The very multiplicity of tribunals before whom the personally unoffending coach proprietor was liable to be haled was in itself terrifying. There was the already-mentioned coroners jury; the jury on the criminal side in trials at the Assizes for manslaughter, and the other "twelve good men and true" who assessed damages in the Sheriff's Court. How even the most well-meaning of men might thus suffer is evident in the case of a proprietor who was cast in damages from excess of caution. For additional security, and in order to protect it from road grit, he had a part of an axle incased in wood. One day this axle broke and a serious accident happened, resulting in an action against him for damages. He lost the day; the judge ruling that, although no proof of a defective axle was adduced, a flaw _might_ have existed which a proper daily examination would have detected had the extra precaution for safety not been adopted. IX WHAT Aldgate might now have been had the original intention of the Eastern Counties directorate to place their terminus there been successful, we need not stop to inquire. But, as a good deal has already been said on the subject of coaches and coaching, it will be of interest to learn what were the views of the projectors of the Eastern Counties Railway. With their original prospectus was issued a map of the proposed railway from London to Norwich and Yarmouth, by which it appears that, instead of going to the left of the road from London, as far as Seven Kings and Chadwell Heath, it was originally intended to construct the line on the right of the road so far. Between Romford and Chelmsford the line has been made practically as first proposed, but onwards, from Chelmsford to Lexden, it is again on the other side of the highway; and, north of Colchester, goes wide of the original plan all the way to Norwich. In many ways this document is very much of a curiosity at this time, as also are the hopes and aspirations of the directors at the first General Meeting of the company. The chairman, for instance, confidently anticipated dividends of 22 per cent., upon which one of the confiding shareholders replied that the report was most satisfactory and the prospects held out by no means overcharged. "If this understanding," said he, "fails in producing the dividend of 22 per cent., calculated upon in the report, then, I must say, human calculations and expectation can no longer be depended upon." O! most excellent man. But better is to come.