“Lover! oh, sir,” said Jenny Hart, casting a sly glance at Ira Elkado, as he solemnly stalked behind the counter, and, as if he had been there for years, fell to putting up a bundle of misses’ hose. “Such a lover, too,” thought Jenny Hart, as he would make,—pretty much, however, like Mr. Martin Barton,—and she cast her eye to the other end of the counter, where Martin Barton stood folding up a bundle of suspenders in the very same solemn way. Hosea Bringle, instead of taking a little girl’s penny for two needles,—he had given her nines for sixes, the paper being turned upside down when he looked at it,—was staring at the new clerk, Ira Elkado. “Put the cent in Hojer Bringle’s hand, little girl; he is thinking”—said Jenny Hart—“here, let me stick the needles in the paper or you’ll lose them; they are tiny little needles; are you hemming fine work, my dear?” “No, Miss Jenny Hart, mother is making a cloak—these are sixes,” said the child, “are they not?” So Jenny Hart had to go to the needle box and get out No. 6, saying—“Look here, Hojer Bringle, the numbers are all at the top; this paper, if turned up so, looks like nines; do you see now?” Hosea Bringle sighed again, and Jenny whispered in his ear—“there are two fine pair of ducks and a huge mess of corn salad for dinner to-day, and I’ll have them at my side of the table and give you the _four_ legs all to your own share, and all the stuffings out of two of them—precious little will I give to Ira Elkado, beside the neck and rack, or may be the drumsticks. Hosea Bringle wiped his mouth and put the needle box nicely away, pitying Ira Elkado for the poor dinner he was to get, for Hosea Bringle held the rack and drumsticks very cheap; while Ira Elkado was revelling in the thoughts of owning this very thread and needle store that day three years, with Jenny Hart for clerk and wife. No one, to look at Ira Elkado, would ever suppose that he had an excursive imagination, he looked so sober and acted so cautiously; but, oh! what a turmoil and what business was going on within. He took all the company in at a glance, and made up his mind that he would rule them all as Jenny Hart did, and her into the bargain. So he began that very moment. “This counter is very inconvenient, Miss Jenny Hart,” said he, striking his foot against the bottom, “it ought to slope inward; it is very wearisome for you to keep at such a distance from the counter. Now, if it sloped inward—now Sigismund Sloper, he”— Ah ha! did Ira Elkado think this was news to Jenny Hart? she had felt the inconvenience often and often, but she counted cost, and made up her mind that the house was old, the counter old, and time precious, so that it was not worth while to make a new counter, and, besides, there was no time to do it. She gave one of her peculiar stares, as if trying to comprehend what Ira Elkado was saying.