I got the poor gentleman a room to himself, and when, in the course of a few hours, the town was alive, I wandered out into the streets and bought a pair of scissors. Any old campaigner may be a tolerable barber, and I was a pretty good one. I trimmed the late prisoner into decency, and with my own hands carried up a pail of water, a piece of soap, and towels. I had taken good stock of him, and carried his bodily measurements in my mind when I went out again to an outfitter's, taking Hinge with me to translate. I bought underclothing, and a suit of clothes; and I took back a shoemaker with me, and when the-count had dressed sent the man to him to try on a number of pairs of boots he had brought with him in a basket. When the Conte di Rossano, clothed like himself for the first time in twenty years, came into the room in which breakfast was set for us, I hardly recognized him, though I myself had taken part in bringing about the transformation which had been worked in him. He came in alert and erect, and for a mere second looked every inch a gentleman. But the broad light to which he had been so long a stranger made him blink, and sent his hand to his eyes. He came across to the table with a faltering and uncertain tread, and with a curious crouch in his walk. It struck me for the first time then, but I saw it so often afterwards that I almost ceased to notice it at all. For an instant pride and liberty had buoyed him so that he could present a passing semblance of what he had been, but the change fell upon him as quick as lightning, and no flash of lightning could have blighted him more dreadfully. He approached the table shuffling, with bent head, and purblind eyes peering this way and that. I placed a chair for him, but he seemed uncertain what to do with it until I helped him to seat himself. The filthy floor of that unspeakable dungeon had been his only seat and couch for a score of years. He sat crouching at the table as if hugging himself together for warmth, though the day was balmy, and the sun was bright and hot outside. When he drank he took his cup in both hands as an ape would have done, and as he tasted the fragrant coffee he made an animal noise of satisfaction. He caught himself at this, and a swift tide of crimson passed over his face; but a minute later the old felon habit was upon him again, and I saw him tearing his bread with his teeth in quite the jail-bird way. Looking at his thin hands, I saw that he had clipped his nails; but the skin had overgrown them, and had split into ragged fragments. I caught him peering at them in a distasteful way, and when he detected me in the act of watching him he hid them beneath the table. We were still at table, when there came a sudden bang at the door, and without waiting for any reply in walked a gentleman with every sign of the public functionary about him, cocked hat, official stick, and all. He bowed, closed the door, stepped forward, and bowed again.