HOJV THE COACH PASSENGERS FARED 353 



maxim that ohjects not appearing and not existing 

 are governed by the same logical constvnction." 



Humour had a splendid field in coaching, and 

 the literature of the road is gemmed with twice 

 a hundred good stories and mirth-j^rovoking scenes. 

 Few things seem to have been more productive of 

 funny stories than the undue tendency to fatness 

 on the part of a passenger. There is, for example, 

 the tale of the stupid servant who, having to l)Ook 

 two seats inside a coach for his master, a man 

 of prodigious hulk, to whom one seat would lie 

 useless, returned from the hooking-ofiice with the 

 news that he had secured the only two places to 

 he had — one inside and one out. 



This hears comparison with that other story 

 of the stout man's revenge. He, too, was 

 accustomed to hook two seats. On one occasion 

 this amiable eccentricity of his was observed 

 overnight by two waggish fellows who thought 

 they would play a trick on tliei fat man. They 

 accordingly booked seats also, and took care to 

 be seated in them before the man of much 

 avoirdupois came. They sat facing one another, 

 one back and the other in front, so that he 

 had indeed two seats, but not, as they necessarily 

 should have been, together. He asked them very 

 politely to change their positions, but they refused, 

 although he explained that he had booked tAvo 

 seats, and his reason for doing so. There the 

 seats were, they said. 



But the outraged man of flesh determined to 

 be revenged, and, looking round at the next stage 

 VOL. I. 23 



