When one was beaten into insensibility or killed, the survivor took the money.
** This obscure reference applies to a blind negro musician who took the world by storm in the latter half of the nineteenth century of the Christian Era.
And then, when he shook hands with me! His handshake was firm and strong, but he looked at me boldly with his black eyes--too boldly, I thought.

You see, I was a creature of environment, and at that time had strong class instincts.

Such boldness on the part of a man of my own class would have been almost unforgivable.

I know that I could not avoid dropping my eyes, and I was quite relieved when I passed him on and turned to greet Bishop Morehouse--a favorite of mine, a sweet and serious man of middle age, Christ-like in appearance and goodness, and a scholar as well.
But this boldness that I took to be presumption was a vital clew to the nature of Ernest Everhard.

He was simple, direct, afraid of nothing, and he refused to waste time on conventional mannerisms.