When I try this, looking for an empty line at the top of a file:
my $counter;
print"TOP\n";
while( (<>) && counter <10){
  $counter++;
  print"$_\n";
  }
 print "BOTTOM";

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it prints prints empty newlines for every line in the file (presumably after printing the ten lines I want).

In reply to peeling the top 10 lines from a file by jjohhn

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