We slept there.
The plaster on the once yellow walls was crumbling away; the beams of the ceiling bent beneath the weight of the slated roof, and on the window-panes was a layer of dust that softened the light like a piece of unpolished glass.

The beds, four walnut boards carelessly put together, had big, round, worm-eaten knobs, and the wood was split by the dryness.
On each bed was a mattress and a matting, covered with a ragged green spread.

A piece of mirror in a varnished frame, an old game-bag on a nail, and a worn silk cravat which showed the crease of its folds, indicated that the room belonged to some one who probably slept there every night.
Under one of the red cotton pillows I discovered a hideous object, a cap of the same color as the coverlet, but coated with a greasy glazing which prevented its texture from being recognisable; a worn, shapeless, clammy, oily thing.

I am sure that its owner prizes it highly and that he finds it warmer than any other cap.

A man's life, the perspiration of an entire existence, is secreted in this layer of mouldy cerate.