' Saying
which, the attorney shrugged his shoulders, smiled, took a second
pinch of snuff, and led the way into the office of the judge's clerk.
This was a room of specially dirty appearance, with a very low
ceiling and old panelled walls; and so badly lighted, that although
it was broad day outside, great tallow candles were burning on
the desks. At one end, was a door leading to the judge's private
apartment, round which were congregated a crowd of attorneys
and managing clerks, who were called in, in the order in which
their respective appointments stood upon the file. Every time this
door was opened to let a party out, the next party made a violent
rush to get in; and, as in addition to the numerous dialogues
which passed between the gentlemen who were waiting to see the
judge, a variety of personal squabbles ensued between the greater
part of those who had seen him, there was as much noise as could
well be raised in an apartment of such confined dimensions.
Nor were the conversations of these gentlemen the only sounds
that broke upon the ear. Standing on a box behind a wooden bar
at another end of the room was a clerk in spectacles who was
'taking the affidavits'; large batches of which were, from time to
time, carried into the private room by another clerk for the
judge's signature.
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