Kathleen had never left Carrigrohane Castle before.  This romantic abode was situated in the extreme south-west of Ireland.  It was a mile away from the sea, and stood on a rocky eminence which overlooked a very wide expanse of moor and wood, rushing streams and purple mountains, and deep dark-blue sea.  In the whole world there could scarcely be found a more lovely view than that which since her birth had presented itself before Kathleen’s young eyes.  Her father, Squire O’Hara, was, as landlords in Ireland go, very well off.  His tenantry adored him.  He got in his rents with tolerable regularity.  He was a good landlord, firm but also kind and indulgent.  A real case of distress was never turned away from his doors, but where rent could be paid he insisted on the cottars giving him his due.  He kept a rather wild establishment, however.  His wife was an Irishwoman from a neighboring county, and had some of the most careless attributes of her race.  The house got along anyhow.  There were always shoals of visitors, mostly relatives.  There were heavy feasts in the old hall, and sittings up very late at night, and no end of hunting and fishing and shooting in their seasons.  In the summer a pretty white yacht made a great “divartisement,” as the Squire was fond of saying; and in all things Kathleen O’Hara was free as the air she breathed.  She was educated in a sort of fashion by an Irish governess, but in reality she was allowed to pursue her lessons exactly as she liked best herself.

It was just before she was fifteen that Kathleen’s aunt, a maiden lady from Dublin, who rejoiced in the truly Irish name of O’Flynn, came to see them, remarked on Kathleen’s wild, unkempt appearance, declared that the girl would be a downright beauty when she was eighteen, said that no one would tolerate such a want of knowledge in the present day, and advised that she should go to school.  Mrs. O’Hara took Miss O’Flynn’s hint very much to heart.  Kathleen was consulted, and of course tabooed the entire scheme; in the end, however, the elder ladies carried the day.  Miss O’Flynn took her niece to Dublin with her, and gave her an expensive and very unnecessary wardrobe; and Mrs. O’Hara, having heard a great deal of Mrs. Tennant, who had Irish relatives, decided that Kathleen should go to the Great Shirley School, where she herself had been educated long ago.  Everything was arranged in a great hurry.  It seemed to Kathleen now, as she lay on her bed, kicking her feet impatiently, and ruffled her beautiful hair, that the thing had come to pass in a flash.  It seemed only yesterday that she was at home in the old house, petted by the servants, adored by her father, worshipped by all her relatives—­the young queen of the castle, free as the air, followed by her dogs, riding on her pony—­and now she was here in this hideous, poor, fifth-class house, going to that ugly school.

“I can’t stand it,” she thought.  “There’s only one way out.  I must have a real desperate burst of naughtiness.  What shall I do that will most aggravate them?  For do that thing I will, and as quickly as possible.”