THE FRONT OF C LARKE'S HOUSE was tidy, which told Enoch that Mrs. Clarke was still alive. He led his horse round into the stable-yard. Scattered about were cracked mortars and crucibles, stained yellow and vermilion and silver. A columnar furnace, smoke-stained, reigned over coal-piles. It was littered with rinds of hardened dross raked off the tops of crucibles – the fœces of certain alchemical processes, mingled on this ground with the softer excrement of horses and geese.