The elder of the speakers was clad in a coarse
woollen doublet; a belt of untanned leather girt his form; and on his
head was a cap of grey felt, without either rim or band. His gait was
heavy and slouching. Strong, tall, and muscular, he stooped
considerably; but less through age and infirmity than from the laborious
nature of his occupations. His companion, younger and more vivacious,
was distinguished by a goodly and well-thriven hump, and by that fulness
and projection of the chest which usually characterise this species of
deformity. His long arms nearly trailed to the ground as he walked; huge
and sprawling, they seemed to have been originally intended as an
attachment to a frame of much more gigantic proportions. His face had
that peculiar form and expression which always, more or less, accompany
this kind of malformation. Wide, large, angular; the chin sharp and
projecting, supported on the breast; the whole head scarcely rivalling
the shoulders in height and obliquity. His disposition was evidently
wayward and irascible, and a keen satirical humour lurked in every line
of his pallid visage; generally at war with his species, and ready to
act on the defensive; snarling whenever he was approached, and always
anticipating gibe and insult from his fellows.
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