He considered the vulgar passenger as so much
troublesome freight, which, while it brought the advantage of a higher
remuneration than the same cubic measurement of inanimate matter, had the
unpleasant drawback of volition and motion. With this general tendency to
bully and intimidate, the wary patron had, however, made a silent
exception in favor of the Italian, who has introduced himself to the
reader by the ill-omened name of Il Maledetto, or the accursed. This
formidable personage had enjoyed a perfect immunity from the effects of
Baptiste's tyranny, which he had been able to establish by a very simple
and quiet process. Instead of cowering at the fierce glance, or recoiling
at the rude remonstrances of the churlish patron, he had chosen his time,
when the latter was in one of his hottest ebullitions of anger, and when
maledictions and menaces flowed out of his mouth in torrents, coolly to
place himself on the very spot that the other had proscribed, where he
maintained his ground with a quietness and composure which it might have
been difficult to say was more to be imputed to extreme ignorance, or to
immeasurable contempt.
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