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quality had looked with favour from phaetons in the parks on
Sundays - waving hers to Kit!
How Mr Chuckster, entranced by this monstrous fact, stood for some
time rooted to the earth, protesting within himself that Kit was the
Prince of felonious characters, and very Emperor or Great Mogul of
Snobs, and how he clearly traced this revolting circumstance back to
that old villany of the shilling, are matters foreign to our purpose;
which is to track the rolling wheels, and bear the travellers company
on their cold, bleak journey.
It was a bitter day. A keen wind was blowing, and rushed against
them fiercely: bleaching the hard ground, shaking the white frost from
the trees and hedges, and whirling it away like dust. But little cared
Kit for weather. There was a freedom and freshness in the wind, as it
came howling by, which, let it cut never so sharp, was welcome. As it
swept on with its cloud of frost, bearing down the dry twigs and
boughs and withered leaves, and carrying them away pell-mell, it
seemed as though some general sympathy had got abroad, and
everything was in a hurry, like themselves. The harder the gusts, the
better progress they appeared to make. It was a good thing to go
struggling and fighting forward, vanquishing them one by one; to
watch them driving up, gathering strength and fury as they came
along; to bend for a moment, as they whistled past; and then to look
back and see them speed away, their hoarse noise dying in the
distance, and the stout trees cowering down before them.
All day long, it blew without cessation. The night was clear and
starlight, but the wind had not fallen, and the cold was piercing.
Sometimes - towards the end of a long stage - Kit could not help
wishing it were a little warmer: but when they stopped to change
horses, and he had had a good run, and what with that, and the
bustle of paying the old postilion, and rousing the new one, and
running to and fro again until the horses were put to, he was so warm
that the blood tingled and smarted in his fingers' ends - then, he felt
as if to have it one degree less cold would be to lose half the delight
and glory of the journey: and up he jumped again, right cheerily,
singing to the merry music of the wheels as they rolled away, and,
leaving the townspeople in their warm beds, pursued their course
along the lonely road.
Meantime the two gentlemen inside, who were little disposed to sleep,
beguiled the time with conversation. As both were anxious and
expectant, it naturally turned upon the subject of their expedition, on
the manner in which it had been brought about, and on the hopes
and fears they entertained respecting it. Of the former they had many,
of the latter few - none perhaps beyond that indefinable uneasiness
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