THE ROAD. 
Manchester Telegraph, from the Bull and Mouth, per- 
forms her journey, with the utmost regularity, in 
eighteen hours ! 
May we be permitted, since we have mentioned the 
Arabian Nights, to make a little demand on our readers' 
fancy, and suppose it possible that a worthy old gentle- 
man of this said year 1742 had fallen comfortably 
asleep, a la Dodswell, and never awoke till Monday last 
in Piccadilly ? " What coach, your honour? " says a ruf- 
fianly-looking fellow, much like what he might have 
been had he lived a hundred years back. "I wish to 
go home to Exeter," replies the old gentleman, mildly. 
"Just in time, your honour, here she comes, them 
there grey horses; where 's your luggage?" "Don't 
be in a hurry," observes the stranger; " that's a gen- 
tleman's carriage!" "It ain't! I tell you," says the 
cad; "it's the Comet, and you must be as quick as 
lightning." Nolens volens, the remonstrating old gen- 
tleman is shoved into the Comet by a cad at each elbow, 
having been three times assured his luggage is in the 
hind boot, and twice three times denied having occular 
demonstration of the fact. 
However, he is now seated; and "What gentleman 
is going to drive us ? " is his first question to his fellow 
passengers. "He is no gentleman, sir," says a person 
who sits opposite to him, and who happens to be a 
proprietor of the coach. " He has been on the Comet 
ever since she started, and is a very steady young man." 
" Pardon my ignorance," replies the regenerated ; " from 
58 
