Describe the characters in the story "The Other Side of the Hedge."

There are two main characters in E. M. Forster's "The Other Side of the Hedge," namely the narrator and the person who rescues the narrator.
The Narrator
The narrator introduces himself as "twenty-five" and "tired." He compares himself to his brother, who "wasted his breath on singing, and his strength on helping others." The narrator says that he has "travelled more wisely" than his brother, which implies that he does not help other people and does not sing.
Early in the story, the narrator's curiosity gets the better of him, and he decides to force his way through a hedge to discover the source of "a glint of light." On the other side of the hedge, he discovers a very different world to the one he has become used to. He has become used to a world defined by the forward march of progress, but the world he finds on the other side of the hedge is a place where there is no drive for progress, and where nothing means anything "but itself." At first, the narrator is convinced that the world defined by progress is more meaningful, but by the end of the story, he succumbs to the charms of the other world.
The Rescuer
When the narrator forces his way through the hedge, he falls into a pool of water. He is rescued by "a man of fifty or sixty." The rescuer is self-assured and content, and he speaks to the narrator as one might speak to a child. He tries to explain to the narrator that the world of progress is meaningless and illusory. He is persistent in his attempts, rather as an evangelist might be persistent in trying to convert someone. In short, the old man is presented as the narrator's savior. He saves the narrator from a world of oppressive, meaningless competition defined by the illusion of progress.