London to John O Groat's. 3 



town hoot at you, with most ignominious and satirical 

 antics, as you pass ; and if they do not shie stones in 

 upon you, or dead cats, it is more from fear of the 

 beadle or the constable than out of respect for your 

 business or pleasure. 



Indeed, every town and village, great or small, which 

 you pass through or near on the railway, looks as if 

 you came fifty years before you were expected. It 

 says, in all the legible expressions of its countenance, 

 " Lack-a-day ! if here isn't that creature come already, 

 and looking in at my back door before I had time to 

 turn around, or put anything in shape ! " The Iron 

 Horse himself gets no sympathy nor humane admiration. 

 He stands grim and wrathy, when reined up for two 

 minutes and forty-five seconds at a station. No ven- 

 turesome boys pat him on the flanks, or look kindly 

 into his eyes, or say a pleasant word to him, or even 

 wonder if he is tired, or thirsty, or hungry. None of 

 the ostlers of the greasy stables, in which the locomo- 

 tives are housed, ever call him Dobbin, or Old Jack, or 

 Jenny, or say, " "Well done, old fellow ! " when they 

 unhitch him from the train at midnight, after a journey 

 of a hundred leagues. His driver is a real man of flesh 

 and blood ; with wife and children whom he loves. He 

 goes on Sunday to church, and, maybe, sings the psalms 

 of David, and listens devoutly to the sermon, and says 

 B 2 



