METRA. 69 



much ill my narrative, and was a person of great 

 wealth and importance ; but I fear that in attempting 

 to present his picture it will be difficult to delineate 

 any remarkable points ; he was, in fact, a very 

 uninteresting individual, and but for his position 

 must have remained unnoticed among the common 

 herd. How often do adventitious circumstances 

 render men, possessing in themselves no points of 

 prominence, objects of importance and celebrity. 

 Metra was no longer young; his hau- had already 

 begun to silver, and a few crows'-feet marked the 

 progress of time, but he had doubtless worn well, 

 being oppressed probably by few cares, and promised 

 to enjoy a green old age ; his form had lost little of 

 its roundness and muscular development, and he 

 could show, when he pleased — which was, however, 

 seldom — well-nigh as great activity as the youngsters, 

 but his ordinary movements were rather snail-like and 

 he was evidently not accustomed either to hurry or to 

 put himself at all out of the way for any one ; indeed, 

 I should say, if such a thing ever occurs among the 

 Tuski, that Metra had been a petted child for whom all 

 services were performed by obsequious attendants, the 

 natural indolence of his character alone preserving it 

 from material deterioration. Like Teo, Metra was 

 not a man of many words ; he had a great partiality 



