It certainly was a daring surprise, but like so many
deformed people, Badcock was forward and hard to check; he was a pushing
fellow to whom the present was just the opportunity he wanted for
carrying war into the enemy's quarters.
Ernest and his friends consulted. Moved by the feeling that as they were
now preparing to be clergymen they ought not to stand so stiffly on
social dignity as heretofore, and also perhaps by the desire to have a
good private view of a preacher who was then much upon the lips of men,
they decided to accept the invitation. When the appointed time came they
went with some confusion and self-abasement to the rooms of this man, on
whom they had looked down hitherto as from an immeasurable height, and
with whom nothing would have made them believe a few weeks earlier that
they could ever come to be on speaking terms.
Mr Hawke was a very different-looking person from Badcock. He was
remarkably handsome, or rather would have been but for the thinness of
his lips, and a look of too great firmness and inflexibility. His
features were a good deal like those of Leonardo da Vinci; moreover he
was kempt, looked in vigorous health, and was of a ruddy countenance.
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