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The Project Gutenberg EBook of Bartleby, The Scrivener, by Herman Melville | |
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with | |
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or | |
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included | |
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net | |
Title: Bartleby, The Scrivener | |
A Story of Wall-Street | |
Author: Herman Melville | |
Release Date: February 23, 2004 [EBook #11231] | |
[Date last updated: April 29, 2005] | |
Language: English | |
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BARTLEBY, THE SCRIVENER *** | |
Produced by Steve J. Nelson and Clara T. Nelson | |
BARTLEBY, THE SCRIVENER. | |
A STORY OF WALL-STREET. | |
I am a rather elderly man. The nature of my avocations for the last | |
thirty years has brought me into more than ordinary contact with what | |
would seem an interesting and somewhat singular set of men, of whom as | |
yet nothing that I know of has ever been written:--I mean the | |
law-copyists or scriveners. I have known very many of them, | |
professionally and privately, and if I pleased, could relate divers | |
histories, at which good-natured gentlemen might smile, and sentimental | |
souls might weep. But I waive the biographies of all other scriveners | |
for a few passages in the life of Bartleby, who was a scrivener of the | |
strangest I ever saw or heard of. While of other law-copyists I might | |
write the complete life, of Bartleby nothing of that sort can be done. | |
I believe that no materials exist for a full and satisfactory biography | |
of this man. It is an irreparable loss to literature. Bartleby was one | |
of those beings of whom nothing is ascertainable, except from the | |
original sources, and in his case those are very small. What my own | |
astonished eyes saw of Bartleby, _that_ is all I know of him, except, | |
indeed, one vague report which will appear in the sequel. | |
Ere introducing the scrivener, as he first appeared to me, it is fit I | |
make some mention of myself, my _employees_, my business, my chambers, | |
and general surroundings; because some such description is indispensable | |
to an adequate understanding of the chief character about to be | |
presented. | |
Imprimis: I am a man who, from his youth upwards, has been filled with | |
a profound conviction that the easiest way of life is the best. Hence, | |
though I belong to a profession proverbially energetic and nervous, even | |
to turbulence, at times, yet nothing of that sort have I ever suffered | |
to invade my peace. I am one of those unambitious lawyers who never | |
addresses a jury, or in any way draws down public applause; but in the | |
cool tranquility of a snug retreat, do a snug business among rich men's | |
bonds and mortgages and title-deeds. All who know me, consider me an | |
eminently _safe_ man. The late John Jacob Astor, a personage little | |
given to poetic enthusiasm, had no hesitation in pronouncing my first | |
grand point to be prudence; my next, method. I do not speak it in | |
vanity, but simply record the fact, that I was not unemployed in my | |
profession by the late John Jacob Astor; a name which, I admit, I love | |
to repeat, for it hath a rounded and orbicular sound to it, and rings | |
like unto bullion. I will freely add, that I was not insensible to the | |
late John Jacob Astor's good opinion. | |
Some time prior to the period at which this little history begins, my | |
avocations had been largely increased. The good old office, now extinct | |
in the State of New York, of a Master in Chancery, had been conferred | |
upon me. It was not a very arduous office, but very pleasantly | |
remunerative. I seldom lose my temper; much more seldom indulge in | |
dangerous indignation at wrongs and outrages; but I must be permitted to | |
be rash here and declare, that I consider the sudden and violent | |
abrogation of the office of Master in Chancery, by the new Constitution, | |
as a--premature act; inasmuch as I had counted upon a life-lease of the | |
profits, whereas I only received those of a few short years. But this | |
is by the way. | |
My chambers were up stairs at No.--Wall-street. At one end they looked | |
upon the white wall of the interior of a spacious sky-light shaft, | |
penetrating the building from top to bottom. This view might have been | |
considered rather tame than otherwise, deficient in what landscape | |
painters call "life." But if so, the view from the other end of my | |
chambers offered, at least, a contrast, if nothing more. In that | |
direction my windows commanded an unobstructed view of a lofty brick | |
wall, black by age and everlasting shade; which wall required no | |
spy-glass to bring out its lurking beauties, but for the benefit of all | |
near-sighted spectators, was pushed up to within ten feet of my window | |
panes. Owing to the great height of the surrounding buildings, and my | |
chambers being on the second floor, the interval between this wall and | |
mine not a little resembled a huge square cistern. | |
At the period just preceding the advent of Bartleby, I had two persons | |
as copyists in my employment, and a promising lad as an office-boy. | |
First, Turkey; second, Nippers; third, Ginger Nut. These may seem | |
names, the like of which are not usually found in the Directory. In | |
truth they were nicknames, mutually conferred upon each other by my | |
three clerks, and were deemed expressive of their respective persons or | |
characters. Turkey was a short, pursy Englishman of about my own age, | |
that is, somewhere not far from sixty. In the morning, one might say, | |
his face was of a fine florid hue, but after twelve o'clock, | |
meridian--his dinner hour--it blazed like a grate full of Christmas | |
coals; and continued blazing--but, as it were, with a gradual wane--till | |
6 o'clock, P.M. or thereabouts, after which I saw no more of the | |
proprietor of the face, which gaining its meridian with the sun, seemed | |
to set with it, to rise, culminate, and decline the following day, with | |
the like regularity and undiminished glory. There are many singular | |
coincidences I have known in the course of my life, not the least among | |
which was the fact, that exactly when Turkey displayed his fullest beams | |
from his red and radiant countenance, just then, too, at that critical | |
moment, began the daily period when I considered his business capacities | |
as seriously disturbed for the remainder of the twenty-four hours. Not | |
that he was absolutely idle, or averse to business then; far from it. | |
The difficulty was, he was apt to be altogether too energetic. There | |
was a strange, inflamed, flurried, flighty recklessness of activity | |
about him. He would be incautious in dipping his pen into his inkstand. | |
All his blots upon my documents, were dropped there after twelve | |
o'clock, meridian. Indeed, not only would he be reckless and sadly | |
given to making blots in the afternoon, but some days he went further, | |
and was rather noisy. At such times, too, his face flamed with | |
augmented blazonry, as if cannel coal had been heaped on anthracite. He | |
made an unpleasant racket with his chair; spilled his sand-box; in | |
mending his pens, impatiently split them all to pieces, and threw them | |
on the floor in a sudden passion; stood up and leaned over his table, | |
boxing his papers about in a most indecorous manner, very sad to behold | |
in an elderly man like him. Nevertheless, as he was in many ways a most | |
valuable person to me, and all the time before twelve o'clock, meridian, | |
was the quickest, steadiest creature too, accomplishing a great deal of | |
work in a style not easy to be matched--for these reasons, I was willing | |
to overlook his eccentricities, though indeed, occasionally, I | |
remonstrated with him. I did this very gently, however, because, though | |
the civilest, nay, the blandest and most reverential of men in the | |
morning, yet in the afternoon he was disposed, upon provocation, to be | |
slightly rash with his tongue, in fact, insolent. Now, valuing his | |
morning services as I did, and resolved not to lose them; yet, at the | |
same time made uncomfortable by his inflamed ways after twelve o'clock; | |
and being a man of peace, unwilling by my admonitions to call forth | |
unseemly retorts from him; I took upon me, one Saturday noon (he was | |
always worse on Saturdays), to hint to him, very kindly, that perhaps | |
now that he was growing old, it might be well to abridge his labors; in | |
short, he need not come to my chambers after twelve o'clock, but, dinner | |
over, had best go home to his lodgings and rest himself till teatime. | |
But no; he insisted upon his afternoon devotions. His countenance | |
became intolerably fervid, as he oratorically assured me--gesticulating | |
with a long ruler at the other end of the room--that if his services in | |
the morning were useful, how indispensable, then, in the afternoon? | |
"With submission, sir," said Turkey on this occasion, "I consider myself | |
your right-hand man. In the morning I but marshal and deploy my | |
columns; but in the afternoon I put myself at their head, and gallantly | |
charge the foe, thus!"--and he made a violent thrust with the ruler. | |
"But the blots, Turkey," intimated I. | |
"True,--but, with submission, sir, behold these hairs! I am getting | |
old. Surely, sir, a blot or two of a warm afternoon is not to be | |
severely urged against gray hairs. Old age--even if it blot the | |
page--is honorable. With submission, sir, we _both_ are getting old." | |
This appeal to my fellow-feeling was hardly to be resisted. At all | |
events, I saw that go he would not. So I made up my mind to let him | |
stay, resolving, nevertheless, to see to it, that during the afternoon | |
he had to do with my less important papers. | |
Nippers, the second on my list, was a whiskered, sallow, and, upon the | |
whole, rather piratical-looking young man of about five and twenty. I | |
always deemed him the victim of two evil powers--ambition and | |
indigestion. The ambition was evinced by a certain impatience of the | |
duties of a mere copyist, an unwarrantable usurpation of strictly | |
professional affairs, such as the original drawing up of legal | |
documents. The indigestion seemed betokened in an occasional nervous | |
testiness and grinning irritability, causing the teeth to audibly grind | |
together over mistakes committed in copying; unnecessary maledictions, | |
hissed, rather than spoken, in the heat of business; and especially by a | |
continual discontent with the height of the table where he worked. | |
Though of a very ingenious mechanical turn, Nippers could never get this | |
table to suit him. He put chips under it, blocks of various sorts, bits | |
of pasteboard, and at last went so far as to attempt an exquisite | |
adjustment by final pieces of folded blotting paper. But no invention | |
would answer. If, for the sake of easing his back, he brought the table | |
lid at a sharp angle well up towards his chin, and wrote there like a | |
man using the steep roof of a Dutch house for his desk:--then he | |
declared that it stopped the circulation in his arms. If now he lowered | |
the table to his waistbands, and stooped over it in writing, then there | |
was a sore aching in his back. In short, the truth of the matter was, | |
Nippers knew not what he wanted. Or, if he wanted any thing, it was to | |
be rid of a scrivener's table altogether. Among the manifestations of | |
his diseased ambition was a fondness he had for receiving visits from | |
certain ambiguous-looking fellows in seedy coats, whom he called his | |
clients. Indeed I was aware that not only was he, at times, | |
considerable of a ward-politician, but he occasionally did a little | |
business at the Justices' courts, and was not unknown on the steps of | |
the Tombs. I have good reason to believe, however, that one individual | |
who called upon him at my chambers, and who, with a grand air, he | |
insisted was his client, was no other than a dun, and the alleged | |
title-deed, a bill. But with all his failings, and the annoyances he | |
caused me, Nippers, like his compatriot Turkey, was a very useful man to | |
me; wrote a neat, swift hand; and, when he chose, was not deficient in a | |
gentlemanly sort of deportment. Added to this, he always dressed in a | |
gentlemanly sort of way; and so, incidentally, reflected credit upon my | |
chambers. Whereas with respect to Turkey, I had much ado to keep him | |
from being a reproach to me. His clothes were apt to look oily and | |
smell of eating-houses. He wore his pantaloons very loose and baggy in | |
summer. His coats were execrable; his hat not to be handled. But while | |
the hat was a thing of indifference to me, inasmuch as his natural | |
civility and deference, as a dependent Englishman, always led him to | |
doff it the moment he entered the room, yet his coat was another matter. | |
Concerning his coats, I reasoned with him; but with no effect. The | |
truth was, I suppose, that a man of so small an income, could not afford | |
to sport such a lustrous face and a lustrous coat at one and the same | |
time. As Nippers once observed, Turkey's money went chiefly for red | |
ink. One winter day I presented Turkey with a highly-respectable | |
looking coat of my own, a padded gray coat, of a most comfortable | |
warmth, and which buttoned straight up from the knee to the neck. I | |
thought Turkey would appreciate the favor, and abate his rashness and | |
obstreperousness of afternoons. But no. I verily believe that | |
buttoning himself up in so downy and blanket-like a coat had a | |
pernicious effect upon him; upon the same principle that too much oats | |
are bad for horses. In fact, precisely as a rash, restive horse is said | |
to feel his oats, so Turkey felt his coat. It made him insolent. He | |
was a man whom prosperity harmed. | |
Though concerning the self-indulgent habits of Turkey I had my own | |
private surmises, yet touching Nippers I was well persuaded that | |
whatever might be his faults in other respects, he was, at least, a | |
temperate young man. But indeed, nature herself seemed to have been his | |
vintner, and at his birth charged him so thoroughly with an irritable, | |
brandy-like disposition, that all subsequent potations were needless. | |
When I consider how, amid the stillness of my chambers, Nippers would | |
sometimes impatiently rise from his seat, and stooping over his table, | |
spread his arms wide apart, seize the whole desk, and move it, and jerk | |
it, with a grim, grinding motion on the floor, as if the table were a | |
perverse voluntary agent, intent on thwarting and vexing him; I plainly | |
perceive that for Nippers, brandy and water were altogether superfluous. | |
It was fortunate for me that, owing to its peculiar | |
cause--indigestion--the irritability and consequent nervousness of | |
Nippers, were mainly observable in the morning, while in the afternoon | |
he was comparatively mild. So that Turkey's paroxysms only coming on | |
about twelve o'clock, I never had to do with their eccentricities at one | |
time. Their fits relieved each other like guards. When Nippers' was | |
on, Turkey's was off; and _vice versa_. This was a good natural | |
arrangement under the circumstances. | |
Ginger Nut, the third on my list, was a lad some twelve years old. His | |
father was a carman, ambitious of seeing his son on the bench instead of | |
a cart, before he died. So he sent him to my office as student at law, | |
errand boy, and cleaner and sweeper, at the rate of one dollar a week. | |
He had a little desk to himself, but he did not use it much. Upon | |
inspection, the drawer exhibited a great array of the shells of various | |
sorts of nuts. Indeed, to this quick-witted youth the whole noble | |
science of the law was contained in a nut-shell. Not the least among | |
the employments of Ginger Nut, as well as one which he discharged with | |
the most alacrity, was his duty as cake and apple purveyor for Turkey | |
and Nippers. Copying law papers being proverbially dry, husky sort of | |
business, my two scriveners were fain to moisten their mouths very often | |
with Spitzenbergs to be had at the numerous stalls nigh the Custom | |
House and Post Office. Also, they sent Ginger Nut very frequently for | |
that peculiar cake--small, flat, round, and very spicy--after which he | |
had been named by them. Of a cold morning when business was but dull, | |
Turkey would gobble up scores of these cakes, as if they were mere | |
wafers--indeed they sell them at the rate of six or eight for a | |
penny--the scrape of his pen blending with the crunching of the crisp | |
particles in his mouth. Of all the fiery afternoon blunders and | |
flurried rashnesses of Turkey, was his once moistening a ginger-cake | |
between his lips, and clapping it on to a mortgage for a seal. I came | |
within an ace of dismissing him then. But he mollified me by making an | |
oriental bow, and saying--"With submission, sir, it was generous of me | |
to find you in stationery on my own account." | |
Now my original business--that of a conveyancer and title hunter, and | |
drawer-up of recondite documents of all sorts--was considerably | |
increased by receiving the master's office. There was now great work | |
for scriveners. Not only must I push the clerks already with me, but I | |
must have additional help. In answer to my advertisement, a motionless | |
young man one morning, stood upon my office threshold, the door being | |
open, for it was summer. I can see that figure now--pallidly neat, | |
pitiably respectable, incurably forlorn! It was Bartleby. | |
After a few words touching his qualifications, I engaged him, glad to | |
have among my corps of copyists a man of so singularly sedate an aspect, | |
which I thought might operate beneficially upon the flighty temper of | |
Turkey, and the fiery one of Nippers. | |
I should have stated before that ground glass folding-doors divided my | |
premises into two parts, one of which was occupied by my scriveners, the | |
other by myself. According to my humor I threw open these doors, or | |
closed them. I resolved to assign Bartleby a corner by the | |
folding-doors, but on my side of them, so as to have this quiet man | |
within easy call, in case any trifling thing was to be done. I placed | |
his desk close up to a small side-window in that part of the room, a | |
window which originally had afforded a lateral view of certain grimy | |
back-yards and bricks, but which, owing to subsequent erections, | |
commanded at present no view at all, though it gave some light. Within | |
three feet of the panes was a wall, and the light came down from far | |
above, between two lofty buildings, as from a very small opening in a | |
dome. Still further to a satisfactory arrangement, I procured a high | |
green folding screen, which might entirely isolate Bartleby from my | |
sight, though not remove him from my voice. And thus, in a manner, | |
privacy and society were conjoined. | |
At first Bartleby did an extraordinary quantity of writing. As if long | |
famishing for something to copy, he seemed to gorge himself on my | |
documents. There was no pause for digestion. He ran a day and night | |
line, copying by sun-light and by candle-light. I should have been | |
quite delighted with his application, had he been cheerfully | |
industrious. But he wrote on silently, palely, mechanically. | |
It is, of course, an indispensable part of a scrivener's business to | |
verify the accuracy of his copy, word by word. Where there are two or | |
more scriveners in an office, they assist each other in this | |
examination, one reading from the copy, the other holding the original. | |
It is a very dull, wearisome, and lethargic affair. I can readily | |
imagine that to some sanguine temperaments it would be altogether | |
intolerable. For example, I cannot credit that the mettlesome poet | |
Byron would have contentedly sat down with Bartleby to examine a law | |
document of, say five hundred pages, closely written in a crimpy hand. | |
Now and then, in the haste of business, it had been my habit to assist | |
in comparing some brief document myself, calling Turkey or Nippers for | |
this purpose. One object I had in placing Bartleby so handy to me | |
behind the screen, was to avail myself of his services on such trivial | |
occasions. It was on the third day, I think, of his being with me, and | |
before any necessity had arisen for having his own writing examined, | |
that, being much hurried to complete a small affair I had in hand, I | |
abruptly called to Bartleby. In my haste and natural expectancy of | |
instant compliance, I sat with my head bent over the original on my | |
desk, and my right hand sideways, and somewhat nervously extended with | |
the copy, so that immediately upon emerging from his retreat, Bartleby | |
might snatch it and proceed to business without the least delay. | |
In this very attitude did I sit when I called to him, rapidly stating | |
what it was I wanted him to do--namely, to examine a small paper with | |
me. Imagine my surprise, nay, my consternation, when without moving | |
from his privacy, Bartleby in a singularly mild, firm voice, replied, "I | |
would prefer not to." | |
I sat awhile in perfect silence, rallying my stunned faculties. | |
Immediately it occurred to me that my ears had deceived me, or Bartleby | |
had entirely misunderstood my meaning. I repeated my request in the | |
clearest tone I could assume. But in quite as clear a one came the | |
previous reply, "I would prefer not to." | |
"Prefer not to," echoed I, rising in high excitement, and crossing the | |
room with a stride. "What do you mean? Are you moon-struck? I want | |
you to help me compare this sheet here--take it," and I thrust it | |
towards him. | |
"I would prefer not to," said he. | |
I looked at him steadfastly. His face was leanly composed; his gray eye | |
dimly calm. Not a wrinkle of agitation rippled him. Had there been the | |
least uneasiness, anger, impatience or impertinence in his manner; in | |
other words, had there been any thing ordinarily human about him, | |
doubtless I should have violently dismissed him from the premises. But | |
as it was, I should have as soon thought of turning my pale | |
plaster-of-paris bust of Cicero out of doors. I stood gazing at him | |
awhile, as he went on with his own writing, and then reseated myself at | |
my desk. This is very strange, thought I. What had one best do? But | |
my business hurried me. I concluded to forget the matter for the | |
present, reserving it for my future leisure. So calling Nippers from | |
the other room, the paper was speedily examined. | |
A few days after this, Bartleby concluded four lengthy documents, being | |
quadruplicates of a week's testimony taken before me in my High Court of | |
Chancery. It became necessary to examine them. It was an important | |
suit, and great accuracy was imperative. Having all things arranged I | |
called Turkey, Nippers and Ginger Nut from the next room, meaning to | |
place the four copies in the hands of my four clerks, while I should | |
read from the original. Accordingly Turkey, Nippers and Ginger Nut had | |
taken their seats in a row, each with his document in hand, when I | |
called to Bartleby to join this interesting group. | |
"Bartleby! quick, I am waiting." | |
I heard a slow scrape of his chair legs on the uncarpeted floor, and | |
soon he appeared standing at the entrance of his hermitage. | |
"What is wanted?" said he mildly. | |
"The copies, the copies," said I hurriedly. "We are going to examine | |
them. There"--and I held towards him the fourth quadruplicate. | |
"I would prefer not to," he said, and gently disappeared behind the | |
screen. | |
For a few moments I was turned into a pillar of salt, standing at the | |
head of my seated column of clerks. Recovering myself, I advanced | |
towards the screen, and demanded the reason for such extraordinary | |
conduct. | |
"_Why_ do you refuse?" | |
"I would prefer not to." | |
With any other man I should have flown outright into a dreadful passion, | |
scorned all further words, and thrust him ignominiously from my | |
presence. But there was something about Bartleby that not only | |
strangely disarmed me, but in a wonderful manner touched and | |
disconcerted me. I began to reason with him. | |
"These are your own copies we are about to examine. It is labor saving | |
to you, because one examination will answer for your four papers. It is | |
common usage. Every copyist is bound to help examine his copy. Is it | |
not so? Will you not speak? Answer!" | |
"I prefer not to," he replied in a flute-like tone. It seemed to me | |
that while I had been addressing him, he carefully revolved every | |
statement that I made; fully comprehended the meaning; could not gainsay | |
the irresistible conclusions; but, at the same time, some paramount | |
consideration prevailed with him to reply as he did. | |
"You are decided, then, not to comply with my request--a request made | |
according to common usage and common sense?" | |
He briefly gave me to understand that on that point my judgment was | |
sound. Yes: his decision was irreversible. | |
It is not seldom the case that when a man is browbeaten in some | |
unprecedented and violently unreasonable way, he begins to stagger in | |
his own plainest faith. He begins, as it were, vaguely to surmise that, | |
wonderful as it may be, all the justice and all the reason is on the | |
other side. Accordingly, if any disinterested persons are present, he | |
turns to them for some reinforcement for his own faltering mind. | |
"Turkey," said I, "what do you think of this? Am I not right?" | |
"With submission, sir," said Turkey, with his blandest tone, "I think | |
that you are." | |
"Nippers," said I, "what do _you_ think of it?" | |
"I think I should kick him out of the office." | |
(The reader of nice perceptions will here perceive that, it being | |
morning, Turkey's answer is couched in polite and tranquil terms, but | |
Nippers replies in ill-tempered ones. Or, to repeat a previous | |
sentence, Nippers' ugly mood was on duty and Turkey's off.) | |
"Ginger Nut," said I, willing to enlist the smallest suffrage in my | |
behalf, "what do you think of it?" | |
"I think, sir, he's a little _luny_," replied Ginger Nut with a grin. | |
"You hear what they say," said I, turning towards the screen, "come | |
forth and do your duty." | |
But he vouchsafed no reply. I pondered a moment in sore perplexity. | |
But once more business hurried me. I determined again to postpone the | |
consideration of this dilemma to my future leisure. With a little | |
trouble we made out to examine the papers without Bartleby, though at | |
every page or two, Turkey deferentially dropped his opinion that this | |
proceeding was quite out of the common; while Nippers, twitching in his | |
chair with a dyspeptic nervousness, ground out between his set teeth | |
occasional hissing maledictions against the stubborn oaf behind the | |
screen. And for his (Nippers') part, this was the first and the last | |
time he would do another man's business without pay. | |
Meanwhile Bartleby sat in his hermitage, oblivious to every thing but | |
his own peculiar business there. | |
Some days passed, the scrivener being employed upon another lengthy | |
work. His late remarkable conduct led me to regard his ways narrowly. | |
I observed that he never went to dinner; indeed that he never went any | |
where. As yet I had never of my personal knowledge known him to be | |
outside of my office. He was a perpetual sentry in the corner. At | |
about eleven o'clock though, in the morning, I noticed that Ginger Nut | |
would advance toward the opening in Bartleby's screen, as if silently | |
beckoned thither by a gesture invisible to me where I sat. The boy | |
would then leave the office jingling a few pence, and reappear with a | |
handful of ginger-nuts which he delivered in the hermitage, receiving | |
two of the cakes for his trouble. | |
He lives, then, on ginger-nuts, thought I; never eats a dinner, properly | |
speaking; he must be a vegetarian then; but no; he never eats even | |
vegetables, he eats nothing but ginger-nuts. My mind then ran on in | |
reveries concerning the probable effects upon the human constitution of | |
living entirely on ginger-nuts. Ginger-nuts are so called because they | |
contain ginger as one of their peculiar constituents, and the final | |
flavoring one. Now what was ginger? A hot, spicy thing. Was Bartleby | |
hot and spicy? Not at all. Ginger, then, had no effect upon Bartleby. | |
Probably he preferred it should have none. | |
Nothing so aggravates an earnest person as a passive resistance. If the | |
individual so resisted be of a not inhumane temper, and the resisting | |
one perfectly harmless in his passivity; then, in the better moods of | |
the former, he will endeavor charitably to construe to his imagination | |
what proves impossible to be solved by his judgment. Even so, for the | |
most part, I regarded Bartleby and his ways. Poor fellow! thought I, he | |
means no mischief; it is plain he intends no insolence; his aspect | |
sufficiently evinces that his eccentricities are involuntary. He is | |
useful to me. I can get along with him. If I turn him away, the | |
chances are he will fall in with some less indulgent employer, and then | |
he will be rudely treated, and perhaps driven forth miserably to starve. | |
Yes. Here I can cheaply purchase a delicious self-approval. To | |
befriend Bartleby; to humor him in his strange willfulness, will cost me | |
little or nothing, while I lay up in my soul what will eventually prove | |
a sweet morsel for my conscience. But this mood was not invariable with | |
me. The passiveness of Bartleby sometimes irritated me. I felt | |
strangely goaded on to encounter him in new opposition, to elicit some | |
angry spark from him answerable to my own. But indeed I might as well | |
have essayed to strike fire with my knuckles against a bit of Windsor | |
soap. But one afternoon the evil impulse in me mastered me, and the | |
following little scene ensued: | |
"Bartleby," said I, "when those papers are all copied, I will compare | |
them with you." | |
"I would prefer not to." | |
"How? Surely you do not mean to persist in that mulish vagary?" | |
No answer. | |
I threw open the folding-doors near by, and turning upon Turkey and | |
Nippers, exclaimed in an excited manner-- | |
"He says, a second time, he won't examine his papers. What do you think | |
of it, Turkey?" | |
It was afternoon, be it remembered. Turkey sat glowing like a brass | |
boiler, his bald head steaming, his hands reeling among his blotted | |
papers. | |
"Think of it?" roared Turkey; "I think I'll just step behind his screen, | |
and black his eyes for him!" | |
So saying, Turkey rose to his feet and threw his arms into a pugilistic | |
position. He was hurrying away to make good his promise, when I | |
detained him, alarmed at the effect of incautiously rousing Turkey's | |
combativeness after dinner. | |
"Sit down, Turkey," said I, "and hear what Nippers has to say. What do | |
you think of it, Nippers? Would I not be justified in immediately | |
dismissing Bartleby?" | |
"Excuse me, that is for you to decide, sir. I think his conduct quite | |
unusual, and indeed unjust, as regards Turkey and myself. But it may | |
only be a passing whim." | |
"Ah," exclaimed I, "you have strangely changed your mind then--you speak | |
very gently of him now." | |
"All beer," cried Turkey; "gentleness is effects of beer--Nippers and I | |
dined together to-day. You see how gentle _I_ am, sir. Shall I go and | |
black his eyes?" | |
"You refer to Bartleby, I suppose. No, not to-day, Turkey," I replied; | |
"pray, put up your fists." | |
I closed the doors, and again advanced towards Bartleby. I felt | |
additional incentives tempting me to my fate. I burned to be rebelled | |
against again. I remembered that Bartleby never left the office. | |
"Bartleby," said I, "Ginger Nut is away; just step round to the Post | |
Office, won't you? (it was but a three minute walk,) and see if there is | |
any thing for me." | |
"I would prefer not to." | |
"You _will_ not?" | |
"I _prefer_ not." | |
I staggered to my desk, and sat there in a deep study. My blind | |
inveteracy returned. Was there any other thing in which I could procure | |
myself to be ignominiously repulsed by this lean, penniless wight?--my | |
hired clerk? What added thing is there, perfectly reasonable, that he | |
will be sure to refuse to do? | |
"Bartleby!" | |
No answer. | |
"Bartleby," in a louder tone. | |
No answer. | |
"Bartleby," I roared. | |
Like a very ghost, agreeably to the laws of magical invocation, at the | |
third summons, he appeared at the entrance of his hermitage. | |
"Go to the next room, and tell Nippers to come to me." | |
"I prefer not to," he respectfully and slowly said, and mildly | |
disappeared. | |
"Very good, Bartleby," said I, in a quiet sort of serenely severe | |
self-possessed tone, intimating the unalterable purpose of some terrible | |
retribution very close at hand. At the moment I half intended something | |
of the kind. But upon the whole, as it was drawing towards my | |
dinner-hour, I thought it best to put on my hat and walk home for the | |
day, suffering much from perplexity and distress of mind. | |
Shall I acknowledge it? The conclusion of this whole business was, that | |
it soon became a fixed fact of my chambers, that a pale young scrivener, | |
by the name of Bartleby, and a desk there; that he copied for me at the | |
usual rate of four cents a folio (one hundred words); but he was | |
permanently exempt from examining the work done by him, that duty being | |
transferred to Turkey and Nippers, one of compliment doubtless to their | |
superior acuteness; moreover, said Bartleby was never on any account to | |
be dispatched on the most trivial errand of any sort; and that even if | |
entreated to take upon him such a matter, it was generally understood | |
that he would prefer not to--in other words, that he would refuse | |
pointblank. | |
As days passed on, I became considerably reconciled to Bartleby. His | |
steadiness, his freedom from all dissipation, his incessant industry | |
(except when he chose to throw himself into a standing revery behind his | |
screen), his great stillness, his unalterableness of demeanor under all | |
circumstances, made him a valuable acquisition. One prime thing was | |
this,--_he was always there;_--first in the morning, continually | |
through the day, and the last at night. I had a singular confidence in | |
his honesty. I felt my most precious papers perfectly safe in his | |
hands. Sometimes to be sure I could not, for the very soul of me, avoid | |
falling into sudden spasmodic passions with him. For it was exceeding | |
difficult to bear in mind all the time those strange peculiarities, | |
privileges, and unheard of exemptions, forming the tacit stipulations on | |
Bartleby's part under which he remained in my office. Now and then, in | |
the eagerness of dispatching pressing business, I would inadvertently | |
summon Bartleby, in a short, rapid tone, to put his finger, say, on the | |
incipient tie of a bit of red tape with which I was about compressing | |
some papers. Of course, from behind the screen the usual answer, "I | |
prefer not to," was sure to come; and then, how could a human creature | |
with the common infirmities of our nature, refrain from bitterly | |
exclaiming upon such perverseness--such unreasonableness. However, | |
every added repulse of this sort which I received only tended to lessen | |
the probability of my repeating the inadvertence. | |
Here it must be said, that according to the custom of most legal | |
gentlemen occupying chambers in densely-populated law buildings, there | |
were several keys to my door. One was kept by a woman residing in the | |
attic, which person weekly scrubbed and daily swept and dusted my | |
apartments. Another was kept by Turkey for convenience sake. The third | |
I sometimes carried in my own pocket. The fourth I knew not who had. | |
Now, one Sunday morning I happened to go to Trinity Church, to hear a | |
celebrated preacher, and finding myself rather early on the ground, I | |
thought I would walk around to my chambers for a while. Luckily I had | |
my key with me; but upon applying it to the lock, I found it resisted by | |
something inserted from the inside. Quite surprised, I called out; when | |
to my consternation a key was turned from within; and thrusting his lean | |
visage at me, and holding the door ajar, the apparition of Bartleby | |
appeared, in his shirt sleeves, and otherwise in a strangely tattered | |
dishabille, saying quietly that he was sorry, but he was deeply engaged | |
just then, and--preferred not admitting me at present. In a brief word | |
or two, he moreover added, that perhaps I had better walk round the | |
block two or three times, and by that time he would probably have | |
concluded his affairs. | |
Now, the utterly unsurmised appearance of Bartleby, tenanting my | |
law-chambers of a Sunday morning, with his cadaverously gentlemanly | |
_nonchalance_, yet withal firm and self-possessed, had such a strange | |
effect upon me, that incontinently I slunk away from my own door, and | |
did as desired. But not without sundry twinges of impotent rebellion | |
against the mild effrontery of this unaccountable scrivener. Indeed, it | |
was his wonderful mildness chiefly, which not only disarmed me, but | |
unmanned me, as it were. For I consider that one, for the time, is a | |
sort of unmanned when he tranquilly permits his hired clerk to dictate | |
to him, and order him away from his own premises. Furthermore, I was | |
full of uneasiness as to what Bartleby could possibly be doing in my | |
office in his shirt sleeves, and in an otherwise dismantled condition of | |
a Sunday morning. Was any thing amiss going on? Nay, that was out of | |
the question. It was not to be thought of for a moment that Bartleby | |
was an immoral person. But what could he be doing there?--copying? Nay | |
again, whatever might be his eccentricities, Bartleby was an eminently | |
decorous person. He would be the last man to sit down to his desk in | |
any state approaching to nudity. Besides, it was Sunday; and there was | |
something about Bartleby that forbade the supposition that he would by | |
any secular occupation violate the proprieties of the day. | |
Nevertheless, my mind was not pacified; and full of a restless | |
curiosity, at last I returned to the door. Without hindrance I inserted | |
my key, opened it, and entered. Bartleby was not to be seen. I looked | |
round anxiously, peeped behind his screen; but it was very plain that he | |
was gone. Upon more closely examining the place, I surmised that for an | |
indefinite period Bartleby must have ate, dressed, and slept in my | |
office, and that too without plate, mirror, or bed. The cushioned seat | |
of a rickety old sofa in one corner bore the faint impress of a lean, | |
reclining form. Rolled away under his desk, I found a blanket; under | |
the empty grate, a blacking box and brush; on a chair, a tin basin, with | |
soap and a ragged towel; in a newspaper a few crumbs of ginger-nuts and | |
a morsel of cheese. Yes, thought I, it is evident enough that Bartleby | |
has been making his home here, keeping bachelor's hall all by himself. | |
Immediately then the thought came sweeping across me, What miserable | |
friendlessness and loneliness are here revealed! His poverty is great; | |
but his solitude, how horrible! Think of it. Of a Sunday, Wall-street | |
is deserted as Petra; and every night of every day it is an emptiness. | |
This building too, which of week-days hums with industry and life, at | |
nightfall echoes with sheer vacancy, and all through Sunday is forlorn. | |
And here Bartleby makes his home; sole spectator of a solitude which he | |
has seen all populous--a sort of innocent and transformed Marius | |
brooding among the ruins of Carthage! | |
For the first time in my life a feeling of overpowering stinging | |
melancholy seized me. Before, I had never experienced aught but a | |
not-unpleasing sadness. The bond of a common humanity now drew me | |
irresistibly to gloom. A fraternal melancholy! For both I and Bartleby | |
were sons of Adam. I remembered the bright silks and sparkling faces I | |
had seen that day, in gala trim, swan-like sailing down the Mississippi | |
of Broadway; and I contrasted them with the pallid copyist, and thought | |
to myself, Ah, happiness courts the light, so we deem the world is gay; | |
but misery hides aloof, so we deem that misery there is none. These sad | |
fancyings--chimeras, doubtless, of a sick and silly brain--led on to | |
other and more special thoughts, concerning the eccentricities of | |
Bartleby. Presentiments of strange discoveries hovered round me. The | |
scrivener's pale form appeared to me laid out, among uncaring strangers, | |
in its shivering winding sheet. | |
Suddenly I was attracted by Bartleby's closed desk, the key in open | |
sight left in the lock. | |
I mean no mischief, seek the gratification of no heartless curiosity, | |
thought I; besides, the desk is mine, and its contents too, so I will | |
make bold to look within. Every thing was methodically arranged, the | |
papers smoothly placed. The pigeon holes were deep, and removing the | |
files of documents, I groped into their recesses. Presently I felt | |
something there, and dragged it out. It was an old bandanna | |
handkerchief, heavy and knotted. I opened it, and saw it was a savings' | |
bank. | |
I now recalled all the quiet mysteries which I had noted in the man. I | |
remembered that he never spoke but to answer; that though at intervals | |
he had considerable time to himself, yet I had never seen him | |
reading--no, not even a newspaper; that for long periods he would stand | |
looking out, at his pale window behind the screen, upon the dead brick | |
wall; I was quite sure he never visited any refectory or eating house; | |
while his pale face clearly indicated that he never drank beer like | |
Turkey, or tea and coffee even, like other men; that he never went any | |
where in particular that I could learn; never went out for a walk, | |
unless indeed that was the case at present; that he had declined telling | |
who he was, or whence he came, or whether he had any relatives in the | |
world; that though so thin and pale, he never complained of ill health. | |
And more than all, I remembered a certain unconscious air of pallid--how | |
shall I call it?--of pallid haughtiness, say, or rather an austere | |
reserve about him, which had positively awed me into my tame compliance | |
with his eccentricities, when I had feared to ask him to do the | |
slightest incidental thing for me, even though I might know, from his | |
long-continued motionlessness, that behind his screen he must be | |
standing in one of those dead-wall reveries of his. | |
Revolving all these things, and coupling them with the recently | |
discovered fact that he made my office his constant abiding place and | |
home, and not forgetful of his morbid moodiness; revolving all these | |
things, a prudential feeling began to steal over me. My first emotions | |
had been those of pure melancholy and sincerest pity; but just in | |
proportion as the forlornness of Bartleby grew and grew to my | |
imagination, did that same melancholy merge into fear, that pity into | |
repulsion. So true it is, and so terrible too, that up to a certain | |
point the thought or sight of misery enlists our best affections; but, | |
in certain special cases, beyond that point it does not. They err who | |
would assert that invariably this is owing to the inherent selfishness | |
of the human heart. It rather proceeds from a certain hopelessness of | |
remedying excessive and organic ill. To a sensitive being, pity is not | |
seldom pain. And when at last it is perceived that such pity cannot | |
lead to effectual succor, common sense bids the soul rid of it. What I | |
saw that morning persuaded me that the scrivener was the victim of | |
innate and incurable disorder. I might give alms to his body; but his | |
body did not pain him; it was his soul that suffered, and his soul I | |
could not reach. | |
I did not accomplish the purpose of going to Trinity Church that | |
morning. Somehow, the things I had seen disqualified me for the time | |
from church-going. I walked homeward, thinking what I would do with | |
Bartleby. Finally, I resolved upon this;--I would put certain calm | |
questions to him the next morning, touching his history, etc., and if he | |
declined to answer them openly and unreservedly (and I supposed he would | |
prefer not), then to give him a twenty dollar bill over and above | |
whatever I might owe him, and tell him his services were no longer | |
required; but that if in any other way I could assist him, I would be | |
happy to do so, especially if he desired to return to his native place, | |
wherever that might be, I would willingly help to defray the expenses. | |
Moreover, if, after reaching home, he found himself at any time in want | |
of aid, a letter from him would be sure of a reply. | |
The next morning came. | |
"Bartleby," said I, gently calling to him behind his screen. | |
No reply. | |
"Bartleby," said I, in a still gentler tone, "come here; I am not going | |
to ask you to do any thing you would prefer not to do--I simply wish to | |
speak to you." | |
Upon this he noiselessly slid into view. | |
"Will you tell me, Bartleby, where you were born?" | |
"I would prefer not to." | |
"Will you tell me _any thing_ about yourself?" | |
"I would prefer not to." | |
"But what reasonable objection can you have to speak to me? I feel | |
friendly towards you." | |
He did not look at me while I spoke, but kept his glance fixed upon my | |
bust of Cicero, which as I then sat, was directly behind me, some six | |
inches above my head. | |
"What is your answer, Bartleby?" said I, after waiting a considerable | |
time for a reply, during which his countenance remained immovable, only | |
there was the faintest conceivable tremor of the white attenuated mouth. | |
"At present I prefer to give no answer," he said, and retired into his | |
hermitage. | |
It was rather weak in me I confess, but his manner on this occasion | |
nettled me. Not only did there seem to lurk in it a certain calm | |
disdain, but his perverseness seemed ungrateful, considering the | |
undeniable good usage and indulgence he had received from me. | |
Again I sat ruminating what I should do. Mortified as I was at his | |
behavior, and resolved as I had been to dismiss him when I entered my | |
offices, nevertheless I strangely felt something superstitious knocking | |
at my heart, and forbidding me to carry out my purpose, and denouncing | |
me for a villain if I dared to breathe one bitter word against this | |
forlornest of mankind. At last, familiarly drawing my chair behind his | |
screen, I sat down and said: "Bartleby, never mind then about revealing | |
your history; but let me entreat you, as a friend, to comply as far as | |
may be with the usages of this office. Say now you will help to examine | |
papers to-morrow or next day: in short, say now that in a day or two you | |
will begin to be a little reasonable:--say so, Bartleby." | |
"At present I would prefer not to be a little reasonable," was his | |
mildly cadaverous reply. | |
Just then the folding-doors opened, and Nippers approached. He seemed | |
suffering from an unusually bad night's rest, induced by severer | |
indigestion than common. He overheard those final words of Bartleby. | |
"_Prefer not_, eh?" gritted Nippers--"I'd _prefer_ him, if I were you, | |
sir," addressing me--"I'd _prefer_ him; I'd give him preferences, the | |
stubborn mule! What is it, sir, pray, that he _prefers_ not to do now?" | |
Bartleby moved not a limb. | |
"Mr. Nippers," said I, "I'd prefer that you would withdraw for the | |
present." | |
Somehow, of late I had got into the way of involuntarily using this word | |
"prefer" upon all sorts of not exactly suitable occasions. And I | |
trembled to think that my contact with the scrivener had already and | |
seriously affected me in a mental way. And what further and deeper | |
aberration might it not yet produce? This apprehension had not been | |
without efficacy in determining me to summary means. | |
As Nippers, looking very sour and sulky, was departing, Turkey blandly | |
and deferentially approached. | |
"With submission, sir," said he, "yesterday I was thinking about | |
Bartleby here, and I think that if he would but prefer to take a quart | |
of good ale every day, it would do much towards mending him, and | |
enabling him to assist in examining his papers." | |
"So you have got the word too," said I, slightly excited. | |
"With submission, what word, sir," asked Turkey, respectfully crowding | |
himself into the contracted space behind the screen, and by so doing, | |
making me jostle the scrivener. "What word, sir?" | |
"I would prefer to be left alone here," said Bartleby, as if offended at | |
being mobbed in his privacy. | |
"_That's_ the word, Turkey," said I--"that's it." | |
"Oh, _prefer_? oh yes--queer word. I never use it myself. But, sir, as | |
I was saying, if he would but prefer--" | |
"Turkey," interrupted I, "you will please withdraw." | |
"Oh certainly, sir, if you prefer that I should." | |
As he opened the folding-door to retire, Nippers at his desk caught a | |
glimpse of me, and asked whether I would prefer to have a certain paper | |
copied on blue paper or white. He did not in the least roguishly accent | |
the word prefer. It was plain that it involuntarily rolled from his | |
tongue. I thought to myself, surely I must get rid of a demented man, | |
who already has in some degree turned the tongues, if not the heads of | |
myself and clerks. But I thought it prudent not to break the dismission | |
at once. | |
The next day I noticed that Bartleby did nothing but stand at his window | |
in his dead-wall revery. Upon asking him why he did not write, he said | |
that he had decided upon doing no more writing. | |
"Why, how now? what next?" exclaimed I, "do no more writing?" | |
"No more." | |
"And what is the reason?" | |
"Do you not see the reason for yourself," he indifferently replied. | |
I looked steadfastly at him, and perceived that his eyes looked dull and | |
glazed. Instantly it occurred to me, that his unexampled diligence in | |
copying by his dim window for the first few weeks of his stay with me | |
might have temporarily impaired his vision. | |
I was touched. I said something in condolence with him. I hinted that | |
of course he did wisely in abstaining from writing for a while; and | |
urged him to embrace that opportunity of taking wholesome exercise in | |
the open air. This, however, he did not do. A few days after this, my | |
other clerks being absent, and being in a great hurry to dispatch | |
certain letters by the mail, I thought that, having nothing else earthly | |
to do, Bartleby would surely be less inflexible than usual, and carry | |
these letters to the post-office. But he blankly declined. So, much to | |
my inconvenience, I went myself. | |
Still added days went by. Whether Bartleby's eyes improved or not, I | |
could not say. To all appearance, I thought they did. But when I asked | |
him if they did, he vouchsafed no answer. At all events, he would do no | |
copying. At last, in reply to my urgings, he informed me that he had | |
permanently given up copying. | |
"What!" exclaimed I; "suppose your eyes should get entirely well--better | |
than ever before--would you not copy then?" | |
"I have given up copying," he answered, and slid aside. | |
He remained as ever, a fixture in my chamber. Nay--if that were | |
possible--he became still more of a fixture than before. What was to be | |
done? He would do nothing in the office: why should he stay there? In | |
plain fact, he had now become a millstone to me, not only useless as a | |
necklace, but afflictive to bear. Yet I was sorry for him. I speak | |
less than truth when I say that, on his own account, he occasioned me | |
uneasiness. If he would but have named a single relative or friend, I | |
would instantly have written, and urged their taking the poor fellow | |
away to some convenient retreat. But he seemed alone, absolutely alone | |
in the universe. A bit of wreck in the mid Atlantic. At length, | |
necessities connected with my business tyrannized over all other | |
considerations. Decently as I could, I told Bartleby that in six days' | |
time he must unconditionally leave the office. I warned him to take | |
measures, in the interval, for procuring some other abode. I offered to | |
assist him in this endeavor, if he himself would but take the first step | |
towards a removal. "And when you finally quit me, Bartleby," added I, | |
"I shall see that you go not away entirely unprovided. Six days from | |
this hour, remember." | |
At the expiration of that period, I peeped behind the screen, and lo! | |
Bartleby was there. | |
I buttoned up my coat, balanced myself; advanced slowly towards him, | |
touched his shoulder, and said, "The time has come; you must quit this | |
place; I am sorry for you; here is money; but you must go." | |
"I would prefer not," he replied, with his back still towards me. | |
"You _must_." | |
He remained silent. | |
Now I had an unbounded confidence in this man's common honesty. He had | |
frequently restored to me sixpences and shillings carelessly dropped | |
upon the floor, for I am apt to be very reckless in such shirt-button | |
affairs. The proceeding then which followed will not be deemed | |
extraordinary. | |
"Bartleby," said I, "I owe you twelve dollars on account; here are | |
thirty-two; the odd twenty are yours.--Will you take it?" and I handed | |
the bills towards him. | |
But he made no motion. | |
"I will leave them here then," putting them under a weight on the table. | |
Then taking my hat and cane and going to the door I tranquilly turned | |
and added--"After you have removed your things from these offices, | |
Bartleby, you will of course lock the door--since every one is now gone | |
for the day but you--and if you please, slip your key underneath the | |
mat, so that I may have it in the morning. I shall not see you again; | |
so good-bye to you. If hereafter in your new place of abode I can be of | |
any service to you, do not fail to advise me by letter. Good-bye, | |
Bartleby, and fare you well." | |
But he answered not a word; like the last column of some ruined temple, | |
he remained standing mute and solitary in the middle of the otherwise | |
deserted room. | |
As I walked home in a pensive mood, my vanity got the better of my pity. | |
I could not but highly plume myself on my masterly management in getting | |
rid of Bartleby. Masterly I call it, and such it must appear to any | |
dispassionate thinker. The beauty of my procedure seemed to consist in | |
its perfect quietness. There was no vulgar bullying, no bravado of any | |
sort, no choleric hectoring, and striding to and fro across the | |
apartment, jerking out vehement commands for Bartleby to bundle himself | |
off with his beggarly traps. Nothing of the kind. Without loudly | |
bidding Bartleby depart--as an inferior genius might have done--I | |
_assumed_ the ground that depart he must; and upon that assumption built | |
all I had to say. The more I thought over my procedure, the more I was | |
charmed with it. Nevertheless, next morning, upon awakening, I had my | |
doubts,--I had somehow slept off the fumes of vanity. One of the | |
coolest and wisest hours a man has, is just after he awakes in the | |
morning. My procedure seemed as sagacious as ever.--but only in theory. | |
How it would prove in practice--there was the rub. It was truly a | |
beautiful thought to have assumed Bartleby's departure; but, after all, | |
that assumption was simply my own, and none of Bartleby's. The great | |
point was, not whether I had assumed that he would quit me, but whether | |
he would prefer so to do. He was more a man of preferences than | |
assumptions. | |
After breakfast, I walked down town, arguing the probabilities _pro_ and | |
_con_. One moment I thought it would prove a miserable failure, and | |
Bartleby would be found all alive at my office as usual; the next moment | |
it seemed certain that I should see his chair empty. And so I kept | |
veering about. At the corner of Broadway and Canal-street, I saw quite | |
an excited group of people standing in earnest conversation. | |
"I'll take odds he doesn't," said a voice as I passed. | |
"Doesn't go?--done!" said I, "put up your money." | |
I was instinctively putting my hand in my pocket to produce my own, when | |
I remembered that this was an election day. The words I had overheard | |
bore no reference to Bartleby, but to the success or non-success of some | |
candidate for the mayoralty. In my intent frame of mind, I had, as it | |
were, imagined that all Broadway shared in my excitement, and were | |
debating the same question with me. I passed on, very thankful that the | |
uproar of the street screened my momentary absent-mindedness. | |
As I had intended, I was earlier than usual at my office door. I stood | |
listening for a moment. All was still. He must be gone. I tried the | |
knob. The door was locked. Yes, my procedure had worked to a charm; he | |
indeed must be vanished. Yet a certain melancholy mixed with this: I | |
was almost sorry for my brilliant success. I was fumbling under the | |
door mat for the key, which Bartleby was to have left there for me, when | |
accidentally my knee knocked against a panel, producing a summoning | |
sound, and in response a voice came to me from within--"Not yet; I am | |
occupied." | |
It was Bartleby. | |
I was thunderstruck. For an instant I stood like the man who, pipe in | |
mouth, was killed one cloudless afternoon long ago in Virginia, by a | |
summer lightning; at his own warm open window he was killed, and | |
remained leaning out there upon the dreamy afternoon, till some one | |
touched him, when he fell. | |
"Not gone!" I murmured at last. But again obeying that wondrous | |
ascendancy which the inscrutable scrivener had over me, and from which | |
ascendancy, for all my chafing, I could not completely escape, I slowly | |
went down stairs and out into the street, and while walking round the | |
block, considered what I should next do in this unheard-of perplexity. | |
Turn the man out by an actual thrusting I could not; to drive him away | |
by calling him hard names would not do; calling in the police was an | |
unpleasant idea; and yet, permit him to enjoy his cadaverous triumph | |
over me,--this too I could not think of. What was to be done? or, if | |
nothing could be done, was there any thing further that I could _assume_ | |
in the matter? Yes, as before I had prospectively assumed that Bartleby | |
would depart, so now I might retrospectively assume that departed he | |
was. In the legitimate carrying out of this assumption, I might enter | |
my office in a great hurry, and pretending not to see Bartleby at all, | |
walk straight against him as if he were air. Such a proceeding would in | |
a singular degree have the appearance of a home-thrust. It was hardly | |
possible that Bartleby could withstand such an application of the | |
doctrine of assumptions. But upon second thoughts the success of the | |
plan seemed rather dubious. I resolved to argue the matter over with | |
him again. | |
"Bartleby," said I, entering the office, with a quietly severe | |
expression, "I am seriously displeased. I am pained, Bartleby. I had | |
thought better of you. I had imagined you of such a gentlemanly | |
organization, that in any delicate dilemma a slight hint would have | |
suffice--in short, an assumption. But it appears I am deceived. Why," | |
I added, unaffectedly starting, "you have not even touched that money | |
yet," pointing to it, just where I had left it the evening previous. | |
He answered nothing. | |
"Will you, or will you not, quit me?" I now demanded in a sudden | |
passion, advancing close to him. | |
"I would prefer _not_ to quit you," he replied, gently emphasizing the | |
_not_. | |
"What earthly right have you to stay here? Do you pay any rent? Do you | |
pay my taxes? Or is this property yours?" | |
He answered nothing. | |
"Are you ready to go on and write now? Are your eyes recovered? Could | |
you copy a small paper for me this morning? or help examine a few lines? | |
or step round to the post-office? In a word, will you do any thing at | |
all, to give a coloring to your refusal to depart the premises?" | |
He silently retired into his hermitage. | |
I was now in such a state of nervous resentment that I thought it but | |
prudent to check myself at present from further demonstrations. | |
Bartleby and I were alone. I remembered the tragedy of the unfortunate | |
Adams and the still more unfortunate Colt in the solitary office of the | |
latter; and how poor Colt, being dreadfully incensed by Adams, and | |
imprudently permitting himself to get wildly excited, was at unawares | |
hurried into his fatal act--an act which certainly no man could possibly | |
deplore more than the actor himself. Often it had occurred to me in my | |
ponderings upon the subject, that had that altercation taken place in | |
the public street, or at a private residence, it would not have | |
terminated as it did. It was the circumstance of being alone in a | |
solitary office, up stairs, of a building entirely unhallowed by | |
humanizing domestic associations--an uncarpeted office, doubtless, of a | |
dusty, haggard sort of appearance;--this it must have been, which | |
greatly helped to enhance the irritable desperation of the hapless Colt. | |
But when this old Adam of resentment rose in me and tempted me | |
concerning Bartleby, I grappled him and threw him. How? Why, simply by | |
recalling the divine injunction: "A new commandment give I unto you, | |
that ye love one another." Yes, this it was that saved me. Aside from | |
higher considerations, charity often operates as a vastly wise and | |
prudent principle--a great safeguard to its possessor. Men have | |
committed murder for jealousy's sake, and anger's sake, and hatred's | |
sake, and selfishness' sake, and spiritual pride's sake; but no man that | |
ever I heard of, ever committed a diabolical murder for sweet charity's | |
sake. Mere self-interest, then, if no better motive can be enlisted, | |
should, especially with high-tempered men, prompt all beings to charity | |
and philanthropy. At any rate, upon the occasion in question, I strove | |
to drown my exasperated feelings towards the scrivener by benevolently | |
construing his conduct. Poor fellow, poor fellow! thought I, he don't | |
mean any thing; and besides, he has seen hard times, and ought to be | |
indulged. | |
I endeavored also immediately to occupy myself, and at the same time to | |
comfort my despondency. I tried to fancy that in the course of the | |
morning, at such time as might prove agreeable to him, Bartleby, of his | |
own free accord, would emerge from his hermitage, and take up some | |
decided line of march in the direction of the door. But no. Half-past | |
twelve o'clock came; Turkey began to glow in the face, overturn his | |
inkstand, and become generally obstreperous; Nippers abated down into | |
quietude and courtesy; Ginger Nut munched his noon apple; and Bartleby | |
remained standing at his window in one of his profoundest dead-wall | |
reveries. Will it be credited? Ought I to acknowledge it? That | |
afternoon I left the office without saying one further word to him. | |
Some days now passed, during which, at leisure intervals I looked a | |
little into "Edwards on the Will," and "Priestly on Necessity." Under | |
the circumstances, those books induced a salutary feeling. Gradually I | |
slid into the persuasion that these troubles of mine touching the | |
scrivener, had been all predestinated from eternity, and Bartleby was | |
billeted upon me for some mysterious purpose of an all-wise Providence, | |
which it was not for a mere mortal like me to fathom. Yes, Bartleby, | |
stay there behind your screen, thought I; I shall persecute you no more; | |
you are harmless and noiseless as any of these old chairs; in short, I | |
never feel so private as when I know you are here. At last I see it, I | |
feel it; I penetrate to the predestinated purpose of my life. I am | |
content. Others may have loftier parts to enact; but my mission in this | |
world, Bartleby, is to furnish you with office-room for such period as | |
you may see fit to remain. | |
I believe that this wise and blessed frame of mind would have continued | |
with me, had it not been for the unsolicited and uncharitable remarks | |
obtruded upon me by my professional friends who visited the rooms. But | |
thus it often is, that the constant friction of illiberal minds wears | |
out at last the best resolves of the more generous. Though to be sure, | |
when I reflected upon it, it was not strange that people entering my | |
office should be struck by the peculiar aspect of the unaccountable | |
Bartleby, and so be tempted to throw out some sinister observations | |
concerning him. Sometimes an attorney having business with me, and | |
calling at my office and finding no one but the scrivener there, would | |
undertake to obtain some sort of precise information from him touching | |
my whereabouts; but without heeding his idle talk, Bartleby would remain | |
standing immovable in the middle of the room. So after contemplating | |
him in that position for a time, the attorney would depart, no wiser | |
than he came. | |
Also, when a Reference was going on, and the room full of lawyers and | |
witnesses and business was driving fast; some deeply occupied legal | |
gentleman present, seeing Bartleby wholly unemployed, would request him | |
to run round to his (the legal gentleman's) office and fetch some papers | |
for him. Thereupon, Bartleby would tranquilly decline, and yet remain | |
idle as before. Then the lawyer would give a great stare, and turn to | |
me. And what could I say? At last I was made aware that all through | |
the circle of my professional acquaintance, a whisper of wonder was | |
running round, having reference to the strange creature I kept at my | |
office. This worried me very much. And as the idea came upon me of his | |
possibly turning out a long-lived man, and keep occupying my chambers, | |
and denying my authority; and perplexing my visitors; and scandalizing | |
my professional reputation; and casting a general gloom over the | |
premises; keeping soul and body together to the last upon his savings | |
(for doubtless he spent but half a dime a day), and in the end perhaps | |
outlive me, and claim possession of my office by right of his perpetual | |
occupancy: as all these dark anticipations crowded upon me more and | |
more, and my friends continually intruded their relentless remarks upon | |
the apparition in my room; a great change was wrought in me. I resolved | |
to gather all my faculties together, and for ever rid me of this | |
intolerable incubus. | |
Ere revolving any complicated project, however, adapted to this end, I | |
first simply suggested to Bartleby the propriety of his permanent | |
departure. In a calm and serious tone, I commended the idea to his | |
careful and mature consideration. But having taken three days to | |
meditate upon it, he apprised me that his original determination | |
remained the same; in short, that he still preferred to abide with me. | |
What shall I do? I now said to myself, buttoning up my coat to the last | |
button. What shall I do? what ought I to do? what does conscience say I | |
_should_ do with this man, or rather ghost. Rid myself of him, I must; | |
go, he shall. But how? You will not thrust him, the poor, pale, | |
passive mortal,--you will not thrust such a helpless creature out of | |
your door? you will not dishonor yourself by such cruelty? No, I will | |
not, I cannot do that. Rather would I let him live and die here, and | |
then mason up his remains in the wall. What then will you do? For all | |
your coaxing, he will not budge. Bribes he leaves under your own | |
paperweight on your table; in short, it is quite plain that he prefers | |
to cling to you. | |
Then something severe, something unusual must be done. What! surely you | |
will not have him collared by a constable, and commit his innocent | |
pallor to the common jail? And upon what ground could you procure such | |
a thing to be done?--a vagrant, is he? What! he a vagrant, a wanderer, | |
who refuses to budge? It is because he will _not_ be a vagrant, then, | |
that you seek to count him _as_ a vagrant. That is too absurd. No | |
visible means of support: there I have him. Wrong again: for | |
indubitably he _does_ support himself, and that is the only unanswerable | |
proof that any man can show of his possessing the means so to do. No | |
more then. Since he will not quit me, I must quit him. I will change | |
my offices; I will move elsewhere; and give him fair notice, that if I | |
find him on my new premises I will then proceed against him as a common | |
trespasser. | |
Acting accordingly, next day I thus addressed him: "I find these | |
chambers too far from the City Hall; the air is unwholesome. In a word, | |
I propose to remove my offices next week, and shall no longer require | |
your services. I tell you this now, in order that you may seek another | |
place." | |
He made no reply, and nothing more was said. | |
On the appointed day I engaged carts and men, proceeded to my chambers, | |
and having but little furniture, every thing was removed in a few hours. | |
Throughout, the scrivener remained standing behind the screen, which I | |
directed to be removed the last thing. It was withdrawn; and being | |
folded up like a huge folio, left him the motionless occupant of a naked | |
room. I stood in the entry watching him a moment, while something from | |
within me upbraided me. | |
I re-entered, with my hand in my pocket--and--and my heart in my mouth. | |
"Good-bye, Bartleby; I am going--good-bye, and God some way bless you; | |
and take that," slipping something in his hand. But it dropped upon the | |
floor, and then,--strange to say--I tore myself from him whom I had so | |
longed to be rid of. | |
Established in my new quarters, for a day or two I kept the door locked, | |
and started at every footfall in the passages. When I returned to my | |
rooms after any little absence, I would pause at the threshold for an | |
instant, and attentively listen, ere applying my key. But these fears | |
were needless. Bartleby never came nigh me. | |
I thought all was going well, when a perturbed looking stranger visited | |
me, inquiring whether I was the person who had recently occupied rooms | |
at No.--Wall-street. | |
Full of forebodings, I replied that I was. | |
"Then sir," said the stranger, who proved a lawyer, "you are responsible | |
for the man you left there. He refuses to do any copying; he refuses to | |
do any thing; he says he prefers not to; and he refuses to quit the | |
premises." | |
"I am very sorry, sir," said I, with assumed tranquility, but an inward | |
tremor, "but, really, the man you allude to is nothing to me--he is no | |
relation or apprentice of mine, that you should hold me responsible for | |
him." | |
"In mercy's name, who is he?" | |
"I certainly cannot inform you. I know nothing about him. Formerly I | |
employed him as a copyist; but he has done nothing for me now for some | |
time past." | |
"I shall settle him then,--good morning, sir." | |
Several days passed, and I heard nothing more; and though I often felt a | |
charitable prompting to call at the place and see poor Bartleby, yet a | |
certain squeamishness of I know not what withheld me. | |
All is over with him, by this time, thought I at last, when through | |
another week no further intelligence reached me. But coming to my room | |
the day after, I found several persons waiting at my door in a high | |
state of nervous excitement. | |
"That's the man--here he comes," cried the foremost one, whom I | |
recognized as the lawyer who had previously called upon me alone. | |
"You must take him away, sir, at once," cried a portly person among | |
them, advancing upon me, and whom I knew to be the landlord of | |
No.--Wall-street. "These gentlemen, my tenants, cannot stand it any | |
longer; Mr. B--" pointing to the lawyer, "has turned him out of his | |
room, and he now persists in haunting the building generally, sitting | |
upon the banisters of the stairs by day, and sleeping in the entry by | |
night. Every body is concerned; clients are leaving the offices; some | |
fears are entertained of a mob; something you must do, and that without | |
delay." | |
Aghast at this torrent, I fell back before it, and would fain have | |
locked myself in my new quarters. In vain I persisted that Bartleby was | |
nothing to me--no more than to any one else. In vain:--I was the last | |
person known to have any thing to do with him, and they held me to the | |
terrible account. Fearful then of being exposed in the papers (as one | |
person present obscurely threatened) I considered the matter, and at | |
length said, that if the lawyer would give me a confidential interview | |
with the scrivener, in his (the lawyer's) own room, I would that | |
afternoon strive my best to rid them of the nuisance they complained of. | |
Going up stairs to my old haunt, there was Bartleby silently sitting | |
upon the banister at the landing. | |
"What are you doing here, Bartleby?" said I. | |
"Sitting upon the banister," he mildly replied. | |
I motioned him into the lawyer's room, who then left us. | |
"Bartleby," said I, "are you aware that you are the cause of great | |
tribulation to me, by persisting in occupying the entry after being | |
dismissed from the office?" | |
No answer. | |
"Now one of two things must take place. Either you must do something, | |
or something must be done to you. Now what sort of business would you | |
like to engage in? Would you like to re-engage in copying for some | |
one?" | |
"No; I would prefer not to make any change." | |
"Would you like a clerkship in a dry-goods store?" | |
"There is too much confinement about that. No, I would not like a | |
clerkship; but I am not particular." | |
"Too much confinement," I cried, "why you keep yourself confined all the | |
time!" | |
"I would prefer not to take a clerkship," he rejoined, as if to settle | |
that little item at once. | |
"How would a bar-tender's business suit you? There is no trying of the | |
eyesight in that." | |
"I would not like it at all; though, as I said before, I am not | |
particular." | |
His unwonted wordiness inspirited me. I returned to the charge. | |
"Well then, would you like to travel through the country collecting | |
bills for the merchants? That would improve your health." | |
"No, I would prefer to be doing something else." | |
"How then would going as a companion to Europe, to entertain some young | |
gentleman with your conversation,--how would that suit you?" | |
"Not at all. It does not strike me that there is any thing definite | |
about that. I like to be stationary. But I am not particular." | |
"Stationary you shall be then," I cried, now losing all patience, and | |
for the first time in all my exasperating connection with him fairly | |
flying into a passion. "If you do not go away from these premises | |
before night, I shall feel bound--indeed I _am_ bound--to--to--to quit | |
the premises myself!" I rather absurdly concluded, knowing not with | |
what possible threat to try to frighten his immobility into compliance. | |
Despairing of all further efforts, I was precipitately leaving him, when | |
a final thought occurred to me--one which had not been wholly unindulged | |
before. | |
"Bartleby," said I, in the kindest tone I could assume under such | |
exciting circumstances, "will you go home with me now--not to my office, | |
but my dwelling--and remain there till we can conclude upon some | |
convenient arrangement for you at our leisure? Come, let us start now, | |
right away." | |
"No: at present I would prefer not to make any change at all." | |
I answered nothing; but effectually dodging every one by the suddenness | |
and rapidity of my flight, rushed from the building, ran up Wall-street | |
towards Broadway, and jumping into the first omnibus was soon removed | |
from pursuit. As soon as tranquility returned I distinctly perceived | |
that I had now done all that I possibly could, both in respect to the | |
demands of the landlord and his tenants, and with regard to my own | |
desire and sense of duty, to benefit Bartleby, and shield him from rude | |
persecution. I now strove to be entirely care-free and quiescent; and | |
my conscience justified me in the attempt; though indeed it was not so | |
successful as I could have wished. So fearful was I of being again | |
hunted out by the incensed landlord and his exasperated tenants, that, | |
surrendering my business to Nippers, for a few days I drove about the | |
upper part of the town and through the suburbs, in my rockaway; crossed | |
over to Jersey City and Hoboken, and paid fugitive visits to | |
Manhattanville and Astoria. In fact I almost lived in my rockaway for | |
the time. | |
When again I entered my office, lo, a note from the landlord lay upon | |
the desk. I opened it with trembling hands. It informed me that the | |
writer had sent to the police, and had Bartleby removed to the Tombs as | |
a vagrant. Moreover, since I knew more about him than any one else, he | |
wished me to appear at that place, and make a suitable statement of the | |
facts. These tidings had a conflicting effect upon me. At first I was | |
indignant; but at last almost approved. The landlord's energetic, | |
summary disposition had led him to adopt a procedure which I do not | |
think I would have decided upon myself; and yet as a last resort, under | |
such peculiar circumstances, it seemed the only plan. | |
As I afterwards learned, the poor scrivener, when told that he must be | |
conducted to the Tombs, offered not the slightest obstacle, but in his | |
pale unmoving way, silently acquiesced. | |
Some of the compassionate and curious bystanders joined the party; and | |
headed by one of the constables arm in arm with Bartleby, the silent | |
procession filed its way through all the noise, and heat, and joy of the | |
roaring thoroughfares at noon. | |
The same day I received the note I went to the Tombs, or to speak more | |
properly, the Halls of Justice. Seeking the right officer, I stated the | |
purpose of my call, and was informed that the individual I described was | |
indeed within. I then assured the functionary that Bartleby was a | |
perfectly honest man, and greatly to be compassionated, however | |
unaccountably eccentric. I narrated all I knew, and closed by | |
suggesting the idea of letting him remain in as indulgent confinement as | |
possible till something less harsh might be done--though indeed I hardly | |
knew what. At all events, if nothing else could be decided upon, the | |
alms-house must receive him. I then begged to have an interview. | |
Being under no disgraceful charge, and quite serene and harmless in all | |
his ways, they had permitted him freely to wander about the prison, and | |
especially in the inclosed grass-platted yard thereof. And so I found | |
him there, standing all alone in the quietest of the yards, his face | |
towards a high wall, while all around, from the narrow slits of the jail | |
windows, I thought I saw peering out upon him the eyes of murderers and | |
thieves. | |
"Bartleby!" | |
"I know you," he said, without looking round,--"and I want nothing to | |
say to you." | |
"It was not I that brought you here, Bartleby," said I, keenly pained at | |
his implied suspicion. "And to you, this should not be so vile a place. | |
Nothing reproachful attaches to you by being here. And see, it is not | |
so sad a place as one might think. Look, there is the sky, and here is | |
the grass." | |
"I know where I am," he replied, but would say nothing more, and so I | |
left him. | |
As I entered the corridor again, a broad meat-like man, in an apron, | |
accosted me, and jerking his thumb over his shoulder said--"Is that your | |
friend?" | |
"Yes." | |
"Does he want to starve? If he does, let him live on the prison fare, | |
that's all." | |
"Who are you?" asked I, not knowing what to make of such an unofficially | |
speaking person in such a place. | |
"I am the grub-man. Such gentlemen as have friends here, hire me to | |
provide them with something good to eat." | |
"Is this so?" said I, turning to the turnkey. | |
He said it was. | |
"Well then," said I, slipping some silver into the grub-man's hands (for | |
so they called him). "I want you to give particular attention to my | |
friend there; let him have the best dinner you can get. And you must be | |
as polite to him as possible." | |
"Introduce me, will you?" said the grub-man, looking at me with an | |
expression which seem to say he was all impatience for an opportunity to | |
give a specimen of his breeding. | |
Thinking it would prove of benefit to the scrivener, I acquiesced; and | |
asking the grub-man his name, went up with him to Bartleby. | |
"Bartleby, this is Mr. Cutlets; you will find him very useful to you." | |
"Your sarvant, sir, your sarvant," said the grub-man, making a low | |
salutation behind his apron. "Hope you find it pleasant here, | |
sir;--spacious grounds--cool apartments, sir--hope you'll stay with us | |
some time--try to make it agreeable. May Mrs. Cutlets and I have the | |
pleasure of your company to dinner, sir, in Mrs. Cutlets' private room?" | |
"I prefer not to dine to-day," said Bartleby, turning away. "It would | |
disagree with me; I am unused to dinners." So saying he slowly moved to | |
the other side of the inclosure, and took up a position fronting the | |
dead-wall. | |
"How's this?" said the grub-man, addressing me with a stare of | |
astonishment. "He's odd, aint he?" | |
"I think he is a little deranged," said I, sadly. | |
"Deranged? deranged is it? Well now, upon my word, I thought that | |
friend of yourn was a gentleman forger; they are always pale and | |
genteel-like, them forgers. I can't pity'em--can't help it, sir. Did | |
you know Monroe Edwards?" he added touchingly, and paused. Then, laying | |
his hand pityingly on my shoulder, sighed, "he died of consumption at | |
Sing-Sing. So you weren't acquainted with Monroe?" | |
"No, I was never socially acquainted with any forgers. But I cannot | |
stop longer. Look to my friend yonder. You will not lose by it. I | |
will see you again." | |
Some few days after this, I again obtained admission to the Tombs, and | |
went through the corridors in quest of Bartleby; but without finding | |
him. | |
"I saw him coming from his cell not long ago," said a turnkey, "may be | |
he's gone to loiter in the yards." | |
So I went in that direction. | |
"Are you looking for the silent man?" said another turnkey passing me. | |
"Yonder he lies--sleeping in the yard there. 'Tis not twenty minutes | |
since I saw him lie down." | |
The yard was entirely quiet. It was not accessible to the common | |
prisoners. The surrounding walls, of amazing thickness, kept off all | |
sounds behind them. The Egyptian character of the masonry weighed upon | |
me with its gloom. But a soft imprisoned turf grew under foot. The | |
heart of the eternal pyramids, it seemed, wherein, by some strange | |
magic, through the clefts, grass-seed, dropped by birds, had sprung. | |
Strangely huddled at the base of the wall, his knees drawn up, and lying | |
on his side, his head touching the cold stones, I saw the wasted | |
Bartleby. But nothing stirred. I paused; then went close up to him; | |
stooped over, and saw that his dim eyes were open; otherwise he seemed | |
profoundly sleeping. Something prompted me to touch him. I felt his | |
hand, when a tingling shiver ran up my arm and down my spine to my feet. | |
The round face of the grub-man peered upon me now. "His dinner is | |
ready. Won't he dine to-day, either? Or does he live without dining?" | |
"Lives without dining," said I, and closed his eyes. | |
"Eh!--He's asleep, aint he?" | |
"With kings and counselors," murmured I. | |
* * * * * * * * | |
There would seem little need for proceeding further in this history. | |
Imagination will readily supply the meager recital of poor Bartleby's | |
interment. But ere parting with the reader, let me say, that if this | |
little narrative has sufficiently interested him, to awaken curiosity as | |
to who Bartleby was, and what manner of life he led prior to the present | |
narrator's making his acquaintance, I can only reply, that in such | |
curiosity I fully share, but am wholly unable to gratify it. Yet here I | |
hardly know whether I should divulge one little item of rumor, which | |
came to my ear a few months after the scrivener's decease. Upon what | |
basis it rested, I could never ascertain; and hence, how true it is I | |
cannot now tell. But inasmuch as this vague report has not been without | |
certain strange suggestive interest to me, however sad, it may prove the | |
same with some others; and so I will briefly mention it. The report was | |
this: that Bartleby had been a subordinate clerk in the Dead Letter | |
Office at Washington, from which he had been suddenly removed by a | |
change in the administration. When I think over this rumor, I cannot | |
adequately express the emotions which seize me. Dead letters! does it | |
not sound like dead men? Conceive a man by nature and misfortune prone | |
to a pallid hopelessness, can any business seem more fitted to heighten | |
it than that of continually handling these dead letters, and assorting | |
them for the flames? For by the cart-load they are annually burned. | |
Sometimes from out the folded paper the pale clerk takes a ring:--the | |
finger it was meant for, perhaps, moulders in the grave; a bank-note | |
sent in swiftest charity:--he whom it would relieve, nor eats nor | |
hungers any more; pardon for those who died despairing; hope for those | |
who died unhoping; good tidings for those who died stifled by unrelieved | |
calamities. On errands of life, these letters speed to death. | |
Ah Bartleby! Ah humanity! | |
End of Project Gutenberg's Bartleby, The Scrivener, by Herman Melville | |
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