which we have any distinct recollection. It was a singular-looking machine, such as we might look for in vain now-a-days, and will bear a brief description. The old basket-coaches had not long before been taken off the road, and the lighter stages, with their liberal outside accommodation, had not yet made their appearance, or, if they had, were by no means common. This was a double-bodied structure, the second or hinder body being an improvement upon the basket, which used to hang uncovered in the rear. Thus, the inside of the coach consisted of two small apartments, separated from each other by a wooden partition in which a sliding door could be opened or shut at pleasure; each division afforded tolerable sitting room for six persons. The roof was much higher than in the common stages that came afterwards-high enough, indeed, to have the narrow windows above the heads of the sitters, who, sitting back to window, would else have been liable to be dashed against the glass by the fearful jolting. The only accommodation for passengers outside was the box-seat, and a broad seat behind it, affording room for six persons in all, including the driver. The long flat roof was piled with goods and luggage; and the guard, with his battered tin horn and polished brass blunderbuss, had a perch erected for him near the rear. The whole structure stood on wheels of an enormous size according to present-day notions, the hinder ones being about the diameter of the drivingwheel of a locomotive engine, and the front ones of proportionate dimensions: the flat tires of all four were little less than seven inches in width, a measure plainly adopted to prevent their cutting too deep into the soil and there sticking fast. This was necessary on account of the state of the roads, into which wheels of the width now in use would, under such a weight, have speedily sunk to the axles. Six stout horses drew the ponderous equipage on ordinary ground; but when we had to ascend hills, two, and sometimes four more were added, and in difficult cases there would be quite a mob of fellows bawling, hooting, cracking their long whips, while others sturdily shouldered at every wheel, until the obstacle was conquered, when they would bid us good speed with a parting cheer. In some places the road consisted of a mass of sea-shingle brought from the coast, pebbles round and smooth, averaging in size a man's fist. In this loose mass the coach would plunge some half a yard deep, and twice it became so embedded that the guard had to go in search of aid, and press horses for the service from the nearest farm, before we could be extricated. We were two days and nights getting from Barnstaple to Londonstopping for breakfast, dinner, and supper, for the two last meals more than an hour each time; and having tea brought to us as we sat, taking it without alighting. The most formidable difficulty of all was the ascent of a steep hill which ran for about a mile and a half through Marlborough Forest. Twenty times at least the eight horses came to a standstill, and had to be allowed their own time before they would move. For more than half the route there lay an extensive encampment of gipsies along each side of the road, forming a most picturesque scene, with their wild figures, their bright-coloured costume, dark bronzed skin, their white tents, and the numerous columns of thin blue smoke that curled upwards and lost itself in the dense foliage. These stout vagabonds rendered us an essential service; they cheered and lashed the horses, they pushed bodily in the rear, and they climbed the spokes of the revolving wheels, to send them round, with a recklessness and dexterity only to be acquired by long practice. To compensate them for their labour, the coachman halted at the top of the hill to give them a chance of trading, and then the women came forward, and did a little fortune-telling with some of the female passengers, not without considerable banter and joking on the part of the on-lookers; while the younger gipsies brought to us abundance of sweet wood strawberries, dished up in dock leaves, than which nothing at the time could have been more welcome. During the first half of the journey our pace had not, on the whole, averaged more than four miles an hour, and sometimes the tramps and wanderers of the road would keep up with us for the hour together, especially the pedlars and packmen, who would display their "brummagem "wares, and now and then effect a sale as we rumbled along. But the roads became firmer and better as we drew nearer to the metropolis. At Newbury, we left a pair of horses and postboy behind, and went on with four horses only the country being level, and the roads compacted by the constant traffic over them. But now the passengers, and the women especially, began to grow nervous on the score of highwaymen, as we were supposed to be entering on the robbers' ground. Two or three gentlemen, who occupied the post of danger in the rear compartment, produced each a pair of holster pistols, and made a liberal display of them upon all occasions, with a view of warding off attack. Their valour, however, was not put to the proof; the dangerous ground, if dangerous it was, was passed over in safety; and when we awoke on the third morning we had left Hounslow behind, and were already entering the outlying suburb of London at its western extremity. It is worth while to notice the cost of this cumbrous mode of travelling compared with that of the present railway transit. The fare from Barnstaple was nominally 388. by the coach, but that did not include the fees to four coachmen and four guards-88. more at the least, or £2 68. ; add to this 10s. a day for refreshments on the route, and the whole cost is £3 6s., not taking the value of time into the account. We lately made the run from Barnstaple in about seven and a half hours, at a total cost of less than 30s., travelling in perfect comfort. Passing over ten or a dozen years, we find that the roads of our island have undergone a thorough transformation under the magic wand of Macadam, and the business of locomotion has assumed a phase altogether different from anything in the experience of former times. The roads, hard, smooth, aud slightly convex in the middle to carry off the drainage, are kept in constant repair; no more ruts a foot deep, no more loose shingle, no more quags and sloughs threatening to swallow you up, but everywhere a solid causeway, densely compacted in armour of the granite rock. The coach has reached its perfect form; the second body has vanished after the basket; the twelve insides are changed for four or six; and the six outsides are changed to twelve or fourteen; and to compensate the heavy weight on the roof, there are the front and hind boots for the stowage of ballast to prevent capsizing. All through the land runs the light stage, doing regularly its eight miles an hour, including stoppages, or its hundred miles or more per day, carrying life and cheerfulness wherever it goes, and looking and behaving like what it is, the pet and darling of the people. The coach man, the "man of many capes"-the "pearlbuttoned and drab-coated spark"-is as much a monarch on the box as is the captain of a ship on his quarter-deck; the guard is his prime minister, and the passengers are his subjects, whom he governs despotically, not forgetting to tax them impartially at the end of the journey. He has his favourite houses of call, where he pulls up and quaffs the sparkling ale, handed to him by the plump barmaid, whom he pays with a chuck under the chin, while he accepts the choicest flower of her garden and sticks it into his button-hole. He has an inexhaustible faculty of conversation, and is equally voluble on sporting and topographical subjects. To have the full benefit of his knowledge you must occupy the box-seat by his side, when, if you have any curiosity in that direction, he will point out everything remarkable on the road, and give you the history of all the county families on his route even for generations back. He knows everybody, apparently, whom he meets or overtakes, and exchanges the telegraphic compliments of the road with high and low; he calls all the grooms and stable-boys by their Christian names, and speaks to them in a sort of fatherly tone, as though they were his children. There is withal a fund of real kindness in him, to which many a weary and penniless pedestrian is indebted for a timely lift to help them on their way. dismal memories on that score, memories of hail As for the guard, he is pretty sure to be a musical genius, for that wonderful instrument, the key-pounding, the virtues of which she knew by exbugle, has found its way over from Germany, and coach-guards have seized it one and all, and banished the old yard-long horn of tin for ever. He can play all the popular airs of the day-"Oh! Nanny," " Auld Lang Syne," "Cherry Ripe," the "Huntsman's Chorus," and fifty more; and on moonlight nights, while coachee is "tooling the tits" learnedly along the white road up hill and down hill, he will play from stage to stage, hour after hour, rousing the echoes from far and near, and scaring from his lair the timid fawn, or provoking the owl to answer again with his weird whoo-oo! Remembering how it used to be years ago, you are amazed at the mere fragment of time it takes to change horses. The grooms have caught the notes of the bugle while it was yet a mile off, and have brought out the new team, and there stand the korses in due position. Almost before the wheels are still the team is are detached, and are walking off in a cloud of their own steam to the stable; then a brief clattering on the ground as the new ones are put to-a single minute does it, and off you go again! Pleasant it is to roll along over the swelling land, climbing the hills and descending the vales, and bowling through the levels under the spreading elms which let in the sunlight in patches upon the road. The wide and ever-changing landscape unfolds itself as you advance; you plunge into forests, you cross winding streams on picturesque bridges, you traverse the grassy downs browsed by flocks of silly sheep, and out of the leafy silences perchance you are borne suddenly into the heart of a market town where all is life and animation, and the hum and din of traffic. Can anything be more delightful than a run of three or four score miles on a summer's day through such a varying landscape as the soil of England presents? But there is light and dark in all pictures, and we have to confess that the dark side of stage-coach travelling, even in its palmiest time, was quite sufficient to overbalance all its fascinations. We have perience. Fortunately, no permanent injury resulted. Once, when journeying to Worcester after a rainy season, we found the waters were out at Tewkesbury, and rising rapidly. The host of the inn where we changed horses protested strongly against our proceeding further, and the coachman seemed to incline to his opinion; the majority of the passengers, however, attributing the landlord's counsel to interested motives, were for going on, and on we went. The Worcester road ran through low meadows just outside the town; the meadows were all under water, presenting the appearance of a turbulent mudcoloured sea, and the road, sunk near a yard beneath the surface, was only traceable by the white tops of the wooden fences on either side. There was a good quarter of a mile of this flooded road to pass before coming to the rising ground on the other side. Urged by the whip, the horses dashed into the surging lake, and for about a furlong advanced bravely. Too soon, however, the water deepened, and rising above the axles, threatened to engulph us; at every step we plunged deeper, and at about midway had come almost to a standstill, the current, which swept strongly across the road, acting with such force upon the horses' flanks that they began to swerve out of the track, while, owing to the depth to which they were submerged, they had but a feeble hold of the ground. In another minute we should have been swept over the fence into six or seven feet of water, when the coachman, throwing the reins to a passenger, leaped up to his middle in the flood, calling at the same time loudly to the guard, who followed his example, and both seized the leaders by the head. Desperate was the struggle that ensued; several of the outsiders in their fright threw themselves off, and, guided by the rails, waded on to the rising ground beyond; the insiders, who were mostly women, sent up a chorus of screams and cries pitiful to hear. For our part we stuck to our perch, keeping all the while an eye upon the position of the guide-rails in case it should come to a swim. Happily, some stout fellows who had followed us from the town, spite of the storm, to witness our adventure, generously rushed to the rescue, and by dint of pushing and shouldering, got us finally through not without material damage to most of us, and the excitement of mortal fear. We made a general contribution for the hardy fellows who had given us their aid, and they gave us a hearty cheer as they waded back to the town, while we pushed on for the next stage-Upton, if we recollect rightly-where we stayed for an hour to dry and refit, and where we had to leave the women behind. We could fill a whole sheet, were it worth while, with details of accidents and calamities on the coach road, in all of which we were personally concerned. We have gone bodily, with a dozen companions, over a hedge into a bean-field; we have burst through the crust of a gravel-pit by the roadside, and been deposited in the ditch; we have come down with a crash on the stones through collision with a waggon, when a fellow-passenger was killed on the spot; we have been left in the snow on a moonless night in consequence of the driver nodding on his box; and have come to grief in various ways, as well through the weather or unavoidable accident, as by the neglect, the thoughtlessness, and the insobriety of those to whom the public safety was confided. When we recall the casualties by stage-coaches and compare them with those attendant upon railway travelling, we are forced to the conclusion that, looking to the number of travellers by both modes of conveyance, the killing and maiming on the turnpike-road was at least ten times the amount of the same disasters on the rail. colours flying on the roof, and the bugle blowing with all its might, "See the conquering hero comes." The public were quite right to laugh, for they got their travelling for nothing; but to professional travellers such opposition was nothing but a nuisance, seeing that they would at times be driven to the expense of posting because the rabble had taken possession of the regular conveyance. The reader must not suppose that we have forgotten the mail-coach, which was the ne plus ultra of locomotion in its day, the pride of Great Britain and the envy of surrounding peoples. The mail was the monarch among stage-coaches, and the model which all others strove to imitate. It had the advantage over all other modes of conveyance, owing to its rapid rate of travelling, which was never less than ten miles an hour, including stoppages, and on some lines of road was as much as twelve miles an hour. It was less liable to accident because its horses were better trained, and of a better breed than the common stage horses, and because the mail coach itself was invariably a new coach, a year or so old at the utmost, and had never been long enough on the road to have become crazy or unsound. As for the drivers, they were gentlemen in appearance, while the guards were the most accomplished of their profession. The passengers by the mail were also usually of the better class of travellers, the fares ranging somewhat higher than the common stage fares. In all its accompaniments the mail was exact and exemplary; punctuality and despatch were the order of the day, and the duty of both was rigidly enforced upon connected with it. It was the express train of the period, and few were the out-door pleasures comparable to an afternoon's outside ride in favourable weather. There was one drawback, though; the brisk ride in the free air was sure to make you all your dinner, there was no time to eat it in. You sat down, you carved the wing of a fowl for the lady opposite you, and were proceeding to help yourself, when-lo! that is the coachman at the door crying "All ready!" and Mrs. Nelson's confidential waiter is collecting the three-and-sixpences--and you have not tasted a mouthful. It is in vain you expostulate and declare that you have eaten nothing. You must be off at once, or the mail will be off without you. It is no great marvel if, in such circumstances, gentlemen with appetites would lay violent hands on the viands, and bear them off to the coach, there to discuss them at leisure, rather than be baulked of a meal for which they had paid the cash. Thus, indeed, we have seen them act, times and again; and, to confess the truth, pars ipsi fuimus, we have done the same ourselves after a long ride. One of the characteristics of the stage-coach system, which seems to have marked its whole career, was that intense love of monopoly which all coach-hungry, and when you stopped, say at Newbury, for proprietors invariably cherished. Whenever a new coach started, the old coach immediately asserted its right to beat it off the road, and would persist in the endeavour at any cost, however ruinous to itself. Hence for years almost every place of note had its opposition coaches, each doing its utmost to ruin the other. There were several modes of rivalry, such as splendour of outfit-superior accommodation, swifter horses, and last, but not least, cheaper fares. We can recollect the fare from Bath to Cheltenham being reduced first from a guinea to fifteen shillings, then to ten, then to seven-and-six, then to five, then to half-a-crown, then to a shilling. At that low ebb the old coach thought to give the coup-de-gráce to the new one by carrying passengers for nothing, and did so; but was met by a counter-check from its antagonist. who published its determination not only to carry its patrons for nothing. but to give them a capital dinner on the road into the bargain. What is instructive in relation to these contests is the fact, that so far as we can learn, no coach ever did succeed in running another off the road. Like mightier combatants, the spiteful proprietors had to come to terms at last, and the war ended, as most wars seem fated to end, in leaving both adversaries in much the same position they occupied at the beginning, with the significant exception, however, that both had well-nigh exhausted their resources. The public, especially the idle section of it, used to enjoy these conflicts amazingly; they looked on the strife as a sort of prize-fight, and would cheer either antagonist as it rattled through the town with its As the mail carried but four insides, allowing a corner to each inmate, it was often preferred for the night journey, old roadsters being from habit able to sleep away the hours as comfortably almost as in their beds at home. On some parts of the route the night mail would stop in the middle of a petty hamlet, where all was still as death and not a soul was to be seen in the streets. If the stoppage woke you up, and you looked out, you would wonder what occasioned it; but if you looked in the right direction you would see a night-capped head thrust forth from an upper window, and the mail-bag of the place would fall plump on the roof, accompanied with a brief "good night" from the sleepy postmaster, and on you would roll again. Nobody took a greater pride in his Majesty's mails than did the London citizen, who found a spiritstirring spectacle in their nightly array as they rolled off, north, south, east, and west, from the neighbourhood of the Post Office as the twilight was settling down. A very interesting sight it was, and cheerful was the sound, as the hoofs clattered, the wheels rattled, and the bugles sang out their plaintive ditties, while the admiring crowds cheered them on their way. More notable still was the grand mailcoach procession on the first of May, when coaches, trappings, liveries, everything, furnished anew by the contractors, made the complete tour of the city in a train some half-mile in length. It was their wont to go slowly round Lincoln's Inn Fields, whence they would move off deliberately and complete their tour in time to start on their first trip. It is near forty years ago that the stage-coach as an institution first began to wane and pale in its glory. Coming up to town from Devonshire in the summer of 1836, we had reached within a mile or two of Maidenhead, when from a rise in the road the coachman pointed out in the distance some puffs of white which we took for smoke. "Look yonder, sir," he said, "that's the steam from the railwayengine, which, according to all accounts, is to drive every coach in the country off the road." The man spoke sneeringly, and he little imagined with how much truth. In a few months the Great Western was open as far as Reading: in a few more the North-Western would take you to Boxmoor; while almost simultaneously other lines were growing into being, and soon began to girdle the capital on all sides. Thus, as the iron road advanced the coaches: had to recede, and gradually that revolution was effected which has made the railroad a universal institution, and the stage-coach a thing of the past. We confess to certain regrets in connection with our old favourites, and sometimes, in thinking pensively over their fate, we cannot help wondering what became of the old coaches at last? Were they transformed by coachmaking skill into vehicles of another description? Did they emigrate to some other soil where railways were not thought of? Or, like the "wave-ruling chariots of fire" once charged with Britannia's thunder, were they laid up in ordinary, and allowed to rot in undignified repose? Then, again, what became of the key-bugle? That sonorous and highly demonstrative instrument has disappeared from the earth as completely as the dodo has. The year 1818 saw its advent and it had become extinct in 1845 or thereabouts. Like the dodo, nothing is now recoverable of it but mere fragments, and even these have to be sought diligently and excavated from the refuse heaps of the marine store dealer. Well, perhaps there is a moral fitness in the destiny which consigns trumpeter and trumpeted to the same oblivion. CHAPTER VII.-THE SACKING AND BURNING OF THE IMPERIAL PALACES AT YUEN-MING-YUEN. On building rose fairy-like from the centre of a lake,. reflecting its image on the limpid blue liquid in which it seemed to float, and then a sloping path would carry them into the heart of a mysterious cavern of artificial rocks, and lead them on to a grotto in the bosom of another lake. The variety was endless and charming in the extreme; indeed, all that is most lovely in Chinese scenery, where art rivals nature, seemed associated in these delightful grounds. The resources of the designer appeared to have been endless, and no money had been spared to bring his work to perfection. All the tasteful landscapes so often viewed in the better class of Chinese paintings, and which they had hitherto looked upon as wrought out of the imagination of the artist, were here fully set forth. They wandered for hours through the cool shades and winding paths, from building to building. Here and there was a terrace on the side of a hill, with summer-houses so cool, each containing suites of richly-furnished apartments, now deserted, most of them untouched; although they met scores of Chinese carrying away heavy loads of plunder from the outbuildings, chiefly cloth and porcelain-ware. Then they ascended a flight of some eighty marble steps, a gentle stream of water at each side falling into a large marble basin at the bottom, bridged with marble also. At the top they reached a terrace surrounded by dark pine-trees, in the centre of which stood a Buddhist temple. They entered the building where the triple deity was represented by huge wooden images, with numerous smaller shrines and smaller images. Before the great idol were the ashes of the stocks of incense, the last that ever were to smoke at his shrine in that imperial temple. 66 What is this?" said the interpreter; "gold, is it not?" taking up with some difficulty an idol about two feet high. "Gold, my dear fellow!" another replied, "do, you think gold is so plentiful in China that they have golden gods in a remote temple like this, where any one might carry them off?" It's heavy enough, then, if it is not gold; let us smash him and see;" and down went the divinity with a heavy thud on the marble floor, but no sign of a smash in him. "I am sure it is gold," he again asserted. "If you think so," said one, "bring it home, then." "I wish I had that lazy servant of mine here," was his rejoinder, as he stood looking at the idol, "I skould make him carry it." So they left it there; but when the burning came it was found by others, who brought it home and made a fortune out of it. Proceeding along the terrace, they arrived at one of the Emperor's favourite residences, where he loved to retire and pass his days with one or more of his wives. Of these he had thirteen. The first wife, or Empress, had no family, but two of the junior wives had blessed him with issue, one a boy (now the reigning Emperor Tung Che), the other a girl. His children, as well as his wives, had accompanied him in his flight to Je-hol, an imperial residence in Manchoo Tartary, about a hundred miles from Peking, a cool retreat during the summer. On entering this palace, they passed through several courtyards paved with marble, surrounded by apartments furnished in the most gorgeous style, with rare ornaments, and cabinets containing sets of the imperial yellow china. There were also imperial sceptres in green and white jade-stone, and tall jars in porcelain painted in the richest colours, representing a series of hunting scenes in which the tiger and stag were pursued. Tablets adorned the walls of large size, in which sylvan scenes of landscape or hunting were represented, and in which the figures, trees, water, animals, and other objects, were inlaid in precious stones. There were sleeping-rooms to the right and left, with satin embroidered hangings over the beds, where doubtless the fugitive Emperor had slept. It is impossible to describe the riches with which the various palaces and subsidiary buildings of Yuenming-yuen were stored-not only with Chinese articles of value, but European articles of vertu, jewellery, and furniture, which the ambassadors of Great Britain and France had brought with them as presents as far back as the past century. These, it may be easily conceived, excited the cupidity of a victorious army, especially the French troops, who were first on the ground and in possession of the principal palace. At first it was understood that the spoil should be fairly divided between the allies, but the French managed to secure by far the greater share, as they were the first to get in. At last every one who could get permission to leave the camp repaired to Yuen-mingyuen, as the generals had made no objection to plundering the palaces. What a terrible scene of destruction then presented itself! Officers and men, Euglish and French, were rushing about in a most unbecoming manner, eager for the acquisition of valuables. Most of the Frenchmen were armed with large clubs, and what they could not carry away they smashed to atoms. The love of gain is most contagious. No one just then cared for gazing tranquilly at the works of art; each one was bent on acquiring what was most valuable. At the close of the day's sacking it was found, as was to be expected, that much dissatisfaction had arisen among the different members of the army. Numbers of the officers, and nearly the whole of the men, had by their duties been deprived of participation in the spoil. Accordingly Sir Hope Grant issued orders that the British share of the plunder must be handed over to a commission of prize agents, to be sold by auction, and the proceeds divided pro rata among the officers and men. Sir Hope Grant very generously made his share over to the men, and as a token of respect the officers presented him with a gold claret jug richly chased, one of the handsomest pieces of the booty. The French general returned home laden with diamonds and pearls. These matters being so far satisfactorily arranged, the allies concentrated their forces before the Anting Gate, an imposing structure on the walls of Peking, which are forty feet in height. It was intended to bombard this gate and effect an entrance if the Chinese authorities did not surrender it within twenty-four hours. Every preparation had been made for the assault, when at the last moment the gate was surrendered, and the British troops had the honour of planting their colours first upon the summit. Meanwhile, great anxiety was felt at the fate of the captives so treacherously seized. Prayers were offered up by the chaplain at all the services on their behalf, and the congregations most heartily joined in their petitions. Soon after the arrival of the troops at Peking, the fears as to Mr. Parkes, the chief interpreter, and Mr. Loch, private secretary to Lord Elgin, were put an end to by their arrival at headquarters. But they could give no account of what had become of their companions in distress, as they had been separated from the time of their seizure. Though these gentlemen suffered much privation during their detention, yet they received no bodily harm. Very different was the treatment of the other victims in the hands of their cruel captors. After the surrender of the gate, eight Indian soldiers and some Frenchmen were restored, fearfully emaciated, with their arms and wrists much |