Silver Stick could never see a stranger without imagining that he was a lord or a duke, and often felt very much surprised at the shabbiness of their clothing; according to his ideas only the great ones of the earth could give themselves the pleasure of travelling, and he opened wide his incredulous and scandalised eyes when Gabriel told him that many were shoemakers from London or shopkeepers from Paris, who during their holidays treated themselves to a trip through the ancient country of the Moors.
Five canons in their choir surplices advanced up the nave, each one holding a key in his hand; these were the guardians of the treasure.
Each one opened the lock confided to his custody, the door swung heavily, and the chapel, with its antique treasures, was opened.

In large glass cases, like a museum, was displayed the ancient opulence of the Cathedral: statues of chiselled silver, large globes crowned by graceful little figures all of precious metal, ivory caskets of complicated work, custodias and viriles[1] of gold, enormous gilt dishes, embossed with mythological subjects reviving the joy of paganism in that sordid and dusty corner of the Christian Church, and precious stones spread their varied colours over pectorals, mitres and mantles for the Virgin.

There were diamonds so immense as to make one doubt their being genuine, emeralds the size of pebbles, amethysts, topaz, and pearls--very many pearls, strewn by the hundreds and thousands on the Virgin's garments.

The foreigners were amazed at all this wealth and dazzled by the quantity, while Gabriel, who had become accustomed to see it daily, looked at it carelessly.

The Treasury presented a deplorable spectacle of neglect: the riches had aged with the Cathedral, the diamonds did not flash, the gold seemed tarnished and dusty, the silver was blackened, the pearls were opaque and sick, the smoke from the wax tapers and the damp atmosphere of the church had sadly dulled everything.
[Footnote 1: _Virile_--small box with double glass in which the Host is exhibited.] "The Church," said Gabriel to himself, "ages everything she touches.
The treasures lose their brilliancy in her hands, like jewels that fall into the power of usurers.