'
'It's a very prison,' said Ulick; 'the horizon is choked all round,
and one can't breathe in these staid stiff hedges and enclosures!'
And he threw out his arms and flapped them over his breast with a
gesture of constraint.
'You seem no friend to cultivation.'
'Why, your meadows would be pretty things if they were a little
greener,' said Ulick; 'but one gets tired of them, and of those
straight lines of ploughed field. There's no sense of liberty; it is
like the man whose prison walls closed in upon him!' And he gave
another weary sigh, his step lost elasticity, and he moved on
heavily.
'You are tired; I have brought you too far.'
'Tired by a bit of a step like this?' cried the boy, disdainfully, as
he straightened himself, and resumed his brisk tread. But it did not
last.
'I had forgotten that you had not been well,' she said.
'Pshaw!' muttered Ulick; then resumed, 'Aye, Mr. Kendal brought in
the doctor upon me--very kind of him--but I do assure you 'tis
nothing but home sickness; I was nearly as bad when I went to St.
Columba, but I got over it then, and I will again!'
'It may be so in part,' said Albinia, kindly; 'but let me be
impertinent, Ulick, for my sister Winifred told me to look after you;
surely you give it every provocation. Such a change of habits is
enough to make any one ill. Should you not ask your uncle for a
holiday, and go home for a little while?'
'Don't name it, I beg of you,' cried the poor lad in an agitated
voice, 'it would only bring it all over again! I've promised my
mother to do my part, and with His help I _will_! Let the columns
run out to all eternity, and the figures crook themselves as
spitefully as they will, I've vowed to myself not to stir till I've
got the better of the villains!'
'Ah!' said Albinia, 'they have blackened your eyes like the bruises
of material antagonists! Yes, it is a gallant battle, but indeed you
must give yourself all the help you can, for it would be doing your
mother no good to fall ill.
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