`` Peter ! How goes it , friend Peter ? '' cried a voice across the street as Peter was drawing in his head . `` Look out here , Peter ! '' Peter looked , and saw his old partner , Mr. John Brown , on the opposite sidewalk , portly and comfortable , with his furred cloak thrown open , disclosing a handsome surtout beneath . His voice had directed the attention of the whole town to Peter Goldthwaite 's window , and to the dusty scarecrow which appeared at it . `` I say , Peter ! '' cried Mr. Brown , again ; `` what the devil are you about there , that I hear such a racket whenever I pass by ? You are repairing the old house , I suppose , making a new one of it ? Eh ? '' `` Too late for that , I am afraid , Mr. Brown , '' replied Peter . `` If I make it new , it will be new inside and out , from the cellar upward . '' `` Had not you better let me take the job ? '' said Mr. Brown , significantly . `` Not yet , '' answered Peter , hastily shutting the window ; for ever since he had been in search of the treasure he hated to have people stare at him . As he drew back , ashamed of his outward poverty , yet proud of the secret wealth within his grasp , a haughty smile shone out on Peter 's visage with precisely the effect of the dim sunbeams in the squalid chamber . He endeavored to assume such a mien as his ancestor had probably worn when he gloried in the building of a strong house for a home to many generations of his posterity . But the chamber was very dark to his snow-dazzled eyes , and very dismal , too , in contrast with the living scene that he had just looked upon . His brief glimpse into the street had given him a forcible impression of the manner in which the world kept itself cheerful and prosperous by social pleasures and an intercourse of business , while he in seclusion was pursuing an object that might possibly be a phantasm by a method which most people would call madness . It is one great advantage of a gregarious mode of life that each person rectifies his mind by other minds and squares his conduct to that of his neighbors , so as seldom to be lost in eccentricity .
Peter XXXXX had exposed himself to this influence by merely looking out of the window .
Brown Goldthwaite Mr. Peter impression manner phantasm scarecrow sunbeams visage