His presence emphasised the
highly political nature of the party. Unless she had asked Crossan,
Lady Moyne could not have got hold of any one of more influence with
our north of Ireland Protestant democracy. The Dean cannot possibly be
accustomed to the kind of semi-regal state which is kept up at Castle
Affey. I should be surprised to hear that he habitually dresses for
dinner. It was only natural, therefore, that he should be a little
overawed by the immensity of the rooms and the number of footmen who
lurk about the halls and passages. When he began explaining to me the
extreme iniquity of the recent Vatican legislation about mixed
marriages, he spoke in a quite low voice. As a rule this subject moves
the Dean to stridency; but the heavy magnificence of Castle Affey
crushed him into a kind of whisper. This encouraged me. If the Dean
had been in his usual condition of vigour, I should not have ventured
to do anything except agree with him heartily. Feeling that I might
never catch him in a subdued mood again, I seized a chance of
expressing my own views on the mixed marriage question. It seems to
me that the whole difficulty about the validity of these unions might
be got over by importing a few priests of the Greek Church into
Ireland. The Vatican, I believe, recognizes that these Orientals
really are priests. The Protestants could not reasonably object to
their ministrations since they refuse to acknowledge the jurisdiction
of the Pope. A mixed marriage performed by one of them would,
therefore, be valid in the opinion of the ecclesiastical advisers of,
let us say, the bridegroom. It would be quite unobjectionable to those
responsible for the soul of the bride. I put my plan as persuasively
as I could; but the Dean did not seem to see any merit in it. Indeed I
have never met any one who did. That is the great drawback to trying
to help the Irish nation out of its difficulties. No one will ever
agree to a reasonable compromise.

I took Lady Moyne in to dinner and enjoyed myself very much. She
was--as indeed she always is--beautifully dressed. Although she talked
a good deal to Babberly who sat on the other side of her, she left me
with the impression that I was the person who really interested her,
and that she only turned occasionally to her other neighbour from a
sense of duty. Babberly talked about Unionist clubs and the vigorous
way in which the members of them were doing dumb bell exercises, so as
to be in thor