everal laureates; but believe
me-and despise if you will--although we had heard tell of Sir John
Davies, I doubt if one in six of us had read a line of him.'

'Ay, indeed,' he caught me up, 'I have scarce read a line of any
other. Having discovered him I had no need. For allow me to
observe--although I know nothing about it--that in poetry the Subject
is nine points of excellence; and, Sir John Davies having hit on the
most exalted subject tractable by the Muse, it follows that he must
be the most exalted poet. Let me tell you--if it will shorten
argument--that in general, and in all walks of life, I hate the
second-best.'

'I have heard, sir,' said I, 'that this masterpiece was a poem on
Dancing. But you must be thinking of another.'

'Not at all, young man,' my host replied, poring anew into his toy.
'"Orchestra" is the name of it; the subject, Dancing. But what
dancing!--the sun, the moon, the stars--Eh? Halleluia, but it goes
again!'

Sure enough, bending over the basin, I heard a buzz of wheels, and
looked up to see the whole machine springing like a score of
whipping-tops gone mad, the brass balls swinging and rotating so fast
that the eye lost them in little twinkling circles and ellipses, the
wheels whirring and filling the room with their hum.

My astronomer had dived under the bench. I saw for the moment little
more than his posterior and the soles of his list slippers.

'You'll pardon me,' I heard him grunt, and the speed of the machinery
slackened as he attached a couple of leaden weights to the dependent
chains. He backed, crawled out, and stood erect; adjusted his
spectacles, and stood beaming upon his invention.

'But what is the signification, sir?' I asked, rising from my chair
and stepping close.

'Ah! You improve, soldier. It hath signification, not use: and it
signifies the motion of the heavens. See--this larger ball is the
sun; and here, on their several rods, the planets--all swinging in
their courses. By a pointer on this dial-plate--observe me now--I
reduce the space of a day to one, two, three minutes, as I chose,
retarding or accelerating, but always in just proportion. 'Tis set
for these December days; you will remark the sun's ambit--how it lies
south of the zenith, and how far short it rises and falls from the
equinoctial points. But wait awhile, and in a few minutes--that is
to say, days--you shall see him start to widen his circuit. Here now
is Saturn, with his ri