In the centre there was an oasis of green lawn, surrounded by rusty iron railings the height of a man, dotted with elms of considerable age, and streaked with narrow paths of yellow gravel.
The surrounding houses represented an eminently respectable appearance, with their immaculately clean steps, white-curtained windows, and neat boxes of flowers.

The windows glittered like diamonds, the door-knobs and plates shone with a yellow lustre, and there were no sticks, or straws, or waste paper lying about to mar the tidy look of the square.
With one exception, Geneva Square was a pattern of all that was desirable in the way of cleanliness and order.

One might hope to find such a haven in some somnolent cathedral town, but scarcely in the grimy, smoky, restless metropolis of London.
The exception to the notable spotlessness of the neighborhood was No.
13, a house in the centre of the side opposite to the entrance.

Its windows were dusty, and without blinds or curtains, there were no flower-boxes on the ledges, the steps lacked whitewash, and the iron railings looked rusty for want of paint.

Stray straws and scraps of paper found their way down the area, where the cracked pavement was damp with green slime.