The girl found, indeed, a
glistening dome formed of clearest diamonds, neatly cemented together,
with a doorway at the side just big enough to admit the duck.
"Where did you find so many diamonds?" asked Dorothy, wonderingly.
"I know a place in the mountains where they are thick as pebbles,"
said the Lonesome Duck, "and I brought them here in my bill, one by one
and put them in the river and let the water run over them until they
were brightly polished. Then I built this palace, and I'm positive
it's the only Diamond Palace in all the world."
"It's the only one I know of," said the little girl; "but if you
live in it all alone, I don't see why it's any better than a wooden
palace, or one of bricks or cobble-stones."
"You're not supposed to understand that," retorted the Lonesome
Duck. "But I might tell you, as a matter of education, that a home of
any sort should be beautiful to those who live in it, and should not
be intended to please strangers. The Diamond Palace is my home, and I
like it. So I don't care a quack whether YOU like it or not."
"Oh, but I do!" exclaimed Dorothy.
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