to start a coach at five o'clock in the morning, was an imposition
"tolerable" only in Dogberry's sense of the word--it was "not to be
endured." And then, the downright absurdity of the undertaking! for
admitting that the proprietors might prevail on some poor idiot
to act as coachman, where were they to entrap a dozen mad people for
passengers? We often experience an irresistible impulse to interfere, in
some matter, simply because it happens to be no business of ours; and
the case in question being, clearly, no affair of mine, I resolved to
inquire into it. I went into the coach-office, expecting to be told, in
answer to my very first question, that the advertisement was altogether
a _ruse de guerre_.

"So, sir," said I to the book-keeper, "you start a coach, to London, at
five in the morning?"

"Yes, sir," replied he--and with the most perfect _nonchalance_!

"You understand me? At _five_?--in the MORNING?" rejoined I, with
an emphasis sufficiently expressive of doubt.

"Yes, sir; five to a minute--two minutes later you'll lose your place."

This exceeded all my notions of human impudence. It was evident I had
here an extraordinary mine to work, so I determined upon digging into
it a few fathoms deeper.

"And would you, now, venture to _book_ a place for me?"

"Let you know directly, sir. (Hand down the Wonder Lunnun-book, there.)
When for, sir?"