THE GHOSTS We were very old-fashioned at Aghadoe Abbey and satisfied with old-fashioned ways.

There was a great deal of talk about opening up the country, and even the gentry were full of it, but my grandfather would take snuff and look scornful.
"And when you have opened it up," he said, "you will let in the devil and all his angels." It was certainly true that the people had hitherto been kind and innocent, so that any change might be for the worse, yet I was a little curious about what lay out in the world beyond our hills.

And now it was no great journey to see, for they had opened a light railway, and from the front of the house we could see beyond the lake and the park, through the opening where the Purple Hill rises, that weird thing which rushes round the base of the hill half a dozen times a day before it climbs with no effort to the gorge between the hills and makes its way into the world.

It does not even go by steam, so the thing was a great marvel to us and our people, to whom steam was quite marvel enough.
My grandfather at first would not even look on it.

I have seen him turn away sharply from the window to avoid seeing it.