A few nights after, being purposely late, we again mounted beside our proverb-speaking acquaintance, and watched for an opportunity to draw him out upon the "rest-rights" of his class. This soon occurred, as the driver remarked that his horses were fresh, "as they had yesterday in the stables."
"And so they have a rest-day now and then," we remarked, "and you have a natural and scriptural right to one in seven. How often do you get it?"
"I've lost mine this many a long year," was the reply; "and as they say somewhere, 'losers are always in the wrong;' and so five thousand or more of us who toil on the stones of London during all the Sundays are in the wrong—of course we are—and being in for a bad bargain must make the best of it. For us there is no help, as saints and sinners are both against us."
"Saints against you?"
"Yes sir, begging your pardon, the saints, or that sort of them that ain't advanced, and can't get on without their ears being tingled. We who live all our waking hours elevated on a 'bus observes a great deal, and that there are two sorts of Christians. It is wonderful if you compare duly what religion does. The hundreds of gentlemen's carriages it keeps indoors; the lots of working-men and city gents who can be happy at home, and the wonderful number that goes to their own places of worship, as is right. Well, these religious riders are a strange set, they are indeed. Sometimes they are ashamed of their prayer or hymn books, and sometimes they show them off boldly. My conductor was a Sunday-school boy not long ago, and he hates the sight of them. Between the box and monkey board there is an understanding, 'signs and wonders,' as I calls them, and when a religious party gets in, he puts his hands together and looks solemn; and when the pleasure-takers—our worst enemies—and there's no end of them, he rubs his hands and looks jolly. Well, these religious Sunday riders are a selfish, shabby lot; it's quite common when they pay with a shilling for them to say, 'Give me a threepenny piece, please, conductor.' That, you know, is for the collection; but if he can help it he don't give it them, as he is of my opinion, that these people ought to keep to their own places of worship, and not bring religion into contempt by supporting Sunday labour. Well, but the Sunday pleasure people are generous fools. They do a hard day's work and pay for it, as they don't believe in the religious way of being happy. At night the men put their wives and children inside and get out here themselves smoking hard after the drink they have had. Last Sunday night two of this sort got up beside me, and one of them swore badly, and offered me a cigar; but I said to him, 'The saying is, that "the tongue defiles the whole body," and I don't care to smoke with a man that curses.' Then he bullied me and threatened to inform about me; and I thought afterwards that I had done wrongly, as it is not doing my duty in that state of life in which God has placed me (as the Catechism says) if I offend riders; and as we outcasts—yes, I say outcasts, as men who have no Sundays and no ministers to care for them are—can't hope to be saved if God Almighty does not have mercy upon them for doing their duty."
The last part of this speech, which had been delivered at intervals between stoppages, was uttered with an expression of despair which reminded one of the day's sigh of the prisoner without hope. After a pause, the remark was ventured, "But, James, you can surely get a Sunday off whenever you like; it is only forfeiting the day's pay; and as I have ridden with you for some time, I had a thought of asking you to let me give you a Sunday, you could then attend Divine worship?"
"Thank you kindly, sir," he replied; "but I could not ask for more than one in two months or so, though we are supposed to have every third or fourth Sunday. I am feeling old, and a man ain't liked who is often off his 'bus. The foreman would soon say that a younger man was ready to take the reins; and then the workhouse, its disgrace, and separation from as good a wife as ever lived. No, sir, personal kindness can't do much for us Sunday slaves. No! it's getting the public to feel that it's a disgrace to the riders, and an injury to us poor fellows, that can alone do it."
Such were his opinions; but we soon after had the satisfaction to know that he enjoyed one happy Christian Sabbath, and upon several journeys we listened to his quaint remarks upon preacher and sermons. An interest in his spiritual state (which is always akin to real friendship) resulted; and upon many occasions instruction concerning personal salvation was given. The last ten minutes of the journey, when we were often alone, were valued, as, at intervals for more than a year, the good-natured driver listened as a little child to the message of a Redeemer's mercy. The summer and autumn had thus passed away, and during the winter we seldom rode with him, as his hours had been changed. Upon one of these occasions he from cold spoke with difficulty; but his weather-beaten countenance expressed a quiet peace, as he said, "I got a day off last Sunday week, and went to church twice. At night it was a saying of Jesus that was preached about, 'Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.' The sermon made me as happy as a prince; and after supper my Polly read the chapter through, where it is; and then I read a Psalm which is like a prayer."
We had not after this many opportunities for conversation, but frequently received his salute (the raising of the whip to the hat) as we passed on other omnibuses. One fine morning towards the end of the winter, which had been very severe, upon mounting an early 'bus, we noticed a bow of Crape on the Whip, and inquired concerning it. "It's James as used to drive this 'bus," the man replied with feeling; "but he is only one of the several old whips who have been done up this horrid winter. He had sixteen hours a day on this box for six weeks hard off, and had a bad cold; and when he tried for a rest Sunday, so many wanted it that he was snubbed, and was afraid of losing his whip, and so he kept on till he couldn't do so any longer, and then he took to his bed, and died in a few days."