I enlarge upon this because I think it justifies me in adding that,
observing so little, what I did observe with my bodily eyes must
almost certainly have been observable. But now let the reader judge.

The first time I ever saw a creature which was really outside ordinary
experience was in the late autumn of my twelfth year. My brother, next
in age to me, was nine, my eldest sister eight. We three had been out
walking with our mother, and were now returning at dusk to our tea
through a wood which covered the top of a chalk down. I remember
vividly the scene. The carpet of drenched leaves under bare branches,
the thin spear-like shafts of the underwood, the grey lights between,
the pale frosty sky overhead with the sickle moon low down in it. I
remember, too, various sensations, such as the sudden chill which
affected me as the crimson globe of the sun disappeared; and again
how, when we emerged from the wood, I was enheartened by the sight of
the village shrouded under chimney smoke and by the one or two
twinkling lights dotted here and there about the dim wolds.

In the wood it was already twilight and very damp. Perhaps I had been
tired, more likely bored--as I always was when I was not being
somebody else. I remember that I had found the path interminable. I
had been silent, as I mostly was, while the other two had chattered
and played about our mother; and when presently I stayed behind for a
purpose I remember that I made no effort to catch them up. I knew the
way perfectly, of course, and had no fear of the dark. Oddly enough I
had no fear of that. I was far less imaginative in the night than in
the day. Besides that, by the time I was ready to go after them I had
much else to think of.