A man is standing pasting together bags made of old newspaper.

"I would like to see Mr. Christie," I said.

"That's me!" replied the man.

"Indeed!" Well, my name was so-and-so. I had taken the liberty of sending
him an application, I did not know if it had been of any use.

He repeated my name a couple of times and commenced to laugh.

"Well now, you shall see," he said, taking my letter out of his
breast-pocket, "if you will just be good enough to see how you deal with
dates, sir. You dated your letter 1848," and the man roared with laughter.

"Yes, that was rather a mistake," I said, abashed--a distraction, a want
of thought; I admitted it.

"You see I must have a man who, as a matter of fact, makes no mistakes in
figures," said he. "I regret it, your handwriting is clear, and I like
your letter, too, but--"

I waited a while; this could not possibly be the man's final say. He
busied himself again with the bags.

"Yes, it was a pity," I said; "really an awful pity, but of course it
would not occur again; and, after all, surely this little error could not
have rendered me quite unfit to keep books?"

"No, I didn't say that," he answered, "but in the meantime it had so much