Haunted by Ghosts.

Otago Witness, Issue 2151, 16 May 1895, Page 49

Haunted by Ghosts.

It is not generally known, in connection with Rudyard Kipling's early life, that to be haunted by a terrible apparition, which took the form of a grandmother's ghost, wa3]almost the constant plague of his existence as a boy. One day the "guardian of his youthful years " discovered him in the garden dancing wildly round a small tree and soundly belabouring it with a stick. In reply to her anxious inquiry as to the reason for his strange conduct, young Kipling assured her that he was trying to thrash h's grandmother, who wai for ever appearing before him in an awful sbape. Then the good woman took Rudyard's pie cc, and Rudyard assumed the role of the bush. He saw no more grandmothers that day at least.

Still, a3 time went on this habit of seeing apparitions developed in the boy, who complained agjiu and again of sSrange figures being seated iv chairs or standing before him. Eventually an oculist was consulted, who recommended a particular kind of spectacles, with tho result that the apparitions were effestaally and permanently bauished from his pretence.