. After the
necessary preliminaries had been accomplished, Herr Huerlin developed a
busy and mysterious activity and correspondence, often took little
journeys, and bought a piece of ground at the bottom of the valley. He
began to build there, on the site of an oil-works that had burned down,
a new brick house, a stable and coachhouse near it, and between the
stable and the house a huge brick chimney. In the meantime he was seen
now and then in the town taking his glass of an evening. At the
beginning he was quiet and dignified, but after he had had a few
glasses he would talk loud and emphatically, and made no secret of the
fact that he had money enough to live a fine gentleman's life--but that
one man was a thick-headed idler and another a genius and a man of
business, that he belonged to the latter class and had no idea of
sitting down to rest until he was able to write six ciphers after the
figures that denoted his wealth.

Business people from whom he asked credit inquired into his history,
and found out that up to that time he had never played an important
part, but had been employed in various workshops and factories, rising
finally to be a foreman. Lately, however, he had fallen into a tidy
inheritance; and so people accorded him a certain measure of respect,
and a few enterprising men put money also into his business. Soon,
then, a moderately large and good-looking factory arose, in which
Huerlin proposed to turn out certain rollers and other machinery
required in the woolen industry.

Hardly was the place opened when its projector was sued by the same
firm for which he had been overseer, on a charge of illegally
representing as his own inventions and using some technical secrets
which he had acquired there. He came out of the endless litigation
without discredit but with heavy costs; he pushed his business with
redoubled zeal, lowering his prices somewhat and flooding the country
with advertisements. Orders were not lacking, the big chimney smoked
night and day, and for a few years Huerlin and his factory flourished,
and enjoyed respect and ample credit.

He had attained his ideal and fulfilled his old dream. It was true that
in his earlier years he had made more than one attempt to acquire
wealth, but it was the almost unexpected inheritance which had set him
on his feet and enabled him to carry out his bold plans. Riches
had not been his only aim; his warmest desires had all along tended
toward the acqui