64 THE LIFE OF PHILIP HENRY GOSSE. 



was hung round with dry skins, received from the trappers, 

 awaiting shipment. It was important that this very costly 

 property should be protected, and so — this fur-room was 

 haunted. The maid-servants recounted to the young clerk 

 a harrowing tale of an incident which had happened before 

 he came. One night one of them told Martin that conver- 

 sation was heard in the house, but no one could say 

 whence the voices came. He listened, and heard the sound 

 as of a man's grave tones, rather subdued, and occasionally 

 intermitted. After a while it was concluded that it was 

 the ghost in the fur-room. Martin, therefore, with a 

 theatrical air of devilry, took a cocked pistol in each hand, 

 marched upstairs — the timid women crouching at his back 

 with a candle — and, throwing open the door of the fur- 

 room, authoritatively asked, " Who's there t " Nothing, 

 however, was heard or seen ; nor was any explanation of 

 the mystery attained. But one of the girls quietly said, at 

 the close, that she thought it was only the buzz of a blue- 

 bottle fly ! 



There can be no question that his timidity was increased, 

 and his dislike of company which he was not certain would 

 be congenial deepened, by Philip Gosse's dreary experiences 

 at St. Mary's. One thing he learned which was afterwards 

 useful to him, book-keeping by double entry, both in prin- 

 cipal and in practice. He sat all day at the desk, mostly 

 alone ; but the work was not nearly sufficient to fill the 

 time, there was no literature in the place, and he was hard 

 set for occupation. His love of animals was known, 

 however, and the good-natured fellows in the port would 

 bring him oddities. One day a fisherman brought him a 

 pretty bird, of dense, soft, spotless white plumage, calling 

 it a sea-pigeon. It was a kittiwake gull in remarkably 

 fine condition ; as Philip was holding it in his hands, 

 gazing on it with admiration, it suddenly darted its long 



