-the perfume of the hawthorn-hedges, pink and white with blossom-the quiet of the yellow hayfields and red-tiled cottages, to the throbbing succession of telegraph-poles, the thunderbolt roar and rush of locomotives? There might be highwaymen on the road, it is true. But who, living to-day, with any tenderness or romance about him, would not regard it a pleasure to sacrifice his purse to such importunate gallants as Captain Macheath, Dick Turpin, Paul Clifford, or Claude Duval ? And, though the road was rough and dark, it was illuminated at well-known and much-loved points by such cozy taverns as the Maypole, where the travelers found such hosts as old Joe Willett to entertain them; where the fires blazed half-way up the chimney; where the flip, the venison, the roasts, the broils, and the jugged hares tickled the appetitewhich needed no tickling-as the elaborate arts of the Trois Frères Provençaux could never do. So it seems to us that the stage-coach is the mirror of many good old customs, and is in itself a custom well worth reviving. Several years ago some English gentlemen, taking this view of it, put coaches driven by themselves on the most beautiful routes in the south of England; and now the same spirit has broken out in the United States, and each morning a four-in-hand leaves the Brunswick Hotel, in Fifth Avenue, with passengers and baggage for Pelham Bridge. Nearly every phase of life has its own literature, and this revival of stage-coaching has, we imagine, inspired a book by one Captain Malet, of the Eighteenth Hussars, recently issued in London. The theme is a rich one, prolific in anecdote, and highly spiced with adventure. It recalls from oblivion many a good story and many oddities of character. It required no great literary skill in its treatment, and we may therefore congratulate Captain Malet on having satisfactorily performed his task. The grain was to be had for the reaping, and how abundant the harvest was this book plainly shows. Stage-coaching became general in Great Britain between 1662 and 1703, and met with the same opposition, Captain Malet tells us, that nearly every innovation on the established order of things is doomed to. One pamphleteer went so far as to say that "it is the greatest evil that has happened of late years in these kingdoms," and another more sweepingly denounced it as being "mischievous to the public, prejudicial to trade, and destructive to lands." "Those who travel in these coaches," continued this Spartan, "contract an idle habit of body, become weary and listless when they have rode a few miles, and are then unable to travel on horseback, to endure frost, snow, or rain, or to lodge in the fields." Yet the earliest stage-coaches were crude and inconvenient compared with the farmers' wagons of our Western Plains. They were not coaches at all, in fact, but wagons, and they moved so slowly that it was jocularly said that the publicans on the 1 Annals of the Road; or, Notes on Mail and Stage Coaching in Great Britain. London: Longmans, Green & Co. road had time to brew a lot of beer between the time when they were sighted in the distance and the hour when they arrived. It was not until the government gave the mails to the stage-coaches that the latter became really important and expeditious conveyances. After this they traveled as fast as ten miles an hour, or even twelve, and the guards were armed with blunderbusses and pistols. In 1825 was established the celebrated Shrewsbury "Wonder," which kept up its character for punctuality, safety, and speed, for thirteen years. Starting at 5 A. M. from Shrewsbury, it arrived in London at 9.45 P. M. on the same day, thus running one hundred and fifty-four miles in sixteen hours, including two stoppages. In 1836 the fastest coaches ever known were running between London and Brighton, fifty-one and a half miles in five and a quarter hours; London and Exeter, one hundred and seventy-one miles, in seventeen hours; London and Manchester, one hundred and eighty-seven miles, in nineteen hours; London and Holyhead, two hundred and sixty-one miles, in twenty-six hours and fifty-five minutes; and London and Liverpool, two hundred and three miles, in twenty hours and fifty minutes. On one occasion the "Quicksilver " Devonport mail made two hundred and sixteen miles in twenty-one hours and fourteen minutes, including stoppages. But all coaches did not sustain the reputation of the Shrewsbury "Wonder" for safety. Between Hounslow and Staines there was a place known as the "hospital-ground," from the number of accidents that happened near it. "I heard a shout ahead," writes a passenger, of an adventure here, "which came from the guard of the Bristol mail just in front of us. One moment more and we came to a sudden stop by our leaders falling and the main bar unhooking itself. The wheelers passed over the leaders as they lay, and when I picked myself up-for I was half thrown off the box of our coach-I found the leaders under the splinter-bar. A flock of sheep had been frightened by the mail in front of us, and had stood stock-still in the middle of the road, and we had run into them, killing several and smashing ourselves." Sometimes a coach running down-hill would find a market-wagon at a stand-still in the middle of the road with the driver asleep, and the collision would inevitably overturn both vehicles. The great day of the year for the mail-coaches was the king's birthday, when a goodly procession of four-in-hands passed through the London streets to the general post-office. They were all freshly and splendidly painted for the occasion, and were driven by men who, as well as the guards behind, were arrayed in new scarlet and gold, with nosegays the size of cabbages on their breasts. The interiors of the coaches were filled with buxom dames and blooming lasses in canary-colored or scarlet silks-the wives, daughters, or sweethearts, of the drivers and guards. But the greatest features were the music of the keybugles, played by the guards with much brilliancy, and the review by the king and queen, who stood in the windows of St. James's Palace to see the proces- with the juiciest cuts of the round of beef. He was a sion past. storehouse of reminiscences, and had a story to tell The departure of the mails was another sight, of every point on the road-how Farmer Darby's which both antiquarians and sportsmen love to re- pretty daughter eloped from the big white house yoncall. At 8 P. M. the coaches, in all the "pride der with the squire's son; how by the milestone a and panoply" of authority, gathered at the post-highwayman stopped the coach one night and rifled office in St. Martin's-le-Grand, waiting to receive the bags. It might have been one of the occasions on which all ordinary circumstances are surpassed. The tidings of a military victory had been received, and the mail was about to convey the intelligence to a thousand homes. Horses, men, and carriages, were dressed in laurels and ribbons. Coachmen and guards displayed themselves to best advantage with the royal livery around their rotund forms. Passengers merged the reserve of their individuality in a stronger feeling of natural exultation, and, as the coaches drove with the music of the bugles, the whole neighborhood rang with cheers. The coachman was a very important functionary with the passengers, who listened to him with the most respectful attention if he was graciously disposed to talk, and never ventured on conversation if he was silent. It was especially wise, with a view to winning his good graces, to be quiet during the first few miles of the journey, when he was busy reckoning his fares and critically examining his team. After this he would eye the passenger sitting next to him, and, if satisfied with his appearance, would open the conversation. It then remained for the passenger to show a knowledge and appreciation of the "art," two things which at once placed him in coachee's affections, and by-and-by the reins would be handed to him with a polite "Now, sir, have you a pair of driving-gloves on?"-the greatest honor that could be bestowed on a traveler of the olden time. There were many reasons for ingratiating one's self with the coachman: he occupied the head of the tavern-table at meals, and favored his friends the passengers of their money and jewelry; how a dingy old gentleman was riding to town with him once who proved to be the Earl of Harrowgate; and how the old mill across the brook was in Cromwell's time a refuge of the great protector. He was known by all the villagers and children on the road, and had a smile and salute for all. His mind was of a contemplative turn, and never exercised itself upon things that did not belong to his business, but upon that he was an enthusiast, calling it an art, and regarding it as next in dignity to the peerage. Sir Henry Peyton once remarked to a coachman of small stature with whom he was riding that it was surprising how well he managed the four-in-hand. "Well, sir," answered the driver, "what the big ones does by strength, I does by hartifiz!" Another anecdote reminds us of Tony Weller: A few years ago a certain baronet, very fond of the road, gave a wedding-dinner to a coachman, one of whose brother-whips afterward described it as follows: "I walks in as free as air; hangs up my hat on a peg behind the door; sits myself down by the side of a young woman, as they calls a lady's-maid, and gets as well acquainted with her in five minutes as if I'd known her for seven years. When we goes to dinner we has a little soup to start with and a dish of fish, as they calls trout, spotted for all the world like a coach-dog, and a loin of veal as white as halleyblaster, the kidney-fat as big as the crown of my hat; a couple of ducks, stuffed with sage and inions, fit for any lord, and a pudding you might have drove a coach around; sherry-white and red-port more than did us good; and at last we goes to tea. I turns my head short around and sees Bill making rather too "Were I to get my bread by the sweat of my brow," says a well-known authority on sporting matters, "I would certainly be a coachman." Generally speaking, the occupation is a pleasant one. The competent driver is well paid; he knows his hours of work, and when he is through them he can enjoy himself in comfort. Moreover, there is a charm that belongs peculiarly to the road, which cheers all who are on it. They have their favorite houses of call, the smiles and good wishes of the people whose habitations they pass, and besides these they have many snug things known only to themselves. free. 'Stop,' says I. 'Bill, that won't do. Nothing lass. The moment he arrives where the horses are won't do here but what's quite genteel.'' to be changed, he throws down the reins with something of an air, and abandons the cattle to the care of the hostler, his duty being merely to drive from one stage to another. When off the box his hands are thrust into the pockets of his great-coat, and he rolls about the inn-yard with an air of most absolute lordliness. Here he is generally surrounded with an admiring throng of hostlers, stable-boys, shoeblacks, and those nameless hangers-on that infest inns and taverns, and run errands and do all kinds of odd jobs for the privilege of fattening on the drippings of the kitchen and the leakage of the tap - room. These all look up to him as an oracle, treasure up his cant phrases, echo his opinions about horses and other topics of jockey-lore, and, above all, endeavor to imitate his air and carriage. Every ragamuffin that has a coat to his back thrusts his hands in the pocket, rolls in his gait, talks slang, and is an embryo coachee." Washington Irving has described the English coachman of former times to perfection: "He has commonly a broad, full face, curiously mottled with red, as if the blood had been forced by hard feeding into every vessel of the skin; he is swelled into jolly dimensions by frequent potations of malt liquors, and his bulk is still further increased by a multiplicity of coats, in which he is buried like a cauliflower, the upper one reaching to his heels. He wears a broadbrimmed, low-crowned hat, a huge roll of colored handkerchief about his neck, knowingly knotted and tucked in at the bosom, and has in summer-time a large bouquet of flowers in his button-hole, the present, most probably, of some enamored country lass. His waistcoat is commonly of some light color, striped, and his small-clothes extend far below the knees to meet a pair of jockey-boots, which reach about half-way up his legs. All this costume is maintained with much precision-he has a pride in having his clothes of excellent materials, and, notwithstanding the seeming grossness of his appearance, The coachman of the present day is a much less picturesque sort of person, however. He drinks nothing on the road, and often adopts the dress of a common citizen. Sharpness of wit, despite obesity of person, was a characteristic of the old-time coachman. It is related that on one occasion a passenger alighted from his own coach at a tavern for dinner, and, instead of reentering it, took a seat in another coach bound in an opposite direction. When he discovered his error he expressed the hope to the driver that his baggage, which had been labeled, would go on to its destination. "Yes, sir," answered the whip, " and if you had been labeled you would have gone on too." his experience with a new guard: "I remember driving over the downs one winter-day, when the conductor came to me from time to time and asked me if I did not think it very cold. I always answered, 'Oh, dear, no!' But he continued to bother me, and at last said, 'Now, Mr. Barton, it is real cold; and I know that you are cold, too, for your eyes are watering.' Watering!' I repeated; 'why, that's perspiration;' after which I heard no more talk from him about the weather." coach traveling in Scotland was blockaded with snow, when the guard, mounting one of the horses, carried the mails nine miles farther. The next day he was found dead on the road. In December, 1836, there was a snow-storm whose severity has never been equaled in England, and for ten days or more traveling was nearly at a standstill. Dozens of coaches were buried in the snow, and many of the passengers were severely injured. The last of the regular coaches was taken off the Coachmen, guards, and postilions suffered much road in 1862, and in 1869 the amateur coachmen, from the cold, and the last were sometimes lifted who include dukes, earls, and other people of nobilfrom their saddles at the end of a stage complete-ity, began to appear in force with their four-in-hand ly frozen. The Bath coach entered Chippenham drags, by which the tourist in England may see the one March morning in 1812 with three of its pas-garden-spots of that garden-country without the prosengers frozen to death; and on another occasion a saic hurry of the railroad. WE engrave from the Paris Salon picture of last culiar charms. The freshness of their young faces, year by Mademoiselle Bôle, entitled "Going to School," this pleasing portrait of a young village maiden of France or Belgium on the way to the seminary, with an atlas or a large cahier of copied manuscript under one arm, and a basketful of les- | son-books hanging on the other. It is an exceedingly pleasing picture, although we more commonly in this country think of a bevy of school-girls hurrying gayly along through the streets, chattering and laughing, and manifesting in many ways their sisterly fondness for one another. The school-girl is peculiarly a gregarious animal; of all members of the human family, she ought to be painted in groups. But, whether alone or in bevies, school-girls always possess a pe the brightness of their sparkling eyes, the neatness of their attire, the gay innocence of their merry laughter, all make up a picture that warms the hearts of old and young alike. The man who has never fallen in love with school-girls must have something hard in his heart. It is perhaps no more than a paternal or a fleeting affection that seizes upon every one when witnessing these happy young faces, but the bright and sometimes saucy innocence of girls just within the shadow of young womanhood has a peculiar and irresistible charm; and, if maidens of more advanced years would learn how to captivate hearts, let them retain the simple, fresh toilets and unaffected manners of their school-days. HE. IN A SWING. ACH daisy underneath your feet E count itself thrice happy, sweet; Each purple trodden clover-head Now up a little; faster! so! While through the soft June air you go, I wish that I might always stay SHE. Dear heart, if June staid all year long, Did not look down and wink at me, C. M. HEWINS. THE EDITOR'S HE report goes from newspaper to newspaper, of a zealous citizen, in one of our Northern States, who has commemorated the Centennial year of our independence by the extensive planting of trees. We wish the newspapers that chronicle this act of patriotic forethought could inspire their readers with a hearty emulation thereof, so that, ere the year ends its course, every household shall have planted its share of trees-shall have given to the future its contribution toward highways tempered by refreshing shade, and have added to the number of cottages that shall nestle under the fretted network of green leaves. Could we devise a better way for signally commemorating this epoch in our national life? Each tree thus planted would be a monument of our reverence of the past, and a blessing for the future; and by this generous forethought the next Centennial would be celebrated in a land of orchards, of wooded hills, of green lanes, of groves that would be fit temples for the Dryads, of towns hid among arching boughs, of urban and suburban places crowned with sylvan beauty. TABLE. trees have the essential place. A swiftly-running stream, for instance, broken into cascades, is very beautiful when shadowed by trees; but it is nothing if the light does not fall upon its surface broken by interlacing boughs, or if green vistas do not hold it in mysterious depths of shadow. The tree is almost as desirable in cities as it is upon country by-ways or in rustic villages. It screens the promenader at high noon from the downward rays of the sun; it confers wholesomeness upon the atmosphere; it gives seclusion and pleasant coolness to the house before which it stands; its masses of green foliage are grateful to the eye inflamed by the glare of reflected sunlight from the brick walls; it lets into the apartment whose windows it screens a charming, graduated light; it takes, without our aid, life from the air and from the soil, and builds up silently forms of beauty that art cannot equal; it charms, indeed, all the senses with a generous dower of gifts which we cannot too highly praise. Too often we are heedless in planting trees, and then complain of our want of success. We should begin by selecting those that are adapted to local climatic con and have long life; and if, after making a careful selection, we simply see to it that the roots are planted in a deep and nourishing soil, we need give ourselves no further concern; the tree makes its own life, and, expanding with the seasons, will cast grateful shadows for many generations of men that follow us. In a zealous devotion to the cultivation of trees we should strengthen and perpetuate one of the best charac-ditions, and we should choose only those that are hardy teristics of our national towns. Could we have sent to the Philadelphia Exhibition the street of an American village-one of those elm-lined avenues, with embowered cottages standing back from the highway, which are so abundant in our land-we should have shown our foreign visitors a feature captivating in its beauty, and yet one peculiarly our own. The traveling American may feel fresh interest in the narrow streets and quaint old houses of European towns; but this is pure novelty of sensation, for the American village is constructed upon a principle that gives it preeminently the palm of beauty and healthfulness. Unfortunately, these tree-lined avenues too often stop at the borders of the town; the traveler emerges from umbrageous shade into long stretches of sandy roadway, upon which the summer sun pours down with uninterrupted fierceness. How easy it might have been in the years past for the people of the towns to have come together and stretched their avenues of arching boughs from village to village! Had this been done, we could now show our Centennial visitors the most truly beautiful land in the world. For neither mountains, nor lakes, nor broad rivers, nor green valleys, have the highest charm of landscape beauty. A mountain without trees at its base, or upon its sides, is commonly a lumpish mass; a lake whose shores are not bordered with towering monarchs of the forest is deprived of the setting which gives to expanses of water their greatest charm; and a valley that is not broken with orchards, and dotted in its meadows with wide-spreading trees, has no sylvan grace whatsoever. In a rural picture trees have the first, the last, and the intermediate place in the scale of beauty; other objects set off or vary the picture, but It is not too late for earnest action in furtherance of our suggestion. Let a few zealous men in every town organize, during the summer, an association pledged to plant, when autumn comes, a hundred trees in symbolical commemoration of the Centennial. We doubt if the patriotic enthusiasm of our people could manifest itself in a better way than this. AMONG the reforms promptly promised by the new Sultan Murad is "the abolition of the seraglio." Should he really have the nerve to do this, what a sigh of relief will escape from the moral English, who have been forced so long to wink at the sultanic polygamy, and give aid and comfort to a pasha with many wives! The English have been very free to sneer at Americans for tolerating Brigham Young; but we do not hear that, in all the advice which has been conveyed from St. James's to Stamboul, it was ever hinted that the English found it difficult to support a sovereign who entertained wives by the ship-load. Will the seraglio really be done away with? Visions arise of lightly-attired ladies, with smooth, dark skins and long, shadowy eyelashes, whom we have been wont to imagine as reclining on silken-pillowed lounges, playing on lutes, eating pomegranates, and puffing languidly on gilded chibouques, sipping black coffee, and served by swarthy serfs with candies and pastry, filing sadly out of |