often is this paradisiacal state disturbed by the intrusion of "the
thirteenth man in the omnibus."

Shall I attempt to portray the creature? He is pretty well known, and
perhaps the picture will be recognized. Sometimes he may be seen
standing at the corner of the street lying in wait for the "bus." He is
never known to walk toward its starting-place, lest he might be
confounded with the "twelve" by getting inside before the seats are
filled. No; he is "nothing if not" odd. His very hat never sits squarely
upon his head like the hat of a gentleman. It is either elevated in
front like a sophomore's, or depressed on one side, as if he had just
come from a cheap spree in the Bowery, or was troubled with some
obtrusive "bump" that kept his hat awry. If by chance he gets a seat
inside the omnibus, (as "accidents will happen," etc.,) he must cross
his legs and wipe the mud from his ill-shod feet upon your trowsers or
your wife's dress.

Indeed, methinks it was he who invented sitting cross-legged in a public
vehicle. Do savages ever sit thus when in close company? I have never
been able to imagine what special human sin this ingenious mode of
annoyance was meant to punish. It has been suggested that it might be
the man's pantomimic protest against sitting at all. But the saddest
commentary upon this vice of our hero is, that by some mysterious
magnetism of awkwardness and ill-breeding, he has betrayed into
imitation of it men whose early education has been less neglected than
his own.

Sometimes, as he gets into the "'bus," he carries in his hand or mouth
the stump of a half-burned, extinct cigar, which fills the atmosphere
with a rank and sickening odor. More frequently he is dressed in