Thurston. This gentleman had been
described, on some earlier occasion, by an unfriendly observer as
"the Suburban Savonarola." He was tall and extremely thin with a
bony pointed face that was in some lights grey and in others white.
He had the excited staring eyes of a fanatic, and his hair now very
scanty, was plastered over his head in black shining streaks. He
wore a rather faded black suit, a white low collar and a white bow
tie. He had a habit, at moments of stress, of cracking his fingers.
He had a very pronounced cockney accent when he was excited, at
other times he struggled against this with some success.
He passed from brooding silences into sudden bursts of declamation
with such abruptness that strangers thought him very eloquent. When
he was excited the colour ran into his nose as though he had been
drinking, and often his ears were red. His history was simple. The
son of a small draper in Streatham, he had at an early age joined
himself to an American Revivalist called Harper. When after some six
years of successful enterprise Mr. Harper had been imprisoned for
forgery, young William Thurston had attached himself to a Christian
Science Chapel in Hoxton.
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