The Marriage of Esther

There was surely complete evidence before the house that the two ragamuffins particularized above were unpopular. So far the silent but contemptuous superiority of the taller, and the drunken and consequently more outspoken insolence of his companion, had failed to prepossess one single soul in their favor. Even the barman, upon whose professional affability the most detested might, during moments of the world's disaffection, rely with some degree of certainty, had not been able to bring himself to treat them otherwise than with the most studied coldness. This fact was in itself significant, not only because it showed the state of his own feelings regarding them, but inasmuch as it served to give the customers of the Hotel of All Nations their cue, upon which they were not slow to model their own behavior. Men are peculiarly imitative animals at times.