"The" thing was the thing that implied the greatest number of other things of the sort he had had to tackle; and it was queer of course, but so it was--the implication here was complete.

Not a single one of his observations but somehow fell into a place in it; not a breath of the cooler evening that wasn't somehow a syllable of the text.

The text was simply, when condensed, that in THESE places such things were, and that if it was in them one elected to move about one had to make one's account with what one lighted on.

Meanwhile at all events it was enough that they did affect one--so far as the village aspect was concerned--as whiteness, crookedness and blueness set in coppery green; there being positively, for that matter, an outer wall of the White Horse that was painted the most improbable shade.

That was part of the amusement--as if to show that the fun was harmless; just as it was enough, further, that the picture and the play seemed supremely to melt together in the good woman's broad sketch of what she could do for her visitor's appetite.
He felt in short a confidence, and it was general, and it was all he wanted to feel.