Imagery is so freely employed;
telling sentences, sharp satire, wit--brilliant, overflowing,
spontaneous--all come to the fore. Laughter sometimes checks the eager
flow of words. Occasionally, too, if the conversation is sorrowful,
tears flow and sobs come from the excited and over-sensitive hearts. No
one need be dull who has the privilege of listening to two Irishwomen
who have been parted for some time talking their hearts out to each
other. Kathleen and her aunt were no exception to the universal rule.
Kathleen had never been from home before, and Aunt Katie had things to
tell her about every person, man and woman, old and young, on the
Carrigrohane estate. But when all the news had been told, when the exact
number of dogs had been recounted, the cats and kittens described, the
fowls, the goats, the donkeys, the horses, the cows enumerated, it came
to be Aunt Katie's turn to listen.
"Now my love, tell me, and be quick, about all you have been doing. And
first and foremost, how do you like school?"
"Not at all, aunty; and I'm not learning anything."
"My dear, that is sad hearing; and your poor father pining his heart out
for the want of you."
"I never wished to go to school," said Kathleen.
"You will have to bear it now, my pet, unless you have real cause for
complaint. They're not unkind to you, acushla, are they?"
"Oh, not really, Aunt Katie; but they're such dull people. The teachers
are dull.
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