There was more than the usual number of traffic snarls in Harvard Square one morning last week. To add to the confusion the subway kept belching shoppers and workers late to the office, some of whom were absorbed by the clumsy cluster of orange busses and some of whom had to insinuate themselves between the cars toward the sidewalk.

The cause of the confusion was at once to be seen, for the State was bending its car to the plaint of a Citizen. On this morning a big Irish Policeman, the grey of the ulster set off by his apple-red face, was the State, and he leaned over the side of his traffic box to talk with a man of the street. The latter was a well-dressed fellow, and from the puzzled expressions of the two it was clear that the location of some back street was uncertain in their minds. As we passed beneath the symbol of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts a fragment of the conversation slipped between the horns of the traffic jam. The officer and not the merchant was the questioner.

"What price can you give me on Lonely Lady in the Fourth," was his topic.