His first requirement was, in lieu of a desk, a table that might have served a family of twelve for Thanksgiving dinner.

No one could imagine what that vast, polished tableland could serve for until they watched the editor at work.
Then they saw.

Order vanished and chaos reigned.

Huge piles of papers, letters, articles, reports, books, pamphlets, magazines, congregated themselves as if by magic.

To work in such confusion seemed hopeless, but Page eluded the congestion by the simple expedient of moving on.