In dress, Hartley was most expensive, perhaps because his father
afforded him better means of being so; but his clothes were neither so
tasteful when new, nor so well preserved when they began to grow old,
as those of Richard Middlemas. Adam Hartley was sometimes fine, at other
times rather slovenly, and on the former occasions looked rather too
conscious of his splendour. His chum was at all times regularly neat
and well dressed; while at the same time he had an air of good-breeding,
which made him appear always at ease; so that his dress, whatever it
was, seemed to be just what he ought to have worn at the time.
In their persons there was a still more strongly marked distinction.
Adam Hartley was full middle size, stout, and well limbed; and an open
English countenance, of the genuine Saxon mould, showed itself among
chestnut locks, until the hair-dresser destroyed them. He loved the
rough exercises of wrestling, boxing, leaping, and quarterstaff,
and frequented, when he could obtain leisure, the bull-baitings and
foot-ball matches, by which the burgh was sometimes enlivened.
Richard, on the contrary, was dark, like his father and mother, with
high features, beautifully formed, but exhibiting something of a foreign
character; and his person was tall and slim, though muscular and active.
His address and manners must have been natural to him, for they were, in
elegance and ease, far beyond any example which he could have found
in his native burgh. He learned the use of the small-sword while in
Edinburgh, and took lessons from a performer at the theatre, with the
purpose of refining his mode of speaking. He became also an amateur of
the drama, regularly attending the playhouse, and assuming the tone of
a critic in that and other lighter departments of literature. To fill up
the contrast, so far as taste was concerned, Richard was a dexterous
and successful angler--Adam, a bold and unerring shot. Their efforts
to surpass each other in supplying Dr. Gray's table, rendered his
housekeeping much preferable to what it had been on former occasions;
and, besides, small presents of fish and game are always agreeable
amongst the inhabitants of a country town, and contributed to increase
the popularity of the young sportsmen.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account