[From _Lord of Himself_ (Boston, 1874)]
It was at this juncture that the youth of many locks and ample Byronic
shirt collar appeared on the scene. Aloysius Pittsinger was his name.
He was a consolation. His very name, Aloysius, had a sweet gurgle in
the sound, resembling the anticipatory and involuntary noises from
children's mouths at the sight of sugar lollipops. He was a clerk in
Mr. Goldstein's store. There he dispensed tobacco, both fine-cut and
plug, assorted nails, New Orleans sugar, Rio coffee, Porto Rico
molasses, Gloucester mackerel, together with foreign cloths and
homespun jeans, and all the gimcracks which little negroes coveted and
the swarms of summer flies had spared.
The appearance of Aloysius happened in this wise. Mr. Fenton was an
early riser, but was loath to go to his shop without his breakfast. On
the fateful morning he had come down rather earlier than usual. After
due search and discussion, it was announced to him that there was
nothing at once appetizing and substantial in the house that could,
within the desired period, be got ready for the table; and his wife
made bold to ask if in this emergency he wouldn't go out and get
something. To a hungry man, in the faint interval after a "nipper" and
before a solid bit, such a proposition is an unpleasant surprise. But,
after devoting the cook and the household generally to immediate pains
and inconveniences, and to something more hereafter, Mr. Fenton put on
his slouched hat and started out. He mused also.
If I were ambitious of the fame of the great American novelist, or were
contending for the fifty thousand dollar prize offered by the publishers
of the Metropolitan Album, and hoped to have my thrilling descriptions
read by its subscribing army of three hundred and fifty-one thousand
chambermaids, I might paint the current of his swift thought thus:
"The air bites shrewdly. Ha, by the mass! Shall I to the _abattoir_
and ask the slayer of oxen for a steak? or a chop from the loin of
sheep, a bell-wether of Kentucky's finest flock--Kentucky, state
renowned for dainty mutton? Or does the slayer of oxen yet sleep,
supinely stertorous, heavy with the lingering fumes of the mighty
Bourbon? Perchance he has no steak, no chop!--all gone to feed an
insatiable people! Bethink me. Ay--and the _abattoir_ is far, though
its perfume is nigh; it is thrice a hundred yards from hence. I will
go to the house of the Israelite, Goldstein, and get a fish--a fish
dear to losel Yankees, and not scorned by the sons of the sun-land
either. 'Tis well. I will make the trial. Haply I shall find that the
young man, Pittsinger, whose prænomen is Aloysius, has arisen, and is
even now combing his ambrosial locks."
What he _did_ think was something like this:
"It's doggon cold this mornin'. I wonder whether that derned old
drunken Bill Stone's got ary bit of fresh meat--and if he's up yet. I
don't b'lieve it, for he was drunk's an owl last night at old Red Eye.
Besides, it's fer to the slaughter-house. Le's see. I might get a
mackerel at Goldstein's. I'll do it. B'iled a little, to take the salt
out, and then het with cream, it ain't bad, by a derned sight."
He walked out to the square, occasionally blowing his cold fingers. The
shutters were not taken down from Goldstein's front windows, but Mr.
Fenton knew that the clerk slept in a little room in a ruinous lean-to
back of the store, and he rattled the door to call him. There was no
answer, nor sound of any one stirring, and he rattled again. His
powerful shake made the square resound. He called, endeavoring to throw
his voice through the key-hole, "Aloysius, ain't you up yit? I want a
mackerel."
The silence was aggravating, and there were internal qualms that made
Fenton doubly impatient.
"Aloysius, you lazy bones! Do you hear? I want a mackerel for
breakfast. You're thest the no-countest boy I ever see! If 'twan't for
your father, you'd thest starve."
Fenton sadly meditated, and was about to give it up, when he heard a
voice within, saying, "Never too late, Mr. Fenton. You shall have your
mackerel. You needn't wait. As soon as I get my clothes on I'll tote
you over one."