Page:The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club.djvu/625

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THE PICKWICK CLUB. 523

every moment, there was no telling where they came from ; they seemed to start up in some strange manner from the ground or the air, and to disappear in the same way. When a porter had put his luggage in the coach and received his fare, he turned round and was gone ; and before my uncle had well begun to wonder what had become of him, half-a-dozen fr.esh ones started up, and staggered along under the weight of parcels which seemed big enough to crush them. The passengers were all dressed so oddly too— large, broad-skirted laced coats with great cuffs and no collars; and wigs, gentlemen, — great formal wigs with a tie behind. My uncle could make nothing of it.

" ' Now, are you going to get in ? ' said the person who had ad- dressed my uncle before. He was dressed as a mail guard, with a wig on his head and most enormous cuffs to his coat, and had got a lantern in one hand and a huge blunderbuss in the other, which he was going to stow away in his little arm-chest. 'Are you going to get in. Jack Martin ?' said the guard, holding the lantern to my uncle's face.

" * Hallo,' said my uncle, falling back a step or two. ' That's familiar ? '

" ' It's so on the way-bill,' replied the guard.

"'Isn't there a ' Mister' before it?' said my uncle— for he felt, gentlemen, that for a guard he didn't know to call him Jack IMartin, was a liberty which the Post-office wouldn't have sanctioned if thej had known it.

" ' No ; there is not,' rejoined the guard coolly.

" 'Is the fare paid?' enquired my uncle.

" ' Of course it is,' rejoined the guard.


 * ' ' It is, is it? ' said my uncle. ' Then here goes — which coach ? '

London Mail, which had got the steps down, and the door open. ' Stop — here are the other passengers. Let them get in first.'
 * ' 'This,' said theguard, pointing to an old-fashioned Edinburgh and

'As the guard spoke, there all at once appeared, right in front of my uncle, a young gentleman in a powdered wig and a sky blue coat trimmed with silver, made very full and broad in the skirts, which were lined with buckram. Tiggin and Welps were in the printed calico and waistcoat piece line, gentlemen, so my uncle knew all the materials at once. He wore knee breeches and a kind of leggings rolled up over his silk stockings, and shoes with buckles ; he had ruffles at his wrists, a three-cornered hat on his head, and a long taper sword by his side. The flaps of his waistcoat came half way down his thighs, and the ends of his cravat reached to his waist. He stalked gravely to the coach-door, pulled off his hat, and held it out above his head at arm's length, cocking his little finger in the air at the same time, as some affected people do when they take a cup of tea : then drew his feet together, and made a low grave bow, and then put out his left hand. My uncle was just going to step forward, and shake it heartily, when he perceived that these attentions were directed not towards him, but to a young lady, who just then appeared at the foot of the steps, attired in an old-fashioned green velvet dress, with a long waist and stomacher. She had no bonnet on her head, gentlemen, which was muffled in a black silk hood, but she looked round for an

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