rds break ranks and disperse. Lady
with hoop skirts hails the driver. Driver again obliging. Enter hoop
skirts. Gentleman with a baby-wagon hails driver. 'Whoa-'p.' Astonishing
driver. Gentleman lifts up the baby-wagon on the top. Driver receives
it, and gently smashes it in pieces. Gentleman gets inside. Dropsical
individual on the starboard quarter hails us. The gentleman enters, and
again we are under way. Teutonic target company turn into Broadway from
Courtlandt street--'The Lager Bier Invincibles, Capt Conrad Kuenzmueller.'
Suddenly find ourselves smashed up amid a perfect labyrinth of carts,
stages, buggies, wagons, horses, mules, cotton bales, boxes, furniture,
drivers, policemen, passengers, pedestrians, &c. A wagonload of dirt on
our port side--wagon-driver unsophisticated; unused to driving in New
York. In advance a cart having two bales of hay on board. Our horses,
having nothing else to do, make efforts to get at the hay. Our driver
again accommodating. He gets down and unchecks the horses. Horses
proceed to make inroads upon property not belonging to the omnibus
company. Carman discovers the larceny. Indignant carman. Hits our horses
over the head with the butt end of his whip. Reciprocal indignation.
Our driver gives carman a cut across his proboscis with a long lash.

"Our progress continues.

[Illustration]

"Fat gentleman impatient. Reasserts his previously-expressed conviction,
that the stage is an imposition: says he'll get out. Driver insists on
payment. Fat gentleman passes up a quarter. Driver passes him back a
ten-cent piece and eight cents. Fat gentleman insists that he is
swindled to the extent of one cent, which he demands. Driver very
obliging, and 'don't he wish he may get it.' Fat gentleman gets out, but
finds himself completely surrounded by vehicles, and without a
possibility of being able to reach the curb-stone in safety, concludes
to enter the stage again. Driver refuses to open the door. Fat gentleman
demands to be admitted. Driver says he'll see him blowed first. Fat
gentleman frantic, but driver incorrigible. At last fat gentleman gets
on his hands and knees, and, after crawling under a team of horses and
the tails of two carts, reaches the sidewalk. Again moving. Irish
female with native infant pulls the strap. Driver accommodating. Female
inquires if this is a Bowery stage. Driver says no. Female insists upon
getting out. Driver insists, with equal warmth, that, as a prior
cond