se every one
of us may, without special astronomical knowledge, be of the greatest
service. Thus, for example, anyone of us can (1) take the measurement
of the diameters of the sun and the moon; (2) sketch the corona of
the sun; (3) take the temperature; (4) take observations of plants
and animals during the eclipse; (5) note down his own impressions,
and so on.

It is a matter of such exceptional importance that I lay aside the
"Past and Future of the Dog Licence" and make up my mind to observe
the eclipse.

We all get up very early, and I divide the work as follows: I am
to measure the diameter of the sun and moon; the wounded officer
is to sketch the corona; and the other observations are undertaken
by Mashenka and the variegated young ladies.

We all meet together and wait.

"What is the cause of the eclipse?" asks Mashenka.

I reply: "A solar eclipse occurs when the moon, moving in the plane
of the ecliptic, crosses the line joining the centres of the sun
and the earth."

"And what does the ecliptic mean?"

I explain. Mashenka listens attentively.

"Can one see through the smoked glass the line joining the centres
of the sun and the earth?" she enquires.

I reply that this is only an imaginary line, drawn theoretically.

"If it is only an imaginary line, how can the moon cross it?" Varenka
says, wondering.

I make no reply. I feel my spleen rising at this naive question.

"It's all nonsense," says Mashenka's _maman_. "Impossible to tell
what's going to happen. You've never been in the sky, so what can
you know of what is to happen with the sun and moon? It's all fancy."

At that moment a black patch begins to move over the sun. General
confusion follows. The sheep and horses and cows run bellowing about
the fields with their tails in the air. The dogs howl. The bugs,
thinking night has come on, creep out of the cracks in the walls
and bite the people who are still in bed.

The deacon, who was engaged in bringing some cucumbers from the
market garden, jumped out of his cart and hid under the bridge;
while his horse walked off into somebody else's yard, where the
pigs ate up all the cucumbers. The excise officer, who had not slept
at home that night, but at a lady friend's, dashed out with nothing
on but his nightshirt, and running into the crowd shouted frantically:
"Save yourself, if you can!"

Numbers of the lady visitors, even young and pretty ones, run out
of their villas without even puttin