The never-ending procession,
to the sensitive and the observant, has also infinite degrees of
language. Some faces seem to welcome, others to defy, some to lower, and
some to brighten, many to ignore, a few to challenge or charm,--as we
pass. And what lessons of fortune and of character are written
thereon,--the blush of innocence and the hardihood of recklessness, the
candid grace of honor and the mean deprecatory glance of knavery,
intelligence and stupidity, soulfulness and vanity, the glad smile of
friendship, the shrinking eye of fallen fortune, the dubious recognition
of disgrace, the effrontery of the adventurer, and the calm, pleasant
bearing of rectitude,--all that is beautiful and base in humanity,
gleams, glances, and disappears as the crowd pass on.
Richard Cobden, when in New York, was caught and long detained in a mesh
of drays and carriages in Broadway, and he remarked that the absence of
passionate profanity among the carmen and drivers, and the good-natured
patience they manifested, were in striking contrast with the blasphemous
violence exhibited in London under like circumstances; and he attributed
it to the greater self-respect bred in this class of men here by the
prospect and purpose of a higher vocation.
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