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"Merciful heaven!" wailed the coachman, "what more could I do? If

I'd been driving fast or had not shouted to him, but I was going

quietly, not in a hurry. Everyone could see I was going along

just like everybody else. A drunken man can't walk straight, we

all know.... I saw him crossing the street, staggering and almost

falling. I shouted again and a second and a third time, then I

held the horses in, but he fell straight under their feet! Either

he did it on purpose or he was very tipsy.... The horses are

young and ready to take fright... they started, he screamed...

that made them worse. That's how it happened!"

"That's just how it was," a voice in the crowd confirmed.

"He shouted, that's true, he shouted three times," another voice

declared.

"Three times it was, we all heard it," shouted a third.