ON HARNESSING. 185 



art', and to do it well is not within everyone's capacity. 

 To enable a man to judge of this, he must be a coach- 

 man himself ; and, to be a coachman, it is necessary that 

 he have not been merely amusing himself with four of 

 his own highly-fed and well-broke horses — which perhaps 

 his own coachman has been at work with for two hours 

 in the morning, in his break — but he must have served a 

 sort of apprenticeship to it, by day and by night ; with 

 good horses, and with bad ; with blind and lame ; by 

 lamplight, and by no light l at all ; on good roads, and 

 on bad ; wet and dry ; drunk and sober ; with rotten 

 tackle, and bolting horses ; jibbers, and millers; 2 heavy 

 loads, and weak horses ; high blowers, and queer ones ; 3 

 steep hills, and broken neckings ; broken axletrees, and 

 over-turned coaches. 



When a man has had a good deal of experience in 

 these matters (and not before), he may lay claim to the 

 honourable appellation of a coachman. But how often 

 this claim is denied, even to those who most zealously 

 aspire to it, all who are acquainted with the road can 

 certify — for how rarely do we meet with a real ' artist ' ! 

 The success of a coachman greatly depends on his 

 education. If, like Phaeton of old, he jumps on the box, 

 a ready-made coachman, he must expect the same fate ; 

 but if he has taken his degrees, and his education has 

 been regular, he begins with driving the leaders of a set 

 of horses before an experienced coachman (perhaps his 



1 In a fog, when lamps are useless. 



2 Kickers. 



3 Subject to the meagrims. 



