musement, if not for their edification, "The last Dying Speech of the
Coachmen from Beambridge," and some two or three other mementoes of a
period and of an institution which have both, alas! long since passed
away--and for ever.

THE LAST DYING SPEECH OF THE COACHMEN FROM BEAM BRIDGE.

The _days_, nay, the very _nights_ of those who have so long
"_reined_" supreme over the "Nonpareils" and the "Brilliants," the
"Telegraphs" and the "Stars," the "Magnets" and the "Emeralds," are
nearly at an end, and the final way-bill of the total "Eclipse" is
made up. It is positively their last appearance on this stage.

In a few weeks they will be unceremoniously pushed from their boxes
by an inanimate thing of vapour and flywheels--by a meddling fellow
in a clean white jacket and a face not ditto to match, who, mounted
on the engine platform, has for some weeks been flourishing a red
hot poker over their heads, in triumph at their discomfiture and
downfall; and the turnpike road, shorn of its glories, is left
desolate and lone. No more shall the merry rattle of the wheels, as
the frisky four-in-hand careers in the morning mist, summon the
village beauty from her toilet to the window-pane to catch a
passing nod of gallantry; no more shall they loiter by the way to
trifle with the pretty coquette in the bar, or light up another
kind of flame for the fragrant Havannah fished from amongst the
miscellaneous deposits in the depths of the box-coat pockets. True,
the race were always a little fond of _raillery_, and therefore
they die by what they love--we speak of course of professional
demise--but no doubt they "hold it hard," after having so often
"pulled up" to be thus pulled down from their "high eminences," and
compelled to sink into mere landlords of hotels, farmers, or
private gentlemen. Yet so it is. They are "regularly booked."
Their "places are taken" by one who shows no disposition to make
room for them; even their coaches are already beginning to crumble
into things that have been; and their bodies (we mean their coach
bodies) are being seized upon by rural loving folks, for the vulgar
purpose of summer-houses. But a few days and they will all vanish--

"And like the baseless fabric of a vision,
Leave not a _trace_ behind."

No, not even a buckle, or an