We were half-way across Great Court when one of the Head's librarywindows opened, and Burgess, with his quaint, mannered courtesy, askedpermission to have a word with me if I could spare him the time. Ientered what was then, and probably is still, the untidiest room inEngland. Since the death of his wife ten years before, Burgess hadruled, or been ruled, with the aid of a capable housekeeper whose tenureof office depended on her undertaking never to touch a book or paper inthe gloomy, low-ceilinged library. From that bargain she can never havedeparted. Overflowing the shelves and tables, piled up in the embrasuresof the windows, littered[Pg 18] carelessly in fireplace or wastepaper basket,lay ten years' accumulation of reports, complaints, presentation copies,text-books, magazines and daily papers.