236 THE OLD SCHOOL 



I had not as yet acquired sufficient knowledge of the 

 moral merits of any individual engaged here in the 

 Coaching business — for this plain reason, I had not 

 associated with them long enough. In my own locality, 

 and in my father's establishment, I had hitherto known 

 them only as servants or inferiors, and therefore could 

 know but little of their habits or character when off the 

 box. 



It is true I had heard of one or two who had visited 

 the antipodes on Government business (lolke), as Emery 

 used to say, in the character of TyJce, in the " School of 

 Reform" ; but this might have happened from a miscon- 

 struction of the law of meum and timm, to which all were 

 liable ; or, at any rate, from the different interpretation 

 given to it by master and man. The causes of such a 

 distinction I therefore simply thought, could not apply to 

 any of those noted practitioners whose company was 

 sought, and dress and manners imitated, by gentles and 

 nobles, and who indeed appeared to me to be as much 

 beyond such vulgar imputations as their employers. 



As I am now about to speak of some of the members of 

 the fraternity, it will not be considered out of place if I 

 here give a slight sketch, or general outline, of this sect 

 of the community as it at that time existed — a time of 

 transition, be it remembered, from the old school to the 

 new ; from the votaries of gin and beer — from those who 

 delighted in the piirlt/ dews of the morning — to those who 

 basked in the noonday sunshine of Sherry or Moselle ; 

 from the old box-coat, with its hundred capes, slouched 

 hat, and huge bare chapped hands, to the cape and 

 Mackintosh, nobby tile, and white gloves. 



