Chapter 1
Canterville Chase 2 People told Mr Otis not to buy Canterville Chase because it had a ghost.
An old-fashioned way of saying great-aunt.
Lord Canterville explains all the reasons why his family will not live in the house.
16
Everyone told Mr Hiram B. Otis, the American politician, that he was doing a very stupid thing buying Canterville Chase, as it was haunted*. Lord Canterville himself, who was a man of honour*, felt it his duty to mention the fact to Mr Otis when they were agreeing the sale. ‘We have not wanted to live in the place ourselves,’ said Lord Canterville, ‘since my grand-aunt, the Doweger Duchess* of Bolton, was so frightened by two skeleton* hands on her shoulders as she was dressing for dinner that she was never the same again. I have to tell you, Mr Otis, that several living members of my family have seen the ghost. The local priest, the Rev. Augustus Dampier, of Cambridge University has seen it too. After the Duchess’ unlucky accident, none of our younger servants* would stay with us, and the strange noises from the corridor and the library kept my wife awake at night.’ ‘My Lord,’ answered the politician, ‘I will take the furniture and the ghost. I have come from a modern haunted (adj.) a place where there are ghosts honour (n.) knowing the right thing to do Dowager Duchess (n.) rich, woman who gets a title or land after her husband dies skeleton (n.) all the bones of the human body together servant (n.) a person who works in a big, rich house
