He always wore a coat which reached below his knees, which
coat, with which knees, perhaps someone had once given him. It had huge
shoulders which sprouted, like wings, on either side of his elbows when
he sat in The Enormous Room quietly writing at a tiny three-legged table,
a very big pen walking away with his weak bony hand. His too big cap had
a little button on top which looked like the head of a nail; and
suggested that this old doll had once lost its poor grey head and had
been repaired by means of tacking its head upon its neck, where it should
be and properly belonged. Of what hideous crime was this being suspected?
By some mistake he had three moustaches, two of them being eyebrows. He
used to teach school in Alsace-Lorraine, and his sister is there. In
speaking to you his kind face is peacefully reduced to triangles. And his
tie buttons on every morning with a Bang! And off he goes; led about by
his celluloid collar, gently worried about himself, delicately worried
about the world. At eating time he looks sidelong as he stuffs soup into
stiff lips. There are two holes where cheeks might have been. Lessons
hide in his wrinkles. Bells ding in the oldness of eyes. Did he, by any
chance, tell the children that there are such monstrous things as peace
and good will .
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