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- 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.”
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