‘Oh, you may abuse the Congested Districts Board to your heart’s content. I never could see what the Government made all the Boards for unless it was to keep the people out of mischief. As long as there is a Board of any kind about the country every blackguard will be so busy throwing stones at it that he won’t have time nor inclination left to annoy decent people. And I’ll say this for the Congested Districts Board: they mean well. Indeed they do; not a doubt of it. There’s one good thing they did, anyway, if there isn’t another, and that’s when they came to Carrowkeel and bought the big Curragh Farm that never supported a Christian, but two herds and some bullocks ever since the famine clearances. They fetched the people down off the mountains and put them on it. Wasn’t that a good thing, now? Sure, all Government Boards do more wrong than right. It’s the nature of that sort of confederation. But it’s all the more thankful we ought to be when once in a while they do something useful.’ Hyacinth came to tell of the choice which Canon Beecher offered him, and dwelt with tragic emphasis on his own decision. The priest listened, a smile on his lips, a look of pity which belied the smile in his eyes. ‘So you thought Ireland would be lost altogether unless you wrote articles for Miss Goold in the _Croppy?_ It’s no small opinion you have of yourself, Hyacinth Conneally. And you thought you’d save your soul by going to preach the Gospel to the English people? Was that it, now?’ ‘It was not,’ said Hyacinth, ‘and you know it wasn’t.’ ‘Of course it wasn’t. What was I thinking of to forget the young lady that was in it? A fine wife you’ve got, any way. God bless her, and make you a good husband to her! By the looks of her she’s better than you deserve. I suppose it was to get money you went to England, so as to buy her pretty dresses and a beautiful house to live in? Did you think you’d grow rich over there?’ ‘Indeed I did not,’ said Hyacinth bitterly. ‘I knew we’d never be rich.’ ‘Well, then, couldn’t you as well have been poor in Ireland? And better, for everybody’s poor here. But there, I know well enough it wasn’t money you were after. Don’t be getting angry with me, now. It wasn’t for the sake of saving your soul you went, nor to get your nice wife, though a man might go a long way for the likes of her. I don’t know why you went, and it’s my belief you don’t know yourself. But you made a mistake, whatever you did it for, going off on that English mission. Is it a mission you call it when you’re a Protestant? I don’t think it is, but it doesn’t matter. You made a mistake. Why don’t you come back again?’ ‘God knows I would if I could. It’s hungry I am to get back--just sick with hunger and the great desire that is on me to be back again in Ireland.’