He but dimly recalls the city as he knew it when a child.

But remember that there was no sense of any lapse of time with me.

So far as my consciousness was concerned, it was but yesterday, but a few hours, since I had walked these streets in which scarcely a feature had escaped a complete metamorphosis.

The mental image of the old city was so fresh and strong that it did not yield to the impression of the actual city, but contended with it, so that it was first one and then the other which seemed the more unreal.

There was nothing I saw which was not blurred in this way, like the faces of a composite photograph.
Finally, I stood again at the door of the house from which I had come out.