Inordinate alike in appetite, mind
and action, he was always suffering for his furies, and always making a
fine recovery. Just now he was at the last gasp for a breath, or so you
would have said to look at him. But not so; his exertions were really
his stimulant. Presently he would eat and drink consumedly, drench
himself with snuff, and then spend half the night with his books,
preparing for to-morrow's lecture. Of this sort was Dr. Porfirio
Lanfranchi, who had more authority over the wild students of Padua than
the Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor and Senate put together.
The same lamp played upon the comely and ingenuous face, upon the
striking presence of Mr. Strelley, and showed him a good-looking, good-
tempered, sanguine young man of an appearance something less than his
age. He was tall and supple, wore his own fair hair tied with a ribbon,
was blue-eyed and bright-lipped, and had a notable chin--firm, square at
the jaw, and coming sharply to a point. He looked you straight in the
face--such was his habit--but by no means arrogantly or with defiance;
seriously rather, gravely and courteously, as if to ask, "Do I take your
precise meaning to be--?" Such a look was too earnest for mere good
manners; he was serious; there was no laughter in him, though he was not
of a melancholy sort. He pondered the world and its vagaries and
examined them, as they presented themselves in each case, UPON THE
MERITS. This, which was, I think, his strongest characteristic, should
show that he lacked the humorous sense; and he did.
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