Page:Burnett - Two Little Pilgrims' Progress A Story of the City Beautiful.djvu/68

56 hands. When he was sent on errands he cast all-embracing glances round every place his orders took him to. The postmaster of the nearest village discovered his weakness, and saved paragraphs and whole papers for him. Before very long there was buried near the Treasure a treasure even more valuable of newspaper cuttings, and on the wonderful Saturday nights they gave themselves up to revelling in them.

How they watched it and followed it and lived with it—this great human scheme, which somehow seemed to their young minds more like the scheme of giants and genii! How they seized upon every new story of its wonders, and felt that there could be no limit to them! They knew every purpose and plan connected with it,—every arch and tower and wall and stone they pleased themselves by fancying. Newspapers were liberal with information. People talked of it, they heard of it on every side. To them it seemed that the whole world must be thinking of nothing else.

"While we are lying here," Meg said—"while you are doing chores and I am scouring pans and scrubbing things, it is all going on. People in France and in England and in Italy are doing work to send to it. Artists are painting pictures and machinery is