Behind, I could see outhouses and the peaked roofs of stacks; and I judged that a manor-house had in some way declined to be the residence of a tenant-farmer, careless alike of appearances and substantial comfort.

The marks of neglect were visible on every side, in flower-bushes straggling beyond the borders, in the ill-kept turf, and in the broken windows that were incongruously patched with paper or stuffed with rags.

A thicket of trees, mostly evergreen, fenced the place round and secluded it from the eyes of prying neighbours.

As I came in view of it, on that melancholy winter's morning, in the deluge of the falling rain, and with the wind that now rose in occasional gusts and hooted over the old chimneys, the cart had already drawn up at the front-door steps, and the driver was already in earnest discourse with Mr.Burchell Fenn.
He was standing with his hands behind his back--a man of a gross, misbegotten face and body, dewlapped like a bull and red as a harvest moon; and in his jockey cap, blue coat and top boots, he had much the air of a good, solid tenant-farmer.
The pair continued to speak as I came up the approach, but received me at last in a sort of goggling silence.

I had my hat in my hand.
'I have the pleasure of addressing Mr.Burchell Fenn ?' said I.
'The same, sir,' replied Mr.Fenn, taking off his jockey cap in answer to my civility, but with the distant look and the tardy movements of one who continues to think of something else.