At noon the next day, London stole upon them through a gloomy, thick,
oppressive atmosphere; for where is it that we can say London bursts on
the sight? It stole on them through one of its fairest and most gracious
avenues of approach,--by the stately gardens of Kensington, along the
side of Hyde Park, and so on towards Cumberland Gate.

Leonard was not the least struck. And yet with a very little money, and
a very little taste, it would be easy to render this entrance to London
as grand and as imposing as that to Paris from the Champs Elysees. As
they came near the Edgware Road, Helen took her new brother by the hand
and guided him; for she knew all that neighbourhood, and she was
acquainted with a lodging near that occupied by her father (to that
lodging itself she could not have gone for the world), where they might
be housed cheaply.

But just then the sky, so dull and overcast since morning, seemed one
mass of black cloud. There suddenly came on a violent storm of rain.
The boy and girl took refuge in a covered mews, in a street running out
of the Edgware Road. This shelter soon became crowded; the two young
pilgrims crept close to the wall, apart from the rest, Leonard's arm
round Helen's waist, sheltering her from the rain that the strong wind
contending with it beat in through the passage. Presently a young
gentleman of better mien and dress than the other refugees entered, not
hastily, but rather with a slow and proud step, as if, though he deigned
to take shelter, he scorned to run to it. He glanced somewhat haughtily
at the assembled group, passed on through the midst of it, came near
Leonard, took off his hat, and shook the rain from its brim. His head
thus uncovered, left all his features exposed; and the village youth
recognized, at the first glance, his old victorious assailant on the
green at Hazeldean.