1 66 HIGHWAYS AND HORSES. 



amongst the team, probably as a wheel-horse, and 

 a crowd of ragged young urchins would collect and 

 follow the vehicle barefooted for at least half-a-mile, 

 screaming and yelling to their hearts' content. 



The common Irish jaunting-car is a kind of one- 

 horse chaise, frequently without springs, in which 

 people sit back to back, and with their faces looking 

 sideways. 



Miss Croker, in her clever novel, "A Bird of 

 Passage," gives an amusing account of a young 

 English lady's arrival in Ireland, and her first intro- 

 duction to Irish cars as follows : 



" After four hours' leisurely travelling on the rail 

 from Dublin, she was deposited at a rough shed 

 placarded Bansha. Bag in hand she stepped down 

 on the platform and looked about her. She was, 

 apparently, the only passenger in that out-of-the-way 

 part of the world ; save a few countrymen who were 

 lounging about, there was the invariable policeman 

 and one solitary porter. She was the cynosure of 

 every eye except the porter's, and he was busily 

 engaged in spelling out the name and address on 

 her trunk. 



" ' You'll be for the Castle, miss,' he at length 

 remarked, rising up from the inspection of her 

 luggage. 



" ' No ; for Crowmore, Mr. Sheridan's place,' she 

 replied, walking out through the station entrance in 

 the fond hope of finding some conveyance waiting 

 for her, but all that met her sight were a little group 

 of countrymen, who were gossiping to a rough-rider 

 on a heavy-looking brown colt. 



" ' Shure, Mr. Sheridan's and the Castle is all wan,' 

 continued the porter. 



