The first was of the most
consequence in numbers, and of the greatest variety in appearance.
Composed of rogues of the worst order from every quarter of the world,
it might be said to present, in its general aspect of numerical
importance, the very sublime of degradation. Confident in their rude
union of common avidity, these worthy citizens vented their insolence on
all objects, and in every direction, with a careless impartiality which
would have shamed the most victorious efforts of modern mobs. The
hubbub of voices was perfectly fearful. The coarse execrations of
drunken Gauls, the licentious witticisms of effeminate Greeks, the noisy
satisfaction of native Romans, the clamorous indignation of irritable
Jews--all sounded together in one incessant chorus of discordant noises.
Nor were the senses of sight and smell more agreeably assailed than the
faculty of hearing, by this anomalous congregation. Immodest youth and
irreverent age; woman savage, man cowardly; the swarthy Ethiopian
beslabbered with stinking oil; the stolid Briton begrimed with dirt--
these, and a hundred other varying combinations, to be imagined rather
than expressed, met the attention in every direction.
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