imposition. They are in general less sinned against than sinning. An
ancient lady, getting into the coach, is from her breadth a very
inconvenient companion in such a vehicle; but to atone for her
rotundity, an old maid of a spare appearance, and in a most grotesque
habit, is advancing towards the steps.

A portly gentleman, with a sword and cane in one hand, is deaf to the
entreaties of a poor little deformed postilion, who solicits his
customary fee. The old woman smoking her short pipe in the basket, pays
very little attention to what is passing around her: cheered by the
fumes of her tube, she lets the vanities of the world go their own way.
Two passengers on the roof of the coach afford a good specimen of French
and English manners. Ben Block, of the Centurion, surveys the subject of
La Grande Monarque with ineffable contempt.

In the window are a very curious pair; one of them blowing a
French-horn, and the other endeavouring, but without effect, to smoke
away a little sickness, which he feels from the fumes of his last
night's punch. Beneath them is a traveller taking a tender farewell of
the chambermaid, who is not to be moved by the clangour of the great bar
bell, or the more thundering sound of her mistress's voice.

The back-ground is crowded with a procession of active citizens; they
have chaired a figure with a horn-book, a bib, and a rattle, intended to
represent Child, Lord Castlemain, afterwards Lord Tylney, who, in a
violent contest for the county of Essex, opposed Sir Robert Abdy and Mr.
Bramston. The horn-book, bib, and rattle are evidently displayed as
punningly allusive to his name.[4]

Some pains have been taken to discover in what part of Essex this scene
is laid; but from the many alterations made by rebuilding, removal, &c.
it has not been positively ascertained, though it is probably
Chelmsford.

[Illustration: COUNTRY INN YARD.]

FOOTNOTE:

[4] At this election a man was placed on a bulk, with a figure
representing a child in his arms: as he whipped it he exclaimed, "What,
you little child, must you be a member?" This election being disputed,
it appeared from the register-book of the parish where Lord Castlemain
was born, that he was but twenty years of age when he offered himself a
candidate.

INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS.

As our future welfare depends, in a great measure, on our own conduct in
the outset of life, and as we derive our best expectations of success
from our own