"Now, then," we said, spreading our notes on our knee, "go at it. Tell us, and through us, tell a quarter of a million anxious readers just what all these new discoveries are about."
"The whole thing," said the Professor, warming up to his work as he perceived from the motions of our face and ears our intelligent interest, "is simplicity itself. I can give it to you in a word—"
"That's it," we said. "Give it to us that way."
"It amounts, if one may boil it down to a phrase—"
"Boil it, boil it," we interrupted.
"—amounts, if one takes the mere gist of it—"
"Take it," we said, "take it."
"—amounts to the resolution of the ultimate atom."
"Ha!" we exclaimed.
"I must ask you first to clear your mind," the Professor continued, "of all conception of ponder able magnitude."