He had looks as well; he was six feet high;
and all those six feet were clothed in perfect taste. He had large
flashing eyes and a broad forehead. He was practised in making
clear to others all in which he was interested, and at such times
how handsome he looked! He was a thorough man of the world, able
to converse in several languages at the cosmopolitan dinners which
were a speciality of the Ravns. He was the owner of one of the few
extensive estates in Norway, and had the control, it was said, of
a considerable fortune besides.
The half of this would have been enough to set all tongues
wagging; therefore, first the family, then their friends, then the
whole town feted him. He was a nine days' wonder! One must know
the critical, unimaginative natives of Christiania, who daily pick
each other to pieces to fill the void in their existences; one
must have admired their endless worrying of threadbare topics to
understand what it must be when they got hold of a fresh theme.
Nothing which flies before the storm is more dangerous than desert
sand, nothing can surpass a Christiania FUROR.
When it became known that two of his relations who were conversant
with the subject, together with a distinguished geologist and a
superintendent of mines, had been down to Hellebergene with
Rafael, and had found that his statements were well grounded, he
was captured and borne off in triumph twenty times a day.
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