Not that he
depreciated the sex, but that he recognized therein a deceitful element,
the pursuit of which sometimes drew mankind away from the equally
uncertain blandishments of poker--of which it may be remarked that Mr.
Hamlin was a professional exponent.

So that when he placed his narrow boot on the wheel and leaped down,
he did not even glance at the window from which a green veil was
fluttering, but lounged up and down with that listless and grave
indifference of his class, which was, perhaps, the next thing to good
breeding. With his closely buttoned figure and self-contained air he
was a marked contrast to the other passengers, with their feverish
restlessness and boisterous emotion; and even Bill Masters, a graduate
of Harvard, with his slovenly dress, his overflowing vitality, his
intense appreciation of lawlessness and barbarism, and his mouth filled
with crackers and cheese, I fear cut but an unromantic figure beside
this lonely calculator of chances, with his pale Greek face and Homeric
gravity.

The driver called "All aboard!" and Mr. Hamlin returned to the coach.
His foot was upon the wheel, and his face raised to the level of the
open window, when, at the same moment, what appeared to him to be the
finest eyes in the world suddenly met his. He quietly dropped down
again, addressed a few words to one of the inside passengers, effected
an exchange of seats, and as quietly took his place inside. Mr. Hamlin
never allowed his philosophy to interfere with decisive and prompt
action.

I fear that this irruption of Jack cast some restraint upon the other
passengers--particularly those who were making themselves most agreeable
to the lady. One of them leaned forward, and apparently conveyed to
her information regarding Mr. Hamlin's profession in a single epithet.
Whether Mr. Hamlin heard it, or whether he recognized in the informant
a distinguished jurist from whom, but a few evenings before, he had won
several thousand dollars, I cannot say. His colorless face betrayed no
sign; his black eyes, quietly observant, glanced indifferently past the
legal gentleman, and rested on the much more pleasing features of
his neighbor. An Indian stoicism--said to be an inheritance from his
maternal ancestor--stood him in good service, until the rolling wheels
rattled upon the river gravel at Scott's Ferry, and the stage drew up at
the International Hotel for dinner. The legal gentleman and a member of
Congress leaped out,