The little houses of
the original half farmers, half fishermen, who welcomed, or rather
did not welcome, the first explorers, grew rapidly into little
boarding-houses, then into big boarding-houses, then into hotels
with registers. Then the hotels grew larger and larger, and the
callings of the steamer more frequent, until the place became famous
and crowded.
All this while, however, the hold of the boarder on it remained
unshaken. He was monarch of all he surveyed. No one on the island,
except the landlords, held his head higher. There was one
distinction between boarders, but it was not one to wound anybody's
self-love: some were "mealers," or persons eating in the hotel where
they lodged; and others were "haul-mealers," or persons who were
collected and brought to their food in wagons. But this
classification produced no heart-burning. The mealer loved and
respected the haul-mealer, or wished him in Jericho, and the
haul-mealer in like manner the mealer, on general grounds, like
other persons with whom he came in contact, without any reference to
his place of abode.
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