A jig here at the reins, and Ratty went forward; a lash from the whip, and the horse, a wall-eyed, attenuated beast, with a rat-tail, went backwards, ending by backing the hansom cab, in whose shafts he played at clay mill, going round and round in a perfect slough of a new unmade road, cut into ruts by builders' carts. "Now, look'ee here," said the driver, our friend of the Pall Mall accident; "on'y one on us can be master, yer know. If you'll on'y say as yer can drive, and will drive, why, I'll run in the sharps, and there's an end on't. Hold still, will yer? Yer might be decent to-day." The horse suddenly stood still--bogged, with the slushy mud over his fetlocks, and the cab wheels half-way down to the nave. "Thenky," said the driver, standing up on his perch; "much obliged. I'm blessed!" he muttered. "Buddy may well say as mine's allus the dirtiest keb as comes inter the yard, as well as the shabbiest. 'Struth, what a place! Now, then, get on, will yer?" The horse gave his Roman-profiled head a shake, and remained motionless. "Just like yer," said the cabman. "When I want yer to go, yer stop; and when I don't want yer to go, off yer do go, all of a shy, and knocks 'alf a dozen people into the mud, and gets yer driver nearly took up for reckless driving, as the bobbies calls it. Come, get on." Another shake of the head, but the four legs seemed planted as if they were to grow. "Well, there's one thing, Ratty," said the driver, "we're about square, mate; for if ever I've give yer too much of the whip, yer've had it outer me with obstinacy. Look at this now, just when yer oughter be on yer best manners, seeing as I've come about the mischief as yer did; and then, to make it wus, yer takes advantage of yer poor master's weakness, and goes a-leading of him inter temptation sore as can't be bore, and pulls up close aside of a public." For the spot at which the horse had stopped was at the opening of one of those new suburban streets run up by speculative builders--a street of six and seven-roomed houses, with a flaring tavern at the corner; and the houses, starting from the commencement of the street, in every stage from finished and inhabited, through finished and uninhabited, down to unfinished skeletons with the bricks falling out--foundations just above the ground, foundations merely dug, to end only with a few scaffold poles, and a brick-field in frill work. "Stops right in front of a public, yer do," said the driver; "and me as thirsty as a sack o' sawdust." The cabman looked at the public-house, to read golden announcements of "Tipkin's Entire," of "The Celebrated Fourpenny Ale," and the "Brown London Stout, threepence per pot in your own jugs," and his whip-hand was drawn across his lips. Then the whip-hand was set free, and forced its way into his pockets, where it rattled some halfpence.