When I turned the corner I saw a strange figure only a few yards distant--a strange figure most strangely accoutred--a tall, thin, loose-jointed man, who had made himself appear taller still by wearing a high-peaked hat, the pinnacle of which was surmounted by a wire framework, in which half a dozen bells were suspended, ringing with every motion of the head. He had on a long linen duster, which flapped about his gaunt shanks encased in tight, black trousers. Between his legs he had a pair of cymbals, fastened one to each knee. Upon his back was strapped a small bass-drum, on which there was painted the announcement that the performer was "Prof. Theophilus Briggs, the Solo Orchestra." A drumstick was attached to each side of the drum and connected with a cord that ran down his legs to his feet, so that by beating time with his toes he could make the drum take part in his concert. The Pan-pipes that I had heard were fastened to his breast just at the height of his chin, so that he could easily blow into them by the slightest inclination of his head. In his left hand he held a fiddle, and in his right hand he had a fiddle-bow. Just as I came in sight, he tapped the fiddle with the bow, as though to call the attention of the orchestra. Then he raised the fiddle; not to his chin, for the Pan-pipes made this impossible, but to the other position, not infrequent among street musicians, just below the shoulder. Evidently I had just arrived in time. He was not a foreigner, obviously enough. It needed only one glance at the elongated visage, with its good-natured eyes and its gentle mouth, to show that here was a native American whose parents and grandparents also had been born on this side of the Atlantic. "I beg your pardon for interrupting you before you begin," I said, hastily, "but I shall be very much obliged indeed if you would kindly consent to give your performance a little farther down this street--a little farther away from this corner." I saw at once that I had not chosen my words adroitly, for the kindly smile faded from his lips, and there was more than a hint of stiffness in his manner as he responded, slowly: "I don't know as I quite catch your meaning," he began. "I ain't--" "I'm sorry to have to ask you to go away," I interrupted, wishing to explain; "I'd like to hear your concert myself; but the fact is, there's a member of my family slowly recovering from a long sickness, and she's only just fallen asleep now for the first time since midnight." "Why didn't you say so at first?" was Professor Briggs's immediate response, and the genial smile returned to his thin face. "Of course, I don't want to worry no one with my music. And I'd just as lief as not go over the other side of the city if it will be any more agreeable to a sick person. I know myself what it is to have sickness in the house; there ain't no one knows what that is better than I do--no one don't."