Unnamed Men of Frenchman's Bend

In The Hamlet there are always groups of men hanging around Frenchman's Bend's more public spaces, like Varner's various businesses or Mrs. Littlejohn's boarding house. Some members appear somewhat individualized, such as with the "man with the peach spray" (343) who discusses the horse auction and its consequences with a "second" and a "third" among the group at Varner's store, although each remains virtually indistinct, members of a communal group who interact with well-defined characters like Varner, Ratliff, Quick, Bookwright, Freeman and the various Snopeses. While not entirely made up of men, the crowd that attends the horse auction is included in this entry. Increasing in size from "six men" in Mrs. Littlejohn's lane (308) to "more than fifty men now standing along the fence beside the gate" of the lot (314), this crowd comes from all around the Bend to watch and perhaps participate in the sale of the wild Texas ponies. Some of these men speak, although they are described simply as "one of the others" or "a second," "third," or "newcomer" without individual characteristics. The "purchasers" of the horses become a kind of subset of the larger group at the end of the auction: "gathering as though by instinct into a separate group" (323).