The best course, therefore, seemed to be to
get into the great north road about Boroughbridge, and there take a place
in the northern diligence, a huge old-fashioned tub, drawn by three
horses, which completed the journey from Edinburgh to London (God
willing, as the advertisement expressed it) in three weeks. Our hero,
therefore, took an affectionate farewell of his Cumberland friends, whose
kindness he promised never to forget, and tacitly hoped ene day to
acknowledge by substantial proofs of gratitude. After some petty
difficulties and vexatious delays, and after putting his dress into a
shape better befitting his rank, though perfectly plain and simple, he
accomplished crossing the country, and found himself in the desired
vehicle vis-a-vis to Mrs. Nosebag, the lady of Lieutenant Nosebag,
adjutant and riding-master of the--dragoons, a jolly woman of about
fifty, wearing a blue habit, faced with scarlet, and grasping a
silver-mounted horse-whip.
This lady was one of those active members of society who take upon them
faire lefrais de la conversation. She had just returned from the north,
and informed Edward how nearly her regiment had cut the petticoat people
into ribands at Falkirk, 'only somehow there was one of those nasty,
awkward marshes, that they are never without in Scotland, I think, and so
our poor dear little regiment suffered something, as my Nosebag says, in
that unsatisfactory affair.
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