On the whole, he considered Ramorny as one whom nature had assigned to him as a serf, to mine for the gold which he worshipped, and the avaricious love of which was his greatest failing, though by no means his worst vice.

He vindicated this sordid tendency in his own eyes by persuading himself that it had its source in the love of power.
"Henbane Dwining," he said, as he gazed in delight upon the hoards which he had secretly amassed, and which he visited from time to time, "is no silly miser that doats on those pieces for their golden lustre: it is the power with which they endow the possessor which makes him thus adore them.

What is there that these put not within your command?
Do you love beauty, and are mean, deformed, infirm, and old?
Here is a lure the fairest hawk of them all will stoop to.

Are you feeble, weak, subject to the oppression of the powerful?
Here is that will arm in your defence those more mighty than the petty tyrant whom you fear.

Are you splendid in your wishes, and desire the outward show of opulence?
This dark chest contains many a wide range of hill and dale, many a fair forest full of game, the allegiance of a thousand vassals.