It was a long, tiresome walk through the outskirts of
the town, where the dwelling-houses were,--long rows of two-story
bricks drabbled with soot-stains. It was two years since she had
been in the town. Remembering this, and the reason why she had
shunned it, she quickened her pace, her face growing stiller than
before. One might have fancied her a slave putting on a mask,
fearing to meet her master. The town, being unfamiliar to her,
struck her newly. She saw the expression on its face better. It
was a large trading city, compactly built, shut in by hills. It
had an anxious, harassed look, like a speculator concluding a
keen bargain; the very dwelling-houses smelt of trade, having
shops in the lower stories; in the outskirts, where there are
cottages in other cities, there were mills here; the trees, which
some deluded dreamer had planted on the flat pavements, had all
grown up into abrupt Lombardy poplars, knowing their best policy
was to keep out of the way; the boys, playing marbles under them,
played sharply "for keeps;" the bony old dray-horses, plodding
through the dusty crowds, had speculative eyes, that measured
their oats at night with a "you-don't-cheat-me" look. Even the
churches had not the grave repose of the old brown house yonder
in the hills, where the few field-people--Arians, Calvinists,
Churchmen-- gathered every Sunday, and air and sunshine and
God's charity made the day holy. These churches lifted their
hard stone faces insolently, registering their yearly alms in the
morning journals.
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