About a hundred horsemen, gaily caparisoned, appeared, and in the midst, with equal numbers of his guard preceding and following, rode Ethelred the king. He was of middle stature and not uncomely, but there was a look of vacillation about his face, which would have struck even an indifferent physiognomist, while his thin lips, which he was constantly biting (when he was not biting his nails), seemed to indicate a tendency towards cruelty.