Rolles.
"Ten fortunes - twenty fortunes," cried the officer.
"The more it is worth," remarked Simon shrewdly, "the more
difficult it must be to sell. Such a thing has a physiognomy not
to be disguised, and I should fancy a man might as easily negotiate
St. Paul's Cathedral."
"Oh, truly!" said the officer; "but if the thief be a man of any
intelligence, he will cut it into three or four, and there will be
still enough to make him rich."
"Thank you," said the clergyman. "You cannot imagine how much your
conversation interests me."
Whereupon the functionary admitted that they knew many strange
things in his profession, and immediately after took his leave.
Mr. Rolles regained his apartment. It seemed smaller and barer
than usual; the materials for his great work had never presented so
little interest; and he looked upon his library with the eye of
scorn. He took down, volume by volume, several Fathers of the
Church, and glanced them through; but they contained nothing to his
purpose.
"These old gentlemen," thought he, "are no doubt very valuable
writers, but they seem to me conspicuously ignorant of life. Here
am I, with learning enough to be a Bishop, and I positively do not
know how to dispose of a stolen diamond. I glean a hint from a
common policeman, and, with all my folios, I cannot so much as put
it into execution. This inspires me with very low ideas of
University training.
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