"Oh, it is prejudice, then."

"Not in the least. It is antipathy. Besides, the thing is unnatural;
there is no existent cause for it. A bit that turns up on certain
sands,--here at home, for aught I know, as often as anywhere."

"Which means Nazareth. We must teach you, Sir, that there are some
things at home as rare as those abroad."

"I am taught," he said, very low, and without looking up.

"Just tell me, what is amber?"

"Fossil gum."

"Can you say those words and not like it? Don't it bring to you a
magnificent picture of the pristine world,--great seas and other
skies,--a world of accentuated crises, that sloughed off age after age,
and rose fresher from each plunge? Don't you see, or long to see, that
mysterious magic tree out of whose pores oozed this fine solidified
sunshine? What leaf did it have? what blossom? what great wind shivered
its branches? Was it a giant on a lonely coast, or thick low growth
blistered in ravines and dells? That's the witchery of amber,--that it
_has_ no cause,--that all the world grew to produce it,--may-be died
and gave no other sign,--that its tree, which must have been beautiful,
dropped all its fruits; and how bursting with juice must they have
been"----

"Unfortunately, coniferous."