Amongst the signs of the time that are conspicuous upon the roads the traveller whose journeyings bring him towards those which lead into the metropolis will be struck by the droves of cattle that are making their painful way up to the great mart for this great festival. But a still more striking, though less noisy, Christmas symptom forms a very amusing object to him who leaves London by such of its highways as lead eastward. There is little exaggeration in the accompanying picture of a Lynn or Bury coach on its town-ward journey with its freight of turkeys at the Christmas season. Nay, as regards the freightage itself, the artist has kept himself within bounds. Many a time have we seen a Norfolk coach with its hampers piled on the roof and swung from beneath the body, and its birds depending, by every possible contrivance, from every part from which a bird could be made to hang. Nay, we believe it is not unusual with the proprietors, at this season, to refuse inside passengers of the human species, in favor of these Oriental gentry, who "pay better;" and on such occasions of course they set at defiance the restriction which limits them to carrying "four insides." Within and without, the coaches are crammed with the bird of Turkey; and a gentleman town-ward bound, who presented himself at a Norwich coach-office at such a time, to inquire the "fare to London," was pertly answered by the bookkeeper, "Turkeys." Our readers will acquit us of exaggeration when we tell them that Mr. Hone, in his "Every-Day Book," quotes from an historical account of Norwich an authentic statement of the amount of turkeys which were transmitted from that city to London between a Saturday morning and the night of Sunday, in the December of 1793, which statement gives the number as one thousand seven hundred, the weight as nine tons, two hundredweight, and two pounds, and the value as £680. It is added that in the two following days these were followed by half as many more. We are unable to furnish the present statistics of the matter; but in forty years which have elapsed since that time the demand, and of course the supply, must have greatly increased; and it is probable that the coach-proprietors find it convenient to put extra carriages on the road for these occasions.
Norfolk Coach at Christmas.—Page 170.
In making the annexed sketch we presume that Mr. Seymour must have had in mind, and intended to illustrate by "modern instances," that class of "wise saws" such as "Birds of a feather flock together," "Tell me the company, and I will tell you the man," and others which tend generally to show that men are apt to catch the hues of surrounding objects, and take the features of their associates. If this was not his design, we have only the alternative conclusion, that he had drawn turkeys till he could draw nothing else, and till his best efforts at representing "the human face divine" resulted in what the Scotch call a "bubbly-jock." Some poet, in describing the perfections of his mistress's countenance, speaks of it as conveying the impression that she "had looked on heaven, and caught its beauty." Our friend the guard of this coach seems to have looked on those turkeys of which he has charge till he has "caught their beauty." It is impossible to conceive that the breath which he is pouring into that horn of his should issue in any other form of sound than that of a gobble. The coachman is clearly a turkey in disguise; and the old-looking figure that sits behind him, with something like a sausage round its neck, is probably his father. As for the swan with two necks that floats on the panel of the coach-door, it is a strange-looking bird at any time, but looks considerably more strange in its present situation. It is unquestionably out of place, and forms no fitting cognizance for a Norfolk coach at Christmas time.
Norfolk must be a noisy county. There must be a "pretty considerable deal" of gabble towards the month of November in that English Turkistan. But what a silence must have fallen upon its farmyards since Christmas has come round! Turkeys are indisputably born to be killed. That is an axiom. It is the end of their training, as it ought to be (and, in one sense, certainly is) of their desires. And such being the destiny of this bird, it may probably be an object of ambition with a respectable turkey to fulfil its fate at the period of this high festival. Certain it is that at no other time can it attain to such dignities as belong to the turkey who smokes on the well-stored table of a Christmas dinner,—the most honored dish of all the feast. Something like an anxiety for this promotion is to be inferred from the breathless haste of the turkey of which our artist has here given us a sketch, in its pursuit of the coach which has started for London without it. The picture is evidently a portrait. There is an air of verisimilitude in the eager features, and about the action altogether, of the bird, which stamps it genuine. In its anxiety it has come off without even waiting to be killed; and at the rate after which it appears to be travelling, is, we think, likely enough to come up with a heavily laden coach. We hope, however, that it is not in pursuit of the particular coach which we have seen on its way to the "Swan with two Necks," because we verily believe there is no room on that conveyance for a single additional turkey, even if it should succeed in overtaking it.
TOO LATE FOR THE COACH.
One of the most striking signs of the season, and which meets the eye in all directions, is that which arises out of the ancient and still familiar practice of adorning our houses and churches with evergreens during the continuance of this festival. The decorations of our mantel-pieces, and in many places of our windows, the wreaths which ornament our lamps and Christmas candles, the garniture of our tables, are alike gathered from the hedges and winter gardens; and in the neighborhood of every town and village the traveller may meet with some such sylvan procession as is here represented, or some group of boys returning from the woods laden with their winter greenery, and like the sturdy ambassador in the plate, engaged in what we have heard technically called "bringing home Christmas" This symptom of the approaching festivity is mentioned by Gay in his "Trivia":—
"When Rosemary and Bays, the poet's crown,
Are bawl'd in frequent cries through all the town,
Then judge the festival of Christmass near,—
Christmass, the joyous period of the year!
Now with bright holly all the temples strow;
With Lawrel green, and sacred Misletoe."
