‘The team was in grand order, three leaders and a pair of great upstanding half-bred horses at the wheel, all in top condition and fit to pull any fellow’s arm off. However, they’d a _man_ behind ’em, and when they jumped off he steadied ’em as easy as a pair of buggy horses. ‘You know what the road’s like. We rattled along a fair pace, but well in hand, though the horses pulled like devils, and I had my foot on the brake, on the near side, just to help him. ‘We were about half way down, and I was wondering what time we should make Penrith, when I felt the near wheeler make a sudden rush, and Ned said in a thick, changed voice— ‘“By——, the brake’s gone!” ‘“You don’t say so,” says I; “it can’t be.”—“You’ll darned soon find out, Jack,” says he, gathering up the reins and bracing himself for the struggle with death. “Blast that infernal blacksmith, he ought to be along with us now.” ‘By this time the team had broken into a wild gallop, and were racing down the narrow, winding road, with a couple of feet, sometimes less, between us and a five hundred feet drop among the rocks. There was no breeching harness on the wheelers; Americans don’t use it, but trust all to the brake. Ours was gone. And the pace we were going down that road was enough to scare the boldest man that ever handled leather. ‘Ned was as cool and determined as if it was a saltbush plain. He held the mad team true and straight, and trusted, I could see, to pulling them up on the long flat at the bottom of the hill. If we got there. _If!_ Of course, the only little chance was to let them go best pace and guide them. The slightest pull up would have sent us sideways over the black rocks, half a mile below. ‘It was a strange sight, I tell you, sir. Ned’s face was pale but set hard, the muscles of his arms showed like cords, his eyes shining and steady, looking forward through the dark; the great lamps swinging wide with the rolling of the coach. As we turned one corner we hung nearly over the cliff, just shaved it. The women inside kept up a dismal screaming; the men looked out and said nothing. ‘“We may do it yet, Jack,” he said, “if we can clear those cursed guard-logs near the bottom.” ‘“Right you are, Ned,” says I, to cheer him. I was afraid of them myself. ‘Now a’most at the bottom of the hill the road had been new metalled, and as the track was broader and clear of the sideling, the road contractor, damn him, had placed a whole lot of heavy logs on both sides of the metal. I never could see the pull of it myself, except to make accidents easy.