e can see nowhere else, and for an hour Mr. Glow and King and
Forbes, sipping their raspberry shrub in a retired corner of the
bar-room, were interested spectators of the scene. Through the padded
swinging doors entered, as in a play, character after character. Each
actor as he entered stopped for a moment and stared about him, and in
this act revealed his character-his conceit, his slyness, his bravado,
his self-importance. There was great variety, but practically one
prevailing type, and that the New York politician. Most of them were
from the city, though the country politician apes the city politician as
much as possible, but he lacks the exact air, notwithstanding the black
broadcloth and the white hat. The city men are of two varieties--the
smart, perky-nosed, vulgar young ward worker, and the heavy-featured,
gross, fat old fellow. One after another they glide in, with an always
conscious air, swagger off to the bar, strike attitudes in groups, one
with his legs spread, another with a foot behind on tiptoe, another
leaning against the counter, and so pose, and drink "My respects"--all
rather solemn and stiff, impressed perhaps by the decorousness of the
place, and conscious of their good clothes. Enter together three stout
men, a yard across the shoulders, each with an enormous development
in front, waddle up to the bar, attempt to form a triangular group
for conversation, but find themselves too far apart to talk in
that position, and so arrange themselves side by side--a most
distinguished-looking party, like a portion of a swell-front street
in Boston. To them swaggers up a young sport, like one of Thackeray's
figures in the "Irish Sketch-Book"--short, in a white hat, poor face,
impudent manner, poses before the swell fronts, and tosses off his
glass. About a little table in one corner are three excessively "ugly
mugs," leering at each other and pouring down champagne. These men are
all dressed as nearly like gentlemen as the tailor can make them, but
even he cannot change their hard, brutal faces. It is not their fault
that money and clothes do not make a gentleman; they are well fed and
vulgarly prosperous, and if you inquire you will find that their women
are in silks and laces. This is a good place to study the rulers of New
York; and impressive as they are in appearance, it is a relief to notice
that they unbend to each other, and hail one another familiarly as
"Billy" and "Tommy." Do they not ape what is mo