Practically It Ceases To Be Beautiful And Only
Recovers The First Effect After We Have Given The Mind An
Interval Of Rest.
Strolling about the green with this thought in my mind, I
began to pay attention to the movements of a man who was
manifestly there with the same object as myself - to look at
the cathedral.
I had seen him there for quite half an hour,
and now began to be amused at the emphatic manner in which he
displayed his interest in the building. He walked up and down
the entire length and would then back away a distance of a
hundred yards from the walls and stare up at the spire, then
slowly approach, still gazing up, until coming to a stop when
quite near the wall he would remain with his eyes still fixed
aloft, the back of his head almost resting on his back between
his shoulders. His hat somehow kept on his head, but his
attitude reminded me of a saying of the Arabs who, to give an
idea of the height of a great rock or other tall object, say
that to look up at it causes your turban to fall off. The
Americans, when they were chewers of tobacco, had a different
expression; they said that to look up at so tall a thing
caused the tobacco juice to run down your throat.
His appearance when I approached him interested me too. His
skin was the color of old brown leather and he had a big
arched nose, clear light blue very shrewd eyes, and a big
fringe or hedge of ragged white beard under his chin; and he
was dressed in a new suit of rough dark brown tweeds,
evidently home-made.
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