A touch of maternal solemnity (Metaphor)
This metaphor is used in its ironic meaning to highlight the chillness, with which Lilia treats her daughter Irma: “She caught sight of her little daughter Irma, and felt that a touch of maternal solemnity was required”. It doesn’t mean that she doesn’t love Irma, she just tried to behave mannerly to find favor in Mrs Herriton, who was her mother-in-low, eyes.
Dentist is a troublesome creature (Metaphor)
Lilia’s second husband father was an Italian dentist, so he didn’t have much money and her family, which consisted of noble and rich Englishmen, looked down at him, as they considered his social position uncertain: “He hovers between the professions and the trades; he may be only a little lower than the doctors, or he may be down among the chemists, or even beneath them.” Hence, this metaphor is used to show how people used to treat representatives of lower classes of the society and divide people into “nobles” and “commons”.
The powers of evil (Metaphor)
Mrs Abbot is going to kidnap Gino’s son, because she thinks that he doesn’t love the child and it would be better to raise it in England. She treats Gino as an evil man and is convinced that it was he, who was to blame in Lilia’s death, so, before she entered his house, she prepared herself to do battle with “the powers of evil” i.e. with Gino and rescue a poor child.
Mechanical functions of tortured flesh (Metaphor)
This metaphor vividly depicts the eternal sorrow of a father, who had just found out that his son is dead. But, on the other hand, the author emphasizes, that Gino’s emotions weren’t sincere “ indignation and despair”, he was just lost, he hasn’t realized yet, what has happened, the words about his son death didn’t come to his mind. This metaphor transfers a complicated and collapsed state of the character.
Harriet crawled like a wounded creature (Simile)
This simile is used to depict the mood Hariets mood when she was to Florence, she didn’t like the place and hoped she never back there again. There were nothing pleasant in that journey so she didn’t have a desire to make it better.
