He nodded. And the very next day he sent all the other servants to the Exhibition, came down to my pantry, opened the plate-room, and put on an apron just like a servant would, and helped me to clean that gold plate. He got tired by one o'clock, and sat down upon a chair and looked at it all glistening as it was spread out on the dresser and shelves--some bright with polishing, some dull and dead and ancient-looking. Cups and bowls and salvers and round dishes covered with coats of arms; some battered and bent, and some as perfect as on the day it left the goldsmith's hands. I'd worked hard--as hard as I could, for sneezing, for I was doing that half the time, just as if I had a bad cold. For every cup or dish was kept in a green baize bag that fitted in one of the old ironbound oak chests, and these chests were lined with green baize. And all this being exceedingly old, the moths had got in; and pounds and pounds of pepper had been scattered about the baize, to keep them away. "I'll have a glass of wine, Burdon," Sir John says at last; "and we'll put it all away again. It's very beautiful. That's Cellini work-- real," he says, as he took up a great golden bowl, all hammered and punched and engraved. "But the whole lot of it is an incubus, for I can't use it, and I don't want to make a show." "Take a glass yourself, my man," he said, as I got him the sherry--a fresh bottle from the outer cellar. "Ha! at a moderate computation that old gold plate is worth a hundred thousand pounds; and a hundred thousand pounds at only three per cent in the funds, Burdon, would be three thousand a year. So you see I lose that income by letting this heap of old gold plate lie locked up in those chests.--Now, what would you do with it, if it were yours?" "Sell it, Sir John, and put it in houses," I said sharply. "Yes, James Burdon; and a sensible thing to do. But you are a servant, and I'm a baronet; though I don't look one, do I?" he said, holding up his red hands and laughing. "You always look a gentleman, Sir John," I said; "and that's what you are." "Please God, I try to be," he said sadly. "But I don't want the money, James; and these are all old family heirlooms that I hold in trust for my life, and have to hand over--bound in honour to do so--to my son.-- Look!" he said, "at the arms and crest of the Boileaus on every piece." "Boileau, Sir John?" "Well, Drinkwater, then. We translated the name when we came over to England. There; let's put it all away. It's a regular incubus."