Australian Tales - Setis

“Pooh! a great big goose!” sneered the inspector, with an angry glance
at his shaking subordinate. — “I'm ashamed of you, Wilkins.”
“There's the ghost! There he is, hooray!” roared the excited crowd,
pointing to the roof, where, sure enough, Mrs. Lemonpip was leaning
over the parapet, and with outstretched hands was calling loudly for help.
“Get out of the way,” said the inspector, as he pushed through the
throng to the ladder, with laudable determination in his looks, and
nimbly mounted to the roof just as Mrs. Lemonpip had fainted away,
fairly overcome with terror and fatigue. The inspector summoned two or
three of his men to his assistance, and with their united strength they
lifted the insensible little woman through the window into her own front
attic.
* * * * *
I must now try to explain the cause of the sudden flight of Mr.
McSkilly, which the reader doubtless is anxious to learn. When he was
first awakened by the unearthly yells which had so alarmed Mrs.
Lemonpip, and after he had heard his landlady's loud cries of fire, he
sprang out of bed, scrambled out of the window, and hastened to the
back attic window of number three. But with characteristic caution he
dragged a hair trunk after him, which contained all that he owned in the
house, except the scattered garments on the floor, which he would not
stay to put on his person.
In the back attic of number three lay a little Celtic doctor, who had
recently arrived in Sydney as surgeon of an emigrant ship. He had taken
up temporary lodgings in the house of Monsieur Blowitt, a professor of
music, and on the night in question, there he lay on a curtainless
stretcher, blessing the mosquitos, and other triflers with nocturnal repose,
which are not scarce in Sydney in the summer season, as most new
comers are aware. The doctor had, a short time before, made a vigorous
attack on the mosquitos with his waiscoat, and fancying that he had
driven them all out of the window, he had put his head beneath the top
sheet and began to dose off. He was dreaming that he was crossing the
Line again in the good ship Diver; and that his 340 emigrants were
dancing with Neptune's crew on the deck over his cabin, just as Mr.
McSkilly was dragging his hair trunk along the roof over the doctor's
dormitory.
On arriving at the open window, Mr. McSkilly unhesitatingly inserted
one half of his tall bony body into the attic, without asking permission, or
indeed without knowing whether there was any person there to consult
on the subject; and having thus secured an entry for himself, he was
leaning forward with his long arms trying to drag in his hair trunk from
the leaden gutter below the window, for, next to his life, he valued his