'Nobody ever comes near the column,--or, as it's called here, Rings-
Hill Speer,' he continued; 'and when I first came up it nobody had
been here for thirty or forty years. The staircase was choked with
daws' nests and feathers, but I cleared them out.'

'I understood the column was always kept locked?'

'Yes, it has been so. When it was built, in 1782, the key was given
to my great-grandfather, to keep by him in case visitors should
happen to want it. He lived just down there where I live now.'

He denoted by a nod a little dell lying immediately beyond the
ploughed land which environed them.

'He kept it in his bureau, and as the bureau descended to my
grandfather, my mother, and myself, the key descended with it.
After the first thirty or forty years, nobody ever asked for it.
One day I saw it, lying rusty in its niche, and, finding that it
belonged to this column, I took it and came up. I stayed here till
it was dark, and the stars came out, and that night I resolved to be
an astronomer. I came back here from school several months ago, and
I mean to be an astronomer still.'

He lowered his voice, and added:

'I aim at nothing less than the dignity and office of Astronomer
Royal, if I live. Perhaps I shall not live.'

'I don't see why you should suppose that,' said she. 'How long are
you going to make this your observatory?'