement is in couples. Appointments,
+dating from the previous night, have filled the streets with happy and
+careless boys and girls--they are not exactly courting, they are
+enjoying the excitement of fresh acquaintance; old conversation is
+here poured into new bottles, old jokes have the freshness of infancy,
+every one is animated, and polite to no one but his partner; the
+people they meet and pass and those who overtake and pass them are all
+subjects for their wit and scorn, while they, in turn, furnish a
+moment's amusement and conversation to each succeeding couple.
+Constantly there are stoppages when very high-bred introductions
+result in a redistribution of the youngsters. As they move apart the
+words "To-morrow night," or "Thursday," or "Friday," are called
+laughingly back, showing that the late partner is not to be lost sight
+of utterly; and then the procession begins anew.
+
+Among these folk Mary Makebelieve passed rapidly. She knew that if she
+walked slowly some partially elaborate gentleman would ask suddenly
+what she had been doing with herself since last Thursday? and would
+introduce her as Kate Ellen to six precisely similar young gentlemen,
+who smiled blandly in a semi-circle six feet distant. This had
+happened to her once before, and as she fled the six young gentlemen
+had roared "bow, wow, wow" after her, while the seventh mewed
+earnestly and with noise.
+
+She stood for a time watching the people thronging into the Gayety
+Theater. Some came in motor cars, others in carriages. Many
+hearse-like cabs deposited weighty and respectable solemnities under
+the glass-roofed vestibule. Swift outside cars buzzed on rubber tires
+with gentlemen clad in evening dress, and ladies whose silken wraps
+blew gently from their shoulders, and, in addition, a constant
+pedestrian stream surged along the pathway. From the shelter of an
+opposite doorway Mary watched these gayly animated people. She envied
+them all innocently enough, and wondered would the big policeman ever
+ask her to go to the theater with him, and if he did, would her mother
+let her go. She thought her mother would refuse, but was dimly certain
+that in some way she would manage to get out if such a delightful
+invitation were given her. She was dreaming of the alterations she
+would make in her best frock in anticipation of such a treat when,
+half-consciously, she saw a big figure appear round the corner of
+Grafton Street and walk towards the theater. It was he, and her heart
+jumped with delight. She prayed that he would not see her, and then
+she prayed that he would, and then, with a sudden, sickening coldness,
+she saw that he was not alone. A young, plump, rosy-cheeked girl was
+at his side. As they came nearer the girl put her arm into his and said
+something. He bent down to her and replied, and she flashed a laugh up
+at him. There was a swift interchange of sentences, and they both
+laughed together, then they disappeared into the half-crown door.
+
+Mary shrank back into the shadow of the doorway. She had a strange
+notion that everybody was trying to look at her, and that they were
+all laughing maliciously. After a few moments she stepped out on the
+path and walked homewards quickly. She did not hear the noises of the
+streets, nor see the promenading crowds. Her face was bent down as she
+walked, and beneath the big brim of her straw hat her eyes were
+blinded with the bitterest tears she had ever shed.
+
+
+
+
+XV
+
+
+Next morning her mother was no better. She made no attempt to get out
+of bed, and listened with absolute indifference when the morning feet
+of the next-door man pounded the stairs. Mary awakened her again and
+again, but each time, after saying "All right, dearie," she relapsed
+to a slumber which was more torpor than sleep. Her yellow, old-ivory
+face was faintly tinged with color; her thin lips were relaxed, and
+seemed a trifle fuller, so that Mary thought she looked better in
+sickness than in health; but the limp arm lying on the patchwork quilt
+seemed to be more skinny than thin, and the hand was more waxen and
+claw-like than heretofore.
+
+Mary laid the breakfast on the bed as usual, and again awakened her
+mother, who, after staring into vacancy for a few moments, forced
+herself to her elbow, and then, with sudden determination, sat up in
+the bed and bent her mind inflexibly on her breakfast. She drank two
+cups of tea greedily, but the bread had no taste in her mouth, and
+after swallowing a morsel she laid it aside.
+
+"I don't know what's up with me at all, at all," said she.
+
+"Maybe it's a cold, mother," replied Mary.
+
+"Do I look bad, now?"
+
+Mary scrutinized her narrowly.
+
+"No," she answered, "your face is redder than it does be, and your eyes
+are shiny. I think you look splendid and well. What way do you feel?"
+
+"I don't feel at all, except that I'm sleepy. Give me the glass in my
+hand, dearie, till I see what I'm like."
+
+Mary took the glass from the wall and handed it to her.
+
+"I don't look bad at all. A bit of color always suited me. Look at my
+tongue, though, it's very, very dirty; it's a bad tongue altogether.
+My mother had a tongue like that, Mary, when she died."
+
+"Have you any pain?" said her daughter.
+
+"No, dearie; there is a buzz in the front of my head as if something
+was spinning round and round very quickly, and that makes my eyes
+tired, and there's a sort of feeling as if my head was twice as heavy
+as it should be. Hang up the glass again. I'll try and get a sleep,
+and maybe I'll be better when I waken up. Run you out and get a bit of
+steak, and we'll stew it down and make beef tea, and maybe that will
+do me good. Give me my purse out of the pocket of my skirt."
+
+Mary found the purse and brought it to the bed. Her mother opened it
+and brought out a thimble, a bootlace, five buttons, one sixpenny
+piece and a penny. She gave Mary the sixpence.
+
+"Get half a pound of leg beef," said she, "and then we'll have
+fourpence left for bread and tea; no, take the other penny, too, and
+get half a pound of pieces at the butcher's for twopence and a
+twopenny tin of condensed milk, that's fourpence, and a three ha'penny
+loaf and one penny for tea, that's sixpence ha'penny, and get onions
+with the odd ha'penny, and we'll put them in the beef tea. Don't
+forget, dearie, to pick lean bits of meat; them fellows do be always
+trying to stick bits of bone and gristle on a body. Tell him it's for
+beef tea for your mother, and that I'm not well at all, and ask how
+Mrs. Quinn is; she hasn't been down in the shop for a long time. I'll
+go to sleep now. I'll have to go to work in the morning whatever
+happens, because there isn't any money in the house at all. Come home
+as quick as you can, dearie."
+
+Mary dressed herself and went out for the provisions, but she did not
+buy them at once. As she went down the street she turned suddenly,
+clasping her hands in a desperate movement, and walked very quickly
+in the opposite direction. She turned up the side streets to the
+quays, and along these to the Park Gates. Her hands were clasping and
+unclasping in an agony of impatience, and her eyes roved busily here
+and there, flying among the few pedestrians like lanterns. She went
+through the gates and up the broad central path, and here she walked
+more slowly: but she did not see the flowers behind the railings, or
+even the sunshine that bathed the world in glory. At the monument she
+sped a furtive glance down the road she had traveled--there was nobody
+behind her. She turned into the fields, walking under trees which she
+did not see, and up hills and down valleys without noticing the
+incline of either. At times, through the tatter of her mind there
+blazed a memory of her mother lying sick at home, waiting for her
+daughter to return with food, and at such memories she gripped her
+hands together frightfully and banished the thought.--A moment's
+reflection and she could have hated her mother.
+
+It was nearly five o'clock before she left the Park. She walked in a
+fog of depression. For hours she had gone hither and thither in the
+well-remembered circle, every step becoming more wayward and aimless.
+The sun had disappeared, and a gray evening bowed down upon the
+fields; the little wind that whispered along the grass or swung the
+light branches of the trees had a bleak edge to it. As she left the
+big gates she was chilled through and through, but the memory of her
+mother now set her running homewards. For the time she forgot her
+quest among the trees and thought only, with shame and fear, of what
+her mother would say, and of the reproachful, amazed eyes which would
+be turned on her when she went in. What could she say? She could not
+imagine anything. How could she justify a neglect which must appear
+gratuitous, cold-blooded, inexplicable?
+
+When she had brought the food and climbed the resonant stairs she
+stood outside the door crying softly to herself. She hated to open the
+door. She could imagine her mother sitting up in the bed dazed and
+unbelieving, angry and frightened, imagining accidents and terrors,
+and when she would go in ... she had an impulse to open the door
+gently, leave the food just inside and run down the stairs out into
+the world anywhere and never come back again. At last in desperation
+she turned the handle and stepped inside. Her face flamed, the blood
+burned her eyes physically so that she could not see through them. She
+did not look at the bed, but went direct to the fireplace, and with a
+dogged patience began mending the fire. After a few stubborn moments
+she twisted violently to face whatever might come, ready to break into
+angry reproaches and impertinences, but her mother was lying very
+still. She was fast asleep, and a weight, an absolutely real pressure,
+was lifted from Mary's heart. Her fingers flew about the preparation
+of the beef tea. She forgot the man whom she had gone to meet. Her
+arms were tired and hungry to close around her mother. She wanted to
+whisper little childish words to her, to rock her to and fro on her
+breast, and croon little songs and kiss her, and pat her face.
+
+
+
+
+XVI
+
+
+Her mother did not get better. Indeed, she got worse. In addition to
+the lassitude of which she had complained she suffered also from great
+heat and great cold, and, furthermore, sharp pains darted so swiftly
+through her brows that at times she was both dizzy and sightless. A
+twirling movement in her head prevented her from standing up. Her
+center of gravity seemed destroyed, for when she did stand and
+attempted to walk she had a strange bearing away on one side, so that
+on striving to walk towards the door she veered irresistibly at least
+four feet to the left-hand side of that point. Mary Makebelieve helped
+her back to bed, where she lay for a time watching horizontal lines
+spinning violently in front of her face, and these lines after a time
+crossed and recrossed each other in so mazy and intricate a pattern
+that she became violently sick from the mere looking at them.
+
+All of these things she described to her daughter, tracing the queer
+patterns which were spinning about her with such fidelity that Mary
+was almost able to see them. She also theorized about the cause and
+ultimate effect of these symptoms, and explained the degrees of heat
+and cold which burned or chilled her, and the growth of a pain to its
+exquisite startling apex, its subsequent slow recession, and the thud
+of an india-rubber hammer which ensued when the pain had ebbed to its
+easiest level. It did not occur to either of them to send for a
+doctor. Doctors in such cases are seldom sent for, seldom even thought
+of. One falls sick according to some severely definite, implacable law
+with which it is foolish to quarrel, and one gets well again for no
+other reason than that it is impossible to be sick forever. As the
+night struggles slowly into day so sickness climbs stealthily into
+health, and nature has a system of medicining her ailments which might
+only be thwarted by the ministrations of a mere doctor. Doctors also
+expect payment for their services--an expectation so wildly beyond the
+range of common sense as to be ludicrous. Those who can scarcely fee a
+baker when they are in health can certainly not remunerate a physician
+when they are ill.
+
+But, despite her sickness, Mrs. Makebelieve was worried with the
+practical common politics of existence. The food purchased with her
+last sevenpence was eaten beyond remembrance. The vital requirements
+of the next day and the following day and of all subsequent days
+thronged upon her, clamoring for instant attention. The wraith of a
+landlord sat on her bed demanding rent and threatening grisly
+alternatives. Goblins that were bakers and butchers and grocers
+grinned and leered and jabbered from the corners of the room.
+
+Each day Mary Makebelieve went to the pawn office with something. They
+lived for a time on the only capital they had--the poor furniture of
+their room. Everything which had even the narrowest margin of value
+was sold. Mary's dresses kept them for six days. Her mother's Sunday
+skirt fed them for another day. They held famine at bay with a patchwork
+quilt and a crazy washstand. A water-jug and a strip of oilcloth tinkled
+momentarily against the teeth of the wolf and disappeared. The maw of
+hunger was not incommoded by the window curtain.
+
+At last the room was as bare as a desert and almost as uninhabitable.
+A room without furniture is a ghostly place. Sounds made therein are
+uncanny, even the voice puts off its humanity and rings back with a
+bleak and hollow note, an empty resonance tinged with the frost of
+winter. There is no other sound so deadly, so barren and dispiriting
+as the echoes of an empty room. The gaunt woman in the bed seemed
+less gaunt than her residence, and there was nothing more to be sent
+to the pawnbroker or the secondhand dealer.
+
+A post-card came from Mrs. O'Connor requesting, in a peremptory
+language customary to such communications, that Mrs. Makebelieve would
+please call on her the following morning before eight o'clock. Mrs.
+Makebelieve groaned as she read it. It meant work and food and the
+repurchase of her household goods, and she knew that on the following
+morning she would not be able to get up. She lay a while thinking, and
+then called her daughter.
+
+"Deary," said she, "you will have to go to this place in the morning
+and try what you can do. Tell Mrs. O'Connor that I am sick, and that
+you are my daughter and will do the work, and try and do the best you
+can for a while."
+
+She caught her daughter's head down to her bosom and wept over her,
+for she saw in this work a beginning and an end, the end of the
+little daughter who could be petted and rocked and advised, the
+beginning of a womanhood which would grow up to and beyond her, which
+would collect and secrete emotions and aspirations and adventures not
+to be shared even by a mother, and she saw the failure which this work
+meant, the expanding of her daughter's life ripples to a bleak and
+miserable horizon where the clouds were soapsuds and floor cloths, and
+the beyond a blank resignation only made energetic by hunger.
+
+"Oh, my dear," said she, "I hate to think of you having to do such
+work, but it will only be for a while, a week, and then I will be well
+again. Only a little week, my love, my sweetheart, my heart's darling."
+
+
+
+
+XVII
+
+
+Early on the following morning Mary Makebelieve awakened with a start.
+She felt as if some one had called her, and lay for a few moments to
+see had her mother spoken. But her mother was still asleep. Her
+slumber was at all times almost as energetic as her wakening hours.
+She twisted constantly and moved her hands and spoke ramblingly. Odd
+interjections, such as "ah, well, no matter, certainly not, and indeed
+aye," shot from her lips like bullets, and at intervals a sarcastic
+sniff fretted or astonished her bedfellow into wakefulness. But now as
+she lay none of these strenuous ejaculations were audible. Sighs only,
+weighty and deep drawn and very tired, broke on her lips and lapsed
+sadly into the desolate room.
+
+Mary Makebelieve lay for a time wondering idly what had awakened her
+so completely, for her eyes were wide open and every vestige of sleep
+was gone from her brain; and then she remembered that on this morning,
+and for the first time in her life, she had to go to work. That
+knowledge had gone to bed with her and had awakened her with an
+imperious urgency. In an instant she sprang out of bed, huddled on
+sufficient clothing for warmth, and set about lighting the fire. She
+was far too early awake, but could not compose herself to lie for
+another moment in bed. She did not at all welcome the idea of going to
+work, but the interest attaching to a new thing, the freshness which
+vitalizes for a time even the dreariest undertaking, prevented her
+from rueing with any bitterness her first day's work. To a young
+person even work is an adventure, and anything which changes the usual
+current of life is welcome. The fire also went with her; in quite a
+short time the flames had gathered to a blaze, and matured, and
+concentrated to the glowing redness of perfect combustion, then, when
+the smoke had disappeared with the flames, she put on the saucepan of
+water. Quickly the saucepan boiled, and she wet the tea. She cut the
+bread into slices, put a spoonful of condensed milk into each cup, and
+awakened her mother.
+
+All through the breakfast her mother advised her on the doing of her
+work. She cautioned her daughter when scrubbing woodwork always to
+scrub against the grain, for this gave a greater purchase to the brush,
+and removed the dirt twice as quickly as the seemingly easy opposite
+movement. She told her never to save soap. Little soap meant much
+rubbing, and advised that she should scrub two minutes with one hand
+and then two minutes with the other hand, and she was urgent on the
+necessity of thoroughness in the wringing out of one's floor cloth,
+because a dry floor cloth takes up twice as much water as a wet one,
+and thus lightens labor; also she advised Mary to change her positions
+as frequently as possible to avoid cramp when scrubbing, and to kneel
+up or stand up when wringing her cloths, as this would give her a rest,
+and the change of movement would relieve her very greatly, and above
+all to take her time about the business, because haste seldom resulted
+in clean work, and was never appreciated by one's employer.
+
+Before going out Mary Makebelieve had to arrange for some one to look
+after her mother during the day. This is an arrangement which, among
+poor people, is never difficult of accomplishment. The first to whom
+she applied was the laboring man's wife in the next room; she was a
+vast woman with six children and a laugh like the rolling of a great
+wind, and when Mary Makebelieve advanced her request she shook six
+children off her like toys and came out on the landing.
+
+"Run off to your work now, honey," said she, "and let you be easy in
+your mind about your mother, for I'll go up to her this minute, and when
+I'm not there myself I'll leave one of the children with her to call me
+if she wants anything, and don't you be fretting at all, God help you!
+for she'll be as safe and as comfortable with me as if she was in Jervis
+Street Hospital or the Rotunda itself. What's wrong with her now? Is it
+a pain in her head she has or a sick stomach, God help her?"
+
+Mary explained briefly, and as she went down the stairs she saw the
+big woman going into her mother's room.
+
+She had not been out in the streets so early before, and had never
+known the wonder and beauty of the sun in the early morning. The
+streets were almost deserted, and the sunlight--a most delicate and
+nearly colorless radiance--fell gently on the long silent paths.
+Missing the customary throng of people and traffic she seemed almost
+in a strange country, and had to look twice for turnings which she
+could easily have found with her eyes shut. The shutters were up in
+all the shops and the blinds were down in most of the windows. Now and
+again a milk cart came clattering and rattling down a street, and now
+and again a big red-painted baker's cart dashed along the road. Such
+few pedestrians as she met were poorly dressed men, who carried tommy
+cans and tools, and they were all walking at a great pace, as if they
+feared they were late for somewhere. Three or four boys passed her
+running; one of these had a great lump of bread in his hand, and as he
+ran he tore pieces off the bread with his teeth and ate them. The
+streets looked cleaner than she had thought they could look, and the
+houses seemed very quiet and beautiful. When she came near a policeman
+she looked at him keenly from a distance, hoping and fearing that it
+might be her friend, but she did not see him. She had a sinking
+feeling at the thought that maybe he would be in the Phoenix Park
+this day looking for her, and might, indeed, have been there for the
+past few days, and the thought that he might be seeking for her
+unavailingly stabbed through her mind like a pain. It did not seem
+right, it was not in proportion, that so big a man should seek for a
+mere woman and not find one instantly to hand. It was pitiful to think
+of the huge man looking on this side and on that, peering behind trees
+and through distances, and thinking that maybe he was forgotten or
+scorned. Mary Makebelieve almost wept at the idea that he should fancy
+she scorned him. She wondered how, under such circumstances, a small
+girl can comfort a big man. One may fondle his hand, but that is
+miserably inadequate. She wished she was twice as big as he was, so
+that she might lift him bodily to her breast and snuggle and hug him
+like a kitten. So comprehensive an embrace alone could atone for
+injury to a big man's feelings.
+
+In about twenty minutes she reached Mrs. O'Connor's house and knocked.
+She had to knock half a dozen times before she was admitted, and on
+being admitted had a great deal of trouble explaining who she was, and
+why her mother had not come, and that she was quite competent to
+undertake the work. She knew the person who opened the door for her
+was not Mrs. O'Connor, because she had not a hairy wart on her chin,
+nor had she buck teeth. After a little delay she was brought to the
+scullery and given a great pile of children's clothing to wash, and
+after starting this work she was left to herself for a long time.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII
+
+
+It was a dark house. The windows were all withered away behind stiff
+curtains, and the light that labored between these was chastened to
+the last degree of respectability. The doors skulked behind heavy
+plush hangings. The floors hid themselves decently under thick red and
+black carpets, and the margins which were uncarpeted were disguised by
+beeswax, so that no one knew they were there at all. The narrow hall
+was steeped in shadow, for there two black velvet portieres, at
+distances of six feet apart, depended from rods in the ceiling.
+Similar palls flopped on each landing of the staircase, and no sound
+was heard in the house at all, except dim voices that droned from
+somewhere, muffled and sepulchral and bodyless.
+
+At ten o'clock, having finished the washing, Mary was visited by Mrs.
+O'Connor, whom she knew at once by the signs she had been warned of.
+The lady subjected each article that had been washed to a particular
+scrutiny, and, with the shadowy gallop of a smile that dashed into and
+out of sight in an instant, said they would do. She then conducted
+Mary to the kitchen and, pointing to a cup of tea and two slices of
+bread, invited her to breakfast, and left her for six minutes, when
+she reappeared with the suddenness of a marionette and directed her to
+wash her cup and saucer, and then to wash the kitchen, and these
+things also Mary did.
+
+She got weary very soon, but not dispirited, because there were many
+things to look at in the kitchen. There were pots of various sizes and
+metals, saucepans little and big, jugs of all shapes, and a regiment
+of tea things were ranged on the dresser; on the walls were hung great
+pot lids like the shields of barbarous warriors which she had seen in
+a story book. Under the kitchen table there was a row of boots all
+wrinkled by usage, and each wearing a human and almost intelligent
+aspect--a well-wrinkled boot has often an appearance of mad humanity
+which can chain and almost hypnotize the observer. As she lifted the
+boots out of her way she named each by its face. There was Grubtoes,
+Sloucher, Thump-thump, Hoppit, Twitter, Hide-away, and Fairybell.
+
+While she was working a young girl came into the kitchen and took up
+the boots called Fairybell. Mary just tossed a look at her as she
+entered and bent again to her washing. Then with an extreme
+perturbation she stole another look. The girl was young and as trim as
+a sunny garden. Her face was packed with laughter and freedom, like a
+young morning when tender rosy clouds sail in the sky. She walked with
+a light spring of happiness; each step seemed the beginning of a
+dance, light and swift and certain. Mary knew her in a pang, and her
+bent face grew redder than the tiles she was scrubbing. Like lightning
+she knew her. Her brain swung in a clamor of "where, where?" and even
+in the question she had the answer, for this was the girl she had seen
+going into the Gayety Theater swinging on the arm of her big
+policeman. The girl said good morning to her in a kindly voice, and
+Mary with a swift, frightened glance, whispered back good morning,
+then the girl went upstairs again, and Mary continued to scrub the
+floor.
+
+When the kitchen was finished and inspected and approved of, she was
+instructed to wash out the front hall, and set about the work at once.
+
+"Get it done as quickly as you can," said the mistress, "I am
+expecting my nephew here soon, and he dislikes washing."
+
+So Mary bent quickly to her work. She was not tired now. Her hands
+moved swiftly up and down the floor without effort. Indeed, her
+actions were almost mechanical. The self that was thinking and probing
+seemed somehow apart from the body bending over the bucket, and the
+hands that scrubbed and dipped and wrung. She had finished about three
+quarters of the hall when a couple of sharp raps came to the door.
+Mrs. O'Connor flew noiselessly up from the kitchen.
+
+"I knew," said she, bitterly, "that you would not be finished before
+he came. Dry that puddle at once, so that he can walk in, and take the
+soap out of the way."
+
+She stood with her hand on the door while Mary followed these
+directions, then, when a couple of hasty movements had removed the
+surplus water, Mrs. O'Connor drew the bolt and her nephew entered.
+Mary knew him on the doorstep, and her blood froze in terror and
+boiled again in shame.
+
+Mrs. O'Connor drew the big policeman inside and kissed him.
+
+"I can't get these people to do things in time," said she. "They are
+that slow. Hang up your hat and coat and come into the parlor."
+
+The policeman, with his eyes fixed steadily on Mary, began to take off
+his coat. His eyes, his moustache, all his face and figure seemed to
+be looking at her. He was an enormous and terrifying interrogation. He
+tapped his tough moustache and stepped over the bucket; at the entrance
+to the parlor he stood again and hung his monstrous look on her. He
+seemed about to speak, but it was to Mrs. O'Connor his words went.
+
+"How's everything?" said he, and then the door closed behind him.
+
+Mary, with extraordinary slowness, knelt down again beside the bucket
+and began to scrub. She worked very deliberately, sometimes cleaning
+the same place two or three times. Now and again she sighed, but
+without any consciousness of trouble. These were sighs which did not
+seem to belong to her. She knew she was sighing, but could not
+exactly see how the dull sounds came from her lips when she had no
+desire to sigh and did not make any conscious effort to do so. Her
+mind was an absolute blank, she could think of nothing but the bubbles
+which broke on the floor and in the bucket, and the way the water
+squeezed down from the cloth. There was something she could have
+thought about if she wanted to, but she did not want to.
+
+Mrs. O'Connor came out in, a few minutes, inspected the hall and said
+it would do. She paid Mary her wages and told her to come again the
+next day, and Mary went home. As she walked along she was very careful
+not to step on any of the lines on the pavement; she walked between
+these, and was distressed because these lines were not equally distant
+from each other, so that she had to make unequal paces as she went.
+
+
+
+
+XIX
+
+
+The name of the woman from next door was Mrs. Cafferty. She was big
+and round, and when she walked her dress whirled about her like a
+tempest. She seemed to be always turning round; when she was going
+straight forward in any direction, say towards a press, she would turn
+aside midway so sharply that her clothing spun gustily in her
+wake--This probably came from having many children. A mother is
+continually driving in oblique directions from her household employments
+to rescue her children from a multitude of perils. An infant and a
+fireplace act upon each other like magnets; a small boy is always trying
+to eat a kettle or a piece of coal or the backbone of a herring; a
+little girl and a slop bucket are in immediate contact; the baby has a
+knife in its mouth; the twin is on the point of swallowing a marble, or
+is trying to wash itself in the butter, or the cat is about to take a
+nap on its face. Indeed, the woman who has six children never knows in
+what direction her next step must be, and the continual strain of
+preserving her progeny converts many a one into regular cyclones of
+eyes and arms and legs. It also induces in some a perpetual good-humored
+irritability wherein one can slap and cuddle a child in the same
+instant, or shout threateningly or lovingly, call warningly and murmur
+encouragingly in an astonishing sequence. The woman with six children
+must both physically and mentally travel at a tangent, and when a
+husband has to be badgered or humored into the bargain, then the life
+of such a woman is more complex than is readily understood.
+
+When Mary came home Mrs. Cafferty was sitting on her mother's bed, two
+small children and a cat were also on the bed, two slightly bigger
+children were under the bed, and two others were galloping furiously
+up and down the room. At one moment these latter twain were runaway
+horses, at another they were express trains. When they were horses
+they snorted and neighed and kicked, when they were trains they backed
+and shunted, blew whistles and blew off steam. The children under the
+bed were tigers in a jungle, and they made the noises proper to such
+beasts and such a place; they bit each other furiously, and howled and
+growled precisely as tigers do. The pair of infants on the bed were
+playing the game of bump; they would stand upright, then spring high
+into the air and come crashing down on the bed, which then sprung them
+partly up again. Each time they jumped they screamed loudly, each time
+they fell they roared delighted congratulations to each other, and
+when they fell together they fought with strong good humor. Sometimes
+they fell on Mrs. Makebelieve; always they bumped her. At the side of
+the bed their mother sat telling with a gigantic voice a story wherein
+her husband's sister figured as the despicable person she was to the
+eye of discernment, and this story was punctuated and shot through and
+dislocuted by objurgations, threats, pleadings, admirations, alarms
+and despairs addressed to the children separately and en masse, by
+name, nickname, and hastily created epithet.
+
+Mary halted in amazement in the doorway. She could not grasp all the
+pandemonium at once, and while she stood Mrs. Cafferty saw her.
+
+"Come on in, honey," said she. "Your ma's as right as a trivet. All
+she wanted was a bit of good company and some children to play with.
+Deed," she continued, "children are the best medicine for a woman that
+I know of. They don't give you time to be sick, the creatures! Patrick
+John, I'll give you a smack on the side of the head if you don't let
+your little sister alone, and don't you, Norah, be vexing him or
+you'll deserve all you get. Run inside, Julia Elizabeth, cut a slice
+of bread for the twins, and put a bit of sugar on it, honey. Yes,
+alanna, you can have a slice for yourself, too, you poor child you,
+well you deserve it."
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve was sitting up in the bed with two pillows propping
+up her back. One of her long thin arms was stretched out to preserve
+the twins from being bruised against the wall in their play. Plainly
+they had become great friends with her, for every now and then they
+swarmed over her, and a hugging match of extreme complexity ensued.
+She looked almost her usual self, and all the animation that had been
+so marked a feature of her personality had returned to her.
+
+"Are you better, mother?" said Mary.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve took her daughter's head in her hands and kissed her
+until the twins butted them apart clamoring for caresses.
+
+"I am, honey," said she. "Those children done me good. I could have
+got up at one o'clock, I felt so well, but Mrs. Cafferty thought I'd
+better not."
+
+"I did so," said Mrs. Cafferty. "Not a foot do you stir out of that
+bed till your daughter comes home, ma'am, said I. For do you see,
+child, many's the time you'd be thinking you were well and feeling as
+fit as a fiddle, and nothing would be doing you but to be up and
+gallivanting about, and then the next day you'd have a relapse, and
+the next day you'd be twice as bad, and the day after that they'd be
+measuring you for your coffin maybe. I knew a woman was taken like
+that--up she got; I'm as well as ever I was, said she, and she ate a
+feed of pig's cheek and cabbage and finished her washing, and they
+buried her in a week. It's the quare thing, sickness. What I say is
+when you're sick get into bed and stop there."
+
+"It's easy saying that," said Mrs. Makebelieve.
+
+"Sure, don't I know, you poor thing you," said Mrs. Cafferty, "but
+you should stay in bed as long as you are able to anyhow."
+
+"How did you get on with Mrs. O'Connor?" said Mrs. Makebelieve.
+
+"That's the mistress, isn't it?" queried Mrs. Cafferty; "an ould
+devil, I'll bet you."
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve rapidly and lightly sketched Mrs. O'Connor's leading
+peculiarities.
+
+"It's queer the people one has to work for, God knows it is," said
+Mrs. Cafferty.
+
+At this point a grave controversy on work might have arisen, but the
+children, caring little for conversation, broke into so tumultuous
+play that talk could not be proceeded with. Mary was enticed into a
+game composed in part of pussy-four-corners and tip-an-tig, with a
+general flavor of leap-frog working through. In five minutes her hair
+and her stockings were both down, and the back of her skirt had crawled
+three-quarters round to the front. The twins shouted and bumped on the
+bed, upon which and on Mrs. Makebelieve they rubbed bread and butter
+and sugar, while their mother roared an anecdote at Mrs. Makebelieve
+in tones that ruled the din as a fog horn rules the waves.
+
+
+
+
+XX
+
+
+Mary had lavished the entire of her first day's wages on delicate
+foods wherewith to tempt her mother's languid appetite, and when the
+morning dawned she arose silently, lit the fire, wet the tea and
+spread her purchases out on the side of the bed. There was a slice of
+brawn, two pork sausages, two eggs, three rashers of bacon, a bun, a
+pennyworth of sweets and a pig's foot. These, with bread, and butter,
+and tea, made a collection amid which an invalid might browse with
+some satisfaction. Mary then awakened her, and sat by in a dream of
+happiness watching her mother's eye roll slowly and unbelievingly from
+item to item. Mrs. Makebelieve tipped each article with her first
+finger and put its right name on it unerringly. Then she picked out an
+important looking sweet that had four colors and shone like the sun,
+and put it in her mouth.
+
+"I never saw anything like it, you good child you," said she.
+
+Mary rocked herself to and fro and laughed loudly for delight, and
+then they ate a bit of everything, and were very happy.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve said that she felt altogether better that morning.
+She had slept like a top all through the night, and, moreover, had a
+dream wherein she saw her brother Patrick standing on the remotest sea
+point of distant America, from whence he had shouted loudly across the
+ocean that he was coming back to Ireland soon, that he had succeeded
+very well indeed, and that he was not married. He had not changed in
+the slightest degree, said Mrs. Makebelieve, and he looked as young
+and as jolly as when he was at home with her father and herself in the
+County Meath twenty-two years before. This mollifying dream and the
+easy sleep which followed it had completely restored her health and
+spirits. Mrs. Makebelieve further intimated that she intended to go to
+work that day. It did not fit in with her ideas of propriety that her
+child should turn into a charwoman, the more particularly as there was
+a strong--an almost certain--possibility of an early betterment of her
+own and her daughter's fortunes.
+
+Dreams, said Mrs. Makebelieve, did not come for nothing. There was
+more in dreams than was generally understood. Many and many were the
+dreams which she herself had been visited by, and they had come true
+so often that she could no longer disregard their promises,
+admonishments or threats. Of course many people had dreams which were
+of no consequence, and these could usually be traced to gluttony or a
+flighty inconstant imagination. Drunken people, for instance, often
+dreamed strange and terrible things, but, even while they were awake,
+these people were liable to imaginary enemies whom their clouded eyes
+and intellects magnified beyond any thoughtful proportions, and when
+they were asleep their dreams would also be subject to this haze and
+whirl of unreality and hallucination.
+
+Mary said that sometimes she did not dream at all, and at other times
+she dreamed very vividly, but usually could not remember what the
+dream had been about when she awakened, and once she had dreamed that
+some one gave her a shilling which she placed carefully under her
+pillow, and this dream was so real that in the morning she put her
+hand under the pillow to see if the shilling was there, but it was
+not. The very next night she dreamed the same dream, and as she put
+the phantom money under her pillow she said out loudly to herself, "I
+am dreaming this, and I dreamt it last night also." Her mother said if
+she had dreamt it for the third time some one would have given her a
+shilling surely. To this Mary agreed, and admitted that she had tried
+very hard to dream it on the third night, but somehow could not do it.
+
+"When my brother comes home from America," said Mrs. Makebelieve,
+"we'll go away from this part of the city at once. I suppose he'd want
+a rather big house on the south side--Rathfarnham or Terenure way, or,
+maybe, Donnybrook. Of course he'll ask me to mind the house for him
+and keep the servants in order, and provide a different dinner every
+day, and all that; while you could go out to the neighbors' places to
+play lawn tennis or cricket, and have lunch. It will be a very great
+responsibility."
+
+"What kind of dinners would you have?" said Mary.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve's eyes glistened, and she leaned forward in the bed;
+but just as she was about to reply the laboring man in the next room
+slammed his door, and went thundering down the stairs. In an instant
+Mrs. Makebelieve bounded from her bed; three wide twists put up her
+hair, eight strange billow-like movements put on her clothes; as each
+article of clothing reached a definite point on her person Mary
+stabbed it swiftly with a pin--four ordinary pins in this place, two
+safety pins in that: then Mrs. Makebelieve kissed her daughter sixteen
+times and fled down the stairs and away to her work.
+
+
+
+
+XXI
+
+
+In a few minutes Mrs. Cafferty came into the room. She was, as every
+woman is in the morning, primed with conversation about husbands, for
+in the morning husbands are unwieldy, morose creatures without joy,
+without lightness, lacking even the common, elemental interest in
+their own children, and capable of detestably misinterpreting the
+conversation of their wives. It is only by mixing amongst other men
+that this malignant humor may be dispelled. To them the company of men
+is like a great bath into which a husband will plunge wildly, renouncing
+as he dives wives and children, all anchors and securities of hearth and
+roof, and from which he again emerges singularly refreshed and capable
+of being interested by a wife, a family, and a home until the next
+morning. To many women this is a grievance amounting often to an
+affront, and although they endeavor, even by cooking, to heal the
+singular breach, they are utterly unable to do so, and perpetually seek
+the counsel of each other on the subject. Mrs. Cafferty had merely asked
+her husband would he hold the baby while she poured out his stirabout,
+and he had incredibly threatened to pour the stirabout down the back of
+her neck if she didn't leave him alone.
+
+It was upon this morning madness she had desired to consult her
+friend, and when she saw that Mrs. Makebelieve had gone away her
+disappointment was quite evident. But this was only for a moment.
+Almost all women are possessed of a fine social sense in relation to
+other women. They are always on their best behavior towards one
+another. Indeed, it often seems as if they feared and must by all
+possible means placate each other by flattery, humor or a serious
+tactfulness. There is very little freedom between them, because there
+is no real freedom or acquaintance but between things polar. There is
+nothing but a superficial resemblance between like and like, but
+between like and unlike there is space wherein both curiosity and
+spirit may go adventuring. Extremes must meet, it is their urgent
+necessity; the reason for their distance, and the greater the distance
+between them, the swifter will be their return and the warmer their
+impact: they may shatter each other to fragments or they may fuse and
+become indissoluble and new and wonderful, but there is no other
+fertility. Between the sexes there is a really extraordinary freedom
+of intercourse. They meet each other something more than half way. A
+man and a woman may become quite intimate in a quarter of an hour.
+Almost certainly they will endeavor to explain themselves to each
+other before many minutes have elapsed; but a man and a man will not
+do this, and even less so will a woman and a woman, for these are the
+parallel lines which never meet. The acquaintanceship of the latter,
+in particular, often begins and ends in an armed and calculating
+neutrality. They preserve their distances and each others' suffrage by
+the exercise of a grave social tact which never deserts them, and
+which more than anything else has contributed to build the ceremonials
+which are nearly one-half of our civilization. It is a common belief
+amongst men that women cannot live together without quarreling, and
+that they are unable to get work done by other women with any of the
+good will which men display in the same occupations. If this is true,
+the reason should not be looked for in any intersexual complications,
+such as fear or an acrid rivalry, but only in the perpetually
+recurring physical disturbances to which, as a sex, they are
+subjected; and as the ability and willingness of a man to use his
+fists in response to an affront has imposed sobriety and good humor
+towards each other in almost all their relations, so women have placed
+barriers of politeness and ceremonial between their fellow-women and
+their own excoriated sensibilities.
+
+Mrs. Cafferty, therefore, dissembled her disappointment, and with an
+increased cordiality addressed herself towards Mary. Sitting down on
+the bedside she discoursed on almost every subject upon which a woman
+may discourse. It is considered that the conversation of women, while
+incessant in its use, is rigorously bounded between the parlor and the
+kitchen, or, to be more precise, between the attic and the scullery,
+but these extremes are more inclusive than is imagined, for the attic
+has an outlook on the stars while the scullery usually opens on the
+kitchen garden or the dust heap--vistas equal to horizons. The
+mysteries of death and birth occupy women far more than is the case
+with men, to whom political and mercantile speculations are more
+congenial. With immediate buying and selling, and all the absolute
+forms of exchange and barter, women are deeply engaged, so that the
+realities of trade are often more intelligent to them than to many
+merchants. If men understood domestic economy half as well as women
+do, then their political economy and their entire consequent
+statecraft would not be the futile muddle which it is.
+
+It was all very interesting to Mary, and, moreover, she had a great
+desire for companionship at the moment. If she had been left alone it
+might have become necessary to confront certain thoughts, memories,
+pictures, from which she had a dim idea it would be wise to keep her
+distance. Her work on the previous day, the girl she had met in the
+house, the policeman--from all or any of these recollections she
+swerved mentally. She steadily rejected all impressions that touched
+upon these. The policeman floated vaguely on her consciousness not as
+a desirable person, not even as a person but as a distance, as an
+hour of her childhood, as a half-forgotten quaintness, a memory which
+it would be better should never be revived. Indeed her faint thought
+shadowed him as a person who was dead, and would never again be
+visible to her anywhere. So, resolutely, she let him drop down into
+her mind to some uncomfortable oubliette from whence he threatened
+with feeble insistence to pop up at any moment like a strange question
+or a sudden shame. She hid him in a rosy flush which a breath could
+have made flame unbearably, and she hid from him behind the light
+garrulity of Mrs. Cafferty, through which now and again, as through a
+veil, she saw the spike of his helmet, a wiry bristling moustache, a
+surge of great shoulders. On these ghostly indications she heaped a
+tornado of words which swamped the wraith, but she knew he was waiting
+to catch her alone, and would certainly catch her, and the knowledge
+made her hate him.
+
+
+
+
+XXII
+
+
+Mrs. Cafferty suggested that she and Mary should go out together to
+purchase that day's dinner, and by the time she had draped her
+shoulders in a shawl, buried her head in a bonnet, cautioned all her
+brood against going near the fireplace, the coal box and the slop
+bucket, cut a slice of bread for each of them, and placed each of them
+in charge of all the rest, Mary's more elaborate dressing was within
+two stages of her hat.
+
+"Wait until you have children, my dear," said Mrs. Cafferty, "you
+won't be so pernickety then." She further told Mary that when she was
+herself younger she had often spent an hour and a half doing up her
+hair, and she had been so particular that the putting on of a blouse
+or the pinning of a skirt to a belt had tormented her happily for two
+hours. "But, bless you," she roared, "you get out of all that when you
+get children. Wait till you have six of them to be dressed every
+morning, and they with some of their boots lost and the rest of them
+mixed up, and each of them wriggling like an eel on a pan until you
+have to slap the devil out of them before their stocking can be got
+on: the way they screw their toes up in the wrong places! and the way
+they squeal that you're pinching them! and the way that they say
+you've rubbed soap in their eyes!"--Mrs. Cafferty lifted her eyes and
+her hands to the ceiling in a dumb remonstrance with Providence, and
+dropped them again forlornly as one in whom Providence had never been
+really interested--"You'll have all the dressing you want and a bit
+over for luck," said she.
+
+She complimented Mary on her hair, her complexion, the smallness of
+her feet, the largeness of her eyes, the slenderness of her waist,
+the width of her hat and of her shoe strings: so impartially and
+inclusively did she compliment her that by the time they went out Mary
+was rosy with appreciation and as self-confident as a young girl is
+entitled to be.
+
+It was a beautiful gray day with a massy sky which seemed as if it
+never could move again or change, and, as often happens in Ireland in
+cloudy weather, the air was so very clear that one could see to a
+great distance. On such days everything stands out in sharp outline. A
+street is no longer a congery of houses huddling shamefully together
+and terrified lest any one should look at them and laugh. Each house
+then recaptures its individuality. The very roadways are aware of
+themselves and bear their horses, and cars, and trams in a competent
+spirit, adorned with modesty as with a garland. It has a beauty beyond
+sunshine, for sunshine is only youth and carelessness. The impress of
+a thousand memories, the historic visage becomes apparent: the quiet
+face which experience has ripened into knowledge and mellowed into the
+wisdom of charity is seen then: the great social beauty shines from
+the streets under this sky that broods like a thoughtful forehead.
+
+While they walked Mrs. Cafferty planned, as a general might, her
+campaign of shopping. Her shopping differed greatly from Mrs.
+Makebelieve's, and the difference was probably caused by her necessity
+to feed and clothe eight people as against Mrs. Makebelieve's two.
+Mrs. Makebelieve went to the shop nearest her house, and there entered
+into a stanch personal friendship with the proprietor. When she was
+given anything of doubtful value or material she instantly returned
+and handed it back, and the prices which were first quoted to her and
+settled upon became to Mrs. Makebelieve an unalterable standard from
+which no departure would be tolerated. Eggs might go up in price for
+the remainder of the world, but not for her. A change of price threw
+Mrs. Makebelieve into so wide-eyed, so galvanic, so power fully-verbal
+and friendship-shattering an anger that her terms were accepted and
+registered as Median exactitudes. Mrs. Cafferty, on the other hand,
+knew shopkeepers as personal enemies and as foes to the human race,
+who were bent on despoiling the poor, and against whom a remorseless
+warfare should be conducted by all decent people. Her knowledge of
+material, of quality, of degrees of freshness, of local and distant
+prices was profound. In Clanbrassil Street she would quote the prices
+of Moore Street with shattering effect, and if the shopkeeper declined
+to revise his tariff her good-humored voice toned so huge a
+disapproval that other intending purchasers left the shop impressed by
+the unmasking of a swindler. Her method was abrupt. She seized an
+article, placed it on the counter and uttered these words, "Sixpence
+and not a penny more; I can get it in Moore Street for five pence half
+penny." She knew all the shops having a cheap line in some special
+article, and, therefore, her shopping was of a very extended
+description, not that she went from point to point, for she
+continually departed from the line of battle with the remark "Let's
+try what they have here," and when inside the shop her large eye took
+in at a glance a thousand details of stock and price which were never
+afterwards forgotten.
+
+Mrs. Cafferty's daughter, Norah, was going to celebrate her first
+Communion in a few days. This is a very important ceremony for a young
+girl and for her mother. A white muslin dress and a blue sash, a white
+muslin hat with blue ribbons, tan shoes, and stockings as germane to
+the color of tan as may be--these all have to be provided. It is a
+time of grave concern for everybody intimately connected with the
+event. Every girl in the world has performed this ceremony: they have
+all been clad in these garments and shoes, and for a day or so all
+women, of whatever age, are in love with the little girl making her
+first Communion. Perhaps more than anything else it swings the passing
+stranger back to the time when she was not a woman but a child with
+present gayety and curiosity, and a future all expectation and
+adventure. Therefore, the suitable appareling of one's daughter is a
+public duty, and every mother endeavors to do the thing that is right,
+and live, if only for one day, up to the admiration of her
+fellow-creatures.
+
+It was a trial, but an enjoyable one, to Mrs. Cafferty and Mary, this
+matching of tan stockings with tan shoes. The shoes were bought, and
+then an almost impossible quest began to find stockings which would
+exactly go with them. Thousands of boxes were opened, ransacked and
+waved aside without the absolute color being discovered. From shop to
+shop and from street to street they went, and the quest led them
+through Grafton Street en route to a shop where months before Mrs.
+Cafferty had seen stockings of a color so nearly approximating to tan
+that they almost might be suitable.
+
+As they went past the College and entered the winding street Mary's
+heart began to beat. She did not see any of the traffic flowing up and
+down, or the jostling, busy foot passengers, nor did she hear the
+eager lectures of her companion. Her eyes were straining up the street
+towards the crossing. She dared not turn back or give any explanation
+to Mrs. Cafferty, and in a few seconds she saw him, gigantic, calm,
+adequate, the monarch of his world. His back was turned to her, and
+the great sweep of his shoulders, his solid legs, his red neck and
+close-cropped, wiry hair were visible to her strangely. She had a
+peculiar feeling of acquaintedness and of aloofness, intimate
+knowledge and a separation of sharp finality caused her to stare at
+him with so intent a curiosity that Mrs. Cafferty noticed it.
+
+"That's a fine man," said she, "he won't have to go about looking for
+girls."
+
+As she spoke they passed by the policeman, and Mary knew that when her
+eyes left him his gaze almost automatically fell upon her. She was
+glad that he could not see her face. She was glad that Mrs. Cafferty
+was beside her: had she been alone she would have been tempted to walk
+away very quickly, almost to run, but her companion gave her courage
+and self-possession, so that she walked gallantly. But her mind was a
+fever. She could feel his eyes raking her from head to foot, she could
+see his great hand going up to tap his crinkly moustache. These things
+she could see in her terrified mind, but she could not think, she
+could only give thanks to God because she had her best clothes on.
+
+
+
+
+XXIII
+
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve was planning to get back such of her furniture and
+effects as had been pawned during her illness. Some of these things
+she had carried away from her father's house many years before when
+she got married. They had been amongst the earliest objects on which
+her eyes had rested when she was born, and around them her whole life
+of memories revolved. A chair in which her father had sat and on the
+edge whereof her husband had timidly balanced himself when he came
+courting her, and into which her daughter had been tied when she was a
+baby. A strip of carpet and some knives and forks had formed portion
+of her wedding presents. She loved these things, and had determined
+that if work could retrieve them they should not be lost forever.
+Therefore, she had to suffer people like Mrs. O'Connor, not gladly,
+but with the resignation due to the hests of Providence which one must
+obey but may legitimately criticise. Mrs. Makebelieve said definitely
+that she detested the woman. She was a cold-eyed person whose only
+ability was to order about other people who were much better than she
+was. It distressed Mrs. Makebelieve to have to work for such a person,
+to be subject to her commands and liable to her reproofs or advice;
+these were things which seemed to her to be out of all due proportion.
+She did not wish the woman any harm, but some day or other she would
+undoubtedly have to put her in her proper place. It was a day to which
+she looked forward. Any one who had a sufficient income could have a
+house and could employ and pay for outside help without any particular
+reason for being proud, and many people, having such an income, would
+certainly have a better appointed house and would be more generous
+and civil to those who came to work for them. Everybody, of course,
+could not have a policeman for a nephew, and there were a great many
+people who would rather not have anything to do with a policeman at
+all. Overbearing rough creatures to whom everybody is a thief! If Mrs.
+Makebelieve had such a nephew she would certainly have wrecked his
+pride--the great beast! Here Mrs. Makebelieve grew very angry: her
+black eyes blazed, her great nose grew thin and white and her hands
+went leaping in fury. "You're not in Court now, you jackanapes
+you,--said I, with his whiskers and his baton, and his feet that were
+bigger than anything in the world except his ignorant self-conceit.
+'Have you a daughter, mam, said he, what's her age, mam, said he, is
+she a good girl, mam, said he?'--but she had settled him,--and that
+woman was prouder of him than a king would be of his crown! never
+mind," said Mrs. Makebelieve, and she darted fiercely up and down the
+room, tearing pieces off the atmosphere and throwing them behind her.
+
+In a few minutes, however, she sat down on the floor and drew her
+daughter's head to her breast, and then, staring into the scrap of
+fire, she counseled Mary wisely on many affairs of life and the
+conduct of a girl under all kinds of circumstances--to be adequate in
+spirit if not in physique: that was her theme. Never be a servant in
+your heart, said she. To work is nothing; the king on his throne, the
+priest kneeling before the Holy Altar, all people in all places had to
+work, but no person at all need be a servant. One worked and was paid,
+and went away keeping the integrity of one's soul unspotted and
+serene. If an employer was wise or good or kind Mrs. Makebelieve was
+prepared to accord such a person instant and humble reverence. She
+would work for such a one until the nails dropped off her fingers and
+her feet crumpled up under her body; but a policeman or a rich
+person, or a person who ordered one about...! until she died and was
+buried in the depths of the world, she would never give in to such a
+person or admit anything but their thievishness and ill-breeding. Bad
+manners to the like of them, said she, and might have sailed
+boisterously away upon an ocean of curses but that Mary turned her
+face closer to her breast and began to speak.
+
+For suddenly there had come to Mary a vision of peace: like a green
+island in the sea it was, like a white cloud on a broiling day; the
+sheltered life where all mundane preoccupations were far away, where
+ambition and hope and struggle were incredibly distant foolishness.
+Lowly and peaceful and unjaded was that life: she could see the nuns
+pacing quietly in their enclosed gardens, fingering their beads as
+they went to and fro and praying noiselessly for the sins of the
+world, or walking with solemn happiness to the Chapel to praise God
+in their own small companies, or going with hidden feet through the
+great City to nurse the sick and to comfort those who had no other
+comforter than God--to pray in a quiet place, and not to be afraid any
+more or doubtful or despised...! These things she saw and her heart
+leaped to them, and of these things she spoke to her mother, who
+listened with a tender smile and stroked her hair and hands. But her
+mother did not approve of these things. She spoke of nuns with
+reverence and affection. Many a gentle, sweet woman had she known of
+that sisterhood, many a one before whom she could have abased herself
+with tears and love, but such a life of shelter and restraint could
+never have been hers, nor did she believe it could be Mary's. For her
+a woman's business was life, the turmoil and strife of it was good to
+be in, it was a cleansing and a bracing. God did not need any
+assistance, but man did, bitterly he wanted it, and the giving of
+such assistance was the proper business of a woman. Everywhere there
+was a man to be helped, and the quest of a woman was to find the man
+who most needed her aid, and having found him to cleave to him
+forever. In most of the trouble of life she divined men and women not
+knowing or not doing their duty, which was to love one another and to
+be neighborly and obliging to their fellows. A partner, a home and
+children--through the loyal co-operation of these she saw happiness
+and, dimly, a design of so vast an architecture as scarcely to be
+discussed. The bad and good of humanity moved her to an equal ecstasy
+of displeasure and approbation, but her God was Freedom and her
+religion Love. Freedom! even the last rags of it that remain to a
+regimented world! That was a passion with her. She must order her
+personal life without any ghostly or bodily supervision. She would
+oppose an encroachment on that with her nails and her teeth; and this
+last fringe of freedom was what nuns had sacrificed and all servants
+and other people had bartered away. One must work, but one must never
+be a slave--these laws seemed to her equally imperative; the structure
+of the world swung upon them, and whoever violated these laws was a
+traitor to both God and man.
+
+But Mary did not say anything. Her mother's arms were around her, and
+suddenly she commenced to cry upon a bosom that was not strange. There
+was surely healing in that breast of love, a rampart of tenderness
+against the world, a door which would never be closed against her or
+opened to her enemies.
+
+
+
+
+XXIV
+
+
+In a little city like Dublin one meets every person whom one knows
+within a few days. Around each bend in the road there is a friend, an
+enemy, or a bore striding towards you, so that, with a piety which is
+almost religious, one says "touch wood" before turning any corner. It
+was not long, therefore, until Mary again met the big policeman. He
+came up behind her and walked by her side, chatting with a pleasant
+ease, in which, however, her curious mind could discover some obscure
+distinctions. On looking backwards it seemed to Mary that he had
+always come from behind her, and the retrospect dulled his glory to
+the diminishing point. For indeed his approach was too consistently
+policemanlike, it was too crafty; his advent hinted at a gross
+espionage, at a mind which was no longer a man's but a detective's
+who tracked everybody by instinct, and arrested his friends instead of
+saluting them.
+
+As they walked along Mary was in a fever of discomfort. She wished
+dumbly that the man would go away, but for the wealth of the world she
+could not have brought herself to hurt the feelings of so big a man.
+To endanger the very natural dignity of a big man was a thing which no
+woman could do without a pang; the shame of it made her feel hot: he
+might have blushed or stammered, and the memory of that would sting her
+miserably for weeks as though she had insulted an elephant or a baby.
+
+She could not get away from him. She had neither the courage nor the
+experience which enables a woman to dismiss a man without wounding
+him, and so, perforce, she continued walking by his side while he
+treated her to an intelligent dissertation on current political events
+and the topography of the city of Dublin.
+
+But, undoubtedly, there was a change in the policeman, and it was not
+difficult to account for. He was more easy and familiar in his speech:
+while formerly he had bowed as from the peaks of manly intellect to
+the pleasant valleys of girlish incompetence he now condescended from
+the loftiness of a policeman and a person of quality to the quaint
+gutters of social inferiority. To many people mental inferiority in a
+companion has a charm, for it induces in one's proper person a feeling
+of philosophic detachment, a fine effect of personal individuality and
+superiority which is both bracing and uplifting--there is not any
+particular harm in this: progress can be, and is, accelerated by the
+hypocrisies and snobbishness, all the minor, unpleasant adjuncts of
+mediocrity. Snobbishness is a puling infant, but it may grow to a
+deeply whiskered ambition, and most virtues are, on examination, the
+amalgam of many vices. But while intellectual poverty may be forgiven
+and loved, social inequality can only be utilized. Our fellows,
+however addled, are our friends, our inferiors are our prey, and since
+the policeman had discovered Mary publicly washing out an alien hall
+his respect for her had withered and dropped to death almost in an
+instant; whence it appears that there is really only one grave and
+debasing vice in the world, and that is poverty.
+
+In many little ways the distinction and the difference was apparent to
+Mary. The dignity of a gentleman and a man of the world was partly
+shorn away: the gentleman portion, which comprised kindness and
+reticence, had vanished, the man of the world remained, typified by a
+familiarity which assumed that this and that, understood but not to be
+mentioned, shall be taken for granted: a spurious equalization perched
+jauntily but insecurely on a non-committal, and that base flattery
+which is the only coin wherewith a thief can balance his depredations.
+For as they went pacing down a lonely road towards the Dodder the
+policeman diversified his entertaining lore by a succession of
+compliments which ravaged the heavens and the earth and the deep sea
+for a fitting symbology. Mary's eyes and the gay heavens were placed
+in juxtaposition and the heavens were censured, the vegetable, animal
+and mineral worlds were discomfited, the deep sea sustained a reproof
+and the by-products of nature and of art drooped into a nothingness
+too vast even for laughter. Mary had not the slightest objection to
+hearing that all the other women in the world seemed cripples and
+gargoyles when viewed against her own transcendent splendor, and she
+was prepared to love the person who said this innocently and happily.
+She would have agreed to be an angel or a queen to a man demanding
+potentates and powers in his sweetheart, and would joyfully have
+equalized matters by discovering the buried god in her lover and
+believing in it as sincerely as he permitted.--But this man was not
+saying the truth. She could see him making the things up as he talked.
+There was eagerness in him, but no spontaneity. It was not even
+eagerness, it was greediness: he wanted to eat her up and go away with
+her bones sticking out of his mouth as the horns of a deer protrude
+from the jaws of an anaconda, veritable evidence to it and his fellows
+of a victory and an orgy to command respect and envy. But he was
+familiar, he was complacent and--amazedly she discovered it--he was
+big. Her vocabulary could not furnish her with the qualifying word,
+or, rather, epithet for his bigness. Horrible was suggested and
+retained, but her instinct clamored that there was a fat, oozy word
+somewhere which would have brought comfort to her brains and her hands
+and feet. He did not keep his arms quiet, but tapped his remarks into
+her blouse and her shoulder. Each time his hands touched her they
+remained a trifle longer. They seemed to be great red spiders, they
+would grip her all round and squeeze her clammily while his face
+spiked her to death with its moustache.... And he smiled also, he
+giggled and cut capers; his language now was a perpetual witticism at
+which he laughed in jerks, and at which she laughed tightly like an
+obedient, quick echo: and then, suddenly, without a word, in a dazing
+flash, his arms were about her. There was nobody in sight at all, and
+he was holding her like a great spider, and his bristly moustache
+darted forward to spike her to death, and then, somehow, she was free,
+away from him, scudding down the road lightly and fearfully and very
+swiftly. "Wait, wait," he called, "wait," but she did not wait.
+
+
+
+
+XXV
+
+
+Mrs. Cafferty came in that evening for a chat with Mrs. Makebelieve.
+There were traces of worry on the lady's face, and she hushed the
+children who trooped in her wake with less of good humor than they
+were accustomed to. Instead of threatening to smack them on the head
+as was usual she did smack them, and she walked surrounded by
+lamentations as by a sea.
+
+Things were not going at all well with her. There was a slackness in
+her husband's trade so that for days together he was idle, and
+although the big woman amended her expenditure in every direction she
+could not by any means adjust eight robust appetites to a shrunken
+income. She explained her position to Mrs. Makebelieve:--Children
+would not, they could not, consent to go on shorter rations than they
+had been accustomed to, and it seemed to her that daily, almost
+hourly, their appetites grew larger and more terrible. She showed her
+right hand whereon the mere usage of a bread-knife had scored a ridge
+which was now a permanent disfigurement.
+
+"God bless me," she shouted angrily, "what right have I to ask the
+creatures to go hungry? Am I to beat them when they cry? It's not
+their fault that they want food, and it's not my poor man's fault that
+they haven't any. He's ready to work at his trade if anybody wants him
+to do so, and if he can't get work and if the children are hungry
+whose fault is it?"
+
+Mrs. Cafferty held that there was something wrong somewhere, but
+whether the blame was to be allocated to the weather, the employer,
+the government or the Deity, she did not know, nor did Mrs.
+Makebelieve know; but they were agreed that there was an error
+somewhere, a lack of adjustment with which they had nothing to do, but
+the effects whereof were grievously visible in their privations.
+Meantime it had become necessary that Mrs. Cafferty should adjust
+herself to a changing environment. A rise or fall in wages is
+automatically followed by a similar enlargement or shrinkage of one's
+necessities, and the consequent difference is registered at all points
+of one's life-contact. The physical and mental activities of a
+well-to-do person can reach out to a horizon, while those of very poor
+people are limited to their immediate, stagnant atmosphere, and so the
+lives of a vast portion of society are liable to a ceaseless change, a
+flux swinging from good to bad forever, an expansion and constriction
+against which they have no safeguards and not even any warning. In
+free nature this problem is paralleled by the shrinking and expansion
+of the seasons; the summer with its wealth of food, the winter
+following after with its famine, but many wild creatures are able to
+make a thrifty provision against the bad time which they know comes as
+certainly and periodically as the good time. Bees and squirrels and
+many others fill their barns with the plentiful overplus of the summer
+fields, birds can migrate and find sunshine and sustenance elsewhere,
+and others again can store during their good season a life energy by
+means whereof they may sleep healthily through their hard times. These
+organizations can be adjusted to their environments because the
+changes of the latter are known and can be more or less accurately
+predicted from any point. But the human worker has no such regularity.
+His food period does not ebb and recur with the seasons. There is no
+periodicity in their changes and, therefore, no possibility for
+defensive or protective action. His physical structure uses and
+excretes energy so rapidly that he cannot store it up and go to sleep
+on his savings, and his harvests are usually so lean and disconnected
+that the exercise of thrift is equally an impossibility and a mockery.
+The life, therefore, of such a person is composed of a constant series
+of adjustments and readjustments, and the stern ability wherewith
+these changes are met and combated are more admirably ingenious than
+the much-praised virtues of ants and bees to which they are constantly
+directed as to exemplars.
+
+Mrs. Cafferty had now less money than she had been used to, but she
+had still the same rent to pay, the same number of children to feed,
+and the same personal dignity to support as in her better days, and
+her problem was to make up, by some means to which she was a stranger,
+the money which had drifted beyond the reach of her husband. The
+methods by which she could do this were very much restricted. Children
+require an attention which occupies the entire of a mother's time,
+and, consequently, she was prevented from seeking abroad any
+mitigation of her hardships. The occupations which might be engaged in
+at home were closed to her by mere overwhelming competition. The
+number of women who are prepared to make ten million shirts for a
+penny are already far in excess of the demand, and so, except by a
+severe under-cutting such as a contract to make twenty million shirts
+for a halfpenny, work of this description is very difficult to obtain.
+
+Under these circumstances nothing remained for Mrs. Cafferty but to
+take in a lodger. This is a form of co-operation much practiced among
+the poorer people. The margin of direct profit accruing from such a
+venture is very small, but this is compensated for by the extra
+spending power achieved. A number of people pooling their money in
+this way can buy to greater advantage and in a cheaper market than is
+possible to the solitary purchaser, and a moderate toll for wear and
+tear and usage, or, as it is usually put, for rent and attendance,
+gives the small personal profit at which such services are reckoned.
+
+Through the good offices of a neighboring shopkeeper Mrs. Cafferty
+had secured a lodger, and, with the courage which is never separate
+from despair, she had rented a small room beside her own. This room,
+by an amazing economy of construction, contained a fireplace and a
+window: it was about one square inch in diameter, and was undoubtedly
+a fine room. The lodger was to enter into possession on the following
+day, and Mrs. Cafferty said he was a very nice young man indeed and
+did not drink.
+
+
+
+
+XXVI
+
+
+Mrs. Cafferty's lodger duly arrived. He was young and as thin as a
+lath, and he moved with fury. He was seldom in the place at all: he
+fled into the house for his food, and, having eaten it, he fled away
+from the house again, and did not reappear until it was time to go to
+bed. What he did with himself in the interval Mrs. Cafferty did not
+know, but she was prepared to wager her soul, the value of which she
+believed was high, on the fact that he was a good young man who never
+gave the slightest trouble, saving that his bedclothes were always
+lying on the floor in the morning, that there was candle grease on one
+corner of his pillow, and that he cleaned his boots on a chair. But
+these were things which one expected a young man to do, and the
+omission of them might have caused one to look curiously at the
+creature and to doubt his masculinity.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve replied that habits of order and neatness were rarely
+to be found in young people of either sex; more especially were these
+absent in boys who are released in early youth by their mothers from
+all purely domestic employments. A great many people believed, and she
+believed herself, that it was not desirable a man or boy should
+conform too rigidly to household rules. She had observed that the
+comfort of a home was lost to many men if they were expected to take
+their boots off when they came into the house or to hang their hats up
+in a special place. The women of a household, being so constantly
+indoors, find it easy and businesslike to obey the small rules which
+comprise household legislation, but as the entire policy of a house
+was to make it habitable and comfortable for its men folk all domestic
+ordinances might be strained to the uttermost until the compromise
+was found to mollify even exceptional idiosyncrasies. A man, she held,
+bowed to quite sufficient discipline during his working hours, and his
+home should be a place free from every vexatious restraint and wherein
+he might enjoy as wide a liberty as was good for him.
+
+These ideas were applauded by Mrs. Cafferty, and she supplemented them
+by a recital of how she managed her own husband, and of the ridiculous
+ease whereby any man may be governed; for she had observed that men
+were very susceptible to control if only the control was not too
+apparent. If a man did a thing twice the doing of that thing became a
+habit and a passion, any interference with which provoked him to an
+unreasoning bull-like wrath wherein both wives and crockery were
+equally shattered; and, therefore, a woman had only to observe the
+personal habits of her beloved and fashion her restrictions according
+to that standard. This meant that men made the laws and women
+administered them--a wise allocation of prerogatives, for she
+conceived that the executive female function was every whit as
+important as the creative faculty which brought these laws into being.
+She was quite prepared to leave the creative powers in male hands if
+they would equally abstain from interference with the subsequent
+working details, for she was of opinion that in the pursuit of comfort
+(not entirely to their credit was it said) men were far more anxiously
+concerned than were women, and they flew to their bourne with an
+instinct for short cuts wherewith women were totally unacquainted.
+
+But in the young man who had come to lodge with her Mrs. Cafferty
+discerned a being in whom virtue had concentrated to a degree that
+almost amounted to a congestion. He had instantly played with the
+children on their being presented to him: this was the sign of a good
+nature. Before he was acquainted with her ten minutes he had made
+four jokes: this was the sign of a pleasant nature; and he sang loudly
+and unceasingly when he awoke in the morning, which was the unfailing
+index to a happy nature. Moreover, he ate the meals provided for him
+without any of that particular, tedious examination which is so
+insulting, and had complimented Mrs. Cafferty on an ability to put a
+taste on food which she was pleased to obtain recognition of.
+
+Both Mary and her mother remarked on these details with an admiration
+which was as much as either politeness or friendship could expect.
+Mrs. Makebelieve's solitary method of life had removed her so
+distantly from youth that information about a young man was almost
+tonic to her. She had never wished for a second husband, but had often
+fancied that a son would have been a wonderful joy to her. She
+considered that a house which had no young man growing up in it was
+not a house at all, and she believed that a boy would love his
+mother, if not more than a daughter could, at least with a difference
+which would be strangely sweet--a rash, impulsive, unquiet love: a
+love which would continually prove her love to the breaking point; a
+love that demanded, and demanded with careless assurance, that
+accepted her goodness as unquestioningly as she accepted the fertility
+of the earth, and used her knowing blindly and flatteringly how
+inexhaustively rich her depths were.... She could have wept for this:
+it was priceless beyond kingdoms: the smile on a boy's face lifted her
+to an exaltation. Her girl was inexpressibly sweet, surely an island
+in her wide heart, but a little boy ... her breasts could have filled
+with milk for him, him she could have nourished in the rocks and in
+desert places: he would have been life to her and adventure, a barrier
+against old age, an incantation against sorrow, a fragrance and a
+grief and a defiance....
+
+It was quite plain that Mrs. Cafferty was satisfied with this addition
+to her household, but the profit which she had expected to accrue from
+his presence was not the liberal one she had in mind when making the
+preliminary arrangements. For it appeared that the young man had an
+appetite of which Mrs. Cafferty spoke with the respect proper to
+something colossal and awesome. A half-loaf did not more than break
+the back of a hunger which could wriggle disastrously over another
+half-loaf: so that, instead of being relieved by his advent, she was
+confronted by a more immediate and desolating bankruptcy than that
+from which she had attempted to escape. Exactly how to deal with this
+situation she did not know, and it was really in order to discuss her
+peculiar case that she had visited Mrs. Makebelieve. She could, of
+course, have approached the young man and demanded from him an
+increase of money that would still be equitable to both parties, but
+she confessed a repugnance to this course. She did not like to
+upbraid or trouble any one on account of an appetite which was so
+noteworthy. She disliked, in any event, to raise a question about
+food: her instinct for hospitality was outraged at the thought, and as
+she was herself the victim, or the owner, of an appetite which had
+often placed a strain on her revenues, a fellow-feeling operated still
+further in mitigation of his disqualification.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve's advice was that she should stifle the first fierce
+and indiscriminate cravings of the young man's hunger by a liberal
+allowance of stirabout, which was a cheap, wholesome and very
+satisfying food, and in that way his destruction of more costly
+victuals would be kept within reasonable limits. Appetite, she held,
+was largely a matter of youth, and as a boy who was scarcely done
+growing had no way of modifying his passion for nourishment, it would
+be a lapse from decency to insult him on so legitimate a failing.
+
+Mrs. Cafferty thought that this might be done, and thanked her friend
+for the counsel; but Mary, listening to these political matters,
+conceived Mrs. Cafferty as a person who had no longer any claim to
+honor, and she pitied the young man whose appetite was thus publicly
+canvassed, and who might at any moment be turned out of house and home
+on account of a hunger against which he had no safeguard and no remedy.
+
+
+
+
+XXVII
+
+
+It was not long until Mary and Mrs. Cafferty's lodger met. As he came
+in by the hall door one day Mary was carrying upstairs a large water
+bucket, the portage of which two or three times a day is so heavy a
+strain on the dweller in tenements. The youth instantly seized the
+bucket and, despite her protestations and appeals, he carried it
+upstairs. He walked a few steps in advance of Mary, whistling
+cheerfully as he went, so she was able to get a good view of him. He
+was so thin that he nearly made her laugh, but he carried the bucket,
+the weight of which she had often bowed under, with an ease
+astonishing in so slight a man, and there was a spring in his walk
+which was pleasant to see. He laid the bucket down outside her room,
+and requested her urgently to knock at his door whenever she required
+more water fetched, because he would be only too delighted to do it
+for her, and it was not the slightest trouble in the world. While he
+spoke he was stealing glances at her face and Mary was stealing
+glances at his face, and when they caught one another doing this at
+the same moment they both looked hurriedly away, and the young man
+departed to his own place.
+
+But Mary was very angry with this young man. She had gone downstairs
+in her house attire, which was not resplendent, and she objected to
+being discovered by any youth in raiment not suitable to such an
+occasion. She could not visualize herself speaking to a man unless she
+was adorned as for a festivity. The gentlemen and ladies of whom her
+mother sometimes spoke, and of whom she had often dreamt, were never
+mean in their habiliments. The gentlemen frequently had green silken
+jackets with a foam of lace at the wrists and a cascade of the same
+rich material brawling upon their breasts, and the ladies were
+attired in a magnificent scarcity of clothing, the fundamental
+principle whereof, although she was quite assured of its
+righteousness, she did not yet understand.
+
+Indeed, at this period Mary's interest in dress far transcended any
+interest she had ever known before. She knew intimately the window
+contents of every costumier's shop in Grafton and Wicklow and Dawson
+streets, and could follow with intelligent amazement the apparently
+trifling, but exceedingly important, differences of line or seam or
+flounce which ranked one garment as a creation and its neighbor as a
+dress. She and her mother often discussed the gowns wherein the
+native dignity of their souls might be adequately caparisoned. Mrs.
+Makebelieve, with a humility which had still a trace of anger,
+admitted that the period when she could have been expressed in color
+had expired, and she decided that a black silk dress, with a heavy
+gold chain falling along the bosom, was as much as her soul was now
+entitled to. She had an impatience, amounting to contempt, for those
+florid flamboyant souls whose outer physical integument so grievously
+misrepresented them. She thought that after a certain time one should
+dress the body and not the soul, and, discovering an inseparability
+between the two, she held that the mean shrine must hold a very
+trifling deity and that an ill-made or time-worn body should never
+dress gloriously under pain of an accusation of hypocrisy or
+foolishness.
+
+But for Mary she planned garments with a freedom and bravery which
+astonished while it delighted her daughter. She combined twenty styles
+into one style of terrifying originality. She conceived dresses of a
+complexity beyond the labor of any but a divinely inspired needle, and
+others again whose simplicity was almost too tenuous for human speech.
+She discussed robes whose trailing and voluminous richness could with
+difficulty be supported by ten strong attendants, and she had heard of
+a dress the fabric whereof was of such gossamer and ethereal
+insubstancy that it might be packed into a walnut more conveniently
+than an ordinary dress could be impressed into a portmanteau. Mary's
+exclamations of delight and longing ranged from every possible dress
+to every impossible one, and then Mrs. Makebelieve reviewed all the
+dresses she had worn from the age of three years to the present day,
+including wedding and mourning dresses, those which were worn at
+picnics and dances and for traveling, with an occasional divergence
+which comprehended the clothing of her friends and her enemies during
+the like period. She explained the basic principles of dress to her
+daughter, showing that in this art, as in all else, order cannot be
+dispensed with. There were things a tall person might wear, but which
+a short person might not, and the draperies which adorned a portly
+lady were but pitiable weeds when trailed by her attenuated sister.
+The effect of long thin lines in a fabric will make a short woman
+appear tall, while round, thick lines can reduce the altitude of
+people whose height is a trouble to be combated. She illustrated the
+usage of large and small checks and plaids and all the mazy
+interweaving of other cloths, and she elucidated the mystery of color,
+tone, half-tone, light and shade so interestingly that Mary could
+scarcely hear enough of her lore. She was acquainted with the colors
+which a dark person may wear and those which are suitable to a fair
+person, and the shades proper to be used by the wide class ranging
+between these extremes she knew also, with a special provision for
+red-haired and sandy folk and those who have no complexion at all.
+Certain laws which she formulated were cherished by her daughter as
+oracular utterances--that one should match one's eyes in the house
+and one's hair in the street, was one; that one's hat and gloves and
+shoes were of vastly more importance than all the rest of one's
+clothing, was another; that one's hair and stockings should tone as
+nearly as possible, was a third. Following these rules, she assured
+her daughter, a woman could never be other than well dressed, and all
+of these things Mary learned by heart and asked her mother to tell her
+more, which her mother was quite able and willing to do.
+
+
+
+
+XXVIII
+
+
+When the sexual instinct is aroused men and dogs and frogs and
+beetles, and such other creatures as are inside or outside of this
+catalogue, are very tenacious in the pursuit of their ambition. We can
+seldom get away from that which attracts or repels us. Love and hate
+are equally magnetic and compelling, and each, being supernormal,
+drags us willingly or woefully in their wake, until at last our blind
+persistency is either routed or appeased and we advance our lauds or
+gnash our teeth as the occasion bids us. There is no tragedy more
+woeful than the victory of hate, nor any attainment so hopelessly
+barren as the sterility of that achievement; for hate is finality, and
+finality is the greatest evil which can happen in a world of movement.
+Love is an inaugurator displaying his banners on captured peaks and
+pressing forever to a new and more gracious enterprise, but the
+victories of hate are gained in a ditch from which there is no horizon
+visible and whence there does not go even one limping courier.
+
+After Mary fled from the embrace of the great policeman he came to
+think more closely of her than he had been used; but her image was
+throned now in anger: she came to him like a dull brightness wherefrom
+desolate thunder might roll at an instant. Indeed, she began to obsess
+him so that not even the ministrations of his aunt nor the obeisances
+of that pleasant girl, the name of whose boots was Fairybell, could
+give him any comfort or wean him from a contemplation which sprawled
+gloomily between him and his duties to the traffic. If he had not
+discovered the lowliness of her quality his course might have been
+simple and straightforward: the issue, in such an event, would have
+narrowed to every man's poser--whether he should marry this girl or
+that girl? but the arithmetic whereby such matters are elucidated
+would at the last have eased his perplexity, and the path indicated
+could have been followed with the fullest freedom on his part and
+without any disaster to his self-love. If, whichever way his
+inclination wavered, there was any pang of regret (and there was bound
+to be) such a feeling would be ultimately waived by his reason or
+retained as a memorial which had a gratifying savor. But the knowledge
+of Mary's social inferiority complicated matters, for, although this
+automatically put her out of the question as his wife, her subsequent
+ill-treatment of himself had injected a virus to his blood which was
+one-half a passion for her body and one-half a frenzy for vengeance.
+He could have let her go easily enough if she had not first let him
+go; for he read dismissal in her action and resented it as a trespass
+on his own just prerogative.--He had but to stretch out his hand and
+she would have dropped to it as tamely as a kitten, whereas now she
+eluded his hand, would, indeed, have nothing to do with it; and this
+could not be forgiven. He would gladly have beaten her into
+submission, for what right has a slip of a girl to withstand the
+advances of a man and a policeman? That is a crooked spirit demanding
+to be straightened with a truncheon: but as we cannot decently, or
+even peaceably, beat a girl until she is married to us he had to
+relinquish that dear idea. He would have dismissed her from his mind
+with the contempt she deserved, but, alas! he could not: she clung
+there like a burr not to be dislodged saving by possession or a
+beating--two shuddering alternatives--for she had become detestably
+dear to him. His senses and his self-esteem conspired to heave her to
+a pedestal where his eye strained upwards in bewilderment--that she
+who was below him could be above him! This was astounding: she must be
+pulled from her eminence and stamped back to her native depths by his
+own indignant hoofs; thence she might be gloriously lifted again with
+a calm, benignant, masculine hand shedding pardons and favors, and
+perhaps a mollifying unguent for her bruises. Bruises! a knee, an
+elbow--they were nothing; little damages which to kiss was to make
+well again. Will not women cherish a bruise that it may be medicined
+by male kisses? Nature and precedent have both sworn to it.... But she
+was out of reach; his hand, high-flung as it might be, could not get
+to her. He went furiously to the Phoenix Park, to St. Stephen's
+Green, to outlying leafy spots and sheltered lanes, but she was in
+none of these places. He even prowled about the neighborhood of her
+home and could not meet her. Once he had seen Mary as she came along
+the road, and he drew back into a doorway. A young man was marching by
+her side, a young man who gabbled without ceasing and to whom Mary
+chattered again with an equal volubility. As they passed by Mary
+caught sight of him, and her face went flaming. She caught her
+companion's arm, and they hurried down the road at a great pace....
+She had never chattered to him. Always he had done the talking, and
+she had been an obedient grateful listener. Nor did he quarrel with
+her silence, but her reserve shocked him--it was a pretense, worse, a
+lie, a masked and hooded falsehood. She had surrendered to him
+willingly, and yet drew about her a protective armor of reserve
+wherein she skulked immune to the arms which were lawfully victorious.
+Is there, then, no loot for a conqueror? We demand the keys of the
+City Walls and unrestricted entry, or our torches shall blaze again.
+This chattering Mary was a girl whom he had never caught sight of at
+all. She had been hiding from him even in his presence. In every
+aspect she was an anger. But she could talk to the fellow with her
+... a skinny whipper-snapper, whom the breath of a man could shred
+into remote, eyeless vacuity. Was this man another insult? Did she not
+even wait to bury her dead? Pah! she was not value for his thought. A
+girl so lightly facile might be blown from here to there and she would
+scarcely notice the difference. Here and there were the same places to
+her, and him and him were the same person. A girl of that type comes
+to a bad end: he had seen it often, the type and the end, and never
+separate. Can one not prophesy from facts? He saw a slut in a slum, a
+drab hovering by a dark entry, and the vision cheered him mightily for
+one glowing minute and left him unoccupied for the next, into which
+she thronged with the flutter of wings and the sound of a great
+mocking.
+
+His aunt tracked his brows back to the responsible duties of his
+employment and commiserated with him, and made a lamentation about
+matters with which he never had been occupied, so that the last tag
+of his good manners departed from him, and he damned her unswervingly
+into consternation. That other pleasant girl, whose sweetness he had
+not so much tasted as sampled, had taken to brooding in his presence:
+she sometimes drooped an eye upon him like a question.... Let her look
+out or maybe he'd blaze into her teeth: howl menace down her throat
+until she swooned. Some one should yield to him a visible and tangible
+agony to balance his. Does law probe no deeper than the pillage of a
+watch? Can one filch our self-respect and escape free? Shall not our
+souls also sue for damages against its aggressor? Some person rich
+enough must pay for his lacerations or there was less justice in
+heaven than in the Police Courts; and it might be that girl's lot to
+expiate the sins of Mary. It would be a pleasure, if a sour one, to
+make somebody wriggle as he had, and somebody should wriggle; of that
+he was blackly determined.
+
+
+
+
+XXIX
+
+
+Indeed, Mrs. Cafferty's lodger and Mary had become quite intimate, and
+it was not through the machinations of either that this had happened.
+Ever since Mrs. Makebelieve had heard of that young man's appetite and
+the miseries through which he had to follow it she had been deeply
+concerned on his behalf. She declined to believe that the boy ever got
+sufficient to eat, and she enlarged to her daughter on the seriousness
+of this privation to a young man. Disabilities, such as a young girl
+could not comprehend, followed in the train of insufficient
+nourishment. Mrs. Cafferty was her friend, and was, moreover, a good
+decent woman against whom the tongue of rumor might wag in vain; but
+Mrs. Cafferty was the mother of six children and her natural
+kindliness dared not expand to their detriment. Furthermore, the fact
+of her husband being out of work tended to still further circumscribe
+the limits of her generosity. She divined a lean pot in the Cafferty
+household, and she saw the young man getting only as much food as Mrs.
+Cafferty dared to give him, so that the pangs of his hunger almost
+gnawed at her own vitals. Under these circumstances she had sought for
+an opportunity to become better acquainted with him, and had very
+easily succeeded; so when Mary found him seated on their bed and
+eating violently of their half-loaf if she was astonished at first she
+was also very glad. Her mother watched the demolition of their food
+with a calm happiness, for, although the amount she could contribute
+was small, every little helped, and not alone were his wants assisted,
+but her friend, Mrs. Cafferty, and her children were also aided by
+this dulling of an appetite which might have endangered their
+household peace.
+
+The young man repaid their hospitality by an easy generosity of speech
+covering affairs which neither Mrs. Makebelieve nor her daughter had
+many opportunities for studying. He spoke of those very interesting
+matters with which a young man is concerned, and his speculations on
+various subjects, while often quite ignorant, were sufficiently vivid
+to be interesting and were wrong in a boyish fashion which was not
+unpleasant. He was very argumentative, but was still open to reason;
+therefore, Mrs. Makebelieve had opportunities for discussion which
+were seldom granted to her. Insensibly she adopted the position of
+guide, philosopher and friend to him, and Mary also found new
+interests in speech, for, although the young man thought very
+differently from her, he did think upon her own plane, and the things
+which secretly engrossed him were also the things wherewith she was
+deeply preoccupied. A community of ignorances may be as binding as a
+community of interests. We have a dull suspicion of that him or her
+who knows more than we do, but the person who is prepared to go out
+adventuring with us with surmise only for a chart and enjoyment for a
+guide may use our hand as his own and our pockets as his treasury.
+
+As the young man had no more shyness than a cat it soon fell out that
+he and Mary took their evening walks together. He was a clerk in a
+large retail establishment, and had many things to tell Mary which
+were of great interest to both of them. For in his place of business
+he had both friends and enemies of whom he was able to speak with the
+fluency which was their due. Mary knew, for instance, that the chief
+was bald but decent (she could not believe that the connection was
+natural), and that the second in command had neither virtues nor
+whiskers. (She saw him as a codfish with a malignant eye.) He
+epitomized the vices which belonged in detail to the world, but were
+peculiar to himself in bulk. (He must be hairy in that event.)
+Language, even the young man's, could not describe him adequately. (He
+ate boys for breakfast and girls for tea.) With this person the young
+man was in eternal conflict (a bear with little ears and big teeth);
+not open conflict, for that would have meant instant dismissal (not
+hairy at all--a long slimy eel with a lot of sense), but a veiled
+unremitting warfare which occupied all their spare attention. The
+young man knew for an actual fact that some day he would be compelled
+to hit that chap, and it would be a sorry day for the fellow, because
+his ability to hit was startling. He told Mary of the evil results
+which had followed some of his blows, and Mary's incredulity was only
+heightened by a display of the young man's muscles. She extolled these
+because she thought it was her duty to do so, but preserved some
+doubts of their unique destructiveness. Once she asked him could he
+fight a policeman, and he assured her that policemen are not able to
+fight at all singly, but only in squads, when their warfare is callous
+and ugly and conducted mainly with their boots; so that decent people
+have no respect for their fighting qualities or their private
+characters. He assured her that not only could he fight a policeman,
+but he could also tyrannize over the seed, breed and generation of
+such a one, and, moreover, he could accomplish this without real
+exertion. Against all policemen and soldiers the young man professed
+an eager hostility, and with these bad people he included landlords
+and many employers of labor. His denunciation of these folk might be
+traced back to the belief that none of them treated one fairly. A
+policeman, he averred, would arrest a man for next door to nothing,
+and any resistance offered to their spleen rendered the unfortunate
+prisoner liable to be man-handled in his cell until their outraged
+dignity was appeased. The three capital crimes upon which a man is
+liable to arrest is for being drunk, or disorderly, or for refusing to
+fight, and to these perils a young man is peculiarly susceptible and
+is, to that extent, interested in the Force, and critical of their
+behavior. The sight of a soldier annoyed him, for he saw a conqueror,
+trampling vaingloriously through the capital of his country, and the
+inability of his land to eject the braggart astonished and mortified
+him. Landlords had no bowels of compassion. There was no kindliness of
+heart among them, nor any wish to assist those whose whole existence
+was engaged on their behalf. He saw them as lazy unproductive gluttons
+who cried forever "Give, give," and who gave nothing in return but an
+increased insolent tyranny. Many employers came into the same black
+category. They were people who had disowned all duty to humanity, and
+who saw in themselves the beginning and the end of all things. They
+gratified their acquisitiveness not in order that they might become
+benefactors of their kind (the only righteous freedom of which we
+know) but merely to indulge a petty exercise of power and to attain
+that approval which is granted to wealth and the giving of which is
+the great foolishness of mankind. These people used their helpers and
+threw them away, they exploited and bought and sold their fellow-men
+while their arrogant self-assurance and the monstrous power which they
+had gathered for their security shocked him like a thing unbelievable
+in spite of its reality. That such things could be fretted him into
+clamor. He wanted to point them out to all people. He saw his
+neighbors' ears clogged, and he was prepared to die howling if only he
+could pierce those encrusted auditories. That what was so simple to
+him should not be understood by everybody! He could see plainly and
+others could not, although their eyes looked straightly forward and
+veritably rolled with intent and consciousness! Did their eyes and
+ears and brains act differently to his, or was he a singular monster
+cursed from his birth with madness? At times he was prepared to let
+humanity and Ireland go to the devil their own way, he being well
+assured that without him they were bound quickly for deep perdition.
+Of Ireland he sometimes spoke with a fervor of passion which would be
+outrageous if addressed to a woman. Surely he saw her as a woman,
+queenly and distressed and very proud. He was physically anguished for
+her, and the man who loved her was the very brother of his bones.
+There were some words the effect of which were almost hypnotic on
+him--The Isle of the Blest, The Little Dark Rose, The Poor Old Woman
+and Caitlin the Daughter of Holohan. The mere repetition of these
+phrases lifted him to an ecstasy; they had hidden, magical meanings
+which pricked deeply to his heartstrings and thrilled him to a
+tempest of pity and love. He yearned to do deeds of valor, violent,
+grandiose feats which would redound to her credit and make the name of
+Irishmen synonymous with either greatness or singularity: for, as yet,
+the distinction between these words was no more clear to him than it
+is to any other young man who reads violence as heroism and
+eccentricity as genius. Of England he spoke with something like
+stupefaction--as a child cowering in a dark wood tells of the ogre who
+has slain his father and carried his mother away to a drear captivity
+in his castle built of bones--so he spoke of England. He saw an
+English-man stalking hideously forward with a princess tucked under
+each arm, while their brothers and their knights were netted in
+enchantment and slept heedless of the wrongs done to their ladies and
+of the defacement of their shields.... "Alas, alas and alas, for the
+once-proud people of Banba!"
+
+
+
+
+XXX
+
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve was astonished when the policeman knocked at her
+door. A knock at her door was a rare sound, for many years had gone by
+since any one had come to visit her. Of late Mrs. Cafferty often came
+to talk to her, but she never knocked: she usually shouted, "Can I
+come in?" and then she came in. But this was a ceremonious knock which
+startled her, and the spectacle of the great man bending through the
+doorway almost stopped her breath. Mary also was so shocked into
+terror that she stood still, forgetful of all good manners, and stared
+at the visitor open-eyed. She knew and did not know what he had come
+for; but that, in some way, his appearance related to her she was
+instantly assured, although she could not even dimly guess at a
+closer explanation of his visit. His eyes stayed on her for an instant
+and then passed to her mother, and, following her rather tremulous
+invitation, he came into the room. There was no chair to sit on, so
+Mrs. Makebelieve requested him to sit down on the bed, which he did.
+She fancied he had come on some errand from Mrs. O'Connor, and was
+inclined to be angry at a visit which she construed as an intrusion,
+so, when he was seated, she waited to hear what he might have to say.
+
+Even to her it was evident that the big man was perplexed and abashed;
+his hat was in his way and so were his hands, and when he spoke his
+voice was so husky as to be distressful. On Mary, who had withdrawn to
+the very end of the room, this discomfort of speech had a peculiar
+effect: the unsteady voice touched her breast to a kindred fluttering,
+and her throat grew parched and so irritated that a violent fit of
+coughing could not be restrained, and this, with the nervousness and
+alarm which his appearance had thronged upon her, drove her to a very
+fever of distress. But she could not take her eyes away from him, and
+she wondered and was afraid of what he might say. She knew there were
+a great many things he might discuss which she would be loath to hear
+in her mother's presence, and which her mother would not be gratified
+to hear either.
+
+He spoke for a few moments about the weather, and Mrs. Makebelieve
+hearkened to his remarks with a perplexity which she made no effort to
+conceal. She was quite certain he had not called to speak about the
+weather, and she was prepared to tell him so if a suitable opportunity
+should occur. She was also satisfied that he had not come on a formal,
+friendly visit--the memory of her last interview with him forbade such
+a conjecture, for on that occasion politeness had been deposed from
+her throne and acrimony had reigned in her stead. If his aunt had
+desired him to undertake an embassy to her he would surely have
+delivered his message without preamble, and would not have been thrown
+by so trifling a duty into the state of agitation in which he was. It
+was obvious, therefore, that he had not come with a message relating
+to her work. Something of fear touched Mrs. Makebelieve as she looked
+at him, and her voice had an uneasy note when she requested to know
+what she could do for him.
+
+The policeman suddenly, with the gesture of one throwing away anchors,
+plunged into the heart of his matter, and as he spoke the look on Mrs.
+Makebelieve's face changed quickly from bewilderment to curiosity and
+dulled again to a blank amazement. After the first few sentences she
+half turned to Mary, but an obscure shame prevented her from searching
+out her daughter's eyes. It was borne quickly and painfully to her
+that Mary had not treated her fairly: there was a secret here with
+which a mother ought to have been trusted, and one which she could not
+believe Mary would have withheld from her; and so, gauging her child's
+feelings by her own, she steadfastly refused to look at her lest the
+shocked surprise in her eyes might lacerate the girl she loved, and
+who she knew must at the instant be in a sufficient agony----
+Undoubtedly the man was suggesting that he wanted to marry her
+daughter, and the unexpectedness of such a proposal left her mentally
+gaping; but that there must have been some preliminaries of meeting
+and courtship became obvious to her. Mary also listened to his remarks
+in a stupor. Was there no possibility at all of getting away from the
+man? A tenacity such as this seemed to her malignant. She had the
+feeling of one being pursued by some relentless and unscrupulous
+hunter. She heard him speaking through a cloud, and the only things
+really clear to her were the thoughts which she knew her mother must
+be thinking. She was frightened and ashamed, and the sullenness which
+is the refuge of most young people descended upon her like a darkness.
+Her face grew heavy and vacant, and she stared in front of her in the
+attitude of one who had nothing to do with what was passing. She did
+not believe altogether that he was in earnest: her immediate
+discomfort showed him as one who was merely seeking to get her into
+trouble with her mother in order to gratify an impotent rage. Twice or
+three times she flamed suddenly, went tiptoe to run from the room. A
+flash, and she would be gone from the place, down the stairs, into the
+streets and away anywhere, and she tingled with the very speed of her
+vision; but she knew that one word from her mother would halt her like
+a barrier, and she hated the thought that he should be a witness to
+her obedience.
+
+While he was speaking he did not look at Mary. He told Mrs.
+Makebelieve that he loved her daughter very much, and he begged her
+permission and favor for his suit. He gave her to understand that he
+and Mary had many opportunities of becoming acquainted, and were at
+one in this desire for matrimony---- To Mrs. Makebelieve's mind there
+recurred a conversation which she had once held with her daughter,
+when Mary was curious to know if a policeman was a desirable person
+for a girl to marry? She saw this question now, not as being prompted
+by a laudable, an almost scientific curiosity, but as the interested,
+sly speculation of a schemer hideously accomplished in deceit. Mary
+could see that memory flitting back through her mother's brain, and it
+tormented her. Nor was her mother at ease--there was no chair to sit
+upon, she had to stand and listen to all this while he spoke, more or
+less at his ease, from the bed. If she also had been sitting down she
+might have been mistress of her thoughts and able to deal naturally
+with the situation; but an easy pose is difficult when standing: her
+hands would fold in front of her and the schoolgirl attitude annoyed
+and restrained her. Also, the man appeared to be in earnest in what he
+said. His words at the least and the intention which drove them seemed
+honorable. She could not give rein to her feelings without lapsing to
+a barbarity which she might not justify to herself even in anger and
+might, indeed, blush to remember. Perhaps his chief disqualification
+consisted in a relationship to Mrs. O'Connor for which he could not
+justly be held to blame, and for which she sincerely pitied him. But
+this certainly was a disqualification never to be redeemed. He might
+leave his work, or his religion, or his country, but he could never
+quit his aunt, because he carried her with him under his skin; he was
+her with additions, and at times Mrs. Makebelieve could see Mrs.
+O'Connor looking cautiously at her through the policeman's eyes; a
+turn of his forehead and she was there like a thin wraith that
+vanished and appeared again. The man was spoiled for her. He did not
+altogether lack sense, and the fact that he wished to marry her
+daughter showed that he was not so utterly beyond the reach of
+redemption as she had fancied.
+
+Meanwhile, he had finished his statement as regarded the affection
+which he bore to her daughter and the suitability of their
+temperaments, and had hurled himself into an explanation of his
+worldly affairs, comprising his salary as a policeman, the possibility
+of promotion and the increased emoluments which would follow it, and
+the certain pension which would sustain his age. There was,
+furthermore, his parents, from whose decease he would reap certain
+monetary increments, and the deaths of other relatives from which an
+additional enlargement of his revenues might reasonably be expected.
+Indeed, he had not desired to speak of these matters at all, but the
+stony demeanor of Mrs. Makebelieve and the sullen aloofness of her
+daughter forced him, however reluctantly, to draw even ignoble weapons
+from his armory. He had not conceived they would be so obdurate: he
+had, in fact, imagined that the elder woman must be flattered by his
+offer to marry her daughter, and when no evidence to support this was
+forthcoming he was driven to appeal to the cupidity which he believed
+occupies the heart of every middle-aged, hard-worked woman. But these
+statements also were received with a dreadful composure. He could have
+smashed Mrs. Makebelieve where she stood. Now and again his body
+strained to a wild, physical outburst, a passionate, red fury that
+would have terrified these women to their knees, while he roared their
+screams into thin whimpers as a man should. He did not even dare to
+stop speaking, and his efforts at an easy, good-humored, half-careless
+presentation of his case was bitterly painful to him as it was to his
+auditors. The fact that they were both standing up unnerved him
+also--the pleasant equality which should have formed the atmosphere of
+such an interview was destroyed from the first moment, and, having
+once sat down, he did not like to stand up again. He felt glued to the
+bed on which he sat, and he felt also that if he stood up the tension
+in the room would so relax that Mrs. Makebelieve would at once break
+out into speech sarcastic and final, or her daughter might scream
+reproaches and disclaimers of an equal finality. At her he did not
+dare to look, but the corner of his eye could see her shape stiffened
+against the fireplace, an attitude so different from the pliable
+contours to which he was accustomed in her as almost to be repellant.
+He would have thanked God to find himself outside the room, but how to
+get out of it he did not know: his self-esteem forbade anything like a
+retreat without honor, his nervousness did not permit him to move at
+all, the anger which prickled the surface of his body and mind was
+held in check only by an instinct of fear as to what he might do if he
+moved, and so, with dreadful jocularity, he commenced to speak of
+himself, his personal character, his sobriety and steadiness--of all
+those safe negations on which many women place reliance he spoke, and
+also of certain small vices which he magnified merely for the sake of
+talking, such as smoking, an odd glass of porter and the shilling
+which, now and again, he had ventured upon a race horse.
+
+Mary listened to him for a while with angry intentness. The fact that
+she was the subject of his extraordinary discourse quickened at the
+first all her apprehensions. Had the matter been less important she
+would have been glad to look at herself in this strange position, and
+to savor, with as much detachment as was possible, the whole spirit of
+the adventure. But when she heard him, as she put it, "telling on
+her," laying bare to her mother all the walks they had taken together,
+visits to restaurants and rambles through the streets and the parks,
+what he had said to her on this occasion and on that, and her remarks
+on such and such a matter, she could not visualize him save as a
+malignant and uncultivated person; and when he tacitly suggested that
+she was as eager for matrimony as he was, and so put upon her the
+horrible onus of rejecting him before a second person, she closed her
+mind and her ears against him. She refused to listen, although her
+perceptions admitted the trend of his speech. His words droned heavily
+and monotonously to her as through dull banks of fog. She made up her
+mind that if she were asked any questions by either of them she would
+not reply, and that she would not look at either of them, and then she
+thought that she would snap and stamp her feet and say that she hated
+him, that he had looked down on her because she worked for his aunt,
+that he had meanly been ashamed of and cut her because she was poor,
+that he had been going with another girl all the time he was going
+with her and that he only pursued her in order to annoy her, that she
+didn't love him, that she didn't even like him, that, in fact, she
+disliked him heartily. She wished to say all these things in one
+whirling outcry, but feared that before she had rightly begun she might
+become abashed, or, worse, might burst into tears and lose all the
+dignity which she meant to preserve in his presence for the purpose of
+showing to him in the best light exactly what he was losing.
+
+But the big man had come to the end of his speech. He made a few
+attempts to begin anew on the desirability of such a union for both of
+them, and the happiness it would give him if Mrs. Makebelieve would
+come to live with them when they were married. He refused to let it
+appear that there was any doubt as to Mary's attitude in the matter,
+for up to the moment he came to their door he had not doubted her
+willingness himself. Her late avoidance of him he had put down to mere
+feminine tactics which leads on by holding off. The unwilling person
+he had been assured was himself--he stooped to her, and it was only
+after a severe battle that he had been able to do it. The astonishment
+and disapproval of his relatives and friends at such a step was very
+evident to him, for to a man of his position and figure girls were
+cheap creatures, the best of them to be had for the mere asking.
+Therefore, the fact that this girl could be seriously rejecting his
+offer of marriage came upon him like red astonishment. He had no more
+to say, however, and he blundered and fumbled into silence.
+
+For a moment or two the little room was so still that the quietness
+seemed to hum and buzz like an eternity. Then, with a sigh, Mrs.
+Makebelieve spoke.
+
+"I don't know at all," said she, "why you should speak to me about
+this, for neither my daughter nor yourself have ever even hinted to me
+before that you were courting one another. Why Mary should keep such a
+secret from her own mother I don't know. Maybe I've been cruel and
+frightened her, although I don't remember doing anything that she
+could have against me of that sort: or, maybe, she didn't think I was
+wise enough to advise her about a particular thing like her marriage,
+for, God knows, old women are foolish enough in their notions, or else
+they wouldn't be slaving and grinding for the sake of their children
+the way they do be doing year in and year out, every day in the week,
+and every hour of the day. It isn't any wonder at all that a child
+would be a liar and a sleeveen and a trampler of the roads with the
+first man that nods to her when her mother is a foolish person that
+she can't trust. Of course, I wouldn't be looking for a gentleman like
+yourself to mention the matter to me when I might be scrubbing out
+your aunt's kitchen or her hall door maybe, and you sitting in the
+parlor with the company. Sure, I'm only an old charwoman, and what
+does it matter at all what I'd be thinking, or whether I'd be agreeing
+or not to anything? Don't I get my wages for my work, and what more
+does anybody want in the world? As for me going to live with you when
+you are married--it was kind of you to ask me that; but it's not the
+sort of thing I'm likely to do, for if I didn't care for you as a
+stranger I'm not going to like you any better as my daughter's
+husband. You'll excuse me saying one thing, Sir, but while we are
+talking we may as well be talking out, and it's this, that I never did
+like you, and I never will like you, and I'd sooner see my daughter
+married to any one at all than to yourself. But, sure, I needn't be
+talking about it; isn't it Mary's business altogether, and she'll be
+settling it with you nicely I don't doubt. She's a practiced hand now
+at arranging things, like you are yourself, and it will do me good to
+be learning something from her."
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve took a cloth in her hand and walked over to the
+fireplace, which she commenced to polish.
+
+The big man looked at Mary. It was incumbent on him to say something.
+Twice he attempted to speak, and each time, on finding himself about
+to say something regarding the weather, he stopped. Mary did not look
+at him; her eyes were fixed stubbornly on a part of the wall well away
+from his neighborhood, and it seemed to him that she had made a vow to
+herself never to look at him again. But the utter silence of the room
+was unbearable. He knew that he ought to get up and go out, but he
+could not bring himself to do so. His self-love, his very physical
+strength, rebelled against so tame a surrender. One thought he
+gathered in from swaying vacuity--that the timid little creature whom
+he had patronized would not find the harsh courage to refuse him
+point-blank if he charged her straightly with the question, and so he
+again assayed speech.
+
+"Your mother is angry with us, Mary," said he, "and I suppose she has
+good right to be angry; but the reason I did not speak to her before,
+as I admit I should have if I had done the right thing, was that I had
+very few chances of meeting her, and never did meet her without some
+other person being there at the same time. I suppose the reason you
+did not say anything was that you wanted to be quite sure of yourself
+and of me too before you mentioned it. We have both done the wrong
+thing in not being open, but maybe your mother will forgive us when
+she knows we had no intention of hurting her, or of doing anything
+behind her back. Your mother seems to hate me: I don't know why,
+because she hardly knows me at all, and I've never done her any harm
+or said a word against her. Perhaps when she knows me as well as you
+do she'll change her mind: but you know I love you better than any one
+else, and that I'd do anything I could to please you and be a good
+husband to you. What I want to ask you before your mother is,--will
+you marry me?"
+
+Mary made no reply. She did not look or give the slightest sign that
+she had heard. But now it was that she did not dare to look at him.
+The spectacle of this big man badgered by her and by her mother,
+pleading to her, and pleading, as he and she well knew, hopelessly,
+would have broken her heart if she looked at him. She had to admire
+the good masculine fight he made of it. Even his tricks of word and
+tactic, which she instantly divined, moved her almost to tears; but
+she feared terribly that if she met his gaze she might not be able to
+resist his huge helplessness, and that she might be compelled to do
+whatever he begged of her even in despite of her own wishes.
+
+The interval which followed his question weighed heavily upon them
+all. It was only broken by Mrs. Makebelieve, who began to hum a song
+as she polished the fire grate. She meant to show her careless
+detachment from the whole matter, but in the face of Mary's silence
+she could not keep it up. After a few moments she moved around and
+said:--
+
+"Why don't you answer the gentleman, Mary?"
+
+Mary turned and looked at her, and the tears which she had resisted so
+long swam in her eyes: although she could keep her features composed
+she had no further command over her tears.
+
+"I'll answer whatever you ask me, mother," she whispered.
+
+"Then, tell the gentleman whether you will marry him or not."
+
+"I don't want to marry any one at all," said Mary.
+
+"You are not asked to marry any one, darling," said Mrs. Makebelieve,
+"but some one--this gentleman here whose name I don't happen to know.
+Do you know his name?"
+
+"No," said Mary.
+
+"My name...." began the policeman.
+
+"It doesn't matter, Sir," said Mrs. Makebelieve. "Do you want to marry
+this gentleman, Mary?"
+
+"No," whispered Mary.
+
+"Are you in love with him?"
+
+Mary turned completely away from him.
+
+"No," she whispered again.
+
+"Do you think you ever will be in love with him?"
+
+She felt as a rat might when hunted to a corner. But the end must be
+very near; this could not last forever because nothing can. Her lips
+were parched, her eyes were burning. She wanted to lie down and go
+asleep and waken again laughing to say--"it was a dream."
+
+Her reply was almost inaudible. "No," she said.
+
+"You are quite sure? It is always better to be quite sure."
+
+She did not answer any more, but the faint droop of her head gave the
+reply her mother needed.
+
+"You see, Sir," said Mrs. Makebelieve, "that you were mistaken in your
+opinion. My daughter is not old enough yet to be thinking of marriage
+and such like. Children do be thoughtless. I am sorry for all the
+trouble she has given you, and"--a sudden compunction stirred her, for
+the man was standing up now, and there was no trace of Mrs. O'Connor
+visible in him: his face was as massive and harsh as a piece of wall.
+"Don't you be thinking too badly of us now," said Mrs. Makebelieve
+with some agitation; "the child is too young altogether to be asking
+her to marry. Maybe in a year or two--I said things I know, but I was
+vexed, and...."
+
+The big man nodded his head and marched out.
+
+Mary ran to her mother moaning like a sick person, but Mrs.
+Makebelieve did not look at her. She lay down on the bed and turned
+her face to the wall, and she did not speak to Mary for a long time.
+
+
+
+
+XXXI
+
+
+When the young man who lodged with Mrs. Cafferty came in on the
+following day he presented a deplorable appearance. His clothes were
+torn and his face had several large strips of sticking-plaster on it,
+but he seemed to be in a mood of extraordinary happiness
+notwithstanding, and proclaimed that he had participated in the one
+really great fight of his life-time, that he wasn't injured at all,
+and that he wouldn't have missed it for a pension.
+
+Mrs. Cafferty was wild with indignation, and marched him into Mrs.
+Makebelieve's room, where he had to again tell his story and have his
+injuries inspected and commiserated. Even Mr. Cafferty came into the
+room on this occasion. He was a large, slow man dressed very
+comfortably in a red beard--his beard was so red and so persistent
+that it quite overshadowed the rest of his wrappings and did, indeed,
+seem to clothe him. As he stood the six children walked in and out of
+his legs, and stood on his feet in their proper turns without causing
+him any apparent discomfort. During the young man's recital Mr.
+Cafferty every now and then solemnly and powerfully smote his left
+hand with his right fist, and requested that the aggressor should be
+produced to him.
+
+The young man said that as he was coming home the biggest man in the
+world walked up to him. He had never set eyes on the man before in his
+life, and thought at first he wanted to borrow a match or ask the way
+to somewhere, or something like that, and, accordingly, he halted; but
+the big man gripped him by the shoulder and said "You damned young
+whelp," and then he laughed and hit him a tremendous blow with his
+other hand. He twisted himself free at that, and said "What's that
+for?" and then the big man made another desperate clout at him. A
+fellow wasn't going to stand that kind of thing, so he let out at him
+with his left and then jumped in with two short-arm jabs that must
+have tickled the chap; that fellow didn't have it all his own way
+anyhow.... The young man exhibited his knuckles, which were skinned
+and bleeding, as evidence of some exchange; but, he averred, you might
+as well be punching a sack of coal as that man's face. In another
+minute they both slipped and rolled over and over in the road, hitting
+and kicking as they sprawled: then a crowd of people ran forward and
+pulled them asunder. When they were separated he saw the big man lift
+his fist, and the person who was holding him ducked suddenly and ran
+for his life: the other folk got out of the way too, and the big man
+walked over to where he stood and stared into his face. His jaw was
+stuck out like the seat of a chair and his moustache was like a
+bristle of barbed wire. The young man said to him, "What the hell's
+wrong with you to go bashing a man for nothing at all?" and all of a
+sudden the big fellow turned and walked away. It was a grand fight
+altogether, said the youth, but the other man was a mile and a half
+too big for him.
+
+As this story proceeded Mrs. Makebelieve looked once or twice at her
+daughter. Mary's face had gone very pale, and she nodded back a
+confirmation of her mother's conjecture; but it did not seem necessary
+or wise to either of them that they should explain their thoughts. The
+young man did not require either condolences or revenge. He was well
+pleased at an opportunity to measure his hardihood against a worthy
+opponent. He had found that his courage exceeded his strength, as it
+always should, for how could we face the gods and demons of existence
+if our puny arms were not backed up by our invincible eyes? and he
+displayed his contentment at the issue as one does a banner emblazoned
+with merits. Mrs. Makebelieve understood also that the big man's
+action was merely his energetic surrender, as of one who, instead of
+tendering his sword courteously to the victor, hurls it at him with a
+malediction; and that in assaulting their friend he was bidding them
+farewell as heartily and impressively as he was able. So they fed the
+young man and extolled him, applauding to the shrill winding of his
+trumpet until he glowed again in the full satisfaction of heroism.
+
+He and Mary did not discontinue their evening walks. Of these Mrs.
+Makebelieve was fully cognizant, and, although she did not remark on
+the fact, she had been observing the growth of their intimacy with a
+care which was one part approval and one part pain; for it was very
+evident to her that her daughter was no longer a child to be
+controlled and directed by authority. Her little girl was a big girl;
+she had grown up and was eager to undertake the business of life on
+her own behalf. But the period of Mrs. Makebelieve's motherhood had
+drawn to a close, and her arms were empty. She was too used now to
+being a mother to relinquish easily the prerogatives of that status,
+and her discontent had this justification and assistance that it could
+be put into definite words, fronted and approved or rejected as reason
+urged. By knowledge and thought we will look through a stone wall if
+we look long enough, for we see less through eyes than through Time.
+Time is the clarifying perspective whereby myopia of any kind is
+adjusted, and a thought emerges in its field as visibly as a tree does
+in nature's. Mrs. Makebelieve saw seventeen years' apprenticeship to
+maternity canceled automatically without an explanation or a courtesy,
+and for a little time her world was in ruins, the ashes of existence
+powdered her hair and her forehead. Then she discovered that the
+debris was valuable in known currency; the dust was golden: her love
+remained to her undisturbed and unlikely to be disturbed by whatever
+event. And she discovered further that parentage is neither a game nor
+a privilege but a duty; it is, astounding thought, the care of the
+young until the young can take care of itself. It was for this freedom
+only that her elaborate care had been necessary; her bud had blossomed
+and she could add no more to its bloom or fragrance. Nothing had
+happened that was not natural, and whoso opposes his brow against that
+imperious urgency is thereby renouncing his kind and claiming a
+kinship with the wild boar and the goat, which they, too, may
+repudiate with leaden foreheads. There remained also the common human
+equality, not alone of blood, but of sex also, which might be fostered
+and grow to an intimacy more dear and enduring, more lovely and loving
+than the necessarily one-sided devotions of parentage. Her duties in
+that relationship having been performed, it was her daughter's turn to
+take up her's and prove her rearing by repaying to her mother the
+conscious love which intelligence and a good heart dictates. This
+given, Mrs. Makebelieve could smile happily again, for her arms would
+be empty only for a little time. The continuity of nature does not
+fail saving for extraordinary instances. She sees to it that a breast
+and an arm shall not very long be unoccupied, and, consequently, as
+Mrs. Makebelieve sat contemplating that futurity which is nothing more
+than a prolongation of experience she could smile contentedly, for all
+was very well.
+
+
+
+
+XXXII
+
+
+If the unexpected did not often happen life would be a logical,
+scientific progression which might become dispirited and repudiate its
+goal for very boredom, but nature has cunningly diversified the
+methods whereby she coaxes or coerces us to prosecute, not our own,
+but her own adventure. Beyond every corner there may be a tavern or a
+church wherein both the saint and the sinner may be entrapped and
+remolded. Beyond the skyline you may find a dynamite cartridge, a
+drunken tinker, a mad dog, or a shilling which some person has
+dropped; and any one of these unexpectednesses may be potent to urge
+the traveler down a side street and put a crook in the straight line
+which had been his life, and to which he had become miserably
+reconciled. The element of surprise being, accordingly, one of the
+commonest things in the world we ought not to be hypercritical in our
+review of singularities, or say--"These things do not happen,"--because
+it is indisputable that they do happen. That combination which
+comprises a dark night, a highwayman armed and hatted to the teeth,
+and myself, may be a purely fortuitous one, but will such a criticism
+bring any comfort to the highwayman? And the concourse of three
+benevolent millionaires with the person to whom poverty can do no
+more is so pleasant and possible that I marvel it does not occur more
+frequently. I am prepared to believe on the very lightest assurance
+that these things do happen, but are hushed up for reasons which
+would be cogent enough if they were available.
+
+Mrs. Makebelieve opened the letter which the evening's post had
+brought to her. She had pondered well before opening it, and had
+discussed with her daughter all the possible people who could have
+written it. The envelope was long and narrow, it was addressed in a
+swift emphatic hand, the tail of the letter M enjoying a career
+distinguished beyond any of its fellows by length and beauty. The
+envelope, moreover, was sealed by a brilliant red lion with jagged
+whiskers and a simper, who threatened the person daring to open a
+missive not addressed to him with the vengeance of a battle-axe which
+was balanced lightly but truculently on his right claw.
+
+This envelope contained several documents purporting to be copies of
+extraordinary originals, and amongst them a letter which was read by
+Mrs. Makebelieve more than ten thousand times or ever she went to bed
+that night. It related that more than two years previously one Patrick
+Joseph Brady had departed this life, and that his will, dated from a
+multitudinous address in New York, devised and bequeathed to his
+dearly beloved sister Mary Eileen Makebelieve, otherwise Brady, the
+following shares and securities for shares, to wit:--and the
+thereinafter mentioned houses and messuages, lands, tenements,
+hereditaments and premises, that was to say:--and all household
+furniture, books, pictures, prints, plate, linen, glass and objects of
+vertu, carriages, wines, liquors and all consumable stores and effects
+whatsoever then in the house so and so, and all money then in the Bank
+and thereafter to accrue due upon the thereinbefore mentioned stocks,
+funds, shares and securities.... Mrs. Makebelieve wept and besought
+God not to make a fool of a woman who was not only poor but old. The
+letter requested her to call on the following day, or at her earliest
+convenience, to "the above address," and desired that she should bring
+with her such letters or other documents as would establish her
+relationship to the deceased and assist in extracting the necessary
+Grant of Probate to the said Will, and it was subscribed by Messrs.
+Platitude & Glambe, Solicitors, Commissioners for Oaths and Protectors
+of the Poor.
+
+To the Chambers of these gentlemen Mrs. Makebelieve and Mary repaired
+on the following day, and, having produced the letters and other
+documents for inspection, the philanthropists, Platitude and Glambe,
+professed themselves to be entirely satisfied as to their bona fides,
+and exhibited an eagerness to be of immediate service to the ladies in
+whatever capacity might be conceived. Mrs. Makebelieve instantly
+invoked the Pragmatic Sanction; she put the entire matter to the
+touchstone of absolute verity by demanding an advance of fifty pounds.
+Her mind reeled as she said the astounding amount, but her voice did
+not. A check was signed and a clerk dispatched, who returned with
+eight five-pound notes and ten sovereigns of massy gold. Mrs.
+Makebelieve secreted these, and went home marveling to find that she
+was yet alive. No trams ran over her. The motor cars pursued her, and
+were evaded. She put her hope in God, and explained so breathlessly to
+the furious street. One cyclist who took corners on trust she cursed
+by the Ineffable Name, but instantly withdrew the malediction for
+luck, and addressed his dwindling back with an eye of misery and a
+voice of benediction. For a little time neither she nor her daughter
+spoke of the change in their fortunes saving in terms of allusion;
+they feared that, notwithstanding their trust, God might hear and
+shatter them with His rolling laughter. They went out again that day
+furtively and feverishly and bought....
+
+But on the following morning Mrs. Makebelieve returned again to her
+labor. She intended finishing her week's work with Mrs. O'Connor (it
+might not last for a week). She wished to observe that lady with the
+exact particularity, the singleness of eye, the true, candid, critical
+scrutiny which had hitherto been impossible to her. It was, she said
+to Mary, just possible that Mrs. O'Connor might make some remarks
+about soap. It was possible that the lady might advance theories as to
+how this or that particular kind of labor ought to be conducted....
+Mrs. Makebelieve's black eye shone upon her child with a calm peace, a
+benevolent happiness rare indeed to human regard.
+
+In the evening of that day Mary and the young man who lodged with
+their neighbor went out for the walk which had become customary with
+them. The young man had been fed with an amplitude which he had never
+known before, so that not even the remotest slim thread, shred, hint,
+echo or memory of hunger remained with him: he tried but could not
+make a dint in himself anywhere, and, consequently, he was as sad as
+only a well-fed person can be. Now that his hunger was gone he deemed
+that all else was gone also. His hunger, his sweetheart, his hopes,
+his good looks (for his injuries had matured to the ripe purple of
+the perfect bruise) all were gone, gone, gone. He told it to Mary, but
+she did not listen to him; to the rolling sky he announced it and it
+paid no heed. He walked beside Mary at last in silence, listening to
+her plans and caprices, the things she would do and buy, the people to
+whom gifts should be made and the species of gift uniquely suitable to
+this person and to that person, the people to whom money might be
+given and the amounts, and the methods whereby such largesse could be
+distributed. Hats were mentioned and dresses, and the new house
+somewhere--a space-embracing-somewhere, beyond surmise, beyond
+geography. They walked onwards for a long time, so long that at last a
+familiar feeling stole upon the youth. The word "food" seemed suddenly
+a topic worthy of the most spirited conversation. His spirits arose.
+He was no longer solid, space belonged to him also, it was in him and
+of him, and so there was a song in his heart. He was hungry and the
+friend of man again. Now everything was possible. The girl? Was she
+not by his side? The regeneration of Ireland and of Man? That could be
+done also; a little leisure and everything that can be thought can be
+done: even his good looks might be returned to him: he felt the sting
+and tightness of his bruises and was reassured, exultant. He was a man
+predestined to bruises; they would be his meat and drink and
+happiness, his refuge and sanctuary forever. Let us leave him, then,
+pacing volubly by the side of Mary, and exploring with a delicate
+finger his half-closed eye, which, until it was closed entirely, would
+always be half-closed by the decent buffet of misfortune. His ally and
+stay was hunger, and there is no better ally for any man: that
+satisfied and the game is up; for hunger is life, ambition, good-will
+and understanding, while fullness is all those negatives which
+culminate in greediness, stupidity and decay; so his bruises troubled
+him no further than as they affected the eyes of a lady wherein he
+prayed to be comely.
+
+Bruises, unless they are desperate indeed, will heal at the last for
+no other reason than that they must. The inexorable compulsion of all
+things is towards health or destruction, life or death, and we hasten
+our joys or our woes to the logical extreme. It is urgent, therefore,
+that we be joyous if we wish to live. Our heads may be as solid as is
+possible, but our hearts and our heels shall be light or we are
+ruined. As to the golden mean--let us have nothing to do with that
+thing at all; it may only be gilded, it is very likely made of tin of
+a dull color and a lamentable sound, unworthy even of being stolen;
+and unless our treasures may be stolen they are of no use to us. It is
+contrary to the laws of life to possess that which other people do not
+want; therefore, your beer shall foam, your wife shall be pretty, and
+your little truth shall have a plum in it--for this is so; that your
+beer can only taste of your company, you can only know your wife when
+some one else does, and your little truth shall be savored or perish.
+Do you demand a big truth? Then, Oh Ambitious! you must turn aside
+from all your companions and sit very quietly, and if you sit long
+enough and quiet enough it may come to you; but this thing alone of
+all things you cannot steal, nor can it be given to you by the County
+Council. It cannot be communicated, and yet you may get it. It is
+unspeakable but not unthinkable, and it is born as certainly and
+unaccountably as you were yourself, and is of just as little immediate
+consequence. Long, long ago in the dim beginnings of the world there
+was a careless and gay young man who said--"Let truth go to hell"--and
+it went there. It was his misfortune that he had to follow it; it is
+ours that we are his descendants. An evil will either kill you or be
+killed by you, and (the reflection is comforting) the odds are with us
+in every fight waged against humanity by the dark or elemental beings.
+But humanity is timid and lazy, a believer in golden means and
+subterfuges and compromises, loath to address itself to any combat
+until its frontiers are virtually overrun and its cities and granaries
+and places of refuge are in jeopardy from those gloomy marauders. In
+that wide struggle which we call Progress, evil is always the
+aggressor and the vanquished, and it is right that this should be so,
+for without its onslaughts and depredations humanity might fall to a
+fat slumber upon its corn sacks and die snoring: or, alternatively,
+lacking these valorous alarms and excursions it might become
+self-satisfied and formularized, and be crushed to death by the mere
+dull density of virtue. Next to good the most valuable factor in life
+is evil. By the interaction of these all things are possible, and,
+therefore (or for any other reason that pleases you) let us wave a
+friendly hand in the direction of that bold, bad policeman whose
+thoughts were not governed by the Book of Regulations which is issued
+to all recruits, and who, in despite of the fact that he was enrolled
+among the very legions of order, had that chaos in his soul which may
+"give birth to a Dancing Star."
+
+As to Mary--even ordinary, workaday politeness frowns on too abrupt a
+departure from a lady, particularly one whom we have companioned thus
+distantly from the careless simplicity of girlhood to the equally
+careless but complex businesses of adolescence. The world is all before
+her, and her chronicler may not be her guide. She will have adventures,
+for everybody has. She will win through with them, for everybody does.
+She may even meet bolder and badder men than the policeman--Shall we
+then detain her? I, for one, having urgent calls elsewhere, will salute
+her fingers and raise my hat and stand aside, and you will do likewise,
+because it is my pleasure that you should. She will go forward, then,
+to do that which is pleasing to the gods, for less than that she cannot
+do, and more is not to be expected of any one.
+
+
+     THUS FAR THE STORY OF MARY MAKEBELIEVE
+
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+
+     On the following pages will be found the complete list of
+     titles in "The Modern Library," including those published
+     during the Fall of Nineteen Hundred and Twenty-one. New
+     titles are added in the Spring and Fall of every year.
+
+
+
+
+THE MODERN LIBRARY OF THE WORLD'S BEST BOOKS
+
+Hand Bound in Limp Binding, Stained Tops, Gold Decorations, only 95c.
+per copy
+
+Postage 5c. per copy extra
+
+
+Six years ago, the Modern Library of the World's Best Books made its
+appearance with twelve titles. It was immediately recognized, to quote
+the New York Times, "as filling a need that is not quite covered by
+any other publication in the field just now." The Dial hastened to say
+"The moderns put their best foot forward in the Modern Library. There
+is scarcely a title that fails to awaken interest and the series is
+doubly welcome at this time." A week or so after the publication of
+the first titles, The Independent wrote: "The Modern Library is
+another step in the very right direction of putting good books into
+inexpensive form," and the clever Editor of the Chicago Daily News, in
+a long review, concluded: "The Modern Library astonishes the cynical
+with the excellence of its choice of titles. You could stand before a
+stack of these books, shut your eyes and pick out the right one every
+time." Despite this enthusiasm, in publishing circles it was
+considered impossible to continue the sale of these attractive Hand
+Bound Limp books, printed in large clear type on good paper, at any
+price under the usual and prevailing price charged for the more
+cheaply made current fiction, which is now about Two Dollars a volume.
+But the large number of intelligent book buyers, a much larger group
+than is generally supposed has not only made possible the continuation
+of this fine series at the low price of Ninety-five Cents a volume,
+but has enabled us progressively to make it a better and more
+comprehensive collection. There are now over a hundred titles in the
+series and a new one is added each month except during the three
+Summer months. And in mechanical excellence, too, the books have been
+constantly improved.
+
+Many distinguished American and foreign authors have said that the
+Modern Library is one of the most stimulating factors in American
+intellectual life. Practically everybody who knows anything about good
+books owns a number of copies and generally promises himself to own
+them all.... One of the largest book stores in the country reports
+that more copies of the Modern Library are purchased for gifts than
+any other books now being issued.
+
+The sweep of world events has, of course, been a contributing
+influence to our success. Purposeful reading is taking the place of
+miscellaneous dabbling in literature, and the Modern Library is being
+daily recommended by notable educators as a representative library of
+modern thought. Many of our titles are being placed on college lists
+for supplementary reading and they are being continuously purchased by
+the American Library Association for Government camps and schools. The
+list of titles on the following six pages (together with the list of
+introductions written especially for the Modern Library), indicates
+that our use of the term "Modern" does not necessarily mean written
+within the last few years. Voltaire is certainly a modern of moderns,
+as are Samuel Butler, Francois Villon, Theophile Gautier and
+Dostoyevsky.
+
+Many of the books in the Modern Library are not reprints, but are new
+books which cannot be found in any other edition. None of them can be
+had in any such convenient and attractive form. It would be difficult
+to find any other editions of any of these books at double the price.
+They can be purchased wherever books are sold or you can get them from
+the publishers.
+
+  BONI AND LIVERIGHT
+  61 West 48th Street
+  New York
+
+
+
+
+Complete List of Titles
+
+
+_For convenience in ordering please use number at right of title_
+
+
+A MODERN BOOK OF CRITICISMS (81) Edited with an Introduction by
+LUDWIG LEWISOHN
+
+
+ANDERSON, SHERWOOD (1876-)
+
+Winesburg, Ohio, (104)
+
+
+ANDREYEV, LEONID (1871-)
+
+The Seven That Were Hanged and The Red Laugh (45) Introduction by
+THOMAS SELTZER
+
+
+ATHERTON, GERTRUDE (1859-)
+
+Rezanov (71) Introduction by WILLIAM MARION REEDY
+
+
+BALZAC, HONORE DE (1799-1850)
+
+Short Stories (40)
+
+
+BAUDELAIRE, PIERRE CHARLES (1821-1867)
+
+His Prose and Poetry (70)
+
+
+BEARDSLEY, THE ART OF AUBREY (1872-1898)
+
+64 Black and White Reproductions (42) Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS
+
+
+BEERBOHM, MAX (1872-)
+
+Zuleika Dobson (50) Introduction by FRANCIS HACKETT
+
+
+BEST GHOST STORIES (73)
+
+Introduction by ARTHUR B. REEVE
+
+
+BEST HUMOROUS AMERICAN SHORT STORIES (87)
+
+Edited with an Introduction by ALEXANDER JESSUP
+
+
+BEST RUSSIAN SHORT STORIES (18)
+
+Edited with an Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER
+
+
+BLAKE, WILLIAM (1757-1827)
+
+Poems (91) Edited with notes by WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS
+
+
+BUTLER, SAMUEL (1835-1902)
+
+The Way of All Flesh (13)
+
+
+CABELL, JAMES BRANCH
+
+Beyond Life (25) Introduction by GUY HOLT
+
+
+CARPENTER, EDWARD (1844-)
+
+Love's Coming of Age (51)
+
+
+CHEKHOV, ANTON (1860-1904)
+
+Rothschild's Fiddle and Thirteen Other Stories (31)
+
+
+CHESTERTON, G. K. (1874-)
+
+The Man Who Was Thursday (35)
+
+
+CONTEMPORARY SCIENCE (99)
+
+Edited with an Introduction by Dr. BENJ. HARROW
+
+
+CRANE, STEPHEN (1870-)
+
+Men, Women and Boats (102) Introduction by VINCENT STARRETT
+
+
+D'ANNUNZIO, GABRIELE (1864-)
+
+The Flame of Life (65)
+
+The Triumph of Death (112) Introduction by BURTON RASCOE
+
+
+DAVIDSON, JOHN
+
+Poems (60)
+
+
+DAUDET, ALPHONSE (1840-1897)
+
+Sapho (85) In same volume Prevost's "Manon Lescaut"
+
+
+DOSTOYEVSKY, FEDOR (1821-1881)
+
+Poor People (10) Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER
+
+
+DOWSON, ERNEST (1867-1900)
+
+Poems and Prose (74) Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS
+
+
+DREISER, THEODORE
+
+Free and Other Stories (50) Introduction by H. L. MENCKEN
+
+
+DUNSANY, LORD (Edward John Plunkett) (1878-)
+
+A Dreamer's Tales (34) Introduction by PADRIAC COLUM
+
+Book of Wonder (43)
+
+
+ELLIS, HAVELOCK (1859-)
+
+The New Spirit (95) Introduction by the author
+
+
+EVOLUTION IN MODERN THOUGHT (37)
+
+A Symposium, including Essays by Haeckel, Thomson, Weismann, etc.
+
+
+FLAUBERT, GUSTAVE (1821-1880)
+
+Madame Bovary (28)
+
+The Temptation of St. Anthony (92) Translated by LAFCADIO HEARN
+
+
+FLEMING, MARJORIE (1803-1811)
+
+Marjorie Fleming's Book (93) Introduction by CLIFFORD SMYTH
+
+
+FRANCE, ANATOLE (1844-)
+
+The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard (22) Introduction by LAFCADIO HEARN
+
+The Queen Pedauque (110) Introduction by JAMES BRANCH CABELL
+
+The Red Lily (7)
+
+Thais (67) Introduction by HENDRIK W. VAN LOON
+
+
+FRENSSEN, GUSTAV (1863-)
+
+John Uhl (101) Introduction by LUDWIG LEWISOHN
+
+
+GAUTIER, THEOPHILE (1811-1872)
+
+Mlle. de Maupin (53)
+
+
+GEORGE, W. L. (1882-)
+
+A Bed of Roses (75) Introduction by EDGAR SALTUS
+
+
+GILBERT, W. S. (1836-1911)
+
+The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance, Iolanthe, The Gondoliers, (26)
+Introduction by CLARENCE DAY, Jr.
+
+
+GISSING, GEORGE, (1857-1903)
+
+The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft (46) Introduction by PAUL ELMER
+MORE
+
+
+De GONCOURT, E. and J. (1822-1896) (1830-1870)
+
+Renee Mauperin (76) Introduction by EMILE ZOLA
+
+
+GORKY, MAXIM (1868-)
+
+Creatures That Once Were Men and Four Other Stories (48)
+Introduction by G. K. CHESTERTON
+
+
+HARDY, THOMAS (1840-)
+
+The Mayor of Casterbridge (17) Introduction by JOYCE KILMER
+
+
+HECHT, BEN
+
+Erik Dorn (29) Introduction by BURTON RASCOE
+
+
+HUDSON, W. H. (1862-)
+
+Green Mansions (89) Introduction by JOHN GALSWORTHY
+
+
+IBANEZ, VICENTE BLASCO (1867-)
+
+The Cabin (69) Introduction by JOHN GARRETT UNDERHILL
+
+
+IBSEN, HENRIK (1828-1906)
+
+A Doll's House, Ghosts, An Enemy of the People (6); Hedda Gabler,
+Pillars of Society, The Master Builder (36) Introduction by H. L.
+MENCKEN
+
+The Wild Duck, Rosmersholm, The League of Youth (54)
+
+
+JAMES, HENRY (1843-1916)
+
+Daisy Miller and An International Episode (63) Introduction by
+WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS
+
+
+KIPLING, RUDYARD (1865-)
+
+Soldiers Three (3)
+
+
+LATZKO, ANDREAS (1876-)
+
+Men in War (88)
+
+
+LAWRENCE, D. H. (1887-)
+
+Sons and Lovers (109) Introduction by JOHN MACY
+
+
+LE GALLIENNE, ANTHOLOGY OF AMERICAN POETRY (107) Edited with an
+introduction by RICHARD LE GALLIENNE
+
+
+LOTI, PIERRE (1850-)
+
+Madame Chrysantheme (94)
+
+
+MACY, JOHN (1877-)
+
+The Spirit of American Literature (56)
+
+
+MAETERLINCK, MAURICE (1862-)
+
+A Miracle of St. Antony, Pelleas and Melisande, The Death of
+Tintagiles, Alladine and Palomides, Interior, The Intruder (11)
+
+
+DeMAUPASSANT, GUY (1850-1893)
+
+Love and Other Stories (72) Edited and translated with an
+Introduction by MICHAEL MONAHAN
+
+Mademoiselle Fifi, and Twelve Other Stories (8); Une Vie (57)
+Introduction by HENRY JAMES
+
+
+MEREDITH, GEORGE (1828-1909)
+
+Diana of the Crossways (14) Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS
+
+
+MOLIERE
+
+Plays (78) Introduction by WALDO FRANK
+
+
+MOORE, GEORGE (1853-)
+
+Confessions of a Young Man (16) Introduction by FLOYD DELL
+
+
+MORRISON, ARTHUR (1863-)
+
+Tales of Mean Streets (100) Introduction by H. L. MENCKEN
+
+
+NIETZSCHE, FRIEDRICH (1844-1900)
+
+Thus Spake Zarathustra (9) Introduction by FRAU FOERSTER-NIETZSCHE
+
+Beyond Good and Evil (20) Introduction by WILLARD HUNTINGTON WRIGHT
+
+Genealogy of Morals (62)
+
+
+O'NEILL, EUGENE (1888-)
+
+The Moon of the Carribbees and Six Other Plays of the Sea (111)
+Introduction by GEORGE JEAN NATHAN
+
+
+OUIDA
+
+In a Winter City (24) Introduction by CARL VAN VECHTEN
+
+
+PAINE, THOMAS (1737-1809)
+
+Selections from the Writings of Thomas Paine (108) Edited with an
+Introduction by CARL VAN DOREN
+
+
+PATER, WALTER (1839-1894)
+
+Marius the Epicurean (90)
+
+The Renaissance (86) Introduction by ARTHUR SYMONS
+
+
+PEPYS', SAMUEL; DIARY (103)
+
+Condensed. Introduction by RICHARD LE GALLIENNE
+
+
+PREVOST, ANTOINE FRANCOIS (1697-1763)
+
+Manon Lescaut (85) In same volume with Daudet's Sapho
+
+
+PSYCHOANALYSIS, AN OUTLINE OF (66)
+
+A Symposium of the latest expressions by the leaders of the various
+schools of the new psychology. Edited by J. S. VAN TESLAAR
+
+
+RODIN, THE ART OF (1840-1917)
+
+64 Black and White Reproductions (41) Introduction by LOUIS WEINBERG
+
+
+SCHNITZLER, ARTHUR (1862-)
+
+Anatol, Living Hours, The Green Cockatoo (32) Introduction by ASHLEY
+DUKES
+
+Bertha Garlan (39)
+
+
+SCHOPENHAUER, ARTHUR (1788-1860)
+
+Studies in Pessimism (12) Introduction by T. B. SAUNDERS
+
+
+SHAW, G. B. (1856-)
+
+An Unsocial Socialist (15)
+
+
+SINCLAIR, MAY
+
+The Belfry (68)
+
+
+STEPHENS, JAMES
+
+Mary, Mary (30) Introduction by PADRIAC COLUM
+
+
+STEVENSON, ROBERT LOUIS (1850-1894)
+
+Treasure Island (4)
+
+
+STIRNER, MAX (Johann Caspar Schmidt) (1806-1859)
+
+The Ego and His Own (49)
+
+
+STRINDBERG, AUGUST (1849-1912)
+
+Married (2) Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER
+
+Miss Julie, The Creditor, The Stronger Woman, Motherly Love, Paria,
+Simoon (52)
+
+
+SUDERMANN, HERMANN (1857-)
+
+Dame Care (33)
+
+
+SWINBURNE, ALGERNON CHARLES (1837-1909)
+
+Poems (23) Introduction by ERNEST RHYS
+
+
+THOMPSON, FRANCIS (1859-1907)
+
+Complete Poems (38)
+
+
+TOLSTOY, LEO (1828-1910)
+
+Redemption and Two Other Plays (77) Introduction by ARTHUR HOPKINS
+
+The Death of Ivan Ilyitch and Four Other Stories (64)
+
+
+TURGENEV, IVAN (1818-1883)
+
+Fathers and Sons (21) Introduction by THOMAS SELTZER
+
+Smoke (80) Introduction by JOHN REED
+
+
+VAN LOON, HENDRIK WILLEM (1882-)
+
+Ancient Man (105)
+
+
+VILLON FRANCOIS (1431-1461)
+
+Poems (58) Introduction by JOHN PAYNE
+
+
+VOLTAIRE, (FRANCOIS MARIE AROUET) (1694-1778)
+
+Candide (47) Introduction by PHILIP LITTELL
+
+
+WELLS, H. G. (1866-)
+
+Ann Veronica (27)
+
+The War in the Air (5) New Preface by H. G. Wells for this edition
+
+
+WHITMAN, WALT (1819-)
+
+Poems (97) Introduction by CARL SANDBURG
+
+
+WILDE, OSCAR (1859-1900)
+
+An Ideal Husband, A Woman of No Importance (84)
+
+Dorian Gray (1)
+
+Fairy Tales and Poems in Prose (61)
+
+Intentions (96)
+
+Poems (19)
+
+Salome, The Importance of Being Earnest, Lady Windermere's Fan (83)
+Introduction by EDGAR SALTUS
+
+
+WILSON, WOODROW (1856-)
+
+Selected Addresses and Public Papers (55) Edited with an
+introduction by ALBERT BUSHNELL HART
+
+
+WOMAN QUESTION, THE (59)
+
+A Symposium, including Essays by Ellen Key, Havelock Ellis, G. Lowes
+Dickinson, etc. Edited by T. R. SMITH
+
+
+YEATS, W. B. (1865-)
+
+Irish Fairy and Folk Tales (44)
+
+
+
+
+
+Transcriber's Notes:
+
+There are several misspellings in the text, such as eagnerness, Padriac.
+
+"deary" & "dearie" are both used.
+
+There are instances of missing capitals, such as 'alanna' and several
+first words of sentences.
+
+There are several instances of missing punctuation.
+
+Mary's room is described as being "one square inch" in size in original
+text.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Mary, Mary, by James Stephens
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MARY, MARY ***
+
+***** This file should be named 24742.txt or 24742.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        http://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/7/4/24742/
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charlene Taylor and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+http://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+http://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at http://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit http://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations.
+To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     http://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
diff --git a/24742.zip b/24742.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..9cee144
--- /dev/null
+++ b/24742.zip
diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6312041
--- /dev/null
+++ b/LICENSE.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,11 @@
+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
+metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be
+in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES.
+
+Procedures for determining public domain status are described in
+the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org.
+
+No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in
+jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize
+this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright
+status under the laws that apply to them.
diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..cae6c5c
--- /dev/null
+++ b/README.md
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #24742 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/24742)
author	Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org>	2025-10-15 02:14:11 -0700
committer	Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org>	2025-10-15 02:14:11 -0700
commit	85339f4151d638cd69d558b2e9551d371e057322 (patch)
tree	55f273122dcf504e5567927003a2957db44d2aec