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 ina