On leaving the door it became painfully apparent that Crafty Kate was in a condition of excitement, not to say insubordination, which boded untoward results. Passing between the lines of dilapidated houses that constitute the little village of Soakington, she piaffed and curvetted, and tucked her head in, and hoisted her great angular quarters, in a manner calculated to excite the admiration of all beholders—limited in the present instance to a lame duck, and two boys playing truant from school; but when we emerged on the smooth expanse of the Waterborough road, stimulated by the love of approbation, or urged by a morbid anxiety to get home, the mare took the bit in her teeth, and very nearly made a bolt of it. I confess I clung to the rail that ran round the seat, thankful even for that frail support, and notwithstanding the slight hold it afforded me, narrowly escaped being dashed out, as we turned with fearful rapidity, and entirely on one wheel, like a skater doing the outside edge, up a lane diverging at right angles from the thoroughfare along which we had been bowling at such a pace. It was evident, however, by Crafty Kate’s demeanour, that this was not the way home. She stopped dead short, stuck her forelegs out, and began nodding her head in that ominous manner, which denotes a determination to fight to the last. “Sit tight, Softly!” exclaimed the Jovial, with a fiendish laugh, as though this had been part of a programme devised for my special entertainment. “Sit tight! whilst I give my lady a taste of the silk!” and without further parley he pulled the whip from its bucket, and commenced a course of punishment on the mare’s sides, which produced no further result than that of causing her to back faster and faster towards the ditch; the tall red wheels hovered on its very brink, when a bright idea flashed across the charioteer’s mind. “Give us a blast of the tin, Softly,” said he, continuing, nevertheless, a vigorous application of the whipcord, “and let us see if _your_ blasting is not more musical than _mine_!” I am no performer, I candidly admit, on a trumpet of any description; but a desperate crisis demands a desperate remedy, and seizing the long coach-horn I performed such a _solo_ upon it as has probably never been heard before, or since. “The Jovial” left off flagellating, and laughed till he cried. The mare laid her ears down into her poll, tucked her tail close to her quarters, and went off at score. Completely blown by my exertions, we had gone nearly a mile ere I returned the horn to its case, and found breath to speak. “But is this the shortest way to The Ashes?” said I, striving by the aid of a “Vesuvian” to relight my cigar, which had gone out in the panic. “I thought we kept straight along the high-road to the turnpike, and then took the first turning to the——”