Page:The London Guide and Stranger's Safeguard.djvu/28

12, and then resumes the dispute, if convenient.

If a hackney coachman be a smasher, or dealer in bad silver, he endeavours to set down his fares (by night) in a dark place, if possible, in total disregard of your orders, generally quarrels with his horses, should he be obliged to take them by the heads,—which quarrel is sometimes meant for his customers. He most frequently "throws off," or talks to his horses of "the precious good looking load they have been "dragging:" "no great shakes; I'll bet a pound of my own money," he will say, while making the animals stand; and if you supervent his attempts at smashing, he mounts his box, with the observation—"You knows about as much as I do, mastee;" but if you reply sharply, rebuking his impertinence, he does not hesitate to charge you with crime, by inuendo, as "Vhere did you come from? I vonder!" making a motion as if you had come from a prison; and adding, "you'll soon be bowled out, I'll be bound." Such is a fair sample of tiie conduct of the far greater number of hackney coachmen.

is managed thus—a bad shilling or two, or a half-crown, is placed in the left hand between the lingers, and the hand is then