"Wo-ho-ho-ho-up—wo-ho!"—Sweet public, you are now in the yard of the Crown and Cauliflower Hotel, famous for posting, roasting, and accommodating the lieges with very lean bills of fare, and very fat bills of figures;—and you have listened to the lover-like tones, half-soliciting, half-imperative, with which our postboy brought his horses at once to a halt, at the hall-door of the Crown and Cauliflower. There he stands at your chaise-door, hand to hat, and whip couchant, soliciting your favourable notice. There stands the postboy, an important individual of the great family of the riders. He is much given to a white silk hat, with the silk worn off the rim in front, a white neckerchief, a white vest, a canary jacket, a small plaited shirt, and white corded unfit-for-finical-ladies-to-conceive-the-proper-ogatives of. The postboy is a jumble of contradictions; he is always rising in the world, yet he is as constantly finding his level; he has had more ups and downs than any other being; he is, at least, fifty-seven, but he has not yet arrived at manhood; should he complete the century, he will be as far off from it then as he is now; he is always a postboy; a boy post dated; he never reaches man's estate; he never knows its declension; he never sinks into second childishness; he lives and dies a postboy. We have heard of one, two, or three instances "down the road," where he saved one or two thousand pounds, and became a landlord. We think they are apocryphal. Perhaps they occurred in the days of the highwaymen, by whom postboys have been known to profit. But whenever they occurred, or however, they are exceptions in the great chapter of postboys, proving that the will of fate has given to the postboy

"A local habitation and a name"—

if, indeed, there can be said to be anything local about his changing and yet monotonous existence—else he had walked about the world an embodied nonentity. He is a totally different being to the cantering gemini, the letter postboy and his horse; nor does he ever become "a postman." Like Tom Moody, he radiates

"Through a country well known to him fifty miles round,"

yet little knoweth he besides the change-houses, and they, in his imagination, stand out in glorious array:—the Pig and Lapstone, the Three Leathern Corkscrews, the Manuscript and Hatchet, the Stork and Ruffles, the Waggon and Shirtpin, the Syllabub and Pump, all of which, in motley succession, dance before his dozing eyes as so many havens from his peril;—the sole green spots that ornament the desert of his life.

The postilion is a veritable centaur—a human quadruped partaking of the two natures, the stable and the bed and bolster, "three-pennorth o' brandy," and the nose-bag. He is a poet, superior to that genuine pastoral, the haymaker, if familiarity with Apollo (and if Apollo be the sun) constitutes a poet. The sickle-wielder of Autumn burns not with such fervid inspiration. Look on his countenance—"that index to the soul"—and imagine how full of fire that soul must be, when the proverbial brevity of an index contains so much—"to overflowing full." His genus stands out like a finger-post before him, introducing him to every circle. His soul is concentrated in the Mews. Talk of Shakspere and Owen Glendower, they never carried such lights before them; even Bardolph himself possessed not such a nasal flambeau. No! his is an inspired nose, and his nose knows it! And it loveth not, neither doth it abide, the familiarities of the aqueous element, but hisses in its ablutions, as a stable-boy hisses when he is cleaning a horse, thereby publishing its heat and its nosology. Again, mark you his freckles—whoever saw such in the face of beauty? He is a character "alone in his glory," so far as his outward indications go. Let us gauge the calibre of his understanding. We were in the tap of the Sun and Cabbage-stump when he called to "wet his whistle." A "boy" was there before him from the Hand and Placquet, drinking with "a return," said return being a runaway apprentice, and our postboy stopped with his in the shape of a clandestine marriage. Upon meeting, the following colloquy took place:—

"Well, Tom, how goes it at the Placquet, eh? I see ye up the road pretty often lately. I 'spose the old man an' her don't agree no better? Ah! he shouldn't a married her."

"That's nither here nor there with us, you know, Bob, as long as there's plenty o' gemmen as wants our assistance; and, somehow, there's all'ays plenty on em' at the Placquet—good payers too. Th' old feller's terrible crabby, but she cocks her cap 'nation high, to be sure, an' she don't care—it suits her better to look arter her customers, eh?"

"Mum about them things, Tom. I got a han'some young couple here going to be made one, an' we shouldn't put canker'd snaffles into young colts' chaps. There's nothin' very pleasant in rising blisters in the mouth—is there, sir?" (to our worthy self.)

"You're the rummiest feller I ever come near, Bob, to talk to the gemman a that way—you'd make a gallows good parson. But I s'pose you're comin' it feelin' like, an' Mary Scrabbles 'll soon be Mrs. Trotter?"

At this repartee there was a general "He! he! he!" the runaway apprentice taking the alto part.

"That young gemman's in a very good humour, ain't he, Tom? I s'pose his mother know he's out? A regular young lord in disguise, come out to 'stonish us gulpins; but if we had him on a flinty road, o' th' off side, at one or two o'clock of a winter's mornin', we could mek him drop his cock-tail, eh, Tom? an' laugh o' th' other side o' his mouth."

"Order, order," as them parliament chaps say—"'tacking my constitent ain't nothin' about Mary, you know, Bob."

"O, stow your chaff, an' I must be off. Here's to your health, Miss, wishin' ye much happiness; and your'n, sir, all the same; an' to the young gentleman there with the mint o' goold in his pocket, an' the kiddy side locks, an' th' pertikler purty count'nance when he laughs"—(he had a mouth like a park, and teeth like its palings)—"'oping he may never have the prison crop, nor th' lock jaw, nor the Vituses dance to spile him, Tom!" and a concurrent nod and wink at Tom scarcely preceded the emptying of the glass of "brandy with," ere he departed.

"Mind ye don't break down at the Horns, there," shouted the remaining "boy," having a sly fling at both parties as they rattled away, and dexterously conciliating his own.

Such is a specimen of his snap-dragon conversation, which partakes strongly of Christmas nonsense—short and caustic, touch and go—the blazing gin and raisins of confabulation.

The postilion seldom marries, but, in general, he does the insinuating to the cook at the inn where he tarries. The postboy has a tooth and a taste for a gastronomical relish; and though his strong stomach and long rides furnish his appetite with the best of all condiments, he can pout out his lips, and depress his eyebrows, at the plain and substantial fare which is allowed and provided for him, while his mouth waters for a portion of the luxuries preparing about him; therefore, whatever Molly can pare and make, as convenience and opportunity offer, never comes either too late or too early for him. He imagines himself to be one of those who are reputed to be "awake to the world," and sooth to say, he distinguishes at a glance the character of his fare of either gender, and deports himself accordingly. He never takes more than his legitimate fare—if he cannot get it: nor will he ever annoy you with impertinence at his departure—if you have purchased his civility. He may, and frequently does, practise a little collusion with toll-gate keepers: thus, just as you are leaving the town where you hire your post-chaise, there is invariably a toll-bar; you pay there, and the postboy receives "a ticket," which frees you from payment at other bars on your line of route, set up to intercept the cross-roads, and so on, till you must pay again, on entering another "line of trust." A lucky dog are you, if you escape so; ten to one your postboy has "an understanding" with the keeper of one of the bars, whereat arriving, he bawls out, "Pay here!"; or, if you have been very liberal "at mine inn," or to the last "boy," it varies to "Pay here, your honour!" in notes as dulcet as his glottis will permit him, and draws up. "Free to Flatbit!" cries the tollman, as you comply with his demand, dash goes the rowel into the left flank of the near horse, and you are pursuing your course in blissful ignorance. As the postboy returns, he receives from his "friend," his share of your mulet, and enjoys his laugh literally at your expense.

The postboy has been a person of importance—we say, has been; for, firstly, the flying stages, with their excellent accommodation, civil functionaries, and eleven miles an hour, more than decimated his "order;" then that northern leveller, Macadam, exacted a triple tithe; and lastly, the iron-ribbed troughs and viaducts, everywhere throwing out arteries from the main trunks, and every individual inch growing, like a chopped centipede, into a perfect monster,—have almost annihilated him, so much so, that the next generation will set him down as an extinct animal, and, like the present with the Dodo, will be able to find only his bill and his boots! Still doth he retain some dignity, for, at a late general election, he headed the poll gallantly for the independent and patriotic borough of Bullybribe; where the Right Honourable Florian Augustus Finglefangle offered golden reasons for the suffrages of his father's tenantry, and those real bulwarks of the British empire—the potwallopers. Notwithstanding, his glory has departed; those incorrigible dogs who rule the roast in the courts of law—cold, unyielding, unromantic civilians—have long decided not to recognise the mysteries of the Gretna smithy; they have openly denounced the votaries of Venus and Vulcan; and one great part of the postboy's occupation is no more.

Our postboy is not about to lead you, gentle reader, the tour of the Continent; he is not about to familiarise you with banditti; he has no forests nor horrible gorges to lead you through; you must expect little from him beside what we have prepared you for; and, as we have exposed his trifling peccadilloes, we entreat you not to let your virtuous indignation overcome your liberality nor your gentlemanly bearing. Probably, sir, you are fresh from the perpetration of rascalities which he would shrink from as being heinous crimes, but which you very complacently assure yourself were cleverly done to take in Messrs. Adderfeed and Co. You are a shrewd fellow, doubtless, and "are not to be done," as you believe in your self-sufficiency;—let him try to impose payment of a toll on you, which you have no business to pay, and you wish they may get it, that's all! Now, put it to your conscience—you have a conscience?—and compare your rascalities with his venialities: your "means and appliances" with his; and if conscience give the balance in your favour, why you are a worthy fellow, and ought not to be imposed on; but be careful; do not insist upon your bond; your memory may play truant, and, if it does not, you are certainly benevolent, nay, munificent, and will not stoop to such a paltry cavil. Remember he is ever at your beck and command, hail, rain, or shine; high-road or bye-road; at hazy morn, or fervid noon, or dreary night; you have but to intimate your pleasure, and he is your humble servitor. In the stifling heat and dust of midsummer, and in the dreary sleet and howling winds of Christmas, he is glad to administer to your business or pleasure. He never tires nor complains of his vocation. Thrice has he been out in this day's heavy rain—the whole of his wardrobe is soaked—a month ago he rose from a bed of fever, induced by the same cause—yet are you waiting, the moment you hear his wheels, to order him off for another sixteen miles, and not a murmur will escape him, although it is now six at eve, the sun setting, and the wind "turning very cold." Still will he lift his hat to you as deferentially as he did to his first fare, and comply with the same alacrity.

The thousands who pass him in his progress think not of his cares nor his sorrows, his abundance or his want. He toils and moils like the rest, unconscious that the eyes and the mind of the philosopher—bright scintillations of heaven and eternity—may rest upon him at the same moment with those of the humble individual who hath here noted his characteristics and sketched his profile. Jao.