Of Travelling Post. There is another species of inhumanity, which all ranks, except the poor and indigent, stand chargeable with; which is the custom of travelling post. How often the trembling chaise or coach-horse, panting for breath, every limb shattered by the hardness of the roads, arrives in the inn-yard, spent to the last under extreme exertion. His sides wreathed or bleeding with the lashes or spurs of his unfeeling driver, and every muscle and tendon quivering with convulsive agony! In vain is he offered food; his mouth is parched with thirst and dust. He cannot eat, and water is denied, because it would endanger his existence, which is to be preserved for future torment. In such cases, it not unfrequeutly has happened that the postillion has been tipped an extraordinary gratuity, for which he would, at any time, flog the horses till they nearly expired under torture and fatigue. Inhuman custom! barbarous propensity! the dreadful effect of polished manners! Such is the misery that a boasted demi-god bestows on his inferiors. On a smaller scale of cruelty, a horse is frequently lashed with the most savage fury, by a gentleman's coachman, during the time of moving the length of a street, for no other reason than that he has, accidentally, stumbled, trod in a hole, or slipped through bad shoeing, and frequently ignorant for what he is corrected.
The following case of cruelty was in the year 1799, proved on oath by Lord Robert Seymour, before the magistrates in Bow-street. His lordship stated, "That he saw in Oxford-street, a coachman unmercifully whipping, from his box, two half starved and perfectly exhausted horses, which were endeavouring to draw from the channel an empty hackney coach. The driver, after so treating the horses, alighted, and
