258 LETTER-FILES OF S. W. JOHNSON 



In one of your letters (to which kindly consider this to be 

 the answer) you referred to a meeting of the "A. A. A. C. 

 and E. S." which it was hoped might be held at St. Paul in 

 August last. I suppose you know that said meeting was not 

 held there or anywhere then! 



But the meeting of that A. A. A. etc. etc. etc. was held at 

 Washington about a month ago, and I went to Washington 

 and staid a week, and thought how much more pleasant it 

 would have been were I at St. Paul having a good time. 



Though I don't go at the ringing of the bell any more, and 

 am not laboring to slice information so thin that it can be 

 passed through the skull-sutures into the brain of the average 

 young man who goes to school, I have enough to keep me busy, 

 and am indeed very busy with the Exp. Station and with the 

 several little sciences that I have struggled with for half a 

 century. 



(S. W. J. TO A GRANDNIECE.) 



Dec. 3d, 1896. 



My dear Sara, I much regret that I have so long delayed 

 answering your very nice letter written from your Grand- 

 mamma Easton's house last summer, a year ago and more. 

 I must not only apologize for this neglect, but must explain 

 that I was very brain-tired when the letter was received, and 

 quite unable to make an appreciative answer. 



Your question as to the comparative brightness of Jupiter 

 and Venus, you may very likely have been able to answer 

 for yourself during the 15 months that have elapsed since it 

 was proposed to me. Nevertheless I will have my little say, 

 though I am more versed in things terrestrial than in those 

 celestial nor have I seen either of the heavenly bodies you 

 inquire about for a long time. But when I was a school-boy 

 I "looked after" the stars occasionally, very much as I 

 ' ' fetched up the cows " or " tended the twins, ' ' and although 

 all these varieties of activity are now and long have been to 



