Read it through once

Fred Parsons--that was his name--was a meagre little man about thirty-five. A high and prominent forehead rose above a small pointed face, and a scanty growth of blonde beard and moustache did not conceal the receding chin nor the red sealing-wax lips. His faded yellow hair was beginning to grow thin, and his threadbare frock-coat hung limp from sloping shoulders. But these disadvantages were compensated by a clear bell-like voice, into which no trace of doubt ever seemed to come; and his mind was neatly packed with a few religious and political ideas. He had been in business in the West End, but an uncontrollable desire to ask every customer who entered into conversation with him if he were sure that he believed in the second coming of Christ had been the cause of severance between him and his employers.