It was a good deal changed; the furniture was improved; a score of ingenious little contrivances made the tiny attic into a cosy bed-chamber.

One corner was full of shelves, laden with books, chiefly of a scientific and practical nature.

John's taste did not lead him into the current literature of the day: Cowper, Akenside, and Peter Pindar were alike indifferent to him.

I found among his books no poet but Shakspeare.
He evidently still practised his old mechanical arts.

There was lying in the window a telescope--the cylinder made of pasteboard--into which the lenses were ingeniously fitted.