Grania, The Story of an Island (Complete)

She was out of the cabin and the fog had closed around her almost before the words were uttered. It was like a pall, only a white pall instead of a black one, a pall that seems...

They were now upon the loneliest piece of the whole island. Far and near not a human creature or sign of humanity, save themselves, was to be seen. The few villages of Inishmaan...

But the atmospheric surprises of such spots as Inishmaan are inexhaustible. When next morning she again opened the cabin-door, leaving Honor asleep, the rain and storm had vanis...

Six years have come and gone since that September evening, and our little twelve-year-old Grania has grown into a tall, broad-chested maiden, vigorous as a frond of bracken in t...

‘Auch, my word, just look at the length of her! My word, she is the big girl that Grania O’Malley, the big girl out and out!’ Rosha exclaimed, looking after her as she ran down...

The art of weaving is one that has been practised upon the Aran isles for a longer time than it is easy to reckon. It cannot, however, be said to have, so far, reached any very...

For several days all the available curraghs belonging to Inishmaan, and the two other islands as well, had been out after them the whole day long. The Aran folk are not particul...

The two listeners remained silent a minute after the tale had ended. Peggy Dowd filled her pipe and puffed at it solemnly, with the air of one who has fulfilled a social duty an...

The Daly brood departed with their booty, Honor next bustled about to get their own meal ready. Grania meanwhile had promptly dumped herself down upon her two small heels and sa...

It was one of those victories, nevertheless, that cost more to the winner than the loser. The first rapture, the first keen tingling satisfaction of her explosion over, Grania w...

The stirabout ready, the two sisters ate their meal together. Honor’s was that of a blackbird. In vain Grania coaxed her with the best-mixed corner of the pot; in vain added mil...

The road from Cashla Bay past Spiddal into Galway is as grim a one surely as is to be found in these three kingdoms. Mile after mile it runs through a grey world of boulders, va...

The disappointment had no effect whatever upon her determination of somehow or other getting to Father Tom that night. There was no one else upon Inishmaan whom she could appeal...

At last the spell which had so long brooded over the islands was broken! The weather changed. The rain ceased--temporarily at any rate. A glimmer of sunshine even broke out, and...

The month of September had begun, but the breach between Grania and Murdough was still unhealed. He, on his side, was feeling less at ease than his jaunty air or undisturbed man...

Yet she did not after this seek him out, or try to make their relations closer in any way. On the contrary, it was a few days later that the first serious quarrel of their lives...

For Grania had by this time utterly lost count of her bearings. To hinder the curragh from turning round, to hinder it from running upon the rocks, and so getting immediately sw...

The hooker had by this time got into the North Sound, known to the islanders as Bealagh-a-Lurgan. Tradition talks here of a great freshwater lake called Lough Lurgan, which once...

Grania and Murdough had parted meanwhile upon the top of the ridge close to the old Mothar Dun, he going west, she east. When she reached home she found the cabin door still shu...

Clouds over the whole expanse of sky, nowhere showing any immediate disposition to fall as rain, yet nowhere allowing the sky to appear decidedly, nowhere even becoming themselv...

She drew up her own particular creepy stool, and sat down, staring at the tongues of red flame as they were blown in towards her, every now and then, by a fresh gust from above.

It was what is called a turning-point, but there are many such turning-points in all lives, and some of them are important, and some not. One thing was lost for Grania, not to b...

Blocking the mouth of the already narrow gully stood a big boulder of pink granite, a ‘Stranger’ from the opposite coast of Galway. Leaning against this boulder as the sisters m...

She did not go very far. Only as far as to the end of the platform, stopping at her usual spot, close to the big granite boulder which blocked the mouth of the gully. Her head w...

Thus the weeks went on, one week after the other, all exactly alike, and no new light came to aid Grania in her investigations about the stolen turf. What was hardly less import...

Tired of trying to conciliate her not-to-be-conciliated companion, little Grania by-and-by trotted over to her father and cuddled up to him, as he lounged, pipe in mouth, one ha...

She hurried desperately on over the flagging, heedless of the cracks, but keeping always upon the same level which must in time, she knew, bring her to the shore exactly opposit...

Hardly had the smaller boat pushed away from the larger one and regained its former place, before the little girl upon the ballast scrambled hastily down from her perch, mounted...

About the still more exposed cabin of the Duranes the storm raged yet more furiously, and awoke, one after the other, all its inhabitants, no less than nine of whom were sleepin...

As it turned out, there was no opportunity for any of these amiable schemes to be carried into effect, for the very next day Honor was taken suddenly worse about nine o’clock in...

Honor was not asleep. Her cough had kept her awake; the restlessness, too, and weariness of illness making it difficult for her to find any position endurable for more than a mi...

At the extreme south-eastern end of the island, upon the same step or level of rock, but about half a mile farther on than the O’Malleys, lived the Duranes. Their cabin was the...

That shroud was whiter and more encompassing than ever as she made her way back to the cabin. Its effect upon her was not, however, now to excite, but to deaden and subdue. The...

Con O’Malley did not care about this commonplace hand-line fishing. He always took a prominent part in the herring fishery, which is the chief fishing event of the year in Galwa...