"'Where'er I take my walks abroad
How many poor I see!
And as I never speaks to them
They never speak to me.'"
Esther laughs; but anyone listening might have heard a melancholy ring in her merriment.
"Does nobody speak to anybody then at Blessington?" asks the young man, aghast at the state of things as revealed by his companion's answers.
"Mr. Blessington roars at Mrs. Blessington, and Mrs. Blessington roars at Mr. Blessington, and I roar at them both."
"And the other two—do not they speak?"
"We are, none of us, much addicted to conversation," she answers, grimly; "but, en revanche, what we do say we say very loud."
"Are you all deaf, then?"
"No; but when one lives with deaf people, one gets into the habit of thinking that the whole world is hard of hearing; one bawls at everyone."
"What an exhausting process!" he says, with a shrug; "takes a great deal out of you, doesn't it?"
"A good deal; lately, I have generally ended the day without any voice at all. I don't mind making short remarks at the top of my voice, but shouting out six columns of the Times, as is daily my pleasing task, is rather fatiguing."