A smart coachman usually took his place in changing horses, and it is quite possible, as I know from experience, having been timed by a box passenger, to effect the change in one minute and a half, with only one horse-keeper, assisted by coachman and guard; but to do this, each one must know his own place; they must not be tumbling over one another. The best drill I ever knew for this purpose was as follows: As the coach gradually stopped, the guard got down, and ran forward to unhook the near leader's outside trace, and then drew the near lead rein through the territs, after which he changed the near wheel horse, and finished by running the near lead rein. The horse-keeper, on the off-side, unhooked the remaining lead traces, uncoupled the wheel horses, and changed the off-side one. The coachman, getting down from his box as fast as he could, finished changing the leaders. The horses had, of course, previous to the arrival of the coach, been properly placed; one wheeler on each side of the road, and the leaders coupled. This, of course, could only be carried out when the team was pretty quiet to "put to," for with queer tempered ones, all sorts of dodges had to be resorted to, attended sometimes with considerable loss of time. Occasionally, it would be necessary to run a leader's rein the first thing, and then the coachman had to bustle up to his box as quick as he could, trusting to the horse-keeper and guard to get the traces hooked as best they might. Again, some wheelers could not bear to be poled up till after the coach was started. Horse-keepers were often exceedingly smart at this sort of work, though they varied a good deal, so much so, that it was no uncommon thing for "queer ones" to start better from one end of the stage than the other. These said horse-keepers were a rough lot, and no great wonder, for they had rough work to do. They were frequently expected to attend to eight horses, four out and four in, every day, or to take charge of six, with eight out and eight in, during the course of the day. But, what was worse than the work, they constantly had vicious horses to attend to, and such as it was dangerous to approach in the stall. To meet this difficulty, I have known a long cord used, with one end fastened to the head collar, and the other made fast to the stall-post, by which the horse could be pulled back far enough to enable the horse-keeper to keep clear of his heels whilst entering the stall. I was once travelling at night, when, upon arriving at the end of a stage, the coachman said to the horsekeeper, "Mind what you are about with that horse," pointing to a fresh one, "he bit a piece out of a man just before starting." It struck me as not a very enviable position to be left, in the middle of a dark night, to look single-handed after four dirty horses, and one of them a "savage."