Austin and His Friends
The Project Gutenberg eBook, Austin and His Friends, by Frederic H.
Balfour
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Title: Austin and His Friends
Author: Frederic H. Balfour
Release Date: June 21, 2005 [eBook #16099]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AUSTIN
AND HIS FRIENDS***
E-text prepared by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Jeannie Howse, and the
Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team
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AUSTIN AND HIS FRIENDS
by
FREDERIC H. BALFOUR
Author Of "The Expiation of Eugene," etc.
London Greening & Co., Ltd.
1906
[Illustration: DAPHNIS AT THE FOUNTAIN]
* * * * *
Advertisement
The old-fashioned ghost-story was always terrifying and ghastly;
something that made people afraid to go to bed, or to look over their
shoulders, or to enter a room in the dark. It dealt with apparitions in a
white sheet, and clanking chains, and dreadful faces that peered out
from behind the window curtains in a haunted chamber. And the more
blood-curdling it was, the more keenly people enjoyed it--until they
were left alone, and then they were apt to wish that they had been
reading Robinson Crusoe or Alison's History of Europe instead. Now
the present book embodies an attempt to write a cheerful ghost-story; a
story in which the ghostly element is of a friendly and pleasant
character, and sheds a sense of happiness and sunshine over the entire
life of the ghost-seer. Whether the author has succeeded in doing so
will be for his readers to decide. It is only necessary to add that he has
not introduced a single supernormal incident that has not occurred and
been authenticated in the recorded experiences of persons lately or still
alive.
* * * * *
Austin and His Friends
Chapter the
First
It was rather a beautiful old house--the house where Austin lived. That
is, it was old-fashioned, low-browed, solid, and built of that peculiar
sort of red brick which turns a rich rose-colour with age; and this warm
rosy tint was set off to advantage by the thick mantle of dark green ivy
in which it was partly encased, and by the row of tall white and purple
irises which ran along the whole length of the sunniest side of the
building. There was an ancient sun-dial just above the door, and all the
windows were made of small, square panes--not a foot of plate-glass
was there about the place; and if the rooms were nor particularly large
or stately, they had that comfortable and settled look which tells of
undisturbed occupancy by the same inmates for many years. But the
principal charm of the place was the garden in which the house stood.
In this case the frame was really more beautiful than the picture. On
one side, the grounds were laid out in very formal style, with straight
walks, clipped box hedges, an old stone fountain, and a perfect
bowling-green of a lawn; while at right angles to this there was a plot
of land in which all regularity was set at naught, and sweet-peas, tulips,
hollyhocks, dahlias, gillyflowers, wall-flowers, sun-flowers, and a
dozen others equally sweet and friendly shared the soil with gooseberry
bushes and thriving apple-trees. Taking it all in all, it was a lovable and
most reposeful home, and Austin, who had lived there ever since he
could remember, was quite unable to imagine any lot in life that could
be compared to his.
Now this was curious, for Austin was a hopeless cripple. Up to the age
of sixteen, he had been the most active, restless, healthy boy in all the
countryside. He used to spend his days in boating, bicycling, climbing
hills, and wandering at large through the woods and leafy lanes which
stretched far and wide in all directions of the compass. One of his chief
diversions had been sheep-chasing; nothing delighted him more than to
start a whole flock of the astonished creatures careering madly round
some broad green meadow, their fat woolly backs wobbling and jolting
along in a compact mass of mild perplexity at this sudden interruption
of their never-ending meal, while Austin scampered at their tails, as
much excited with the sport as Don Quixote himself when he dispersed
the legions of Alifanfaron. Let hare-coursers, otter-hunters, and
pigeon-torturers blame him if they choose; the exercise probably did
the sheep a vast amount of good, and Austin fully believed that they
enjoyed it quite as much as he did. Then suddenly a great calamity
befell him. A weakness made itself apparent
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