The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde

Mr. Utterson the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance that was never lighted by a smile; cold,
scanty and embarrassed in discourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, drearyand yet
somehow lovable. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was to his taste, something eminently
human beaconed from his eye; something indeed which never found its way into his talk, but which
spoke not only in these silent symbols of the after-dinner face, but more often and loudly in the acts
of his life. He was austere with himself; drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a taste for
vintages; and though he enjoyed the theatre, had not crossed the doors of one for twenty years.
But he had an approved tolerance for others; sometimes wondering, almost with envy, at the high
pressure of spirits involved in their misdeeds; and in any extremity inclined to help rather than to
reprove. "I incline to Cain's heresy," he used to say quaintly: "I let my brother go to the devil in his
own way." In this character, it was frequently his fortune to be the last reputable acquaintance and
the last good influence in the lives of downgoing men. And to such as these, so long as they came
about his chambers, he never marked a shade of change in his demeanour.