parties at Windsor, lesser functions nearer home, free passages to all
the gay festivals, free admissions everywhere, the route indicated, and
a gracious request for the presence of the mayor and mayoress. Genuine
business engagements now save the situation, and the invitations are put
by, but our chief citizen is now bewildered. These social missiles are
flying in all directions, always gracious and flattering, never
challenging and rude--who can withstand them? Still he is bewildered,
but not yet caught. A new assault is made: the great Health Crusade
Battery is called up. Here we must all unite, God's English and the wild
Irish, the Fenian and the Castleman, the labourer and the lord. Surely,
we are all against the microbes. There is a great demonstration, their
Excellencies attend--and the mayor presides. Under the banner of the
microbe he is caught. It is a great occasion, which their Excellencies
grace and improve. His Excellency is affable with the mayor; her
Excellency is confidential and gracious with the mayoress--we might have
been schoolchildren in the same townland we are so cordial. Everything
proceeds amid plaudits, and winds up in acclamation. Their Excellencies
depart. Great is the no-politics era--you can so quietly spike the guns
of many an old politician--and keep him safe. The social amenities do
this. Their Excellencies have gone, but they do not forget. There is a
warm word of thanks for recent hospitality. Perhaps the mayor has a
daughter about to be married, or a son has died; it is remembered, and
the cordial congratulation or gracious sympathy comes duly under the
great seal. What surly man would resent sympathy? And so, the strength
of the old warrior is sapped; the web is woven finely; in its secret net
the Castle has its man. You who have exercised yourselves in Dublin
recently over mayoral doings, note all this--not to the making light of
any man's surrender, but to the true judging of the event, its deeper
significance and danger. Whoever fails must be called to account. When a
man takes a position of trust, influence, and honour, and, whatever the