Conspicuous among these latter, like an animated bit of
the spiked wall of Newgate, Jerry stood: aiming at the prisoner the
beery breath of a whet he had taken as he came along, and discharging
it to mingle with the waves of other beer, and gin, and tea, and
coffee, and what not, that flowed at him, and already broke upon the
great windows behind him in an impure mist and rain.
The object of all this staring and blaring, was a young man of about
five-and-twenty, well-grown and well-looking, with a sunburnt cheek
and a dark eye. His condition was that of a young gentleman. He was
plainly dressed in black, or very dark grey, and his hair, which was
long and dark, was gathered in a ribbon at the back of his neck; more
to be out of his way than for ornament. As an emotion of the mind
will express itself through any covering of the body, so the paleness
which his situation engendered came through the brown upon his cheek,
showing the soul to be stronger than the sun. He was otherwise quite
self-possessed, bowed to the Judge, and stood quiet.
The sort of interest with which this man was stared and breathed at,
was not a sort that elevated humanity.
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