The realization of these facts effected a great change in Norbert.

He was the equal of all these people, and yet how great a gulf separated him from them.

While he and his father tramped to Mass in heavy shoes, the others drove up in their carriages with powdered footmen to open the doors.

Why was this extraordinary difference?
He knew enough of the value of crops and land to know that his father was as wealthy as any of these gentlemen.

The laborers on the farm said that his father was a miser, and the villagers asserted that he got up at night and gazed with rapture upon the treasure that was hidden away from men's eyes.
"Norbert is an unhappy lad," they would say.