'Oh, I am so glad--so rejoiced!' she cried. 'What is it? But don't stop
to tell me. Publish it at once in some paper; nail your name to it, or
somebody will seize the idea and appropriate it,--forestall you in some
way. It will be Adams and Leverrier over again.' 'If I may walk with you I will explain the nature of the discovery. It accounts for the occasional green tint of Castor, and every difficulty.

I said I would be the Copernicus of the stellar system, and I have begun to
be. Yet who knows?' 'Now don't be so up and down! I shall not understand your explanation,
and I would rather not know it. I shall reveal it if it is very grand.
Women, you know, are not safe depositaries of such valuable secrets.

You may walk with me a little way, with great pleasure. Then go and write
your account, so as to insure your ownership of the discovery. . . .

But how you have watched!' she cried, in a sudden accession of anxiety, as
she turned to look more closely at him. 'The orbits of your eyes are
leaden, and your eyelids are red and heavy. Don't do it--pray don't.

You will be ill, and break down.' 'I have, it is true, been up a little late this last week,' he said
cheerfully. 'In fact, I couldn't tear myself away from the equatorial;
it is such a wonderful possession that it keeps me there till daylight.
But what does that matter, now I have made the discovery?' 'Ah, it _does_ matter! Now, promise me--I insist--that you will not
commit such imprudences again; for what should I do if my Astronomer
Royal were to die?' She laughed, but far too apprehensively to be effective as a display of
levity.