ways, more or less, machinery of this ponderous,
elaborate sort strikes, in some moods, strange
dread into the human heart, as some living,
panting Behemoth might. But what made the
thing I saw so specially terrible to me was the
metallic necessity, the unbudging fatality which
governed it. Though, here and there, I could
not follow the thin, gauzy vail of pulp in the
course of its more mysterious or entirely invis-
ible advance, yet it was indubitable that, at
those points where it eluded me, it still marched
on in unvarying docility to the autocratic cun-
ning of the machine. A fascination fastened
on me. I stood spell-bound and wandering in
my soul. Before my eyes -- there, passing in
slow procession along the wheeling cylinders, I
seemed to see, glued to the pallid incipience of
the pulp, the yet more pallid faces of all the
pallid girls I had eyed that heavy day. Slowly,
mournfully, beseechingly, yet unresistingly, they
gleamed along, their agony dimly outlined on
the imperfect paper, like the print of the tor-
mented face on the handkerchief of Saint Ve-
ronica.
"Halloa! the heat of the room is too much
for you," cried Cupid, staring at me.
"No -- I am rather chill, if any thing."
"Come out, Sir — out -- out," and, with the
protecting air of a careful father, the precocious
lad hurried me outside.
In a few moments, feeling revived a little, I
went into the folding-room -- the first room I
had entered, and where the desk for transacting
business stood, surrounded by the blank count-
ers and blank girls engaged at them.
"Cupid here has led me a strange tour," said
I to the dark-complexioned man before men-
tioned, whom I had ere this discovered not only
to be an old bachelor, but also the principal pro-
prietor. "Yours is a most wonderful factory.
Your great machine is a miracle of inscrutable
intricacy."
"Yes, all our visitors think it so. But we
don't have many. We are in a very out-of-the-
way corner here. Few inhabitants, too. Most
of our girls come from far-off villages."
"The girls," echoed I, glancing round at their
silent forms. " Why is it, Sir, that in most factories,
female operatives, of whatever age, are
indiscriminately called girls, never women?"
"Oh! as to that -- why, I suppose, the fact
of their being generally unmarried -- that's the
reason, I should think. But it never struck
me before. For our factory here, we will not
have married women; they are apt to be off-
and-on too much. We want none but steady
workers: twelve hours to the day, day after day,
through the three hundred and sixty-five days,
excepting Sundays, Thanksgiving, and Fast-
days. That's our rule. And so, having no
married women, what females we have are
rightly enough called girls."
"Then these are all maids," said I, while
some pained homage to their pale virginity made
me involuntarily bow.
"All maids."
Again the strange emotion filled me.
"Your cheeks look whitish yet, Sir," said the
man, gazing at me narrowly. "You must be
careful going home. Do they pain you at all
now? It's a bad sign, if they do."
"No doubt, Sir," answered I, "when once I
have got out of the Devil's Dungeon, I shall
feel them mending."
"Ah, yes; the winter air in valleys, or gorges,
or any sunken place, is far colder and more bit-
ter than elsewhere. You would hardly believe
it now, but it is colder here than at the top of
Woedolor Mountain."
"I dare say it is, Sir. But time presses me;
I must depart."
With that, remuffling myself in dread-naught
and tippet, thrusting my hands into my huge
seal-skin mittens, I sallied out into the nipping
air, and found poor Black, my horse, all cring-
ing and doubled up with the cold.
Soon, wrapped in furs and meditations, I as-
cended from the Devil's Dungeon.
At the Black Notch I paused, and once more
bethought me of Temple-Bar. Then, shooting
through the pass, all alone with inscrutable na-
ture, I exclaimed -- Oh! Paradise of Bachelors!
and oh! Tartarus of Maids!
The Paradise of Bachelors and the Tartarus of Maids Page 4