Holder had
mounted on a chair to look close at the stuff by the gaslight; and
this was my bogey!
We had a delightful custom in nursery days, devised by my mother,
that on festival occasions, such as birthdays or at Christmas, our
presents were given us in the evening by a fairy called
Abracadabra.
The first time the fairy appeared, we heard, after tea, in the
hall, the hoarse notes of a horn. We rushed out in amazement. Down
in the hall, talking to an aunt of mine who was staying in the
house, stood a veritable fairy, in a scarlet dress, carrying a wand
and a scarlet bag, and wearing a high pointed scarlet hat, of the
shape of an extinguisher. My aunt called us down; and we saw that
the fairy had the face of a great ape, dark-brown, spectacled, of a
good-natured aspect, with a broad grin, and a curious crop of white
hair, hanging down behind and on each side. Unfortunately my eldest
brother, a very clever and imaginative child, was seized with a
panic so insupportable at the sight of the face, that his present
had to be given him hurriedly, and he was led away, blanched and
shuddering, to the nursery.
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