--a bottle of real Devonshire cider."--"You must change me a
sovereign," handing one out. "Certainly, sir," upon which the waiter,
giving it a loud ring upon the table, ran out of the room. "Now,
gentlemen and ladies! pray, come, time's hup--carn't wait--must
go"--roars the guard, as the passengers shuffle themselves into their
coats, cloaks, and cravats, and Joe "Boots" runs up the passage with the
ladder for the lady. "Now, my dear Mrs. Sprat, good-bye.--God bless you,
and remember me most kindly to your husband and dear little ones --and
pray, write soon," says an elderly lady, as she hugs and kisses a
youngish one at the door, who has been staying with her for a week,
during which time they have quarrelled regularly every night. "Have you
all your things, dearest? three boxes, five parcels, an umbrella, a
parasol, the cage for Tommy's canary, and the bundle in the red silk
handkerchief--then good-bye, my beloved, step up--and now, Mr. Guard,
you know where to set her down." "Good-bye, dearest Mrs. Jackson, all
right, thank you," replies Mrs. Sprat, stepping up the ladder, and
adjusting herself in the gammon board opposite the guard, the seat the
last comer generally gets.--"But stay! I've forgot my reticule--it's on
the drawers in the bedroom--stop, coachman! I say, guard!" "Carn't wait,
ma'am--time's hup"--and just at this moment a two-horse coach is
heard stealing up the street, upon which the coachman calls to the
horse-keepers to "stand clear with their cloths, and take care no one
pays them twice over," gives a whistling hiss to his leaders, the double
thong to his wheelers, and starts off at a trot, muttering something
about, "cuss'd pair-'oss coach,--convict-looking passengers," observing
confidentially to Mr. Jorrocks, as he turned the angle of the street,
"that he would rather be hung off a long stage, than die a natural death
on a short one," while the guard drowns the voices of the lady who has
left her reticule, and of the gentleman who has got no change for his
sovereign, in a hearty puff of:

Rule Britannia,--Britannia rule the waves.
Britons, never, never, never, shall be slaves!

Blithely and merrily, like all coach passengers after feeding, our
party rolled steadily along, with occasional gibes at those they met or
passed, such as telling waggoners their linch-pins were out; carters'
mates, there were nice pocket-knives lying on the road; making urchins
follow the coach for miles by holding up