“Cathal Brugha came in off the 9.30 train & I was late for my class because I stayed listening to him. He is small & very dry & wan looking, & lame, with a rather long moustache. He told a lot about the Convention, & Middleton’s & Redmond’s efforts to fix up a scheme without full control of the customs, & the great danger there is of a majority of the country accepting whatever scheme the Convention does agree on. Then he sat down to a tea with horrid looking black kidneys on toast, & I went away.”
NLI Call Number: MS, 3582/33
NLI Catalogue Link can be found here
Date Range of Diary: December 10th 1917 – August 4th 1918
WEEK 17: 21st – 27th January 1918
Monday 21st. –Still wet. I went to town in the morning, to Jennings, to the office, & to J. Ayres, whom I found in bed, with rheumatism & a
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cough. She says no priest has come near here since Fr Kehoe left town 3 months ago; they never seem to visit people unless they are sent for. She praises me for being “umble to the poor”. In the evening I went to the Fianna Hall, & after hearing a lot about her experiences at the Tech, cooking etc, from K. Dalton, “Mr Mac” arrived & laid down the law to 3 boys, K.D. a girl named Myer & me about officers’ classes. Each was to take one branch & study it & teach it to the rest. The crowd below were noisy and could scarcely be controlled by stomps on the floor. K.D. and Myer got first aid to study; they have 2 books on it there. The classes were to be on Wednesday evenings. I being not exactly an officer aim not to teach anything, but may attend the classes.
Tuesday 22nd. – Still wet. I went to the hotel in [short-hand symbols here]
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the afternoon and found them at tea except Marie & all with colds except Tash; Mrs P.’s & Kitty’s very bad. Mrs P. was complaining of the morals of the S.F. club – little girls hanging about & going home late & so on; & the clergy complaining of it. I said why did none of the clergy join it & exert a good influence, & when she was complaining of the amount of leg a girl showed, leaning forward to talk to someone at the ceilidh, Tash’s patience broke down & she said she couldn’t see what harm there was in a leg, or how a woman’s leg was worse than a man’s, etc etc etc, with great fluency & feeling. Mrs P. took refuge in feigning terror. I supported Tash, though I think very short skirts are ugly & undignified.
Cathal Brugha came in off the 9.30 train & I was late for my class because I stayed listening to him. He is small & very dry & wan looking,
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& lame, with a rather long moustache. He told a lot about the Convention, & Middleton’s & Redmond’s efforts to fix up a scheme without full control of the customs, & the great danger there is of a majority of the country accepting whatever scheme the Convention does agree on. Then he sat down to a tea with horrid looking black kidneys on toast, & I went away. Connolly was there that night. After the portion of Seadna Miss Deasy told a story about a robber helping a poor old woman in a lonely cottage & being let off hell for it when he died. She had it by heart, but I don’t think I could have done as well.
Wednesday 23rd. – Still wet. I went to the Tech in the morning & got the brooch nearly done. Fastening & all. Nothing remained but to oxydise it & put the enamel in. I seemed to have
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got a cold.
Thursday 24th Jan. – I spent most of the day in bed, reading The Image in the Sand – it was very interesting except for the people, who are all in Benson’s very dullest style except Henderson. Ida especially is terrible. Dorothea & Tom came to tea & went to Griffith’s lecture, but as they were rather late, there wasn’t a seat vacant and they had to go home again.
Friday 25th. – I finished the Image in the Sand and read a lot of The Perfect Way. It really is beyond me, & a good deal of it seems nonsensical, but I feel that the foundations of it, about soul & spirit & substance, is sound if only I could grasp it. [short-hand symbols here]
Sunday 29th. – D. & T. came to dinner, and in the afternoon they went up to Washington Lodge
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to meet a couple from Limerick named Stephenson who were staying spending the evening there, and didn’t come back till after tea, when the Coades & Stephensons had gone to evening church. Then at 8.30 they went down to see the latter at their hotel. They are very energetic civic workers; had to do with getting allotments & food or milk depots for the poor in Limerick, & want T & D. to hustle round in that way here. Dear me how I should hate having to try and do things like that.