He had written the English text thinking of the Latin that would come after, and very conscious of the fact that he had written no Latin since he had left Maynooth, and that a bad translation would discredit his ideas in the eyes of the Pope's secretary, who was doubtless a great Latin scholar. "The Irish priests have always been good Latinists," he murmured as he hunted through the dictionary. The table was littered with books, for he had found it necessary to create a Latin atmosphere before beginning his translation. He worked principally at night, and one morning about three he finished his translation, and getting up from his chair he walked to the whitening window. His eyes pained him, and he decided he would postpone reading over what he had written till morning. His illusions regarding his Latin were broken. He had laid his manuscript on a table by his bedside, and on awakening he had reached out his hand for it, but he had not read a page when he dropped it; and the manuscript lay on the floor while he dressed. He went into his breakfast, and when he had eaten his breakfast his nerve failed him. He could not bring himself to fetch the manuscript, and it was his housekeeper who brought it to him. "Ah," he said, "it is tasteless as the gruel that poor James Murdoch is eating." And taking a volume from the table--"St. Augustine's Confessions"--he said, "what diet there is here!" He stood reading. There was no idiom, he had used Latin words instead of English. At last he was interrupted by the wheels of a car stopping at his door. Father Meehan! Meehan could revise his Latin! None had written such good Latin at Maynooth as Meehan. "My dear Meehan, this is indeed a pleasant surprise." "I thought I'd like to see you. I drove over. But--I am not disturbing you.... You've taken to reading again. St. Augustine! And you're writing in Latin!" Father James's face grew red, and he took the manuscript out of his friend's hand. "No, you mustn't look at that." And then the temptation to ask him to overlook certain passages made him change his mind. "I was never much of a Latin scholar." "And you want me to overlook your Latin for you. But why are you writing Latin?" "Because I am writing to the Pope. I was at first a little doubtful, but the more I thought of this letter the more necessary it seemed to me." "And what are you writing to the Pope about?" "You see Ireland is going to become a Protestant country." "Is it?" said Father Meehan, and he listened a little while. Then, interrupting his friend, he said:-- "I've heard enough. Now, I strongly advise you not to send this letter. We have known each other all our lives. Now my dear MacTurnan--" Father Michael talked eagerly, and Father MacTurnan sat listening. At last Father Meehan saw that his arguments were producing no effect, and he said:-- "You don't agree with me."