“It is better. It is richer, more nutritious; but you do not see what is to be done with it, because you have not my head and my eyes. I do not propose to do here what was done at Holsworthy, but to invert the operation.” “What do you mean?” “Not to carry the sand to the clay, but the mud to the sand. Do you not know Bovey Heathfield? Do you not know Stover sands? What is there inland but a desert waste of sand-hill and arid flat that is barren as my hand, bearing nothing but a little scrubby thorn and thistle and bramble--sand, that’s not worth half a crown an acre? There is no necessity for us to cut a canal. The canal exists, cut in order that the Hey-tor granite may be conveyed along it to the sea. It has not occurred to the fools that the barges that convey the stone down might come up laden with Teign mud, instead of returning empty. This mud, I tell you, is not merely rich of itself, but it has a superadded richness from seaweed and broken shells. It is fat with eels and worms. Let this be conveyed up the canal to the sandy waste of Heathfield, and the marriage of clay and sand will be as profitable there as that marriage has been at Holsworthy. I would spread this rich mud over the hungry sand, thick as cream, and the land will laugh and sing. Do you take me now, brother-in-law? Do you believe in the philosopher’s stone?” He touched his head. Pasco Pepperill had clasped his right knee in his hands. He sat nursing it, musing, looking into the fire. Presently he said-- “Yes; very fine for the owners of the sandy land, but how about you and me?” “We must buy up.” “But where is the money to come from?” “Brimpts oak.” “What! the profit made on this venture?” “Exactly. Every oak stick is a rung in my ladder. There has been, for hundreds of years, a real forest of oaks, magnificent trees, timber incomparable for hardness--iron is not harder. Who knows about it save myself? The Exeter Bank knows nothing of the property on which it has advanced money. The agent runs over it and takes a hasty glance. He thinks that the trees he sees all up the slopes are thorn bushes or twisted stumps worth nothing, and when he passes is too eager to get away from the moor to stay and observe. I have felt my way. A small offer and money down, and the whole forest is mine. Then I must fell at once, and it is not, I say, calculable what we shall make out of that oak. When we have raked our money together, then we will buy up as much as we can of sandy waste near the canal, and proceed at once to plaster it over with Teign clay. Pasco, our fortune is made!” Jason kept silence for a while, to allow what he had said to sink into the mind of his brother-in-law.