I saw that he was a spare man, wearing a brown velvet coat and
a dark felt hat. The collar of the coat seemed to have been made
carefully larger than usual, in order to increase the apparent width
of his chest. His hair was brown and curly, but close cut. His
features were regular, perhaps handsome. His complexion was
bright,--fair almost,--rosy in hue, and his eyes were brown.
He shook hands with Sinfi as he passed us, and gave me a glance of
that rapid and all-comprehending kind which seems to take in, at
once, a picture in its every detail.
'What do you think of him?' said Sinfi to me, as he passed on and we
two sat down on the grass by the side of the stream.
'I am puzzled,' I replied, 'to know whether he is a young man who
looks like a middle-aged one, or a middle-aged man who looks like a
young one. How's his hair under the hat?'
'Thinnish atop,' said Sinfi laconically. 'And I'm puzzled,' I added,
still looking at him as he walked over the grass, 'as to whether he's
a little man who looks middle-sized, or a middle-sized man who looks
little.
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