The Canterville Ghost

That's quite absurd! You have merely to go to bed and blow out the candle. It is very difficult sometimes to keep awake, especially at church, but there is no difficulty at all about sleeping. Why, even babies know how to do that, and they are not very clever.'

'I have not slept for three hundred years,' he said sadly, and Virginia's beautiful blue eyes opened in wonder; `for three hundred years I have not slept, and I am so tired.'

Virginia grew quite grave, and her little lips trembled like rose-leaves. She came towards him, and kneeling down at his side, looked up into his old withered face.

'Poor, poor Ghost,' she murmured; `have you no place where you can sleep?'

'Far away beyond the pinewoods,' he answered, in a low dreamy voice, `there is a little garden. There the grass grows long and deep, there are the great white stars of the hemlock flower, there the nightingale sings all night long. All night long he sings, and the cold, crystal moon looks down, and the yew-tree spreads out its giant arms over the sleepers.'

Virginia's eyes filled with tears, and she hid her face in her hands. 'You mean the Garden of Death,' she whispered.

Vocabulary:

Absurd: Stupid and funny.
Merely: Only.
Grave: Serious.
Withered: Old and dried up.
Murmur: Talk very quietly.
Dreamy: As if almost asleep
Nightingale: A bird that sings at night