I have thoughts and aims, feeble at present--Good God! I see nothing for me but a choice of the two--"most unfortunate" seems likeliest.

You read at a glance that I had no other choice.

Rather the extremes!--I would rather grasp the limits of life and be swung to the pits below, be the most unfortunate of human beings, than never to have aimed at a star.

You laugh at me?
An Englishman must be horribly in earnest to talk as I do now.

But it is a star!' (The image of Ottilia sprang fountain-like into blue night heavens before my eyes memorably.) 'She,' was my next word.