Coaching, with Anecdotes of the RoadLennox, William Pitt, Lord
History
Coaching, with Anecdotes of the Road
Lennox, William Pitt, Lord
Coaching (Transportation)
Then might be seen approaching a pony-phaeton, with a duedecimo
postilion, and a pair of long-tailed Arabians, containing two
of England's loveliest daughters--the turnpike-man is lost in
admiration. Quickly follows the light Whitechapel cart with a
fast trotter, "surrounding objects rendered invisible by extreme
_w_elocity," as the owner declares, who by his bulldog and his
costume shows he belonged to the once royally-patronised prize-ring.
But see! a "drag" approaches; it is the perfection of neatness, one
of Adams's[1] best--body yellow, slightly picked out with black;
under carriage black; two servants in plain liveries behind four
spicy nags--three greys and a chestnut--each ready to leap through
his collar, put together with skill and working beautifully. The
driver is evidently a first-rate artist, a perfect master of the
science. See how well he has his team in hand! He is every inch
a coachman. Our turnpike-man brightens up and, doffing his hat
respectfully, exclaims,
[1] Adams, now Hooper, Victoria Street.
"Now, that's what I like to see--a gentleman patronising the road!
He's a right regular and right honourable trump, and no mistake!"
And no mistake was there, for the driver was John Warde. A
fashionable equestrian now rides by,
"With heel insidious by the side
Provokes the caper which he seems to chide;"
and a "galloping snob" of Rotten Row, since immortalised in song,
follows him. Half a dozen spring-vans decorated with flags and
laurels, containing men, women, and children, barrels of beer, and
baskets of provisions, are the East-End Benevolent Society, on their
road to Bushey Park to enjoy a picnic under its stately avenues of
horse-chestnuts.
"It's a poor heart that never rejoices!" says the man at the gate,
smirking at the females as he gives the ticket, and helping himself
to a handful of apples from a neighbouring barrow-woman's stall,
which he throws into the laps of the delighted juveniles. A key
bugle, playing "Love's young dream," announces the approach of
another "drag;" but what a contrast to the one I have described! It
is painted green, picked out with red, evidently an old stage-coach
metamorphosed; for a close observer might perceive the words "Chatham
and Rochester," partly defaced, and painted over with a fancy crest
and motto; the driver sitting, like a journeyman tailor on his board,
with one servant behind, with a gaudy livery and gold-laced hat; the
horses, one blind, two kickers and a bolter, evidently bent on having
a way of their own. "Regular Brummagem," exclaims the man of "no
trust." "All is not gold that glitters."
Next comes a youth on an animal long in the neck and high in the
bone, accoutred with a pair of saddle-bags, his twanging horn
announcing him to be the suburban postman, the
"Herald of a noisy world;
News from all nations lumbering at his back."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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