Judith came to visit her parents on Monday, but Judith was very far from being Christian, and could be relied on merely as far as a counter-irritant might prove of service.
"Well, of course, it was abominable impertinence of the priest to come up with the tenants to try and bully you, Papa, but you know, I see their point." Thus, Judith, annoyingly, and with pertinacity.
"You do, do you!" interjected Judith's progenitor, his once ruddy face now a congested purple. "It seems to me, Judith, you're always deuced ready to see any one's point but mine!"
"After all," went on Judith, with all the self-confidence and intolerance of five and twenty, "it's in your interest to sell, just as much as theirs to buy! With this detestable Government in power it will be a case of the Sibylline Books. You'll see the Nationalists will have it all their own way, and the next Act--"
"Nationalists!" roared the Major, sitting upright in his chair, and panting, his utterance temporarily checked by the sheer pressure of all that he wished to say. "Don't talk to me of Nationalists! Common thieves! That's all they are! There's no Nationalism about _them_! Call it Socialism, if you like, or any other name for robbery! They'd look very blue if _we_ took to shouting 'Ireland a Nation!' and expecting to come in at the finish! They mightn't be able to call us English invaders and to steal our property then! English! I've got Brian Boroihme in my pedigree and that's more than they can say! A pack of half-bred descendants of Cromwell's soldiers! That's what they are, and the best of them, too! That's the best drop of blood they've got!" Dick shouted, veering in the wind of his own words like a rudderless ship in a storm. "That's what gives them tenacity and bigotry! Look at the old places that they're squeezing the old families out of! It's the Protestant farmers and the Religious Orders that are getting them, swarming into them like rats! Don't tell me that I and my family aren't a better asset to any country than a lot of fat, lazy Monks and Nuns!"
"But, Papa, they're not all fat!" said Judith, beginning to laugh.
"Deuce a many of them's thin for want of plenty to eat!" returned Dick, with the confidence of a man whose faith in his theories has never been interfered with by investigation. He was recovering his temper, having enjoyed the delivery of his diatribe; and the fact that he had not only silenced Judith but had tickled her to a laugh, restored his sense of domination.