greetings the occasion demanded, he might even then have been standing
for the portrait of himself that was one day to be added to those of
his predecessors on the library wall; or he might have been one of the
portraits already there that had stepped from its frame for a moment to
take the newcomer by the hand.

In short, the thing of greatest significance in this meeting, the thing
which made itself felt by all three participants, was the juxtaposition
of the ancient and modern. The young man, clothed in a light grey
suit, his soft hat crushed in the nervous grasp of his long fingers, a
man whose scholastic training had been disassociated from religious
traditions, now stood face to face with mediaevalism, with two elderly
men in dark habiliments, as greatly superior to himself in that
subtlety which finds its highest expression in the ecclesiastical type
as he was superior to them in the acquisition of scientific truth.

Presently the bishop invited his young friend, as he already called the
new arrival, to walk with him about the grounds. Doctor Renshaw, left
alone, resumed his seat in the heavy oaken chair which had once
belonged to the founder of blessed memory, his shining head round as a
ball against the diamonded panes at his back, the framed plans of the
St. George's Hall of the future looking down upon him. On the broad
stone mantel rested an antique episcopal mitre of black cloth,
decorated with ecclesiastical symbols in tarnished thread, and a tall
clock of almost equal age stood silent in the corner, showing on its
pale, round face the carven signs of the zodiac. These objects seemed
the peculiar property of the solitary tenant of the room, rather than
relics of a former time, so still he sat, so convincing was the
changelessness of his decorous age.