“Right, sir, I'm on the job. Old Buller's done it.” By the time we reached Bloomsbury he had the whole country to himself, and he did his duty manfully. As we crossed a thoroughfare, he would shout to the'bus drivers on either side, “Ladysmith relieved; just come from the War Office. Old Buller's done it.” Then in an instant, before we plunged into the opposite street, one could see the tidings run both ways, from 'bus to 'bus, from cab to cab, and the hats waving in the air, and hear, “Ladysmith and Buller.” Bloomsbury is a fearfully decorous and immovable district, inhabited by professors and British Museum students, and solid merchants, and professional men, but my driver for once stirred up Bloomsbury. A householder would be standing on his doorstep in tall hat and frock coat, well brushed, and with a daintily folded umbrella under his left arm, fastening the left button of the second glove, and looking out upon the world from the serene superiority of a single eyeglass. Then he would catch sight of us, and the sound of something my driver was flinging to the men on a furniture van. “What's that?” he would cry in a sharp, excited, insistent voice; “anything about Ladysmith?” “Relieved,” from the hansom top. “War Office news. Old Buller's done it.” Down fell the umbrella on the step, and down came the eyeglass from the eye, and with an answering cheer the unstarched, enthusiastic, triumphant, transformed householder bolted into his home to make it known from attic to kitchen that White and his men had not fought in vain. Round the dustbin at the corner of a street half a dozen street boys were gathered, and the driver in his glory passed a word to them also. They did not know where they would get their dinner, and they had not had much breakfast, their whole stock of clothes would not have been worth 1s. 9d., and not one of them had a cap, but they also were a bit of England, and this victory was theirs, and the last I saw of them they were standing each one upon his head and waving joyfully with his feet. “See, sir, how the kids took it,” for my driver was getting more magnificent every minute; “said all along old Buller would do it.” Coming down Euston Road was one blaze of glory, and when we swept into King's Cross Station at the gallop, and my driver saw the crowd of waiting porters and other hangers-on, an audience as yet unspoiled and waiting, ready for such news, it was, I take it, the greatest moment in his life. He pulled up the horse on his haunches, and again stood up on his high place. “Straight from the War Office, as hard as we could drive; it's all right at Ladysmith--the siege is lifted, and old Buller's done it”; and then, to crown the occasion, “Three cheers for General Buller.” He led from the top, and they joined from below, and so great was the excitement that when I offered the usual tip to the porter to carry my things to the carriage, he flatly refused to take it.