He looked at it all, his man's eyes almost wistful as a girl's.

Was it as hard in this new crude condition of things to hew for oneself a new way through the invisible barriers of the time-honoured judgments of men, as it would be where road and field had been smoothed by the passing of generations?
He had this contrast between English and Canadian scenery vividly in his mind, wondering what corresponding social differences, if any, could be found to make his own particular problem of the hour more easy, and all the fine speculations he had had when he came down from the cemetery had resolved themselves into--whether, _after all_, it would be better to go on being a butcher or not, when he came to the beginning of the Rexford paling.

He noticed how battered and dingy it was.

The former owner had had it painted at one time, but the paint was almost worn off.

The front fencing wanted new pales in many places, and the half acre's space of grass between the verandah and the road was wholly unkempt.