"The sun, as the day advanced, kept thawing the snow, till at last, on
coming to a deep drift, we were repeatedly obliged to get out, sometimes
walking up to the knees, and sometimes helping to lift the vehicle out
of the snow. However, at length we fairly stuck fast, in spite of all
our hauling and pushing. The horses struggled and plunged to no purpose,
excepting that the leaders, after breaking part of their tackle,
galloped off over the hills and far away, leaving us to kick our heels
in the slush, till they were brought back after a chase of several
miles."
The road now passed through Vermont, the state of green mountains. The
country appeared striking; and Montpelier, where they breakfasted, seems
to be a very pretty place, looking more the residence of hereditary ease
and luxury, than the capital of a republic of thrifty graziers. It is,
in fact, an assemblage of villas; the wide streets run between rows of
trees, and the houses, each in its own little garden, are shaded by
verandas.
In that very pleasant little book, the "Miseries of Human Life," one of
those small calamities is, the being called at the wrong hour to go off
in the wrong coach from a Yorkshire inn. Time and the railroad have
changed all this in England, but in America we have the primitive misery
well described.
The author, after forty-two hours of hard jolting, goes to bed at one
o'clock to obtain a little repose, leaving orders to be called at five
in the morning. He is wrapt in the profoundest of all possible slumbers,
when a peal of blows is heard at his door. "In spite, however, of
laziness, and a cold morning to boot," he says, "I had completed the
operations of washing and dressing by candlelight, having even donned
hat and gloves, to join my companions, when the waiter entered my room
with a grin. 'I guess,' said the rascal, 'I have put my foot in it. Are
you the man that wanted to be called at two?' 'No,' was my reply.
'Then,' said he, 'I calculate I have fixed the wrong man, so you had
better go to bed again.' Having delivered himself of this friendly
advice, he went to awaken my neighbour, who had all this time been
quietly enjoying the sleep that properly belonged to me. Instead of
following the fellow's recommendation, I sat up for the rest of the
night." Whether the author possessed a watch we cannot tell, but if he
was master of that useful and not very rare article, he might have saved
himself his premature trouble, and escaped shaving at midnight.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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