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Updated: June 29, 2025
"Our division of time is of Babylonian origin," says Hornmel; "to Babylonia we owe the week of seven days, with the names of the planets for the days of the week, and the division into hours and months." Hence the almost personal interest which we of to-day must needs feel in the efforts of the Babylonian star-gazer.
The most curious thing about it is that it was not discovered by me; it was discovered by my friend Basil Grant, a star-gazer, a mystic, and a man who scarcely stirred out of his attic. Very few people knew anything of Basil; not because he was in the least unsociable, for if a man out of the street had walked into his rooms he would have kept him talking till morning.
Mystic, star-gazer, dabbler in black or blackish arts, he seemed in his lowly occupation of shepherd to represent some strange miscarriage of Nature's designs; but Mrs. Abel, who understood the secrets of many hearts, always maintained that Snarley, the breeder of the famous Perryman rams, had found the calling to which he had been fore-ordained from the foundation of the world.
The second brother also met a man, who, when he found out what he was setting out upon, asked him what craft he meant to follow. 'I do not know yet, said he. 'Then come with me, and be a star-gazer.
And yet, to give credit where credit is due, I must admit that I owe a great deal to that gray-beard, Maka, the star-gazer. But for him, perchance, the name of Strokor would mean but little, for 'twas he who gave me ambition. Truly it was an uncommon affair, my first meeting with him.
One day he was lying with his head up-stream, as was his usual habit, when a particularly fat, plump little larva, torn from his home by the remorseless river, came drifting down with the current. He looked very tempting, and our friend sallied out from under a stick and caught him on the fly, just as he had seen the star-gazer catch his own brother.
Then the king broke silence and said: "She should be given to the brave man, who risked his life and killed the giant and saved the girl. The wise man and the clever man were only helpers whom Fate gave him. A star-gazer and a chariot-maker work for other people, do they not?" When the goblin heard this answer, he suddenly escaped from the king's shoulder and went back.
It is a noble art, for nothing can be hidden from you, when once you understand the stars. The plan pleased him much, and he soon became such a skilful star-gazer, that when he had served out his time, and wanted to leave his master, he gave him a glass, and said, 'With this you can see all that is passing in the sky and on earth, and nothing can be hidden from you.
Not only is Orion the most brilliant of all constellations to the casual star-gazer, but it contains the richest mines that the delver for telescopic treasures can anywhere discover.
It makes me giddy too; and last time I couldn't sleep for thinking about the world going at a thousand miles an hour, for it can't be safe. Then, too, I'm sure I should catch a cold in my head with that great shutter open. I was never meant for a star-gazer. Let me be as I am."
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