“Why, Dick, don’t yer know him?” said one, in a low voice, to his neighbor.
“No, d—— him! and don’t want to.”
“I do, though,” replied the first man, still watching the new-comer curiously.
“Why, Jim, who in h—— is it?” asked Dick.
“That air man’s our representative. That ain’t nobody else but Abel Newt.”
“Well,” muttered Jim, sullenly, as he surveyed the general appearance of Abel while he stood drinking a glass of brandy—“pure as imported”—at the counter—“well, we’ve done lots for him: what’s he going to do for us? We’ve put that man up tremendious high; d’ye think he’s going to kick away the ladder?”
He half grumbled to himself, half asked his neighbor Dick. They were both a little drunk, and very surly.
“I dunno. But he’s vastly high and mighty—that I know; and, by ——, I’ll tell him so!” said Dick, energetically clasping his hands, bringing one of them down upon the bench on which he sat, and clenching every word with an oath.
“Hallo, Jim! let’s make him give us somethin’ to drink!”
The two constituents approached the representative whose election they had so ardently supported.