WHEN the precipitancy of a man’s wishes hurries on his ideas ninety
times faster than the vehicle he rides in—woe be to truth! and woe be
to the vehicle and its tackling (let ’em be made of what stuff you
will) upon which he breathes forth the disappointment of his soul!
As I never give general characters either of men or things in choler,
“_the most haste the worse speed_,” was all the reflection I made upon
the affair, the first time it happen’d;—the second, third, fourth, and
fifth time, I confined it respectively to those times, and accordingly
blamed only the second, third, fourth, and fifth post-boy for it,
without carrying my reflections further; but the event continuing to
befal me from the fifth, to the sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, and
tenth time, and without one exception, I then could not avoid making a
national reflection of it, which I do in these words;
_That something is always wrong in a French post-chaise, upon first
setting out._
Or the proposition may stand thus:
_A French postilion has always to alight before he has got three
hundred yards out of town._
What’s wrong now?——Diable!——a rope’s broke!——a knot has slipt!——a
staple’s drawn!——a bolt’s to whittle!——a tag, a rag, a jag, a strap, a
buckle, or a buckle’s tongue, want altering.
Now true as all this is, I never think myself impowered to
excommunicate thereupon either the post-chaise, or its driver——nor do I
take it into my head to swear by the living G—, I would rather go
a-foot ten thousand times——or that I will be damn’d, if ever I get into
another——but I take the matter coolly before me, and consider, that
some tag, or rag, or jag, or bolt, or buckle, or buckle’s tongue, will
ever be a wanting or want altering, travel where I will—so I never
chaff, but take the good and the bad as they fall in my road, and get
on:——Do so, my lad! said I; he had lost five minutes already, in
alighting in order to get at a luncheon of black bread, which he had
cramm’d into the chaise-pocket, and was remounted, and going leisurely
on, to relish it the better.——Get on, my lad, said I, briskly—but in
the most persuasive tone imaginable, for I jingled a four-and-twenty
sous piece against the glass, taking care to hold the flat side towards
him, as he look’d back: the dog grinn’d intelligence from his right ear
to his left, and behind his sooty muzzle discovered such a pearly row
of teeth, that _Sovereignty_ would have pawn’d her jewels for them.
Just heaven! {What masticators!—/What bread!—
and so as he finished the last mouthful of it, we entered the town of
_Montreuil._