Meanwhile, the way before him grew fouler. Unpleasant smells had beset him from his entrance into this quarter; they had grown more and more powerfully unpleasant as he progressed; and now, quite suddenly, as he turned a narrow and crowded corner, a scent of Araby struck him that was like an explosion in his nostrils. It was the great chief ancestor and Beelzebub of all demon smells, he thought, a Goliath among smells; and he turned back from it as from flood or fire; for it was not to be borne except by people inured and hardened by bitter experience. But when he turned he found that he had been followed; he had a train of unscavenged riffraff the most leprous he had seen, and they filled the narrow passageway behind him.
They had been whining and chattering at him; but as they had kept behind him, he had not been aware of them, for there was other chattering everywhere in this dark byway. Now, when he sought to pass through them they kept close, so that he could not; and pressing near him they set up a loud clamour half-imploring, half-sinister. Therefore he turned again, and with his handkerchief to his nose, faced the mighty smell and went into it. He walked as rapidly as he could; but his followers were nimble
