The debilitated¹ old house in the city, wrapped in its mantle² of soot³, and leaning heavily on the crutches⁴ that had partaken of its decay and worn out with it, never knew a healthy or a cheerful interval⁵, let what would betide. If the sun ever touched it, it was but with a ray, and that was gone in half an hour; if the moonlight ever fell upon it, it was only to put a few patches on its doleful cloak, and make it look more wretched. The stars, to be sure, coldly watched it when the nights and the smoke were clear enough; and all bad weather stood by it with a rare fidelity⁶. You should alike find rain, hail, frost, and thaw⁷ lingering in that dismal⁸ enclosure when they had vanished from other places; and as to snow, you should see it there for weeks, long after it had changed from yellow to black, slowly weeping away its grimy life. The place had no other adherents⁹. As to street noises, the rumbling¹⁰ of wheels in the lane merely rushed in at the gateway¹¹ in going past, and rushed out again: making the listening Mistress Affery feel as if she were deaf, and recovered the sense of hearing by instantaneous flashes. So with whistling, singing, talking, laughing, and all pleasant human sounds. They leaped the gap in a moment, and went upon their way.