rds with an expression on his features and a
gesture which had something sublime in them.

"And I say and maintain that all that is sheer nonsense!" exclaimed the
Collector with emphasis. "I have examined the old toasting-iron no less
than a hundred times, and it isn't five hundred years old! It comes down
perhaps from the time of the feud of Soest, when very likely one of the
Archbishop's cavalrymen crawled into the bushes here and left it."

"The devil take you!" cried the Justice, pounding his fist on the table.
Then he mumbled softly to himself "Just wait; you'll get your punishment
for that this very day!"

The servant came out of the door. He was carrying a terra-cotta jug with
a rather large circumference and a strange, exotic appearance, gripping
it firmly and carefully by the handles with both hands.

"Oh!" cried the Collector, when he had obtained a closer view of it.
"What a splendid large amphora! Where did it come from?"

The Justice replied with an air of indifference: "Oh, I found the old
jug in the ditch a week ago when we were digging out gravel. There was
a lot more stuff around there, but the men smashed it all to pieces
with their picks. This jug was the only thing they spared, and, inasmuch
as you are here, I wanted you to see it."

The Collector looked at the large, well-preserved vessel with moist
eyes. Finally he stammered: "Can't we strike a bargain for it?"

"No," replied the peasant coldly. "I'll keep the pot for myself." He
motioned to the servant, and the latter started to carry the amphora
back into the house. He was prevented from doing so, however, by the
Collector, who, without turning his eyes away from it, besought its
owner with all kinds of lively arguments to turn the longed-for wine-jug
over to him. But it was all in vain; the Justice, in the face of the
most urgent entreaties, maintained an attitude of unshakable composure.
In this way he formed the motionless centre-figure of the group, of
which the peasants, listening to the business with open mouths, the
servant tugging the jug with both handles toward the house, and the
antiquarian holding on to the lower end, constituted the excited lateral
and secondary figures. Finally the Justice said that he had been of a
mind to give the jug to his guest along with several other pieces which
he had previously discovered, because he himself would take pleasure in
seeing the old things arranged in order on the shelves of the collecti