For look, a different play performs to-night! See how come crowding in, with a bold air Of pertinence I do not dare to question This odd rag-tag-and-bobtail of lost souls, Ecclesiastical, furtive, dim, far gone In their _dementia praecox_! Doctor Hornblow On the Pentateuch, Dean Dogma upon Ruth (Ay, Ruth; the alien corn was not the worst) Keble and Pusey, Moody and Sankey griddling, And one most strange Victorian apparition, The ghost of Gladstone, with his stickout collars, Goes hand in hand with Senor Monkey-brand, Comrades who, printed on a paper cover, Gladstone in front and Monkey on the back, Made the _Impregnable Rock of Holy Scripture_ Tacit defence of Darwin’s blasphemies. There go the ghosts of Mason, Martin Tupper, Dean Farrar, South, Cautionary Mrs. Turner, Butterfield with a spotted senior clerk, And a long rabble of confusing figures, Nuns, deacons, theologians, commentators, Spikes in birettas, missionaries like apes Hairy and chattering, bald; with, everyone, A book in the left hand tight clasped, the right Free to point scorn. My cauliflower-wicked candle Gutters and splutters on the chair beside me, Over two books and a letter; the crowd passing Groans for reproach, confident in their numbers. But I, long used to crowds and their cowardly ways, Return these insults with the cold set eye That break their corporate pride— What? those are plays. Yes, dramas by John Ford—_Love’s Sacrifice_, _The Broken Heart_, _’Tis Pity she’s a Whore_. The titles shock? These things are “not convenient?” Well, try this other by (ah) Canon Trout, _The Wisest Course of Love_—why do you smile? The book of plays I bought, this was a present, Sent me with Rachel’s letter—but you smile, You’re smiling still? Then I apologize, Ladies and Lords. Indeed I never guessed Humour was a luxury you admitted. “’Tis pity she’s a ... postulant.” Is it that? Malicious hearts! but you still nod, laugh, point, Pointing what joke? _The Wisest Course of Love?_ Yes? I don’t see. I’ll buy it for a forfeit. Then a red-haired beaky-nosed burly nun Called Sister Agatha, so I tell myself, Comes nearer, throws her veil aside, takes up The envelope of the letter. Now she lays A manicured finger on the office post-mark, Leering down in my face. I see it now, You ugly she-bear. Wisest Course of Love Is _Maidenhead_? Then you have read the letter? Dictated it quite likely? You, then, you! I know you, nun-official set to guide The postulants through their long penances And stern soul-searchings—with the twisted grin Of a bawd mistress, none too well concealed, You greeted Rachel in the Convent Hall, And peered and saw that she was beautiful,