Meeting Him Here A Little Beyond The
Threshold Of My Hotel I Was Singularly Struck With The Refinement Of
His Nature, Which Has Hardly Been Influenced By His New Life, And
The Townsmen And Sailors He Has Met With.
'I do often come outside the town on Sunday,' he said while we were
talking, 'for what is there to do in a town in the middle of all the
people when you are not at your work?'
A little later another Irish-speaking labourer - a friend of
Michael's - joined us, and we lay for hours talking and arguing on
the grass. The day was unbearably sultry, and the sand and the sea
near us were crowded with half-naked women, but neither of the young
men seemed to be aware of their presence. Before we went back to the
town a man came out to ring a young horse on the sand close to where
we were lying, and then the interest of my companions was intense.
Late in the evening I met Michael again, and we wandered round the
bay, which was still filled with bathing women, until it was quite
dark, I shall not see him again before my return from the islands,
as he is busy to-morrow, and on Tuesday I go out with the steamer.
I returned to the middle island this morning, in the steamer to
Kilronan, and on here in a curagh that had gone over with salt fish.
As I came up from the slip the doorways in the village filled with
women and children, and several came down on the roadway to shake
hands and bid me a thousand welcomes.
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