poker and began stirring the fire as if doing it thoroughly were
the one aim of his existence, and a second time the shepherd said,
"Walk in!" In a moment another man stood upon the straw-woven
door-mat. He too was a stranger.

This individual was one of a type radically different from
the first. There was more of the commonplace in his manner, and a
certain jovial cosmopolitanism sat upon his features. He was several
years older than the first arrival, his hair being slightly frosted,
his eyebrows bristly, and his whiskers cut back from his cheeks.
His face was rather full and flabby, and yet it was not altogether
a face without power. A few grog-blossoms marked the neighbourhood
of his nose. He flung back his long drab greatcoat, revealing that
beneath it he wore a suit of cinder-gray shade throughout, large,
heavy seals, of some metal or other that would take a polish,
dangling from his fob as his only personal ornament. Shaking the
water-drops from his low-crowned, glazed hat, he said, "I must ask
for a few minutes' shelter, comrades, or I shall be wetted to my
skin before I get to Casterbridge."

"Make yerself at home, master," said the shepherd, perrhaps a trifle
less heartily than on the first occasion. Not that Fennel had the
least tinge of niggardliness in his composition, but the room was
far from large, spare chairs were not numerous, and damp companions
were not altogether comfortable at close quarters for the women
and girls in their bright-coloured gowns.

However, the second comer, after taking off his greatcoat and
hanging his hat on a nail in one of the ceiling beams as if he had
been specially invited to put it there, advanced, and sat down at