Zachariah looked round again. There was an old male attendant near
him. He had on a brown rough coat with brass buttons, and shoes
which were much too big for him. They were supplied in sizes, and
never fitted. The old men always took those that were too large.
They had as their place of exercise a paved courtyard surrounded by
high brick walls, and they all collected on the sunny side, and
walked up and down there, making a clapping noise with their feet as
the shoes slipped off their heels. This sound was characteristic of
the whole building. It was to be heard everywhere.
"You've been very bad," said the old man, "but you'll get better now;
it a'nt many as get better here."
He was a poor-looking, half-fed creature, with a cadaverous face. He
had the special, workhouse, bloodless aspect--just as if he had lived
on nothing stronger than gruel and had never smelt fresh air. The
air, by the way, of those wards was something peculiar. It had no
distinctive odour--that is to say, no odour which was specially this
or that; but it had one that bore the same relation to ordinary
odours which well-ground London mud bears to ordinary colours.
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