showing a bit of the leg of his Wellington boots;
who carries a brown snuff-box like a bit of
mottled soap; who hands everybody into the
omnibus, and who is particular in pushing
down and sending quickly after their wearers,
the exuberant crinolines of the ladies. It is he
who always starts subscriptions among the
"regulars" for the Lancashire distress, or the
frozen-out operatives, or for the widow of some
stable-helper who was killed by a kicking horse,
or for the crippled crossing-sweeper who was
knocked down by the Hansom cab. It was he
who, when Stunning Joe, our "express" nine
A.M. coachman, was pitched off his box going
sharp round the corner of Pineapple-place, and
upset us all—we were not hurt, but Joe smashed
his collar-bone and his right arm, and was not
expected to live—it was our pleasant-faced little
friend who used to go every day to the hospital,
made interest, and got himself admitted, and
took Joe a thousand little comforts, and sat by
his bedside and read to him by the hour
together—not forgetting, when Joe grew  convalescent,
to put three sovereigns into his hand, and
tell him to go and set himself thoroughly right
by a fortnight's stay at the sea-side. The omnibus
calls for him regularly, but long before it
arrives he has walked down to the end of the
crescent where he lives, with two or three of
his grandchildren, who all insist on being kissed
before they allow him to start, while their
mother, his daughter, seldom omits to wave her
farewell from the dining-room window. He
takes six weeks' holiday in the autumn, when it
is understood that he is away at the sea-side
with his family; but at no other time does he
omit riding to and from town in the omnibus,
save on Christmas-eve, when, in consideration
of certain trifling purchases he has made—among
them a huge Leadenhall Market turkey, a large
slice out of Fortnum and Mason's shop, and
half the Lowther Arcade store of toys—he
charters a cab, and freights it for the return
journey with the precious produce.

I still find the old gentleman who sits on the
left side of the door, and whose hands are always
clasped on the top of his stick; the old gentleman
with a face like a withered apple, with the
high stiff-starched cross-barred check neckerchief,
the close napped curly brimmed hat, the
beaver gloves, the pepper-and-salt trousers, the
drab gaiters and boots. He never helps
anybody in or out, and scowls if he be accidentally
touched; when the women's crinolines scrape
his legs as their wearers pass him, he growls
"Yar!" and prods at them with his stick; he
knows the sensitive part of the conductor's
anatomy, and pokes him viciously therein when
people want the omnibus to be stopped; he raps
the fingers of the little boys who spring on
the step proffering newspapers; he checks
the time of the journey by a large white-faced
gold watch, which he compares with every
church clock on the road; he tells women to
get their money ready; he shakes his stick in
a very terrifying and Gog and Magogish
manner at crying children. He never will have
the window open on the hottest summer day;
and he refuses to alight, if there be any mud,
unless he is deposited close by the kerb-stone, no
matter if the City crush is at its height, and the
omnibus has to be steered through an opposing
procession of Pickfords. He is the great
delight of the knifeboard "regulars," who never
omit to send a puff of tobacco-smoke (which he
detests) into his face as they mount to their
elevated berths; who call him "The Dry Fish;"
who declare that, instead of washing, he rasps
himself, as a baker does rolls; who vow, when the
omnibus goes over any rough bit of road, that
they hear his heart rattling inside him like a
pebble; who send him by the conductor the most
tremendous messages, which that functionary
enormously enjoys, but never delivers.

The Feebles, who are the constant supporters
of omnibuses, still remain in all their forcible
feebleness. They are of both sexes, the female
perhaps predominating. They never know
whether the omnibus is outward or homeward
bound, and, having got in at Charing-cross, begin,
when we arrive at Turnham-green, to express
their wonder "when we shall come to the
Bank." They never can recollect the name of
the street at which they are to be set down.
"Deary me, Newland-street—no, not Newland,
some name just like Newland—Archer-street, I
think, or terrace; don't you know it? Mrs.
Blethers lives at Number Seven!" If by chance
they do know the name of their destination, they
mention it to the conductor when they get in,
and then for the whole remainder of the seven-
mile journey, whenever the vehicle stops, they
bounce up from their seats, mutter "Is this
Belinda-grove?" stagger over the feet of their
fellow-passengers until they reach the door,
where they are wildly repulsed, and fall back until
they are jolted by the motion of the omnibus
into a seat. The women carry their money either
in damp smeary colourless kid gloves, round
the palms of which they roke with their
forefinger for a sixpence, as a snuff connoisseur will
round his box  for the last few grains of Prince's
Mixture; or, they carry it in a mysterious
appendage called a pocket: not a portion of the
dress, but, so far as I can make out from cursory
observation, a kind of linen wallet suspended
from the waist, to reach which causes a great
deal of muscular exertion, and not a small
display of under garment. It is scarcely necessary
to say that the Feebles never know the fare,
that they always want change for a sovereign—
fourpence to be deducted—that they constantly
think the omnibus is going to be upset, or that
the horses have run away; that they always interrupt
testy old gentlemen deep in their newspapers
by asking them whether there is any news; and
that they are in omnibuses, as they are in life,
far more obstructive and disagreeable than the
most wrong-headed and bumptious.

When a child in an omnibus is good, you hate
it; what can you do when it is bad? When
it is good, it kneels on the seat with its face to
the window, and with its muddy boots, now on
the lap of its next, now against the knees of its
opposite, neighbour. It drums upon the glass
with its fist, it rubs the glass with its nose.