I sat down on the top of the chest and read them all through, from
Jack the Giant-killer down to Hop o' my Thumb without rising, and this in
the broad daylight, with the yellow sunshine nestling beside me on the
rose-coloured silken seat, richly worked, of a large stately-looking chair
with three golden legs. Yes I could tell you all those stories, not to say
the names of them, over yet. Only I knew every one of them before; finding
now that they had fared like good vintages, for if they had lost something
in potency, they had gained much in flavour. Harry could not read these,
and Charlie not very well, but they put confidence in them notwithstanding,
in virtue of the red, blue, and yellow prints. Then there was a box of
sawdust, the design of which I have not yet discovered; a huge ball of
string; a rabbit's skin; a Noah's ark; an American clock, that refused to
go for all the variety of treatment they gave it; a box of lead-soldiers,
and twenty other things, amongst which was a huge gilt ball having an eagle
of brass with outspread wings on the top of it.
Great was their consternation and dismay when they found that this magazine
could not be taken in the post-chaise in which they were to follow us to
the station.
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