VIII
THE METEOR
The next morning, after breakfast, Hogarth went down old Thring Street,and spent a penny for a note-book to contain the signatures of hisassociation.
But this was no day for interest in that scheme: for under theprojecting first-floor of the paper-shop were newspaper placards bearingsuch words as:
THE EARTH IN DANGER
SHALL WE PERISH TO-NIGHT?
and Hogarth was soon bending in the street over a paragraph, short--butin _pica_.
M. Tissot, the astronomer, had, at half-past ten the previous night,observed through the 40-inch telescope of the Nice observatory a bodywhich seemed a tiny planet or aerolite of abnormal size. It was sightedat a point two degrees W. of _a_ Librae at an angle of 43 1/2 deg. withthe horizon, and had been photographed, its elements calculated, itsspectrum taken. The ascertained diameter was 3 deg. 17", or about 73 miles,and its substance seemed to consist of ironstone mixed with diamond.
By noon a fresh light was thrown upon the little world, the Yerkesobservatory and Greenwich both uttering their voice, the AstronomerRoyal announcing that the so-called planet was merely a meteor--not morethan 400 yards in diameter, with a low velocity of two miles a second;and its distance was less than a tenth of that estimated by Tissot. TheYerkes observatory fixed the diameter at 230 yards. All, however, agreedin the opinion that it must strike the earth between ten and twelve thatnight.
These later announcements so much allayed the panic, that by one o'clockHogarth, on peeping into the note-book on the box before the smithy, sawsix signatures; and a young man who came about six P.M. to sign, criedout: "Hullo! the book is filled up!" on which Hogarth ran out, saying:"Don't run away on that account, I'll run and get--" darting into thehouse to ask Margaret where a certain account-book was.
"Didn't I throw it into the box of rubbish in the cellar at Lagden, whenwe were leaving?" she asked; on which he threw off his apron, and wasoff toward Lagden Dip to get it.
He had almost cleared the village when he was blocked by a crowd beforea cottage, from out of which were coming screams--a woman's; and he ranin, found a man named Fred Bates beating his wife, planted a blow on hischest.
The next morning the wife of Bates was found dead, greatly disfiguredabout the face, whereupon Bates was arrested, and Hogarth, as we shallsee, was subpoenaed to give evidence of the beating.
In ten minutes he was at the old farm-house of the Hogarths.
The new tenant was a Mr. Bond, a bankrupt metal-broker, who hadtwo hobbies--farming and astronomy; and, as Hogarth approached theyard-gate, he saw Mr. Bond, his two daughters, his servants, groupedround an optic tube mounted on a tripod. He asked permission to get theaccount-book, got it, in a few minutes was again passing through, and,as he went by, bowing his thanks, Mr. Bond said: "But--have you seen theasteroid?"
"No--whereabouts?"
"Not quite visible to the naked eye yet: but come--you shall see".
He himself looked through, fixing the sight, turning the adjuster; thenwith fussy suddenness: "Now, sir--"
Hogarth put an eager eye to the glass.
"You see her?" said Mr. Bond, rubbing his soft old palms; "straight forus she comes--in a considerable hurry by this time, I can tell you! andif she happens to break up in the air, then, pray, sir, that a splinterof her may fall into your back yard--not too big a one! but a nicelittle comfortable _piece_"--he rubbed his palms--"for you know, nodoubt, of what her substance is composed? Diamond, sir, in extraordinaryevidence! in conjunction with specular iron ore, commonly called the redhaematite, and the ferrous carbonate, or spathic iron. You see her, sir?you see her?"
Hogarth whispered: "Yes".
There, fairest among ten thousand, sailing the high seas she came; andlonger than was modest he stopped there, gazing, then ran, wondering ather daisy loveliness, not dreaming that between himself and her was--arelation.
She broke up with a European display soon after eleven that night overthe North Sea.