But this
discussion will be more appropriate a little later.
6
I found Herr Krall in his goldsmith's shop, a sort of palace of
Golconda, streaming and glittering with the most precious pearls
and stones on earth. Herr Krall, it is well to remember, in order
to dispel any suspicion of pecuniary interest, is a rich
manufacturer whose family for three generations, from father to
son, have conducted one of the most important jewelry businesses
in Germany. His researches, so far from bringing him the least
profit, cost him a great deal of money, take up all his leisure
and some part of the time which he would otherwise devote to his
business and, as usually happens, procure him from his fellow
citizens and from not a few scientific men more annoyance, unfair
criticism and sarcasm than consideration or gratitude. His work
is preeminently the disinterested and thankless task of the
apostle and pioneer.
For the rest, Herr Kraft, though his faith is active, zealous and
infectious, has nothing in common with the visionaries or
illuminati. He is a man of about fifty, vigorous, alert and
enthusiastic, but at the same time well-balanced; accesible to
every idea and even to every dream, yet practical and methodical,
with a ballast of the most invincible common-sense. He inspires
from the outset that fine confidence, frank and unrestrained,
which instantly disperses the instinctive doubt, the strange
uneasiness and the veiled suspicion that generally separate two
people who meet for the first time; and one welcomes in him, from
the very depths of one's being, the honest man, the staunch
friend whom one can trust and whom one is sorry not to have known
earlier in life.
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