wives, and 'live widders,'
ranged with solemn regularity like coffins in a vault. All fix their eyes
where their minds are, on vacuity, and try to _be_ for the time present,
what they _seem_ to be, as stupid as the devil, as if they dreaded some
sympathetic contact, revealing bank-frauds and transactions in stocks. Who
ever saw a smile in an omnibus, even when court-plasters have changed
places? You might as well look into a slow-driven hearse for something
sunshiny! Your broker dares not even chuckle. Your exquisite cannot resort
for consolation to the suction of his cane, but all look grim and virtuous
as Seneca, until they pull the leather, pass up six-pence through the
port-hole, and as they open the door, their faces begin to expand, but
only with the animal anticipation of dinner. Compare this with the
_grouping_ and animation of the Sleigh-omnibus; heads piled upon heads, as
in a picture; black hats, feathers, plumage, barrel-caps, etc., bobbing
about in a lively manner to the music of bells. Down they go into the
gullies, through thick and thin, with a ludicrous contrast and
juxtaposition of faces; all forced in spite of themselves to give
expression to their several humors, mirth, deviltry, or spleen. Cheeks
glow, eyes shine, spectacles sparkle, glances fly impudently to the
windows where the face of beauty presses against the cold pane. The runner
sinks into a 'rut,' and that makes the company bow to each other, and
gives that old rascal of a sexegenarian an excuse to bring his gray
whiskers very near to the blooming visage of a girl whose charming modesty
is shrined in colors more delicate than the blush on the cheek of a
magnum-bonum plum. Sixty must not aspire after such fruitage; but in an
_omnibus_, where's the harm? But we have a remark to make on _nosology_,
or the noses of the group. So spicy a variety of folk cheek-by-jowl
(Parthians and Elamites, Medes, Jews and Persians,) begets contrast.
Nose-bridges of all styles show their peculiar architecture, Roman or
Grecian; while straight, crooked, bottle, snub, pug; some flat and with no
bridge at all, others very much _abridged_; are brought together in an
amicable jostling, 'comparing themselves by themselves,' and setting off
one another as a rose sets off a geranium. While I point out these
peculiarities to my friend PHIZ, a coral shriek rends the air, and by
heavens! the whole load is upset!' . . . WE hear from all quarters 'good
exclamation' on the _D