John Bull's Other Island Author:Bernard George Shaw Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: ACT II Rosscullen. Westward a hillside of granite rock and heather slopes upward across the prospect from south to north. A huge stone stands on it in a natur... more »ally impossible place, as if it had been tossed up there by a giant. Over the brow, in the desolate valley beyond, is a round tower. A lonely white high road trending away westward past the tower loses itself at the foot of the far mountains. It is evening; and there are great breadths of silken green in the Irish sky. The sun is setting. A man with the face of a young saint, yet with white hair and perhaps 50 years on his back, is standing near the stone in a trance of intense melancholy, looking over the hills as if by mere intensity of gaze he could pierce the glories of the sunset and see into the streets of heaven. He is dressed in black, and is rather more clerical in appearance than most English curates are nowadays; but he does not wear the collar and waistcoat of a parish priest. He is roused from his trance by the chirp of an insect from a tuft of grass in a crevice of the stone. His face relaxes: he turns quietly, and gravely takes off his hat to the tuft, addressing the insect in a brogue which is the jocular assumption of a gentleman and not the natural speech of a peasant. The Man. An is that yourself, Misther Grasshopper? I hope I see you well this fine evenin. The Grasshopper (prompt and shrill in answer). X.X. The Man (encouragingly). Thats right. I suppose '. now youve come out to make yourself miserable be ad- | myerin the sunset? The Grasshopper (sadly). X.X. The Man. Aye, youre a thrue Irish grasshopper. The Grasshopper (loudly). X.X.X. ; The Man. Three cheers for ould Ireland, is it? That helps you to face out the misery and the poverty and the torment, doesnt it? The Grasshopper...« less