s in this country are an invisible minority of the community! The
natural consequence is, that they are clean and expensive. The drivers
are charmingly independent and undeniably free-and-easy birds, but not
meaning to be uncivil. One of them showed his independence by asking two
dollars one night for a three-mile drive home to the hotel. I inquired
of the master, and found the proper charge was a dollar and a half;
but, on my sending out the same, Jarvey was too proud to confess he was
wrong, and, refusing the money, drove off--nor did I ever hear more of
him.

Their free-and-easiness can never be better exemplified than in the old
anecdote told of so many people, from an ex-prince of France, downward;
viz., the prince having ordered a hack cab, was standing at the door of
the hotel, smoking his cigar, and waiting for its arrival. When Cabby
drove up, judging from the appearance of the prince that he was "the
fare," he said, "Are you the chap that sent for a cab?" And, being
answered with an affirmative smile, he said, "Well, get in; I guess I'm
the gentleman that's to drive you."

The next means of conveyance to be spoken of is the omnibus. I was told
by a friend who had made inquiries on the subject, that there were
upwards of a thousand, and that they pay twenty-two per cent. They are
infinitely better than ours, simply because they are broader: the most
rotund embodiment of an alderman after a turtle-soup dinner, even if he
had--to use the emphatic language of Mr. Weller--been "swellin'
wisibly," could pass up the centre without inconvenience to the
passengers on either side; and as a good dividend is a thing not to be
despised, they do not employ a "cad" behind. The door shuts by a strap
running along the roof, with a noose in the end, which Jehu puts on his
foot. Any one wishing to alight pulls the strap; Jehu stops; and, poking
his nose to a pigeon-hole place in the roof, takes the silver fare; and,
slipping the noose, the door is open to the human "fare." Doubtless,
this effects a very great saving, and, dispensing with a cad in this
country might enable the fares to be lowered; but I question if there be
not very many objections to our adopting the plan; and I should miss
very much that personification of pertness and civility, with his
inquisitive eye, and the eccentric and perpetual gyrations of his fore
finger, which ever and anon stiffens in a skyward point, as though under
the magic influence of some uns