A woman brought sin into the world. For Helen, the runaway wife of Menelaus, ten years the Greeks. O’Rourke, prince of Breffni.
―Is he a widower? Stephen asked.
―Ay, a grass one, Myles Crawford said, his eye running down the typescript. Emperor’s horses. Habsburg. An Irishman saved his life on the ramparts of Vienna. Don’t you forget! Maximilian Karl O’Donnell, graf von Tirconnel in Ireland. Sent his heir over to make the king an Austrian fieldmarshal now. Going to be trouble there one day. Wild geese. O yes, every time. Don’t you forget that!
―The moot point is did he forget it, J. J. O’Molloy said quietly, turning a horseshoe paperweight. Saving princes is a thank you job.
Professor MacHugh turned on him.
―And if not? he said.
―I’ll tell you how it was, Myles Crawford began. A Hungarian it was one day …
Lost Causes Noble Marquess Mentioned
―We were always loyal to lost causes, the professor said. Success for us is the death of the intellect and of the imagination. We were never loyal to the successful. We serve them. I teach the blatant Latin language. I speak the tongue of a race the acme of whose mentality is the maxim: time is money. Material domination. Dominus! Lord! Where is the spirituality? Lord Jesus! Lord Salisbury. A sofa in a westend club. But the Greek!
Kyrie Eleison!