"There!" said he, throwing them into the basket; "perhaps your mother will accept them of me, if you won't; so I'll carry them to her, and we can walk along together. I've a word or two to say to you." "What is it?" said Theresa, pursuing her knitting, and stepping out at a good pace. "All that you said just now," rejoined he, after a short silence, "about my getting brandy, and selling horses, and looking after cows,--to which you might have added doctoring them when ill,--is true enough, Theresa; and what is more, it has put a goodish bit of money into my pocket." "Very likely," said Theresa; "but what of that? Money is not the thing of most consequence in the world." "Well, _I_ almost think it is." "It is of much consequence, certainly, Franz, in _this_ way, I grant you,--the way it is employed,--whether good or evil. If it enables (and inclines) you to be generous and helpful to your poor old blind mother, and your hard-working sister, it is an instrument of good; but if you only hide it in a hole, it is of no good at all; and if you spend it in betting and drinking, it is worse than no good, for it is downright evil." "All that is very well to say,"--began Franz. "Nothing is very well to say, unless it be true," interrupted Theresa. "But it's quite certain," continued Franz, "that money is a real good, whether or no: and for this plain reason--that it gives you _power_." "Power of some sort," said Theresa. "Almost endless power," returned Franz, warming with his subject. "Why, now, how could Buonaparte carry on this war without money?" "Without wit, rather," said Theresa. "I never heard that he was very rich to start with, but quite the reverse; the thing was, _he had a clever head, and made use of it_. He was very pains-taking, very resolute; and that has made him so powerful; not money." "It has put him in possession of money, without which he could not pay his troops," argued Franz; "and if they were not paid, they would not fight for him." "Not they! I believe you there," said Theresa. "They have not the motives for fighting that we poor Tyrolese have; and that is why we so often beat them." "Well, but, Theresa, when I began to speak about money, I did not mean to get into this long argument. What I was going to tell you,--(in confidence, you know,)--is that I've a goodish bit of money underground, in a pot--" "Then, there it will rot!" "No, it won't! It will increase!" "What! like a grain of corn? Franz, I wonder how you can tell such stories!" "I didn't say like corn. It will increase, because I shall put more to it." "Oh! that's one way--" "Yes, and that one way will suffice. Why should we try a dozen roads, when one leads to the mill? Now, Theresa, listen to me. I've had a dream--" "Humph!" "And I dreamed that I was in a certain spot, which I shall not now disclose; and that I saw a cloud of golden dollars floating in the air before me, just out of my reach--" "I should think so!"