OX COACHMEN. 261 



ampton ' Telegraph,' about five years ago ; and Mr. 

 Charles Buxton tells me I should travel with a coachman 

 by the name of Pop, on the Light Salisbury, as he thinks 

 I should like him, and ere long I intend to do so. Hi:j 

 father once hunted Mr. Chute's hounds. There is also 

 a very prime artist on the Cheltenham ' Magnet.' by the 

 name of James Witherington, alias Bloody J cmmy. The 

 latter title implies that he has been a bit of a larker in 

 his time ; and when on the Birmingham and Manchester 

 • Express,' he had like to have killed a whole coach-load 

 at once, by galloping them round a corner, with a ram- 

 mish team, and himself queer. For this job he was 

 pulled up and paid 70/. towards doctors' bills, which with 

 the help of a few more years over his head, has made 

 him quite steady ; and, as Black Will says, he now 

 begins to see danger. He is a strong, powerful man, 

 in the prime of life, and certainly one of the very best 

 opposition coachmen of the present hour. I used to see 

 a good deal of him when on the Worcester day coach, 

 and have often been pleased to look at him taking a full 

 load down Broadway hill without a wheel tied — sitting 

 as much at his ease as if he were blowing a cloud. Jem 

 Whitchurch is a loss to the road, being one of the quickest 

 of the quick ; and the ease with which he did his work — 

 from Brighton to London, and back to Brighton every 

 day — was a proof of his being a coachman. His break- 

 fast, dinner, a glass of sherry, and an apple, was all the 

 refreshment he partook of in his hundred miles of 

 ground. 



Doubtless the greatest instance of corporal exertion 



