Then go and finish your breakfast, and when you have finished your
breakfast, when you have called for the newspaper, go and water your
horse, letting him have about one pailful; then give him another feed of
corn, and enter into discourse with the ostler about bull-baiting, the
prime minister, and the like; and when your horse has once more taken
the shine out of his corn, go back to your room and your newspaper. Then
pull the bell-rope and order in your bill, which you will pay without
counting it up--supposing you to be a gentleman. Give the waiter
sixpence, and order out your horse, and when your horse is out, pay for
the corn, and give the ostler a shilling, then mount your horse and walk
him gently for five miles.

"See to your horse at night, and have him well rubbed down. Next day,
you may ride your horse forty miles just as you please, and those will
bring you to your journey's end, unless it's a plaguey long one. If so,
never ride your horse more than five-and-thirty miles a day, always
seeing him well fed, and taking more care of him than yourself, seeing
as how he is the best animal of the two."

The stage-coachmen of that time--low fellows, but masters of driving--
were made so much fuss of by sprigs of nobility and others that their
brutality and rapacious insolence had reached a climax. One, who
frequented our inn, and who was called the "bang-up coachman," was a
swaggering bully, who not only lashed his horses unmercifully, but in
one or two instances had beaten in a barbarous manner individuals who
had quarrelled with him. One day an inoffensive old fellow of sixty, who
refused him a tip for his insolence, was lighting his pipe, when the
coachman struck it out of his mouth.

The elderly individual, without manifesting much surprise, said: "I