“In vain did they teize him, they drew nothing more from him: he continued to observe with heroic courage; and he died on the leads, his left hand on his eye of that side, his right laid on the tube of the telescope, and his right eye applied close to the eyeglass; between his son, who cried that he made a false calculation; his apothecary, who proposed him a clyster, his physician, who with a toss of his head pronounced, that there was nothing more to be done; and his priest, who said to him: ‘Brother, make an act of contrition, and recommend yourself to Brama.’ ”

“That is,” says Mangogul, “what they call dying in the bed of honour.”