dashing horseman astride of a steed of matchless mettle, riding at the head of a stately cavalcade, what did they behold? They beheld a round-headed, pudgy, strangely-clothed individual seated in a cushioned armchair that was strapped upon the back of a steed of approved gentleness. Very slowly he rode, and with nice circumspection, while the knights and gentlemen of England, concealing their disgust, followed in orderly succession or rode caracoling, with becoming dignity, about the flanks of the royal procession.

At the villages and wayside inns the king ate and drank with the rest, never washing his hands; and all along the road he aired his superior scholarship by spouting Latin and reciting wonderful poems of his own composing. And sometimes, in spite of the friendly straps that were intended to hold him in his armchair saddle, he contrived to tumble ungracefully but harmlessly from his horse's back. Nevertheless, his famous ride to London was a continuous triumph - an event never to be forgotten by those who witnessed any portion of it. In every city and town the populace came out to receive and admire the monarch of two kingdoms; there were speeches by the town officers, and eulogies by the clergy; and the streets and houses were made gay with banners and bright festoons.

Thus was the king of Scotland escorted to his new kingdom of England. His ride from Edinburgh to

London occupied thirty-two days, whereas Sir Robert Carey had covered the same ground in two days and a half. The fact that the modern tourist may now accomplish the feat in less than nine hours illustrates the vast distance that the world has traveled since the days of the Stuart kings.

HEN the coach came round at last, with "Lon

WHE

don" blazoned in letters of gold upon the boot, it gave Tom such a turn that he was half disposed to run away. But he didn't do it; for he took his seat upon the box instead, and looking down upon the four grays, felt as if he were another gray himself, or, at all events, a part of the turn-out; and was quite confused by the novelty and splendor of his situation.

And really it might have confused a less modest man than Tom Pinch to find himself sitting next to that coachman; for of all the swells that ever flourished a whip professionally, he might have been elected Emperor. He didn't handle his gloves like another man, but put them on - even when he was standing on the pavement, quite detached from the

coach as if the four grays were, somehow or other, at the ends of the fingers.

It was the same with his hat. He did things with his hat which nothing but an unlimited knowledge of horses and wildest freedom of the road could ever have made him perfect in. Valuable little parcels were brought to him with particular instructions, and he pitched them into his hat, and stuck it on again; as if the laws of gravity did not admit of such an event as its being knocked off or blown off, and nothing like an accident could befall it.

The guard, too! Seventy breezy miles a day were written in his very whiskers. His manners were a canter; his conversation a round trot. He was a fast coach upon a downhill turnpike road; he was all pace.

The coach was none of your steady-going yokel coaches, but a swaggering, rakish, dissipated London coach; up all night, and lying by all day. It cared no more for Salisbury than if it had been a hamlet. It rattled noisily through the best streets, defied the Cathedral, took the worst corners sharpest, went cutting in everywhere, making everything get out of its way; and spun along the open country road, blowing a lively defiance out of its key-bugle, as its last glad parting legacy.

It was a charming evening. The four grays skimmed along as if they liked it quite as well as Tom did. The bugle was in as high spirits as the

grays. The coachman chimed in sometimes with his voice; the wheels hummed cheerfully in unison; the brass work on the harness was an orchestra of little bells; and thus they went clinking, jingling, rattling smoothly on, the whole concern, from the buckles of the leaders' coupling-reins to the handle of the hind boot, was one great instrument of music.

Yoho! past hedges, gates, and trees; past cottages and barns, and people going home from work. Yoho! past donkey-chaises, drawn aside into the ditch, and empty carts with rampant horses whipped up at a bound and held by struggling carters until the coach had passed.

Yoho! by churches dropped down by themselves in quiet nooks, with rustic burial grounds about them, where the graves are green and daisies sleep for it is evening on the bosoms of the dead. Yoho! past streams in which the cattle cool their feet, and where the rushes grow; past paddock fences, farms, and rick-yards; past last year's stacks, cut, slice by slice, away, and showing in the waning light, like ruined gables, old and brown. Yoho! down the pebbly dip, and through the merry water-splash, and up at a canter to the level road again. Yoho! Yoho! . .

Yoho! among the gathering shades; making of no account the deep reflections of the trees, but scampering on through the light and darkness, all the same, as if the light of London, fifty miles away, were quite enough to travel by, and some to spare. Yoho!