All within hearing immediately turned about and beheld the semblance of Mr. Hooper pacing slowly his meditative way toward the meeting-house . With one accord they started , expressing more wonder than if some strange minister were coming to dust the cushions of Mr. Hooper 's pulpit . `` Are you sure it is our parson ? '' inquired Goodman Gray of the sexton . `` Of a certainty it is good Mr. Hooper , '' replied the sexton . `` He was to have exchanged pulpits with Parson Shute of Westbury , but Parson Shute sent to excuse himself yesterday , being to preach a funeral sermon . '' The cause of so much amazement may appear sufficiently slight . Mr. Hooper , a gentlemanly person of about thirty , though still a bachelor , was dressed with due clerical neatness , as if a careful wife had starched his band and brushed the weekly dust from his Sunday 's garb . There was but one thing remarkable in his appearance . Swathed about his forehead and hanging down over his face , so low as to be shaken by his breath , Mr. Hooper had on a black veil . On a nearer view it seemed to consist of two folds of crape , which entirely concealed his features except the mouth and chin , but probably did not intercept his sight further than to give a darkened aspect to all living and inanimate things . With this gloomy shade before him good Mr. Hooper walked onward at a slow and quiet pace , stooping somewhat and looking on the ground , as is customary with abstracted men , yet nodding kindly to those of his parishioners who still waited on the meeting-house steps . But so wonder-struck were they that his greeting hardly met with a return . `` I ca n't really feel as if good Mr. Hooper 's face was behind that piece of crape , '' said the sexton . `` I do n't like it , '' muttered an old woman as she hobbled into the meeting-house . `` He has changed himself into something awful only by hiding his face . '' `` Our parson has gone mad ! '' cried Goodman Gray , following him across the threshold . A rumor of some unaccountable phenomenon had preceded Mr. Hooper into the meeting-house and set all the congregation astir . Few could refrain from twisting their heads toward the door ; many stood upright and turned directly about ; while several little boys clambered upon the seats , and came down again with a terrible racket .
There was a general bustle , a rustling of the women 's gowns and shuffling XXXXX the men 's feet , greatly at variance with that hushed repose which should attend the entrance of the minister .
about across as by into of on toward with within