by loading it with provisions, there being many hospitable houses by the way open for their entertainment: though I did once see a coach which set out from the Tower, stop in the middle of St. James's Street, and the company that were in it take a small repast of ham and cold chicken; but that perhaps was owing to a weakness in some of the stomachs of the passengers, which disabled them from fasting above an hour at a time.
As David and his company passed through the polite parts of the town early in the morning, they saw but few people worthy their observation; all there was hushed and still, as at the dead of night; but when they came to the more trading part of the town, the hurry was equal to the stillness they had before observed.
As they drove through Covent Garden, they saw a company of men reeling along, as if they in a manner had lost the use of their legs; each of them had something in his right hand, which he had picked up in the market—some had flowers, others cabbages, and some chose for nosegays a bunch of onions or garlic; but all their hands shook, as if it was with difficulty they could hold anything in them. As soon as they saw the coach, they ran, or rather tumbled up to it, with the utmost speed their condition would admit them, and stammered out a desire that the ladies would accept of their garlands.
Poor Camilla was frighted; but Cynthia, who had seen more of the world, and perceived they were gentlemen (though they had, as Shakespeare says, "put that into their mouths which had stolen away their brains"), took a bunch of flowers from a very young fellow who was foremost, and thanked him for her garland; after which they all staggered away again, huzzaing her for her good-humour.
David called to a man who was passing by, and
