I had ceased to be a writer of tolerably poor tales and essays, and had become a tolerably good Surveyor of the Customs. That was all.
These old gentlemen -- seated, like Matthew at the receipt of custom, but not very liable to be summoned thence, like him, for apostolic errands -- were Custom-House officers.
All this, it seemed, had been the property of the two chieftains I had slain, and now, by the customs of the Tharks, it had become mine.
"But," he continued, in his fierce guttural tones, "if you run off with the red girl it is I who shall have to account to Tal Hajus; it is I who shall have to face Tars Tarkas, and either demonstrate my right to command, or the metal from my dead carcass will go to a better man, for such is the custom of the Tharks.
Then silence being made, Warner reminds them of the old School-house custom of drinking the healths, on the first night of singing, of those who are going to leave at the end of the half.
We looked upon every trumpery little custom and habit which had obtained in the School as though it had been a law of the Medes and Persians, and regarded the infringement or variation of it as a sort of sacrilege.
If anyone, at this moment, had entered the Custom House, he would have found Mr.
Fogg, Aouda, and Passepartout left the Custom House without delay, got into a cab, and in a few moments descended at the station.
"It is the custom in war," said D'Artagnan, "why should it not be the custom in a duel?"
D'Artagnan began by making his most splendid toilet, then returned to Athos's, and according to custom, related everything to him.
Of the peculiar
custom, prevalent among these people, of flattening the head, we have already spoken.
Strolling along the native runways in the fringe of jungle just beyond the beach, as was his custom, to see whatever he might pick up, the steward had picked up Kwaque.
It was the custom. Whenever a loved pig died its owners were in custom bound to go out and kill somebody, anybody.
Officers of the Custom House, too, which stood on the opposite side of King Street, often sat in the chair wagging their tongues against John Hancock."
About this period the people were much incensed at an act committed by a person who held an office in the Custom House.
