It was winter, and the streets of tall and sullen houses in that gloomy neighbourhood were darkening with fog.

This fog crept slowly into the cathedral.

The surpliced boy who presented an alms-dish just within the doors was stamping his feet and snuffling with cold.

The leaves of tracts and pamphlets on the table blew up and chattered in the wind every time the door was thrust open.
The huge building was only half filled, perhaps hardly that.

Through the fog it was not easy to see the glittering altar, and when three priests appeared before it their vestments so melted into the cloth that they were visible only when they bowed to the monstrance.