And then something swayed from beneath into the field of his vision.

It was a tall cross borne by a beadle.

In the wake of the cross there came to view gorgeous ecclesiastics in pairs, and then a robed man walking backwards and gesticulating in the manner of some important, excited official of the Salvation Army; and after this violet robe arrived the scarlet choristers, singing to the beat of his gesture.

And then swung into view the coffin, covered with a heavy purple pall, and on the pall a single white cross; and the pall-bearers--great European names that had hurried out of the corners of Europe as at a peremptory mandate-- with Duncan Farll to complete the tale! Was it the coffin, or the richness of its pall, or the solitary whiteness of its cross of flowers, or the august authority of the bearers, that affected Priam Farll like a blow on the heart?
Who knows?
But the fact was that he could look no more; the scene was too much for him.

Had he continued to look he would have burst uncontrollably into tears.