I slept in a little den behind the office; Pinkerton, in the office itself, stretched on a patent sofa which sometimes collapsed, his slumbers still further menaced by an imminent clock with an alarm.

Roused by this diabolical contrivance, we rose early, went forth early to breakfast, and returned by nine to what Pinkerton called work, and I distraction.

Masses of letters must be opened, read, and answered; some by me at a subsidiary desk which had been introduced on the morning of my arrival; others by my bright-eyed friend, pacing the room like a caged lion as he dictated to the tinkling type-writers.

Masses of wet proof had to be overhauled and scrawled upon with a blue pencil--"rustic"-- "six-inch caps"-- "bold spacing here"-- or sometimes terms more fervid, as for instance this, which I remember Pinkerton to have spirted on the margin of an advertisement of Soothing Syrup: "Throw this all down.

Have you never printed an advertisement?
I'll be round in half an hour." The ledger and sale-book, besides, we had always with us.