Of glass he blackened above his candle-flame To watch that orange ember in the sky Wane into smouldering ash. He whispered there, "So it is true. By searching in the heavens, Men can foretell the future." In the street Below him, throngs were babbling of the plague That might or might not follow. He resolved To make himself the master of that deep art And know what might be known. He bought the books Of Stadius, with his tables of the stars. Night after night, among the gabled roofs, Climbing and creeping through a world unknown Save to the roosting stork, he learned to find The constellations, Cassiopeia's throne, The Plough still pointing to the Polar Star, The sword-belt of Orion. There he watched The movements of the planets, hours on hours, And wondered at the mystery of it all. All this he did in secret, for his birth Was noble, and such wonderings were a sign Of low estate, when Tycho Brahe was young; And all his kinsmen hoped that Tycho Brahe Would live, serene as they, among his dogs And horses; or, if honour must be won, Let the superfluous glory flow from fields Where blood might still be shed; or from those courts Where statesmen lie. But Tycho sought the truth. So, when they sent him in his tutor's charge To Leipzig, for such studies as they held More worthy of his princely blood, he searched The Almagest; and, while his tutor slept, Measured the delicate angles of the stars, Out of his window, with his compasses, His only instrument. Even with this rude aid He found so many an ancient record wrong That more and more he burned to find the truth.