Grania, The Story of an Island; vol. 1/2

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 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...

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 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...

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...

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...

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...

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...

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...