“Very well, father,” answered she demurely, while a dimple crept out, as she surveyed his unfinished slice of ham and the fragments of his bread. “As to the wine,” pursued he, “it is another matter. I will not deny that wine, producing this pleasant exhilaration (were it not accompanied by the not disagreeable langour which I now feel, and which is the result of my own self-indulgence) might stimulate the brain to greater lucidity than does the usual liquor provided by Mrs. Nutmeg. It is quite possible,” he went on, leaning back in his chair while the lamplight played on the shrunken line of his figure, on the silver beard, and the diaphanous countenance. “It is quite possible that even as the plant requires sun-rays to produce its designed colour, so the veins of man may require this distillation of sun-heat and sun-light to liberate to the utmost his potential forces. David, we may both be the better of this drinkable sunshine!” As he spoke, he meditatively sipped and gazed at the glass which his daughter had unobtrusively refilled. The astronomer had been crumbling the white bread and eating and drinking much in the same frugal and half unconscious manner as the simpler; it seemed as if spirits so attuned to secluded paths of thought could scarce condescend to notice the material needs. But upon Master Simon’s last remark, Sir David put down his beaker. “Drinkable sunshine!” he cried, the light of the enthusiast leaped into his eye. He rose from the table as he spoke. “Ah, cousin Simon, I have this night drunk into my soul its fill of creating light.” “Pooh! With your cold stars,” scoffed the simpler, once more eyeing the gorgeous colour of the wine against the light. “The sun that raises from the soil and vivifies your plants, that gives the soul to the wine you are drinking, is one of the lesser stars,” said the astronomer gravely. “The countless stars you deem so cold are suns—I have to-night watched the birth of a new distant world of fire.” “Ah,” commented the other, calmly scientific. “A phenomenon, like Ellinor here, rare, but possible.” “I came down to tell you, to bring you back with me to see it,” David continued, and Ellinor could detect the exaltation of his thoughts in manner and voice. “Come, master of the microscope and of the test-tube, come and see the new star. Come and witness such a wonder as those microscopes, those crucibles will never show you.”