Not a few swore, by
all their importance, a greater man never lived. He is, indeed, all
that can be desired to please the simple pretensions of a
free-thinking and free-acting southern people, who, having elevated
him to the office of alderman, declare him exactly the man to
develope its functions. A few of the old school aristocracy, who
still retain the bad left them by their English ancestry, having
long since forgotten the good, do sneer now and then at Mr.
Brodereque's pretensions. But, like all great men who have a great
object to carry out, he affects to frown such things down,--to remind
the perpetrators of such aristocratic sneers what a spare few they
are. He asserts, and with more truth than poetry, that any gentleman
having the capacity to deluge the old aristocracy with doubtful
wine, line his pockets while draining theirs-all the time making
them feel satisfied he imports the choicest-and who can keep on a
cheerful face the while, can fill an alderman's chair to a nicety.
In addition to the above, Mr. O'Brodereque is one of those very
accommodating individuals who never fail to please their customers,
while inciting their vanity; and, at the same time, always secure a
good opinion for themselves. And, too, he was liberally inclined,
never refused tick, but always made it tell; by which well-devised
process, his patrons were continually becoming his humble servants,
ready to serve him at call.
Always civil, and even obsequious at first, ready to condescend and
accommodate, he is equally prompt when matters require that peculiar
turn which southerners frequently find themselves turned into,--no
more tick and a turn out of doors.
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