HORSE-SELLING ADVERTISEMENTS. 229 



Oxford by my knowledge of hydropathics — through 

 the city, one pulling, another rearing, and all from 

 their excited state being nearly unmanageable. How- 

 ever, at last, much to my relief, I landed them safe 

 in the Golden Cross yard ; and those who recollect 

 that yard before it was purchased by Government 

 and pulled down, will understand that this could 

 have been no very easy task.' 



Of course, to coach-proprietors working over the 

 middle-ground, if they had no stoppages at their 

 houses for the passengers' meals, but merely their 

 share of the earnings to depend on as the profit 

 arising from their undertaking, economy in the pur- 

 chase of horses was a most important matter — a 

 good appearance being considered unnecessary for 

 horses which were never seen at work by daylight, 

 as with the mails and night-coaches on certain parts 

 of their journeys. Thus a horse that would be quite up 

 to the mark over a stage in the Bristol or Gloucester 

 mail, would not do to show in the 'York House,' 

 the swell day-coach from Bath, or the 'Berkeley 

 Hunt,' filling a similar position on the Cheltenham 

 road. 



So totally different were the day and night horses, 

 that I have fancied sometimes when describing the 

 latter to men who had never seen them, they thought 

 my descriptions were ' travellers' tales ' very much 



