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
easily 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 tea-time.
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.”