I was diverted from this meditation, by the rueful groans of a great many souls that were under the lash, and the devil tyrannising over them with whips and scourges. I asked what they were, and it was told me, that there was a plot among the hackney-coachmen to exhibit an information against the devils, for taking the whip out of their hands, and setting up a trade they had never served to, (which is directly contrary to _Quinto Elizabethæ_). “Well,” said I: “but why are these tormented here?” With that, an old sour-looked coachman took the answer out of the devil’s mouth, and told me, that it was because they came to hell a horseback, which they pretended was a privilege that did not belong to rogues of their quality. “Speak truth, and be hanged,” cried the devil; “and make an honest confession here. Say, sirrah, how many bawdy voyages have you made to Hackney? How many nights have you stood pimping at Marybone? How many whores and knaves have you brought together? And how many lies have you told, to keep all private, since you first set up this scandalous trade?” There was a coachman by, that had served a judge, and thought ’twas no more for his old master to fetch a rascal out of hell than out of Newgate; which made this fellow stand upon his points, and ask the devil, how he durst give that language to so honourable a profession; “for,” says he, “who wears better clothes than your coachmen? Are not we in our velvets, embroideries, and laces? and as glorious as so many phaetons? Have not our masters reason to be good to us, when their necks are at stake and their lives at our mercy? Nay, we govern those, many times, that govern kingdoms; and a prince is almost in as much danger of his coachman as of his physician. And there are that understand it too, and themselves, and us; and that will not stick to trust their coachmen as far as they would do their confessors. There’s no absurdity in the comparison; for if they know some of their privacies, we know more; yes, and perhaps more than we’ll speak of.” “What have we here to do?” cried a devil that was ready to break his heart with laughing. “A coachman in his tropes and figures? An orator instead of a waggoner? The slave has broke his bridle, and got his head at liberty, and now he’ll never have done.” “No, why should he?” says another that had served a great lady more ways than one. “Is this the best entertainment you can afford your servants? your daily drudges? I’m sure we bring you good commodity, well packed; well conditioned; well perfumed; right, neat, and clean: not like your city-ware that comes dirty to you, up to the hocks; and yet every daggle-tailed wench, and skip-kennel, shall be better used than we. Ah! The ingratitude of this place! If we had done as much for somebody else, as we have done for you, we should not have been now to seek for our wages. When you have nothing else to say, you tell me that I am punished for carrying the