as on the
surface of a pearl shell. Mirrors reflected pictures, and inlaid
floors shone like mirrors. Here and there dark tapestry and
massive curtains seemed to decrease the effect, but only at first
sight, for, in fact, they lent the whole interior a dignity which
was almost churchlike. At some points everything glistened,
gleamed, changed into azure, scarlet, gold, bronze, and the
various tints of white peculiar to plaster-of-Paris, marble,
silk, porcelain. In that house were products of Chinese and
Japanese skill; the styles of remote ages were there, and the
most exquisite and elegant among modern styles, lamps,
chandeliers, candlesticks, vases, ornamental art in its highest
development. Withal much taste and skill was evident, a certain
tact in placing things, and a keenness in disposing them, which
indicated infallibly the hand and the mind of a woman who was far
above mediocrity.

The furnishing of this mansion must have cost sums which to the
poor would seem colossal, and very considerable even to the
wealthy.

Aloysius Darvid, the owner of this mansion, had not inherited his
millions; he had won them with his own iron labor, and he toiled
continually to increase them. His industry, inventiveness, and
energy were inexhaustible. To him business seemed to be what
water is to a fish: the element which gives delight and freedom.
What was his business? Great and complicated enterprises: the
erection of public edifices, the purchase, sale, and exchange of
values of various descriptions, exchanges in many markets and
corporations. To finish all this business it was necessary to
possess qualities of the most opposite character: the courage of
the lion and the caution of the fox, the talons of the falcon and
the elasticity of the cat. His life was passed at a gaming-table,
composed of the whole surface of a gigantic State; that life was
a species of continuous punting at a bank kept by blind chance
rather frequently; for calculation and skill, which meant very
much in his career, could not eliminate chance altogether, that
power which appears independently. Hence, he must not let chance
overthrow him; he might drop to the earth before its thrusts and
contract a muscle, but only to parry, make an elastic spring, and
seize new booty. His career was success rising and falling like a
river, it was also a fever, ceaselessly bathed in cool
calculation and reckoning.

As to the rest, post-wagons, railways, bells at rai