Hazel: That is so.  And the worst is, there is no question ever rises that we do not agree on, or that would have power to make us fall out in earnest.  It was different in my early time.  The questions used to rise up then were worth fighting for.

Mineog: There are some people so cantankerous they will heat themselves in argument as to which side might be right or wrong in a war, or if wars should be in it at all, or hangings.

Hazel: Ah, when they are as long on the road as we are, they’ll take things easy. Mineog: Now all the kingdoms of the earth to go struggling on one wrong side or another, or to bring themselves down to dust and ashes, it would not break our friendship.  In all the years past there never did a cross word rise between us.

Hazel: There never will.  What are the fights of politics and parties beside living neighbourly with one another, and to go peaceable to the grave, our selves that are the oldest residents in the Square.

Mineog: It will be long indeed before you will be followed to the grave.  You didn’t live no length yet.  You are too fresh to go out and to forsake your wife and your family.

Hazel: Ah, when the age would be getting up on you, you wouldn’t be getting younger.  But it’s yourself that is as full of spirit as a four-year-old.  I wish I had a sovereign for every year you will reign after me in the Square.

Mineog: (Sneezes.) There is a draught of air coming in the window.

Hazel: (Rising.) Take care might it be open—­no, but a pane that is out.  There is a very chilly breeze sweeping in.

Mineog: (Rising.) I will put on my coat so.  There is no use giving provocation to a cold.

Hazel: I’ll do the same myself.  It is hard to banish a sore throat.

   (They put on coats.  John brings in dinner.  They sit down.)

Mineog: See can you baffle that draught of air, John.

John: I’ll go in search of something to stop it, sir.  This bit of a board I brought is too unshapely.

Mineog: Two columns of the Tribune as empty yet as anything you could see.  I had them kept free for the Bishop’s speech and he didn’t come after.

Hazel: That’s the same cause has left myself with so wide a gap.

Mineog: In the years past there used always to be something happening such as famines, or the invention of printing.  The whole world has got very slack.

Hazel: You are a better hand than what I am at filling odd spaces would be left bare.  It is often I think the news you put out comes partly from your own brain, and the prophecies you lay down about the weather and the crops.

Mineog: Ah, I might stick in a bit of invention sometimes, when I’m put to the pin of my collar.

Hazel: I might maybe make an attack on the Tribune for that.