- end_line
- 1311
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T07:57:55.409Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 1278
- text
- 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
scriveners 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. Everything 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.
- title
- Chunk 13