"Sure there's time enough," said James, "amn't I there all day." "I'll go and see Mike Mulhare myself," said the priest. "Long life to your reverence." "And I will try to get you the price of the pig." "Ah,'tis your reverence that's good to us." The priest stood looking after him, wondering if he would give up life as a bad job and go back to the poor-house. But while thinking of James Murdoch, he was conscious of an idea; it was still dim and distant, but every moment it emerged, it was taking shape. Ireland was passing away. In five-and-twenty years, if some great change did not take place, Ireland would be a Protestant country. "There is no one in this parish except myself who has a decent house to live in," he murmured; and then an idea broke suddenly in his mind. The Greek priests were married. They had been allowed to retain their wives in order to avoid a schism. Rome had always known how to adapt herself to circumstances, and there was no doubt that if Rome knew Ireland's need of children Rome would consider the revocation of the decree--the clergy must marry. He walked very slowly, and looking through the peat stacks he saw St. Peter's rising above a rim of pearl-coloured mountains, and before he was aware of it he had begun to consider how he might write a letter to Rome. Was it not a fact that celibacy had only been made obligatory in Ireland in the twelfth century? When he returned home, his housekeeper was anxious to hear about James Murdoch, but the priest sat possessed by the thought of Ireland becoming a Protestant country; and he had not moved out of his chair when the servant came in with his tea. He drank his tea mechanically, and walked up and down the room, and it was a long time before he took up his knitting. But that evening he could not knit, and he laid the stocking aside so that he might think. Of what good would his letter be? A letter from a poor parish priest asking that one of the most ancient decrees should be revoked! The Pope's secretary would pitch his letter into the waste paper basket. The Pope would be only told of its contents! The cardinals are men whose thoughts move up and down certain narrow ways, clever men no doubt, but clever men are often the dupes of conventions. All men who live in the world accept the conventions as truths. And the idea of this change in ecclesiastical law had come to him because he lived in a waste bog. But was he going to write the letter? He could not answer the question! Yes, he knew that sooner or later he must write this letter. "Instinct," he said, "is a surer guide than logic. My letter to Rome was a sudden revelation." The idea had fallen as it were out of the air, and now as he sat knitting by his own fireside it seemed to come out of the corners of the room.