`` It 's wonderful to be looking at something that happened three thousand years ago , is n't it ? '' said Rilla . `` That is when astronomers think the collision took place which produced this new star . It makes me feel horribly insignificant , '' she added under her breath . `` Even this event can not dwarf into what may be the proper perspective in star systems the fact that the Germans are again only one leap from Paris , '' said Gertrude restlessly . `` I think I would like to have been an astronomer , '' said Mr. Meredith dreamily , gazing at the star . `` There must be a strange pleasure in it , '' agreed Miss Oliver , `` an unearthly pleasure , in more senses than one . I would like to have a few astronomers for my friends . '' `` Fancy talking the gossip of the hosts of heaven , '' laughed Rilla . `` I wonder if astronomers feel a very deep interest in earthly affairs ? '' said the doctor . `` Perhaps students of the canals of Mars would not be so keenly sensitive to the significance of a few yards of trenches lost or won on the western front . '' `` I have read somewhere , '' said Mr. Meredith , `` that Ernest Renan wrote one of his books during the siege of Paris in 1870 and ` enjoyed the writing of it very much . ' I suppose one would call him a philosopher . '' `` I have read also , '' said Miss Oliver , `` that shortly before his death he said that his only regret in dying was that he must die before he had seen what that ` extremely interesting young man , the German Emperor , ' would do in his life . If Ernest Renan ` walked ' today and saw what that interesting young man had done to his beloved France , not to speak of the world , I wonder if his mental detachment would be as complete as it was in 1870 . '' `` I wonder where Jem is tonight , '' thought Rilla , in a sudden bitter inrush of remembrance . It was over a month since the news had come about Jem . Nothing had been discovered concerning him , in spite of all efforts . Two or three letters had come from him , written before the trench raid , and since then there had been only unbroken silence .
Now the Germans were again at the Marne , pressing nearer and nearer Paris ; now rumours were coming XXXXX another Austrian offensive against the Piave line .
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