"Do take care, sir, you have lost your shadow!"
"Thank you, good mother!" I threw her a gold piece for her well-meant
intelligence, and stopped under the trees.
At the city gate I was compelled to hear again from the sentinel, "Where
has the gentleman left his shadow?" And immediately again from some
women, "Jesus Maria! the poor fellow has no shadow!" That began to
irritate me, and I became especially careful not to walk in the sun.
This could not, however, be accomplished everywhere; for instance, over
the broad street I must next take--actually, as mischief would have it,
at the very moment the boys came out of school. A cursed hunchbacked
rogue--I see him yet--spied out instantly that I had no shadow. He
proclaimed the fact with a loud outcry to the whole assembled literary
street youth of the suburb, who began forthwith to criticize me and to
pelt me with mud. "Decent people are accustomed to take their shadow
with them when they go into the sunshine." To defend myself from them I
threw whole handfuls of gold amongst them, and sprang into a hackney
coach which some compassionate soul procured for me. As soon as I found
myself alone in the rolling carriage, I began to weep bitterly. The
presentiment must already have arisen in me that on earth, far as gold
transcends merit and virtue in estimation, so much higher than gold
itself is the shadow valued; and as I had earlier sacrificed wealth to
conscience, I had now thrown away the shadow for mere gold. What in the
world could and would become of me!