move or walk; and I liked staying at the mouth of the alley, watching
the autumnal shower come sweeping down the street: besides, I wanted
to look again at the stranger-lad.

He had scarcely stirred, but remained leaning against the wall--
either through weariness, or in order to be out of our way. He took
little or no notice of us, but kept his eyes fixed on the pavement--
for we actually boasted pavement in the High Street of our town of
Norton Bury--watching the eddying rain-drops, which, each as it fell,
threw up a little mist of spray. It was a serious, haggard face for
a boy of only fourteen or so. Let me call it up before me--I can,
easily, even after more than fifty years.

Brown eyes, deep-sunken, with strongly-marked brows, a nose like most
other Saxon noses, nothing particular; lips well-shaped, lying one
upon the other, firm and close; a square, sharply outlined, resolute
chin, of that type which gives character and determination to the
whole physiognomy, and without which in the fairest features, as in
the best dispositions, one is always conscious of a certain want.

As I have stated, in person the lad was tall and strongly-built; and
I, poor puny wretch! so reverenced physical strength. Everything in
him seemed to indicate that which I had not: his muscular limbs, his
square, broad shoulders, his healthy cheek, though it was sharp and
thin--even to his crisp curls of bright thick hair.

Thus he stood, principal figure in a picture which is even yet as
clear to me as yesterday--the narrow, dirty alley leading out of the
High Street, yet showing a glimmer of green field at the further end;
the open house-doors on either side, through which came the drowsy