I soon discovered, from his manners and remarks, that my new coaching ally was a prodigious favourite with the fair sex, and from the roguish leer that he gave the respective damsels at the different inns and public-houses, I fancied he did not quite merit the confidence his wife placed in him. Indeed, when we stopped to change horses at Slough, I saw the faithless Lothario present the pretty barmaid of the "Red Lion" with the bunch of violets, which she placed near her heart. Nay, more, if my optics did not deceive me, he implanted a kiss on the rosy lips of the blooming landlady, who faintly exclaimed, "For shame, you naughty man." As I had won the good graces of this driving Giovanni, not only by listening to the story of his conquests over the rural Hebes, who dispensed their smiles and liquor to him, but by commending his voice in "Pray, Goody," which I declared to be equal to Sinclair's, he offered me the reins just after passing the "Sun Inn" at Maidenhead. "Take 'em gently up the hill," said he, "and then you can have a spirt over the thicket." To say that I was proud is to say nothing, for, having passed a few months with a private tutor at Littlewick Green, within two miles of the spot where we were, I felt that I should cut no little figure as I drove by the "Coach and Horses," a wayside public-house where I and my companions used to keep our guns when at our tutor's. "Do you pull up at the 'Coach and Horses?'" I inquired, in so nervous a manner--I was then young, and, as Shakespeare writes, "in my salad days"--that the coachman, who is what is termed "wide-awake" upon all affairs of the heart, guessed my motive. "We can, Sir, if you like," he responded. "Perhaps Dick has a parcel to leave for Squire Lee. Anything for the thicket?" he continued, turning to the "shooter" behind, and giving him a knowing wink, a hint which the other took at once. "Why, yes, Sam; I wish to know whether Mr. Vansittart has sent for the empty sack I left there last Monday." As we reached the well-known spot where I had passed many a half-hour in the society of the pretty, innocent girl whose fair face, blue eyes, auburn ringlets, and bewitching smile had turned the heads of all the youths in the neighbourhood, my heart began to palpitate, my hands to tremble, and I should have driven past the house had not my box companion caught hold of the reins with a firm grasp and pulled the horses up in front of the public-house. Fortunately, my Dulcinea had not noticed the hand that assisted me, and, seeing the coach stop, rushed to the door, exclaiming. "Lord William! Who would have thought it! How much you have improved in driving! Do you recollect when you upset the dog-cart close to that pond?" "I hope your father is well," I replied, anxious to change the conversation; "and Sally--I mean Miss Sadbroke--let the coachman and guard have a glass of your cream of the valley."