I think, a little inferiority to an English coachman. The English coachman would have grown very red in the face, would have cursed horribly, and would have persistently refused all contact with the fish. Apollo jumped on his box, seized the reins, flogged the horses, and endeavoured to run away both from the fish and the gentleman.
But the man, with more than colonial alacrity, and with a courage worthy of a better cause, made a successful rush, and catching the back of the vehicle with one hand got on to the step behind, while he held on to the fish with his other hand and his teeth. There were many exclamations from the folks behind. The savour of the fish was unpleasant in their nostrils. It must have been very unpleasant as it reached us uncomfortably up on the box. Gradually the man got in,—and the fish followed him! Labor omnia vincit improbus. By his pertinacity the company seemed to become reconciled to the abomination. On looking round when we were yet many miles from Pieter Maritzburg I saw the gentleman sitting with his feet dangling back over the end of the car; his neighbour and vis-a-vis, who at first had been very loud against the fish, was sitting in the same wretched position; while the fish itself was placed upright in the place of honour against the door, where the legs of the two passengers ought to have been. Before we reached our journey's end I respected the gentleman with the fish,—who nevertheless had perpetrated a great injustice; but I thought very little of the good-natured man who had allowed the fish to occupy the space intended for a part of his own body. I never afterwards learned what became of
