PROVINCIAL INN 3 



with their attendant horsekeeper, the harness all in the 

 nicest order ; the quantity of packages issuing from the 

 booking-office ; the instructions, not unmixed with a 

 little good-natured banter, vulgarly called chaff, given 

 by the book-keeper to the well-known characters about 

 to 2^1'oceed to their accustomed destination, formed 

 altogether a scene not unworthty the pen or pencil of a 

 Hogarth. 



How different the same half-hour in a provincial town 

 in one corner of the kingdom. On approaching the inn 

 not a solitary person did I see. The dingy, half-washed 

 coach stood by itself outside the gates, like a deserted 

 ship ; inside the yard there was a dim, dirty place set 

 aside for the office ; in it glimmered one poor mutton 

 candle, stuck on a piece of rusty tin, that had served the 

 ostler for a candlestick for years ; by its light I entered, 

 and could just jDcrceive a lantern-jawed, melancholy- 

 looking man, whose visage indicated — indeed, seemed 

 already to anticipate — the fate that awaited both him 

 and me, leaning with his head upon his hand, inert and 

 heedless, as most men are who have nothing to do — this 

 was the porter. On the other side of the counter, behind 

 an old worm-eaten desk, sat the book-keeper. The usual 

 salutation having passed between us, I took from the 

 desk a long sheet of white paper, which, with the 

 exception of the heading, was unsullied — not the name 

 of a passenger or parcel was written thereon ! This was 

 what is technically called the "way-bill." With a 

 complacency I could sometimes assume, I read the date 

 aloud, adding thereto that it was a most remarkable 

 day. 



