Mr. Hooper, a gentlemanly person, of about thirty, though still a
bachelor, was dressed with due clerical neatness, as if a careful
wife had starched his band, and brushed the weekly dust from his
Sunday's garb. There was but one thing remarkable in his
appearance. Swathed about his forehead, and hanging down over his
face, so low as to be shaken by his breath, Mr. Hooper had on a
black veil. On a nearer view it seemed to consist of two folds of
crape, which entirely concealed his features, except the mouth
and chin, but probably did not intercept his sight, further than
to give a darkened aspect to all living and inanimate things.
With this gloomy shade before him, good Mr. Hooper walked onward,
at a slow and quiet pace, stooping somewhat, and looking on the
ground, as is customary with abstracted men, yet nodding kindly to
those of his parishioners who still waited on the meeting-house
steps. But so wonder-struck were they that his greeting hardly
met with a return.
"I can't really feel as if good Mr. Hooper's face was behind that
piece of crape," said the sexton.
"I don't like it," muttered an old woman, as she hobbled into the
meeting-house.
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