sunshine, like those humbler ones which Mr. Gathergold, in his
young play-days, before his fingers were gifted with the touch of
transmutation, had been accustomed to build of snow. It had a
richly ornamented portico, supported by tall pillars, beneath
which was a lofty door, studded with silver knobs, and made of a
kind of variegated wood that had been brought from beyond the
sea. The windows, from the floor to the ceiling of each stately
apartment, were composed, respectively, of but one enormous pane
of glass, so transparently pure that it was said to be a finer
medium than even the vacant atmosphere. Hardly anybody had been
permitted to see the interior of this palace; but it was
reported, and with good semblance of truth, to be far more
gorgeous than the outside, insomuch that whatever was iron or
brass in other houses was silver or gold in this; and Mr.
Gathergold's bedchamber, especially, made such a glittering
appearance that no ordinary man would have been able to close his
eyes there. But, on the other hand, Mr. Gathergold was now so
inured to wealth, that perhaps he could not have closed his eyes
unless where the gleam of it was certain to find its way beneath
his eyelids.

In due time, the mansion was finished; next came the
upholsterers, with magnificent furniture; then, a whole troop of
black and white servants, the harbingers of Mr. Gathergold, who,
in his own majestic person, was expected to arrive at sunset. Our
friend Ernest, meanwhile, had been deeply stirred by the idea
that the great man, the noble man, the man of prophecy, after so
many ages of delay, was at length to be made manifest to his
native valley. He knew, boy as he was, that there were a thousand
ways in which Mr. Gathergold, with his vast wealth, might