CHAPTER V.

NOTHING NEW UNDER THE SUN.

There can be but few left now who are able to call to mind that the style of coaches which now run in the summer months from the "White Horse Cellars," and traverse the different roads out of London, were to a great extent anticipated more than fifty years ago. But so it is, and I have a vivid recollection of having seen, in the years 1837 or 38, a remarkably well-appointed coach start from the "Cellars," which created quite a crowd of people, even in those days when coaches were as common as blackberries. It was named the "Taglioni," after a favourite _danseuse_ of those days, and ran to Windsor and back in the day. It was painted blue, with a red undercarriage, the family colours of Lord Chesterfield, who horsed it, in conjunction with Count d'Orsay and Prince Bathyani. Young Brackenbury was the professional coachman, for, though his Lordship and his brother proprietors drove very frequently, they kept a curate to do the work when they had other things to do which they liked better. Brackenbury used to wear a most _récherché_ blue scarf, with "Taglioni" embroidered on it by the Countess's own hands.

His Lordship had the credit of being a very good coachman, as will be seen from the few lines I venture to produce, which appeared in one of the sporting periodicals of that time:--

"See Chesterfield advance with steady hand, Swish at a rasper and in safety land, Who sits his horse so well, or at a race, Drives four in hand with greater skill or grace."

No doubt, the "Taglioni" did take her share in the ordinary business of a public conveyance, and not, as in the present day, of carrying only parties on "pleasure bent," but it had a certain spice of the toy about it; and I should think did not much exercise the minds of Pears or Shepherd, who each had a coach on the same road. As a boy, I had an eye for a coach, and remember, as well as I remember old Keat's birch, seeing those two coaches pass through Eton. Shepherd's was a true blue coach, and travelled on the maxim of "Certain, though slow." Pears drove a coach painted chocolate with red undercarriage, and was altogether a smarter turn-out than the gentle Shepherd, and travelled somewhat faster, but, I believe, ran little chance of being run in for furious driving.

Whilst I stand in fancy upon the classic ground of Eton, there arises before my sight a pageant, which for better or worse has now, like so many other antique customs, passed away never to be revived. I suppose this is a necessary accompaniment of the progress of the age, and that "Montem" could hardly have been carried on in the days of the boiling kettle. It would have been as easy to get blood out of a stone as _salt_ from a rushing train; besides which the present facilities of locomotion would have brought together an exceedingly miscellaneous gathering at Salt Hill, to say the least of it.

Still it was a unique institution, and contained in it a very kindly feeling--that of giving a little start in the world to a youth who had attained the top rung of the college ladder, and was entering upon his university career.

Most of the ways and doings of old Eton have found plenty of chroniclers. The institution in the library is never forgotten. The birch and the block always come in for their fair share of comment, but the triennial festival of "Montem" has, so far as I am aware, not received anything like the same amount of attention; and as I acted a part in two of them, both in blue and red, I will venture to intrude upon the patience of the reader whilst I make a short digression, emboldened thereto by the fact that Eton customs have already been handled, as well as the ribbons, in a book on coaching.

Well, then, "Montem" was celebrated every third year. The day's work began by four boys, selected for the purpose and gaily habited, starting off by two and two, early in the morning, to scour the principal roads in the neighbourhood, and gather donations in money--called for the occasion "_Salt_"--from all the travellers they met with. By this means a nice sum was collected, which was given to the senior boy on the foundation upon his leaving the college for the University of Cambridge. At a later hour, about ten o'clock, the whole school assembled in the college square. The sixth form, if I recollect rightly, wore fancy dresses, representing some classical or historical characters, and attended by one or two pages, selected from the lower boys, and also wearing fancy dresses. The fifth form wore a rather heterogeneous dress, a mixture of military and civil. It consisted of a red coat and white trousers, with a sword and sash, surmounted by a cocked hat, from which was fluttering in the wind a feather, such as was worn by a Field-Marshal or a General Officer, according to the taste of the wearer, or in what he could get. The lower boys were dressed in blue jackets and white trousers, each carrying in his hand a white wand, in length about six or seven feet, and in the procession were mixed alternately with the semi-military fifth form.

In this formation they marched round the quadrangle of the college, upon debouching from which a somewhat strange scene ensued. The wearers of the red coats drew their swords and began hacking vigorously at the wands, which were held out by their owners for the purpose of being cut to pieces. The swords, however, were so blunt that more wands owed their destruction to the hands of the blue boys than the swords of the red. The work of destruction being accomplished, the whole fell in again and marched to Salt Hill, where dinners were provided for them by their different houses; and dinner being ended, they returned to college as they liked.

The two hotels at Salt Hill are, I believe, now converted to other uses, and the dwellers there would be as much astonished to see a "Montem," as one of the hundred and odd mails and coaches which passed their doors in those days.