He had a dark, narrow face, pale and eager, a small, pointed beard trimmed after the fashion of the times, and the wide-brimmed sugar-loaf hat drawn down upon his brows cast a deep shadow over his features.

But his voice was peculiarly melodious and persuasive, and there was a nameless attraction about him that Cuthbert was quick to feel.

Others in the days to follow felt it to their own undoing, but of that the lad knew nothing.

He only wished to retain the good opinion this stranger seemed to have formed of him.
"I have led but a hermit's life, as I have told you.

I have been bred up in the faith of my forefathers, and that faith I believe.
What perplexes me is that those who hold the Established or Reformed faith, as men term it, have the same creeds, the same doctrines as we ourselves.