That was why he despised that otherwise excellent
person, the Financial Commissioner for Nicaragua, whose wildest flights
of embezzlement never exceeded a few hundred dollars. He respected a
man who, like himself, could work in the grand style. To play upon the
credulity of a continent--it was Napoleonic, it was like stealing a
kingdom; it was not stealing at all. This, he shrewdly suspected, was
what his good friend the Count was engaged upon. That delightful old
man was working in the grand style.
Bronzes, ancient or modern, were Greek to Mr. van Koppen. He could not
tell the difference between the art of Clodion and of Myron--had, in
fact, never heard the names of these good people and did not
particularly care to hear them; he paid Sir Herbert Street for that
part of the business. But he had picked up, in the course of his long
humanitarian career, a good deal of general knowledge. Old Koppen was
no fool. He was intelligent; intelligence, as the Count had said, being
perfectly compatible with progress.
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