"I think I would like to have been an astronomer," said Mr. Meredith
dreamily, gazing at the star.
"There must be a strange pleasure in it," agreed Miss Oliver, "an
unearthly pleasure, in more senses than one. I would like to have a few
astronomers for my friends."
"Fancy talking the gossip of the hosts of heaven," laughed Rilla.
"I wonder if astronomers feel a very deep interest in earthly affairs?"
said the doctor. "Perhaps students of the canals of Mars would not be so
keenly sensitive to the significance of a few yards of trenches lost or
won on the western front."
"I have read somewhere," said Mr. Meredith, "that Ernest Renan wrote one
of his books during the siege of Paris in 1870 and 'enjoyed the writing
of it very much.' I suppose one would call him a philosopher."
"I have read also," said Miss Oliver, "that shortly before his death he
said that his only regret in dying was that he must die before he had
seen what that 'extremely interesting young man, the German Emperor,'
would do in his life. If Ernest Renan 'walked' today and saw what that
interesting young man had done to his beloved France, not to speak of
the world, I wonder if his mental detachment would be as complete as it
was in 1870."
"I wonder where Jem is tonight," thought Rilla, in a sudden bitter
inrush of remembrance.
It was over a month since the news had come about Jem.
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