"Say, rather, into the region where we balance probabilities and choose the most likely.
It is the scientific use of the imagination, but we have always some material basis on which to start our speculation.
Now, you would call it a guess, no doubt, but I am almost certain that this address has been written in a hotel."
"How in the world can you say that?"
"If you examine it carefully you will see that both the pen and the ink have given the writer trouble.
The pen has spluttered twice in a single word and has run dry three times in a short address, showing that there was very little ink in the bottle.
Now, a private pen or ink-bottle is seldom allowed to be in such a state, and the combination of the two must be quite rare.
But you know the hotel ink and the hotel pen, where it is rare to get anything else.
Yes, I have very little hesitation in saying that could we examine the waste-paper baskets of the hotels around Charing Cross until we found the remains of the mutilated Times leader we could lay our hands straight upon the person who sent this singular message.
Halloa! Halloa! What's this?"