ening city disturbed him.

The room was hung with a dark arras, sprinkled with red flowers; he
slept in a great bed with black curtains to shut out all light; the
windows looked into the garden; but on the left of the bed, which
stood with its head to the street, was an alcove, behind the hangings,
containing the window that gave on the church. On the same floor were
three other rooms; in one of these, looking on the garden, Anthony had
his meals. It was a plain panelled room. Next was a room where he
read, filled with books, also looking on the garden; and next to that
was a little room of which he alone had the key. This room he kept
locked, and no one set foot in it but himself. There was one more room
on this floor, set apart for a guest who never came, with a great bed
and a press of oak. And that looked on the street. Above, there was a
row of plain plastered rooms, in which stood furniture for which
Anthony had no use, and many crates in which his machines and phials
came to him; this floor was seldom visited, except by the man, who
sometimes came to put a box there; and the spiders had it to
themselves; except for a little room where stood an optic glass
through which on clear nights Anthony sometimes looked at the moon and
stars, if there was any odd misadventure among them, such as an
eclipse; or when a fiery-tailed comet went his way silently in the
heavens, coming from none might say whence and going none knew
whither, on some strange errand of God.

Anthony had but two friends who ever came to see him. One was an old
physician who had ceased to practise his trade, which indeed was never
abundant, and who would sometimes drink a glass of wine with Anthony,
and engage in curious talk of men's bodies and diseases, or look at
one of Anthony's toys. Anthony had come to know him by having called
him in to cure some ailment, which needed a surgical knife; and that
had made a kind of friendship between them; but Anthony had little
need thereafter to consult him about his health, which indeed was now
settled enough, though he had but little vigour; and he knew enough of
drugs to cure himself when he was ill. The other friend was a foolish
priest of the college, that made belief to be a student but was none,
who thought Anthony a very wise and mighty person, and listened with
open mouth and eyes to all that he said or showed him. This priest,
who was fond of wonders, had introduced himself to Anthony by making
beli