232 STAGE-COACH AND MAIL IN DAYS OF YORE 



pupils unconsciously initiated them in new 

 manners of thought, sjieech and dress. The two 

 classes strangely reacted on one another, for 

 Avhile the coachmen learned to discard top-hoots 

 and took to trousers, the amateurs thought it 

 a line thing to file their front teeth, so that they 

 could sj^lice whij^-points and spit like the profes- 

 sionals, to wear the heavy " douhle Eenjamins," 

 clumsy and many-caped, that were necessary for 

 the coachmen, and to he, in fact, as thoroughly 

 " down the road " in dress, manner and talk as 

 though they were professionals themselves. Each 

 exaggerated the most remarkahle features of the 

 other, so that the coachmen hecame caricature 

 gentlemen, and the gentlemen the most Avonderful 

 travesties of the coachmen. 



An admiring critic of coaching in its last 

 decade enlarged with great satisfaction upon 

 the comj^lete dissimilarity hetween the modern 

 " artists " and the " workmen " of old time. 

 Their change of character and appearance had 

 kej^t jiace with the improvements in the different 

 points of their j^rofession. No longer did one see 

 the dram-drinking, gin-consuming, jolly-looking 

 rotundities of yore. Instead of those honest, wet 

 old souls, the " ribhons " were handled by jDinks 

 of perfection, turned out at all points like gentle- 

 men, and in character also like gentlemen, tasting 

 nothing hut their glass of sherry from end to end 

 of a journey. 



But side by side Avith these improvements 

 upon the old order came what were knoAvn to oui' 



