After some shouting in Gaelic, I
learned that they had a packet of letters and tobacco for myself. We
sidled up as near as was possible with the roll, and my goods were
thrown to me wet with spray.
After my weeks in Inishmaan, Kilronan seemed an imposing centre of
activity. The half-civilized fishermen of the larger island are
inclined to despise the simplicity of the life here, and some of
them who were standing about when I landed asked me how at all I
passed my time with no decent fishing to be looking at.
I turned in for a moment to talk to the old couple in the hotel, and
then moved on to pay some other visits in the village.
Later in the evening I walked out along the northern road, where I
met many of the natives of the outlying villages, who had come down
to Kilronan for the Holy Day, and were now wandering home in
scattered groups.
The women and girls, when they had no men with them, usually tried
to make fun with me.
'Is it tired you are, stranger?' said one girl. I was walking very
slowly, to pass the time before my return to the east.
'Bedad, it is not, little girl,' I answered in Gaelic, 'It is lonely
I am.'
'Here is my little sister, stranger, who will give you her arm.'
And so it went.
