Page:The London Guide and Stranger's Safeguard.djvu/25

Rh from that place; nor is it our business or inclination to enquire how they got there. It was pleasant to see the hangers-on scamper away with the square bundle of a morning; sometimes from one point, sometimes from another, taking care not to make their deposit at the same place too often.

From all this, the reader must be aware, that persons so employed, are not trustworthy with his luggage, and that he would do well to see after it witn his own eyes; for if he permit one of the officious hangers-on to meddle with it, no opportunity will slip by unimproved, even though the coachman and guard are standing near. These are not a check sufficiently strong upon his dishonesty, since he is himself down to so many of their tricks—such as "shouldering," and the like, that they dare not interfere in his "nibbling."

Shouldering, among coachmen, is that species of cheating in which they take the fares and pocket them, generally of such passengers as they overtake on the road, or who come across the country; but it not unfrequently happens that they take passengers the whole line of their run, even when the proprietors scarcely have one inside for themselves. A curious story of this