Mr. Kendal told the Banker that it had been decided that his nephew
needed exercise, and that Mrs. Kendal would be glad of his company in
a long walk. Mr. Goldsmith seemed rather surprised, but consented,
whereupon the young clerk lighted up into animation, and bounded out
of his prison house, with a springy step learnt upon mountain
heather. Mr. Kendal only waited to hear whither they were bound.
'Oh! as far as we can go on the Woodside road,' said Albinia. 'I
think the prescription I used to inflict on poor Sophy will not be
thrown away here. I always fancy there is a whiff of sea air upon
the hill there.'
Ulick smiled at such a fond delusion, bred up as he had been upon the
wildest sea-coast, exposed to the full sweep of the Atlantic storm!
She set him off upon his own scenery, to the destruction of his
laborious English, as he dwelt on the glories of his beloved rocks
rent by fierce sea winds and waves into fantastic, grotesque, or
lovely shapes, with fiords of exquisite blue sea between, the variety
of which had been to him as the gentle foliage of tamer countries.
Not a tree stood near the 'town' of Ballymakilty, but the wild crags,
the sparkling waters, the broad open hills, and the bogs, with their
intensely purple horizon, held fast upon his heart; and he told of
white sands, reported to be haunted by mermaids, and crevices of rock
where the tide roared, and gave rise to legends of sea monsters, and
giants turned to stone.
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