He was a tall, gentlemanly man, seemingly between fifty and sixty, with greyish hair; his features were very handsome, but with a somewhat melancholy cast: the tones of his voice were rich and noble, but also with somewhat of melancholy in them.

The text which he gave out was the following one: "In what would a man be profited, provided he gained the whole world, and lost his own soul ?" And on this text the clergyman preached long and well: he did not read his sermon, but spoke it extempore; his doing so rather surprised and offended me at first; I was not used to such a style of preaching in a church devoted to the religion of my country.

I compared it within my mind with the style of preaching used by the high-church rector in the old church of pretty D.

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., and I thought to myself it was very different, and being very different I did not like it, and I thought to myself how scandalised the people of D.