Peter Leather, the head man, was one of
the fallen angels of servitude. He had once driven a duke--the Duke of
Dazzleton--having nothing whatever to do but dress himself and climb into
his well-indented richly fringed throne, with a helper at each horse's head
to 'let go' at a nod from his broad laced three-cornered hat. Then having
got in his cargo (or rubbish, as he used to call them), he would start off
at a pace that was truly terrific, cutting out this vehicle, shooting past
that, all but grazing a third, anathematizing the 'buses, and abusing the
draymen. We don't know how he might be with the queen, but he certainly
drove as though he thought nobody had any business in the street while the
Duchess of Dazzleton wanted it. The duchess liked going fast, and Peter
accommodated her. The duke jobbed his horses and didn't care about pace,
and so things might have gone on very comfortably, if Peter one afternoon
hadn't run his pole into the panel of a very plain but very neat yellow
barouche, passing the end of New Bond Street, which having nothing but a
simple crest--a stag's head on the panel--made him think it belonged to
some bulky cit, taking the air with his rib, but who, unfortunately, turned
out to be no less a person than Sir Giles Nabem, Knight, the great police
magistrate, upon one of whose myrmidons in plain clothes, who came to the
rescue, Peter committed a most violent assault, for which unlucky casualty
his worship furnished him with rotatory occupation for his fat calves in
the 'H.
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