Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1890-09-17
COACH RIDE IN ENGLAND
LIKE A BIT OF LAST CENTURY
TRAVELLING.
Snylng Papers Through Cottage Doors
and Into Inn Yards.

.1QuIte n nice amusement Tor you,
Mr.. Saunders, shying them news
papers about" remarks one of the
passengers outside the coach ..Well,"
replies the cheerful coachman, n ruddy,
thick-set man, with short, weather
beaten beard and twinkling eyes, lone
must have some occupation for the
nI hd in the winter when there are so
few passengers" and so. without
checking his -four horses, he, with a
deNterous jerk, sends flying news
paper across trim little garden gay
with veronica, laurustinus and late
chrysanthemums, and lands il just
within the front door. We are driving
on the four-hor>e coach from Dart
mouth 10 kinsbridge, as varied and
beautiful fifteen miles drive as can
be found m England, and especially
lovely on this bright December morn
ing, with the sea dancing in the sum
shine, and the ivy and ferns which
richly clothe the steep lanes shining
brilliantly after last nights rain.
Its n cheerful, well-cultiyated, pop
ulous tract of country, with frequent
villages, but quite of the track of rail
roads, and dependent for contact with
the outside world upon this passing
coach. Ii Is like a bit of last centary
travelling; We pick up farmers and
drop parcels; We leave n wedding cake
at an expectant village; and, above
all, we distribute news, and that with
thoroughness which would have as
tonished the last century, and which
yiyidly illustrates the ever-growing
power of the press AMI the facility
with which the quietest corners of the
country are now brought into touch
with the centres of thought
Under the box seat Is slowed great
parcel of Il local paper. each copy
neatly fastened up aid addressed. The
coachman places beside him on the box
some twenty copies at time, and as
he drives quickly past the various
habitations throws paper deftly over
the hedge or through the open cottage
door; one Is left lying, a white patch,
on the smooth lawn of marine villa
As the coach swings round d corner OF
the coast road, ano' her is dropped into
the apron of a chubby child wal ing for
it a: the corner of a by-lane, and one
through an open window in the upper
story of "A cottage, and deposits it III
the lap of an old woman.
In some villages the thirst for
knowledge is satisfied by a co. V fiying
over the vicarage wall and another into
the inn var, but III other villages a
perfect volley of shots to right and
left is required. The operation is ex-
citing, and, as the coachman has said,
quite an occupation tor the mind. On
the whole, his aim Is accurate, but of
course there are failures; one copy is
left in the branches of "A tree, another
reposes in big bush of lemon-thyme,
and one, thrown high over the : edge,
is caught by the wind, and flutters
bac into the road. ..Ah! there's moth
ing so bad to shy n wspapers against
as a north win =" remarks the coach
man, and tn next small boy we meet
il desired to run aiOng up TO the vicar
age and tell the gardener the ! aper is
N the road.
And so the coach rumbles along,
rousiug these peaceful villages with
Gladstone's speeches, filling the rustic
Imagination with news of Stanley,
to which so many of them look vaguely
as the fountain of wealth and success,
is but too full of sorrow and suffering;
bringing them. moreover, the interest
ing annals of their own county and
neighborhood, and, in short, placing
snv cottager in this secluded corner of
South Devon in the same position in
regard TO any event which has recently
stirred the world a he would be if he
lived in a Peabody building i'll lsling-
ton or Westminster.
By the time the coach rattles into
kingsbridge we must have dropped at
least hundred papers, many of them
at quite small cottages Whether our
genial coachman i conscious of the po-
sition he fills a. an instrument for the
diffusion of useful knowledge il l. diff
ficult to say. | can't help fancying he
has an inkling of his civilizing mission
from the readiness with which he
seizes upon the discarded paper Of one
sf the passengers. and with the civil
remark, IF you have quite done with
il, sir." drops it into the eager hand of
passing carter.