The globe was composed of the purest white beeswax, it stood upon a steel needle that passed through it, and rested on pivots, so that the globe was held up and held firm, and could be easily made to revolve. Frau Witte closed the shutters, leaving open only one orifice through which the light could penetrate and fall on the wax ball. The doctor raised his hands in admiration. Never had he seen anything that so delighted him. The globe's surface had been most delicately manipulated. The mountains were pinched into peaks, the hollows indented to the requisite depth, the craters were rendered with extraordinary precision, the striæ being indicated by insertions of other tinted wax. A shadow hung sombre over the mysterious Sea of Storms. Professor Maedler returned to his hotel a prey to emotion. He inquired the address of a certain Rollmann, whom he had known in former years at Berlin, and who was now professor in the Polytechnic school at Hanover. Then he rushed off in quest of Rollmann. The Polytechnic Professor was delighted to see his friend, but disturbed at the condition of mind in which he found him. "What has brought you to Hanover, dear Professor?" he asked. "The moon! the moon! I have come after the moon." "The moon! How can that be? She shines over Dorpat as surely as over our roofs in Hanover." "I've just seen her." "Impossible. The moon is new. Besides, it is broad daylight." "New! of course she is new. Only made lately." Professor Rollman was puzzled. "The moon is certainly as old as the world, and even if we give the world so limited an age as four thousand years--" "I was not allowed to touch her, scarcely to breathe near her," interrupted Maedler. "My dear colleague, what is the matter with you? You are--what do you say, seen, touched, breathed on the moon? The distance of the moon from the earth is two hundred and forty thousand miles." "Not the old moon--I mean the other." "There is no other, that is, not another satellite to this world. I am well aware that Jupiter has four moons, two of which are smaller than the planet Mars. I know also that Mars--" "My dear Rollman, there is another--here in Hanover." "I give it up, I cannot understand." "Happy Hanover to possess such an unique treasure," continued the excited Maedler, "and such a woman as Frau Witte." "Oh! her wax moon!" said Rollmann, with a sigh of relief. "Of what else could I speak?" "So you have seen that. The old lady is very proud of her performance." "She has cause to be proud of it. It is simply superb." "And the sight of it has nearly sent you off your head!" "Rollmann! what will become of that model? Frau Councilloress Witte will not live for ever. She is old, puffy, and red, and might have apoplexy any day. Is her husband an astronomer?" "O dear no! he regards astronomy as as unprofitable a study as astrology. It is quite as expensive a pursuit, he says."