Page:In bad company and other stories.djvu/232

 REEDY LAKE STATION

Post-office clock in Bourke Street, Melbourne, is about to strike six, in the month of June 1858. At this 'ever-lastingly early hour in the morning' (as remarked by Mr. Chuckster), I am the box-passenger of Cobb's coach, en route for Bendigo. The team of greys stand motionless, save for a faint attempt to paw on the part of the near-side leader. The first stroke vibrates on high. Mr. Jackson, with an exclamation, tightens his 'lines.' The six greys plunge at their collars, and we are off.

There was no Spencer Street terminus in those days. We were truly thankful to King Cobb. I, for one, was glad to get over a hundred miles of indifferent road in a day—winter weather, too. We did not grumble so comprehensively as latter-day travellers.

Remembered yet, how, when we came to the long hill at Keilorbridge, the driver let his horses out when half-way down. The pace that we went 'was a caution to see.' The wheel-spokes flew round, invisible to the naked eye. The coach rocked in a manner to appal the nervous. The horses lay down to it as if they were starting for a Scurry Stakes. But it was a good piece of macadam, and we were half-way up to the next hill before any one had time to think seriously of the danger.

Nobody, of course, would have dared to have addressed the driver upon the subject. In those flush days, when both day and night coaches loaded well, when fares were high and profits phenomenal, he was an autocrat not to be lightly approached. It almost took two people to manage a communication—one to bear the message from the other. Silent