“We are all prisoners, in a sense, from the very minute we are born, and we may be prisoners after we are dead too, for all any of us know,” said Micus.
“That may be,” said Padna, “but nevertheless, some of us know how to treat ourselves better than the authorities treat the prisoners of Sarduanna.”
“And how are they treated at all? Is it the way they get too much to eat and not enough of work, or too much work and not enough to eat?”
“’Tisn’t so much one as the other, but something worse than either. They get nothing to eat but pickled pork from one end of the year to the other,” said Padna.
“And what do they get to quench their thirst?” said Micus.
The Folly of Being Foolish
“What are you doing there?” said Padna Dan to Micus Pat, as he watched him sifting sand between his fingers as he stood on the shore of Bantry Bay.
“I’m doing what nobody ever thought of doing before and what no one may ever think of doing again,” said Micus. “I’m counting the pebbles of Bantry Bay from Dunboy to Glengarriffe. And that’s more than Napoleon thought of doing.”