SKETCHES ON THE ROAD.
THE CHECK-STRING.
THOSE who have travelled much, as inside passengers in a long stage-coach, whilst they admired the facility of starting off
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 with one, must have occasionally remarked the difficulty of stopping with it, just at the point where it would be convenient to be set down. An ailing man may not have voice enough to lock all the four wheels at once; and should he be, as is probable, a nervous man besides, he will not without some hesitation make up his mind to request of some stentorian neighbour the loan of a set of lungs. In a six-inside coach, the timid occupier of a middle seat has no chance whatever, unless to take advantage of the first casual halt, or an upset. Even in the four-inside vehicle, a weakly, shy traveller’s case is equally hopeless, supposing the passengers on the roof to have properly tucked up the skirts of their great and little coats. To a bold, brassy fellow even, with a tongue like a trumpet, it is anything but an easy affair to say woh! with any effect to a Dart that is flying at twelve miles within the hour. The coachman, who ought to hear, will not: the horses hear but do not understand: the coach cannot hear: the outsiders admire the pace too much to hear anything but the patter of the hoofs. At last, when he has succeeded, the stout gentleman with the big voice, who wants to run home, finds generally that he has a good hundred yards or two allowed him of law, measured, as the Irish always mete it out, backwards.
It was after a more serious dilemma,—for a little nervous bashful man with a little squeaking voice like Punch’s, though he was not so fond of exhibiting it, after suffering himself to be carried two miles beyond his house, had at last fractured the small bone of his leg, by opening the door in despair and jumping out,—that a discussion ensued in the Brighton “Age” as to the best means of being let out to order. Many different methods had been proposed before the little florid plump gentleman in black delivered his opinion, with his back to the horses.
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“For my own part, ratiocinating on hackney-coaches, I should hypothetically pr............