Next evening there were more costly gifts, but albeit Puer natus was
still to be heard in the streets, we no longer were moved to join in.




CHAPTER XII.

Every Christmas all my grand-uncle's kith and kin, or so many of them as
were on good terms with him, assembled in the great house of the Im
Hoffs. Everything in that dwelling spoke of ease and wealth, and no
banqueting-hall could be more brightly lighted or more richly decked than
that where the old man welcomed us on the threshold; and yet, how well
soever the hearth was piled or the stove heated, a chill breath seemed to
blow there.

While great and small were rejoicing over the grand old knight's bounty
he himself would ever stand apart, and his calm, hueless countenance
expressed no change. Meseemed he cared but little for the pleasure he
gave us all; yet was he not idle in the matter, nor left it to others;
for there was no single gift which he had not himself chosen as befitting
him to whom it should be given.

The trade of his great house was for the most part with Venice, and it
would have been easy to fancy oneself in some fine palazzo on the grand
canal as one marked the carpets, the mirrors, the brocade, and the
vessels in his house; and not a few of his tokens had likewise been
brought from thence.