There are three persons who, better than any others, could have — told the simple, uneventful story of 'mr. Staples's life. Of these his wife stands first. She would not have me say it, but I must. And I regret unspeakably that any distrust of her own ability or fitness should have prevented her doing what I am sure she would have done most perfectly. As I have talked with her about her husband, her appreciation of his character and work has seemed so perfect, her sympathy with all his hopes and plans so lively and profound, that I never shall be reconciled to her unwillingness to be his bio grapher and the editress of his writings. I am only partly reconciled by the consideration that she would not have told, as I must tell, or be no true biographer of him, what noble furtherance her husband found in her, what intellectual and spiritual companionship, what rest in weariness, what patient cheer in sickness and in death.