After searching his pocket and doublet and convincing himself that all the crowns were spread out before him, he heaped them up and ran his hands through them as if to enjoy the sparkle and jingle of the gold.  He held his breath, for fear of losing the least sound; with eyes wide open he contemplated the brilliant treasure.

For a long time Julio remained, with a smile of happiness upon his lips, in mute admiration, and, perhaps scarcely aware of what he was doing, he ranged the crowns in a line and counted them; then he separated them into piles of twenty pieces each; then he tossed them from hand to hand, until, wearied of this amusement, he looked at them musingly.  At last he exclaimed in a joyous outbreak: 

“Two hundred crowns!  What will I do with them?  How will I spend them?  Shall I drink Malmsey, Muscatel, the very best, such as brings pleasure to the heart?  But at that rate I shall soon see the end of my money.  Shall I play for florins and crowns?  That would be an excellent means, certainly, of either becoming a hundred times richer or of losing every farthing.  Strange! how fearful and avaricious money makes me!  I do not even care to play; no, I will not do it.  I will dress like a nobleman:  in satin, velvet, and silk; I will drink and eat of the most exquisite dishes; I will Jive in luxury and abundance, as though the world were a terrestrial paradise.  Ah, what a glorious life!

“But what a cowardly wretch I am!  My only anxiety is to know how to spend or rather squander this treasure, and at this moment there lives, far from me, one who perhaps is stretching out her hand to me to beg an alms!  My poor mother! she may even need bread.  Were she to curse her ungrateful son, would he not have deserved it a hundred times?  I am afraid of myself!  With ten crowns, with the twentieth part of what I am going to throw away in dissipation, she might be saved from misery for more than a year.  Why did I not give twenty crowns to my master to send to her?  Suppose I return to the factory to execute this good thought?  Impossible!  Signor Turchi would be enraged; besides, I have no confidence in him.  I will inquire, when in Germany, if she still lives, and if she be in want I will send her money.”

He took up twenty crowns, one by one, from the table, counted them, regarded them wistfully, and said, as he dropped them into his pocket: 

“Twenty crowns! that is a large sum; but it may make my blind old mother happy.  I will put her portion by itself.”

His eye again rested on the glittering coin.  The sight appeared to deject him.