s, a big brown-bearded man was passing teacups
to women who were lounging in chairs and to men who stood black against the
red glow of the grate. The big man was George Russell, the famous AE, poet,
painter and philosopher, the "north star of Ireland."

At last he sat down on the edge of a chair--his blue eyes atwinkle as if he
knew some good secret of the happy end of human struggling and was only
waiting the proper moment to tell. This much he did reveal as he gestured
with the pipe that was more often in his hand than in his mouth: it is his
belief that all acts purposed for good work out towards good. He gives ear
to all sincere radicals, Sinn Feiners and "Reds." But he states that he
believes he is the only living pacifist, and disputes the value of bloody
methods. He advocates the peaceful revolution of co-operation. His
powerfully gentle personality has an undoubted effect on the
revolutionaries, and while neither element wants to embrace pacifism, both
want AE's revolution to go forward with theirs.

His gaiety at the little Sunday evenings which he holds quite regularly,
goes far, I am told, towards easing the strain on the taut nerves of the
Sinn Fein intellectuals who attend them. On the Sunday evening I was
present the subject of jail journals was broached. Darrell Figgis had just
written one. In a dim corner of the room was miniatured the ivory face and
the red gold beard of the much imprisoned Figgis.

"Why write a jail journal?" queried AE, smiling towards the corner. "The
rare book, the book that bibliophiles will pray to find twenty years from
now, will be written by an Irishman who never went to jail."

Some one, I think that it was "Jimmy" Stephens, author of "The Crock of
Gold," who sat cross-legged on the end of a worn wicker chaise longue and
talked with all the facility with which he writes, mentioned the countess's
plan of living in the Coombe district. AE returned that as far as he knew
the countess was the only member of parliament who felt called upon to live
with her constituency.

Then suddenly the whole room seemed to join a chorus of protest against
President Wilson. At the Peace Conference all power was his. He was backed
by the richest, greatest nation in the world. But he failed to keep his
promise of gaining the self-determination of small nations. Was he yielding
to the anti-Irish sentiment brought about by English control of the cables
and English propaganda in the United States--