e was ruddy,
and inclined to be freckled under the exposure to the sun, his hair at
this age still fair and reddish, although in a few years later it turned
grey, and became white while he was still a young man. His nose was
slightly aquiline, his face long and rather full; his eyes of a clear
blue, with sharply defined eyebrows--seamen's eyes, which get an
unmistakable light in them from long staring into the sea distances.
Altogether a handsome and distinguished-looking young man, noticeable
anywhere, and especially among a crowd of swarthy Portuguese. He was not
a lively young man; on the contrary, his manner was rather heavy, and
even at times inclined to be pompous; he had a very good opinion of
himself, had the clear calculating head and tidy intellectual methods of
the able mariner; was shrewd and cautious--in a word, took himself and
the world very seriously. A strictly conventional man, as the
conventions of his time and race went; probably some of his gayer and
lighter-hearted contemporaries thought him a dull enough dog, who would
not join in a carouse or a gallant adventure, but would probably get the
better of you if he could in any commercial deal. He was a great
stickler for the observances of religion; and never a Sunday or feast-day
passed, when he was ashore, without finding him, like the dutiful son of
the Church that he was, hearing Mass and attending at Benediction. Not,
indeed, a very attractive or inspiring figure of a man; not the man whose
company one would likely have sought very much, or whose conversation one
would have found very interesting. A man rather whose character was cast
in a large and plain mould, without those many facets which add so much
to the brightness of human intercourse, and which attract and reflect the
light from other minds; a man who must be tried in large circumstances,
and placed in a big setting, if his qualities are to be seen to advantage
. . . . I seem to see him walking up from the shop near the harbour
at Lisbon towards the convent of Saints; walking gravely and firmly, with
a dignified demeanour, with his best clothes on, and glad, for the
moment, to be free of his sea acquaintances, and to be walking in the
direction of that upper-class world after which he has a secret hankering
in his heart. There are a great many churches in Lisbon nearer his house
where he might hear Mass on Sundays; but he prefers to walk up to the
rich and fashionable convent o