y night. About seven or eight coaches were filled by those
of our fellow-passengers who, like ourselves, were going to cross the
mountains. Some of the vehicles set off immediately; but three waited
to let their passengers get tea or supper, meals which in America are
identical. About 8 P.M. we started on our cold and dreary journey of 73
miles across the Alleghany Mountains. A stage-coach in America is a
very different thing from the beautiful machine that used to pass by
that name in England.

It has no outside accommodation, except for one person on the box along
with the driver. The inside, in addition to the fore seat and the hind
seat, has also a middle seat across the vehicle. Each of these three
seats holds three persons, making nine in all. In our stage we had ten
persons; but the ten, in a pecuniary point of view, were only eight and
a half. The night was fearfully dark, and the roads were altogether
unworthy of the name. Yet there is an immense traffic on this route,
which is the highway from East to West. The Americans, with all their
"smartness," have not the knack of making either good roads or good
streets. About 11 P.M. we arrived at Uniontown, 12 miles from
Brownsville. There the horses were to be changed, an operation which
took about an hour to accomplish. Three coaches were there together.
The passengers rushed out of the inn, where we had been warming
ourselves, and jumped into the coaches. Crack went the whips, off went
the horses, and round went the wheels. But, alas! while we could hear
the rattling of the other coaches, our own moved not at all! "Driver,
why don't you be off?" No answer. "Driver, push on." No reply. "Go
a-head, driver,--don't keep us here all night." No notice taken. We
began to thump and stamp. No response. At last I put my head out
through the window. There _was_ no driver; and, worse still, there were
no horses! How was this? There was no "team," we were told, for our
coach! I jumped out, and began to make diligent inquiry: one told me
one thing, and another another. At length I learned that there was a
"team" in the stable, but there was no driver disposed to go. The one
who should have taken us was cursing and swearing in bed, and would not
get up. This was provoking enough. "Where is the agent of the
stage-coach company?"--"He lives about 47 miles off." "Where is the
landlord of this house?"--"He is in bed." There we were helpless and
deserted on the highroad, between 12 a