let ’em!  But don’t tell me that’sh morality, don’t tell me that’sh civilisation!  What can you expect in a counthry where the crimson, emotions are never allowed to smell the air?  And what’sh the result?  My bhoy, the result is sentiment, a yellow thing with blue spots, like a fungus or a Stilton cheese.  Go to the theatre, and see one of these things they call plays.  Tell me, are they food for men and women?  Why, they’re pap for babes and shop-boys!  I was a blanky actor moyself!”

Shelton listened with mingled feelings of amusement and dismay, till the old actor, having finished, resumed his crouching posture at the table.

“You don’t get dhrunk, I suppose?” he said suddenly—­“too much of ’n Englishman, no doubt.”

“Very seldom,” said Shelton.

“Pity!  Think of the pleasures of oblivion!  Oi ’m dhrunk every night.”

“How long will you last at that rate?”

“There speaks the Englishman!  Why should Oi give up me only pleasure to keep me wretched life in?  If you’ve anything left worth the keeping shober for, keep shober by all means; if not, the sooner you are dhrunk the better—­that stands to reason.”

In the corridor Shelton asked the Frenchman where the old man came from.

“Oh, and Englishman!  Yes, yes, from Belfast very drunken old man.  You are a drunken nation”—­he made a motion with his hands “he no longer eats—­no inside left.  It is unfortunate-a man of spirit.  If you have never seen one of these palaces, monsieur, I shall be happy to show you over it.”

Shelton took out his cigarette case.

“Yes, yes,” said the Frenchman, making a wry nose and taking a cigarette; “I’m accustomed to it.  But you’re wise to fumigate the air; one is n’t in a harem.”

And Shelton felt ashamed of his fastidiousness.

“This,” said the guide, leading him up-stairs and opening a door, “is a specimen of the apartments reserved for these princes of the blood.”  There were four empty beds on iron legs, and, with the air of a showman, the Frenchman twitched away a dingy quilt.  “They go out in the mornings, earn enough to make them drunk, sleep it off, and then begin again.  That’s their life.  There are people who think they ought to be reformed.  ‘Mon cher monsieur’, one must face reality a little, even in this country.  It would be a hundred times better for these people to spend their time reforming high Society.  Your high Society makes all these creatures; there’s no harvest without cutting stalks.  ’Selon moi’,” he continued, putting back the quilt, and dribbling cigarette smoke through his nose, “there’s no grand difference between your high Society and these individuals here; both want pleasure, both think only of themselves, which is very natural.  One lot have had the luck, the other—­well, you see.”  He shrugged.  “A common set!  I’ve been robbed here half a dozen times.  If you have new shoes, a good waistcoat,