JESUITICA: Robotic virtues

Readers may be aware that able-bodied Irish Jesuits are fewer on the ground than they used be; but lawns still have to be mowed. One of the biggest lawns that we tend is beside our R and R house in Blainroe, Co. Wicklow, where the grass grows vigorously over some forty metres square. Richard O’Dwyer confronted the problem a couple of years ago by purchasing a robotic lawn-mower, a marvellous machine, pictured here. Electrically powered, it moves over the lawn following its own plan, does a lovely job quietly, and when tired crawls back into its little kennel where its batteries are automatically recharged. So far it is the only robot substituting for Jesuit manpower.