A moment after, from a little dingy den behind, came out a neat, dapper little man, with a very straight-cut, snuff colored coat, fastened with a hook and eye high up upon the chest, in order to permit the liberal extension of a very smart flowered waistcoat, and a stomach, somewhat too large in its proportions, shaped like the back of a mandolin. Energy, activity, and acuteness, were in all his movements and sparkled in his bright black eye; and, roused by his step, I could perceive that as he approached, he scanned me from head to foot with a rapidity truly marvelous. Before I knew what I was about he was shaking hands with me, and before I could ask for my books, he was asking me innumerable questions—who I was—where I came from—what my name was—what was my profession—how old I was—whether I intended to stay long in Boston, and—what I thought of America. I was strongly inclined to laugh, but I was out of the habit of laughing now, and I answered gravely: “Order in all things, if you please, sir. Are you what this person calls the ‘boss,’ or what I should call the master of this shop—or store?” “Oh, never mind him,” replied the new comer. “He is from another state, and doesn’t half understand English. It’s only in Bost’n I guess that there’s any thing like English to be found in all the universal world. I’m the master of this store, sir, and a very pretty little considerable quantity of literature you will find therein, I guess.” “Well then, to reply to your questions,” I said, “I am a stranger in this city. I come from a distant part of the world. My name is my own, for any thing I know to the contrary. I am of any profession that suits me at the moment. I am somewhere between twenty and thirty, I have no notion how long I shall stay in Boston, and having only seen two square miles of America, I do not think the taster is decisive of the cheese.—Now, sir, will you have the goodness to tell me about the books I want.” “Capital, capital, capital!” cried my new friend. “I guess such answers would pose half the men in Congress. We Yankees are terrible question askers it must be acknowledged. It’s a way we have, and not a bad way either; for if we get an answer, we are all the better for it, and if we get none, we can do very well without it. Now, sir, you’re just the man we want: I can see that in a minute. We haven’t had any thing new in Bost’n for six months—that is, since the giantess, and the horse with three tails. They did very well, but we want something literary now, and if you chose to come out with a lecture, or a book, or a pamphlet, or a sermon against the Trinity, or something very racy upon democracy and federalism—take which side you will; it’s all the same to me—or even in defense of the old country, showing that we are all rebels and traitors and ought to have been hanged long ago, it’s sure to answer—it will sell, sir,—it will pay—it will bring in the dollars.”