there was a letter by Watson. Oddly enough it left out all that was of
direct importance; but it left in this statement, that he, an authentic
person, wrote the dear old "American Anecdote" story. That was something.
So then I gratefully confessed ignorance again, and again, and again. And
I have many friends, so that there were many brave men, and many fair
women, who were extending the various tentacula of their feeling processes
into the different realms of the known and the unknown, to find that lost
scrap of a Roundhead song for me. And so, at last, it was a girl--as old,
say, as the youngest who will struggle as far as this page in the
Cleveland High School--who said, "Why, there is something about it in that
funny English book, 'Gleanings for the Curious,' I found in the Boston
Library." And sure enough, in an article perfectly worthless in itself,
there were the two words which named the printed collection of music which
the other people had forgotten to name. These three books were each
useless alone; but, when brought together, they established a fact. It
took three people in talk to bring the three books together. And if I had
been such a fool that I could not confess ignorance, or such another fool
as to have distrusted the people I met with, I should never have had the
pleasure of my discovery.

Now I must not go into any more such stories as this, because you will say
I am violating the sixth great rule of talk, which is

Be Short.

And, besides, you must know that "they say" (whoever _they_ may be) that
"young folks" like you skip such explanations, and hurry on to the
stories. I do not believe a word of that, but I obey.

I know one Saint. We will call her Agatha. I used to think she could be