It was the house to which the writer of the note had gone--the
Three Mariners--whose two prominent Elizabethan gables, bow-window, and
passage-light could be seen from where he stood. Having kept his eyes on
it for a while he strolled in that direction.
This ancient house of accommodation for man and beast, now,
unfortunately, pulled down, was built of mellow sandstone, with
mullioned windows of the same material, markedly out of perpendicular
from the settlement of foundations. The bay window projecting into the
street, whose interior was so popular among the frequenters of the
inn, was closed with shutters, in each of which appeared a heart-shaped
aperture, somewhat more attenuated in the right and left ventricles
than is seen in Nature. Inside these illuminated holes, at a distance of
about three inches, were ranged at this hour, as every passer knew, the
ruddy polls of Billy Wills the glazier, Smart the shoemaker, Buzzford
the general dealer, and others of a secondary set of worthies, of a
grade somewhat below that of the diners at the King's Arms, each with
his yard of clay.
A four-centred Tudor arch was over the entrance, and over the arch
the signboard, now visible in the rays of an opposite lamp. Hereon
the Mariners, who had been represented by the artist as persons of two
dimensions only--in other words, flat as a shadow--were standing in a
row in paralyzed attitudes.
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