orld, and profited
in shrewdness by his experience; he had rubbed off, however, all
superfluous devotion as he rubbed off his prejudices, and though he
drank more often than any one else with the landlord of the Spotted
Dog, he also quarrelled with him the oftenest, and testified the least
forbearance at the publican's segments of psalmody. Jacob was a
tall, comely, and perpendicular personage; his threadbare coat was
scrupulously brushed, and his hair punctiliously plastered at the sides
into two stiff obstinate-looking curls, and at the top into what he
was pleased to call a feather, though it was much more like a tile. His
conversation had in it something peculiar; generally it assumed a quick,
short, abrupt turn, that, retrenching all superfluities of pronoun and
conjunction, and marching at once upon the meaning of the sentence, had
in it a military and Spartan significance, which betrayed how
difficult it often is for a man to forget that he has been a corporal.
Occasionally indeed, for where but in farces is the phraseology of
the humorist always the same? he escaped into a more enlarged and
christianlike method of dealing with the king's English, but that was
chiefly noticeable, when from conversation he launched himself into
lecture, a luxury the worthy soldier loved greatly to indulge, for much
had he seen and somewhat had he reflected; and valuing himself, which
was odd in a corporal, more on his knowledge of the world than his
knowledge even of war, he rarely missed any occasion of edifying a
patient listener with the result of his observations.

After you had sauntered by the veteran's door, beside which you
generally, if the evening were fine, or he was not drinking with
neighbour Dealtry--or taking his tea with gossip this or master that--or
teaching some emulous urchins the broadsword exercise--or snaring trout
in the stream--or, in short, otherwise engaged; beside which, I say, you
not unfrequently beheld him sitting on a rude bench, and enjoying with
half-shut eyes, crossed legs, but still unindulgently erect posture, the
luxury of his pipe; you ventured over a little wooden bridge; beneath
which, clear and shallow, ran the rivulet we have before honorably
mentioned; and a walk of a few minutes brought you to a moderately sized
and old-fashioned mansion--the manor-house of the parish. It stood at
the very foot of the hill; behind, a rich, ancient, and hanging wood,
brought into relief--the exceeding fr