"
This is what the Panjandrum said, and we never could tell who "she" was,
nor, indeed, whom he meant by the barber.
"Pickaninnies, open the wonderful Pantoscopticon, and let them see."
The wonderful Pantoscopticon was brought out, and we were allowed to look
in it.
There were holes enough for us all to see, and we beheld several rainbows
in one sky. On one of them was marked "Get and keep," on another "Eat,
drink, and be merry," besides some that were too far away for me to read.
There was one that had an inscription in unknown letters that shone with
their own light. Though I could not read the words, they reminded me
somehow of the Latin sentence which I once read over the gate of a park
belonging to the richest duke in England, which says, that goodness is
the only true nobility, or something of the sort.
All the time we were looking the Great Panjandrum Himself, with his
little round button-at-the-top on his head, was turning a crank in the
side of the wonderful Pantoscopticon, which had a hopper on the top of it
like that of an old-fashioned coffee-mill. As he turned he kept puffing
out:
"If you want to find out whether there is any gold at the end of the
rainbow, please walk up the ladder, get into the hopper, and be ground
down to a proper size.
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