To say that it rose to the stars is no mere metaphor, for the sky
had cleared to that occasional and astonishing transparency in
which one can see plainly both stars and moon.

As the white-robed figure went upward in his white chariot, he
said quite quietly to Evan: "There is an answer to all the folly
talked about equality. Some stars are big and some small; some
stand still and some circle around them as they stand. They can
be orderly, but they cannot be equal."

"They are all very beautiful," said Evan, as if in doubt.

"They are all beautiful," answered the other, "because each is in
his place and owns his superior. And now England will be
beautiful after the same fashion. The earth will be as beautiful
as the heavens, because our kings have come back to us."

"The Stuart----" began Evan, earnestly.

"Yes," answered the old man, "that which has returned is Stuart
and yet older than Stuart. It is Capet and Plantagenet and
Pendragon. It is all that good old time of which proverbs tell,
that golden reign of Saturn against which gods and men were
rebels. It is all that was ever lost by insolence and overwhelmed
in rebellion. It is your own forefather, MacIan with the broken
sword, bleeding without hope at Culloden. It is Charles refusing
to answer the questions of the rebel court. It is Mary of the
magic face confronting the gloomy and grasping peers and the
boorish moralities of Knox. It is Richard, the last Plantagenet,