Greatly impressed by astronomer William Herschel's forty-foot telescope, George III invited the archbishop of Canterbury to view the magnificent new instrument. "Come, my lord bishop," he urged. "I will show you the way to Heaven."

William Wordsworth boasted in Charles Lamb's hearing, "I could write Shakespeare if I had a mind to."

"So it's only the mind that's lacking," murmured Lamb.

An old midwestern farmer once ponderously announced that no ear of corn ever had anything but an even number of rows in it, normally twelve. Out of sheer contrariness, R. Stout maintained this was not the case, although, as a midwesterner himself, he knew that what the farmer said was true. It was winter when this conversation took place, and the farmer made a $100 wager with Stout that he would not be able to produce ears of corn with odd numbers of rows come the following harvest.

In the spring Stout went out to his corn field and carefully cut out a single row from no fewer than 100 young ears of corn. At harvest time he found that he had about a dozen eleven-rowed ears on which no trace of his operations could be detected. He sent the "proof" off to the farmer, who duly mailed back a check for $100. Stout returned the check, saying that he could not win money by betting on a certainty.

Mann was introduced to an American writer of some note who abased himself before the famous novelist, saying that he scarcely considered himself to be a writer in comparison with Thomas Mann. Mann answered him civilly, but afterward he remarked, "He has no right to make himself so small. He's not that big."

Hemingway's son Patrick asked his father to edit a story he had written. Hemingway went through the manuscript carefully, then returned it to his son. "But, Papa," cried Patrick in dismay, "you've only changed one word."

"If it's the right word," said Hemingway, "that's a lot