The Coachmaster 



the rooks from the new-sown fields ; or 

 plod at the head of the plough, guiding the 

 strong aentle horses, or crouch over the 

 dull acres of fallow land, riddino^ them of 

 stones from hedge to hedge. 



And if the childhood was dreary and 

 strenuous, the manhood was little better. 

 To rise before day-break the long year 

 through, to grow old and crippled before 

 middle-manhood with the hard toil, poor 

 fare and worse housing, this was the pros- 

 pect for him and his like. This was the lot 

 of his father before him, who had had the 

 luck of orettinor the best wao-es to be earned 

 in those parts. Upon this wage, eight 

 shillings a week, he kept himself and wife 

 and four children, living God knows how, 

 in a two-roomed hovel, a picturesque little 

 place with a mossy rotten thatch and bottle- 

 glass windows, good for neither light nor 

 air. For such there was neither change 

 nor bettering, save from the clayey field to 

 the tap-room of the "White Horse," until 

 worn out by the long struggle with Mother 

 Earth for bare existence, they came to 

 claim a little space in her lap in which to 

 lay their worn-out l:)odies. 



On the other side the hedge a great 

 road ran between two cities, either far 

 awav, and twice a week between the two 



