Beautiful but Poor — page 25: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

16 BEAUTIFUL BUT POOR. CHAPTER III. THE FOREMAN’S DISCOVERY. The bindery in which Hattie Butler, with over one hundred other persons, male and female, worked, was famous for doing very fine private work, outside of that done for many publishers who had their work contracted for there. Gentlemen of — wealth and taste, who had rare old works tn worn- out covers, and wished them preserved in more stately dress, frequently brought them there for the purpose of outer renovation. So it happened that on the very morning’ which succeeded the night when Hattie received the Cali- fornia letter, a fine equipage, from far up town, stopped in the narrow street which fronted the bindery, and an elderly, old-fashioned gentleman got out and toiled up the stairs to the bindery floor with a bundle of some size under one arm. He was met, quite obsequiously, by Mr. w——, one of the proprietors, who knew, by past experi- ence, that some nice, well-paying work was in view, and asked into the office. _ "No, no, T am in a-hurry,’’ said the old gentle- man. “‘I want to see your foreman—I] have some French and German reviews here—old and rare— which are all to pieces and somewhat mixed up. I bought them at an auction—a regular old book- worm once owned them, but he died, and his erace- less heirs sold off the collection of years for a mere song, compared to their real value. I wish these properly collated, and bound nicely for my library.’ (e(e) comicbooks nm