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diff --git a/old/66597-0.txt b/old/66597-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 7a4c710..0000000 --- a/old/66597-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3333 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Early Carriages and Roads, by Walter Gilbey - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Early Carriages and Roads - -Author: Walter Gilbey - -Release Date: October 23, 2021 [eBook #66597] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -Produced by: Fay Dunn, Fiona Holmes and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was - produced from images generously made available by The Internet - Archive/American Libraries. - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EARLY CARRIAGES AND ROADS *** - - -Transcriber’s Notes - -Hyphenation has been standardised. - -Footnotes were moved to the ends of the text they pertain to and -numbered in one continuous sequence. - - - - -[Illustration: GOING TO BURY FAIR. - -_From Engraving, A.D. 1750_.] - - - - -EARLY CARRIAGES AND ROADS - -BY SIR WALTER GILBEY, Bart. - -ILLUSTRATED - -London VINTON & CO., Ltd., 9, NEW BRIDGE STREET, E.C. - -1903 - - - - -_The use of carriages, coaches and wheeled conveyances have had an -intimate relationship with the social life of English people from an -early period in history._ - -_Many instructive books have appeared on the subject of carriages -generally, but these have been for the most part written by experts in -the art of coach and carriage building._ - -_In this publication, attention has been given to the early history -of wheeled conveyances in England and their development up to recent -times._ - -[Illustration] - -_Elsenham Hall, Essex._ _April, 1903._ - - - - -CONTENTS. - - PAGE -Introduction 1 - -First Use of Wheeled Vehicles 2 - -Badness of Early Roads 3 - -Saxon Vehicles and Horse Litters 4 - -Continental Carriages in the 13th and 14th Centuries 8 - -Conveyances in Henry VI.’s Time 11 - -“Chariots” First Used on Great Occasions 12 - -First Use of Carriages: called Coaches 13 - -Coaches in France 15 - -Coaches First Used by Queen Elizabeth 16 - -Duke of Brunswick, 1588, Forbids Use of Coaches 20 - -The Stage Waggon 21 - -The Introduction of Springs 23 - -Steel Springs Introduced 24 - -The First Hackney Coaches 26 - -Excessive Number of Coaches in London 28 - -Hackney Carriages and the Thames Watermen 30 - -Hackney Carriages a Nuisance in London 32 - -Licensed Hackney Carriages 33 - -Coaches with “Boots” 35 - -Carriages in Hyde Park 38 - -Coach and Cart Racing 40 - -Regulations for Hackney Carriages 41 - -Pepys on Carriages 43 - -Glass Windows in Carriages 45 - -Improvements in Carriages 47 - -Pepys’ Private Carriage 50 - -Carriage Painting in Pepys’ Day 52 - -The First Stage Coaches 54 - -Objections Raised to Stage Coaches 56 - -Seventeenth Century High Roads 62 - -Hackney Cabs as a Source of Revenue 66 - -Manners of the Cabman 69 - -Cab-driving a Lucrative Occupation 70 - -Coaches and Roads in Queen Anne’s Time 73 - -Coaching in George I.’s and II.’s Reigns 74 - -Dean Swift on Coaches and Drivers 76 - -Roads in the 18th Century 78 - -Speed of the 18th Century Stage Coach 80 - -The Application of Springs 84 - -Outside Passengers 87 - -Roads in George III.’s Time 88 - -Improvements in Stage Coaches 90 - -The Mail Coach 91 - -Regulations for Mail and Stage Coaches 94 - -Mail Coach Parade on the King’s Birthday 95 - -The Mail Coachman and Guard 97 - -“The Road” in Winter 100 - -Passenger Fares 102 - -Difference Between Stage and Mail Coach 102 - -The “Golden Age” of Coaching 104 - -Fast Coaches 106 - -Heavy Taxation of Coaches 111 - -Early Cabs 112 - -Private and Stage Coaches, 1750-1830 116 - -Varieties of Carriage 120 - - - - -ILLUSTRATIONS. - - -PAGE - -“Going to Bury Fair” _Frontispiece_ - -Hammock Waggon 5 - -Horse Litter 7 - -Flight of Princess Ermengarde 9 - -Queen Elizabeth’s Travelling Coach 17 - -Hackney Coaches in London, 1637 29 - -Coach of Queen Elizabeth’s Ladies 35 - -The Machine, 1640-1700 Face 56 - -Mr. Daniel Bourn’s Roller Wheel Waggon, 1763 79 - -Travelling Posting Carriage (1), 1750 83 - -Travelling Posting Carriage (2), 1750 85 - -Portrait of Mr. John Palmer Face 92 - -Portrait of Mr. Macadam 104 - -Royal Mail Coach 108 - -London Hackney Cab (Boulnois’ Patent) 115 - -Travelling Post, 1825-35 Face 118 - -King George IV. in His Pony Phaeton 120 - - -[Illustration: - -JOHN BALE SONS and DANIELSSON L^{TD}. -G^T TITCHFIELD STREET LONDON.] - - - - -EARLY CARRIAGES AND ROADS. - - - - -INTRODUCTION. - - -Only some three hundred and fifty years have elapsed since wheeled -conveyances for passengers came into use in England; but, once -introduced, they rapidly found favour with all classes of society, more -especially in cities. The progress of road-making and that of light -horse-breeding are so intimately connected with the development of -carriages and coaches that it is difficult to dissociate the three. In -the early days of wheeled traffic the roads of our country were utterly -unworthy of the name, being, more particularly in wet weather, such -quagmires that they were often impassable. - -Over such roads the heavy carriages of our ancestors could only be -drawn by teams of heavy and powerful horses, strength being far more -necessary than speed; and for many generations the carriage or coach -horse was none other than the Great or Shire Horse. Improved roads -made rapid travel possible, and the increase of stage coaches created a -demand for the lighter and more active harness horses, for production -of which England became celebrated. - -If comparatively little has been said concerning horses, it is because -the writer has already dealt with that phase of the subject in previous -works.[1] - -[1] _The Great Horse, or War Horse; Horses, Past and Present._ By Sir -Walter Gilbey, Bart. (Vinton and Co., Ltd.) - - -FIRST USE OF WHEELED VEHICLES. - -Wheeled vehicles for the conveyance of passengers were first introduced -into England in the year 1555. The ancient British war chariot was -neither more nor less than a fighting engine, which was probably -never used for peaceful travelling from place to place. Carts for -the conveyance of agricultural produce were in use long before any -wheeled vehicle was adapted for passengers. The ancient laws and -institutes of Wales, codified by Howel Dda, who reigned from A.D. 942 -to 948, describe the “qualities” of a three-year-old mare as “to draw -a car uphill and downhill, and carry a burden, and to breed colts.” -The earliest mention of carts in England that some considerable -research has revealed is in the _Cartulary of Ramsay Abbey_ (Rolls -Series), which tells us that on certain manors in the time of Henry I. -(1100-1135) there were, among other matters, “three carts, each for -four oxen or three horses.” - - -BADNESS OF EARLY ROADS. - -That carriages did not come into use at an earlier period than the -sixteenth century is no doubt due to the nature of the cattle tracks -and water-courses which did duty for roads in England. These were -of such a nature that wheeled traffic was practically impossible -for passengers, and was exceedingly difficult for carts and waggons -carrying goods. - -In old documents we find frequent mention of the impossibility of -conveying heavy wares by road during the winter. For example, when -Henry VIII. began to suppress the monasteries, in 1537, Richard -Bellasis, entrusted with the task of dismantling Jervaulx Abbey, in -Yorkshire, refers to the quantity of lead used for roofing purposes, -which “cannot be conveyed away till next summer, for the ways in that -countrie are so foule and deepe that no carriage (cart) can pass in -winter.” - -In the Eastern counties, and no doubt elsewhere in England, our -ancestors used the water-courses and shallow stream beds as their -roads. This is clear to anyone who is at pains to notice the lie and -course of old bye-ways; and it is equally clear that a stream when low -offered a much easier route to carts, laden or empty, than could be -found elsewhere. The beds of the water courses as a general rule are -fairly smooth, hard and gravelled, and invited the carter to follow -them rather than to seek a way across the wastes. In process of use -the banks and sides were cut down by the wheels or by the spade; and -eventually the water was diverted into another channel and its old bed -was converted into a road. - - -SAXON VEHICLES AND HORSE LITTERS. - -Strutt states that the chariot of the Anglo-Saxons was used by -distinguished persons for travel. If the illustrations from which -he describes them give a fair idea of their proportions and general -construction, they must have been singularly uncomfortable conveyances. -The drawing is taken from an illuminated manuscript of the Book of -Genesis in the Cotton Library (Claud. B. iv.), which Strutt refers to -the ninth century, but which a later authority considers a production -of the earlier part of the eleventh. The original drawing shows a -figure in the hammock waggon, which figure represents Joseph on his way -to meet Jacob on the latter’s arrival in Egypt; this figure has been -erased in order to give a clear view of the conveyance, which no doubt -correctly represents a travelling carriage of the artist’s own time, -viz., A.D. 1100-1200. - -[Illustration: HAMMOCK WAGGON. - -Supposed to have been in use in England about A.D. 1100-1200.] - -Horse litters, carried between two horses, one in front and one -behind, were used in early times by ladies of rank, by sick persons, -and also on occasion to carry the dead. Similar vehicles of a lighter -description, carried by men, were also in use. - -William of Malmesbury states that the body of William Rufus was brought -from the spot where he was killed in the New Forest in a horse-litter -(A.D. 1100). When King John fell ill at Swineshead Abbey, in 1216, -he was carried in a horse-litter to Newark, where he died. For a man -who was in good health to travel in such a conveyance was considered -unbecoming and effeminate. In recording the death, in 1254, of Earl -Ferrers, from injuries received in an accident to his conveyance, -Matthew Paris deems it necessary to explain that the Earl suffered from -gout, which compelled him to use a litter when moving from place to -place. The accident was caused by the carelessness of the driver of the -horses, who upset the conveyance while crossing a bridge. - -The illustration is copied from a drawing which occurs in a manuscript -in the British Museum (Harl. 5256). - -Froissart speaks of the English returning “in their charettes” from -Scotland after Edward III.’s invasion of that country, about 1360; -but there is little doubt that the vehicles referred to were merely -the baggage carts which accompanied the army used by the footsore and -fatigued soldiers. - -[Illustration: HORSE LITTER USED A.D. 1400-1500.] - -The same chronicler refers to use of the “chare” or horse-litter in -connection with Wat Tyler’s insurrection in the year 1380:— - -“The same day that these unhappy people of Kent were coming to London, -there returned from Canterbury the King’s mother, Princess of Wales, -coming from her pilgrimage. She was in great jeopardy to have been -lost, for these people came to her chare and dealt rudely with her.” - -As the chronicler states that the “good lady” came in one day from -Canterbury to London, “for she never durst tarry by the way,” it is -evident that the chare was a “horse-litter,” the distance exceeding -sixty miles. - -The introduction of side-saddles by Anne of Bohemia, Richard II.’s -Queen, is said by Stow to have thrown such conveyances into disuse: -“So was the riding in those whirlicotes and chariots forsaken except -at coronations and such like spectacles:” but when the whirlicote or -horse-litter was employed for ceremonial occasions it was a thing of -great magnificence. - - -CONTINENTAL CARRIAGES IN THE 13TH AND 14TH CENTURIES. - -Carriages were in use on the continent long before they were employed -in England. In 1294, Philip the Fair of France issued an edict whose -aim was the suppression of luxury; under this ordinance the wives of -citizens were forbidden to use carriages, and the prohibition appears -to have been rigorously enforced. They were used in Flanders during the -first half of the fourteenth century; an ancient Flemish chronicle in -the British Museum (Royal MSS. 16, F. III.) contains a picture of the -flight of Ermengarde, wife of Salvard, Lord of Rouissillon. - -[Illustration: THE FLIGHT OF PRINCESS ERMENGARDE. - -Carriage used about 1300-1350 in Flanders.] - -The lady is seated on the floor boards of a springless four-wheeled -cart or waggon, covered in with a tile that could be raised or drawn -aside; the body of the vehicle is of carved wood and the outer edges -of the wheels are painted grey to represent iron tires. The conveyance -is drawn by two horses driven by a postillion who bestrides that on -the near-side. The traces are apparently of rope, and the outer trace -of the postillion’s horse is represented as passing under the saddle -girth, a length of leather (?) being let in for the purpose; the traces -are attached to swingle-bars carried on the end of a cross piece -secured to the base of the pole where it meets the body. - -Carriages of some kind appear also to have been used by men of rank -when travelling on the continent. _The Expeditions to Prussia and -the Holy Land of Henry, Earl of Derby, in 1390 and 1392-3_ (Camden -Society’s Publications, 1894), indicate that the Earl, afterwards King -Henry IV. of England, travelled on wheels at least part of the way -through Austria. - -The accounts kept by his Treasurer during the journey contain several -entries relative to carriages; thus on November 14, 1392, payment is -made for the expenses of two equerries named Hethcote and Mansel, who -were left for one night at St. Michael, between Leoban and Kniltelfeld, -with thirteen carriage horses. On the following day the route lay over -such rugged and mountainous country that the carriage wheels were -broken despite the liberal use of grease; and at last the narrowness of -the way obliged the Earl to exchange his own carriage for two smaller -ones better suited to the paths of the district. - -The Treasurer also records the sale of an old carriage at Friola -for three florins. The exchange of the Earl’s “own carriage” is the -significant entry: it seems very unlikely that a noble of his rank -would have travelled so lightly that a single cart would contain his -own luggage and that of his personal retinue; and it is also unlikely -that he used one baggage cart of his own. The record points directly to -the conclusion that the carriages were passenger vehicles used by the -Earl himself. - - -CONVEYANCES IN HENRY VI.’s TIME. - -It was probably possession of roads unworthy of the name that deterred -the English from following the example of their continental neighbours, -for forty years later the horse-litter was still the only conveyance -used by ladies. On July 13, 1432, King Henry VI. writes to the -Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishops of Winchester and Durham, and the -High Treasurer, in connection with the journeyings of Joan of Navarre, -widow of Henry IV.:— - -“And because we suppose that she will soon remove from the place where -she is now, that ye order for her also horses for two chares and let -her remove thence into whatever place within our kingdom that she -pleases.” - - -“CHARIOTS” FIRST USED ON GREAT OCCASIONS. - -There is still some little doubt concerning the date when the carriage -or coach was first seen in England; but it seems certain that wheeled -vehicles of some kind were used on great ceremonial occasions before -the coach suitable for ordinary travel came into vogue. - -When Catherine of Aragon was crowned with Henry VIII., on June 24, -1509, she was, says Holinshed, conveyed in a litter followed by -“chariots covered, with ladies therein.” Similarly when Anne Boleyn -passed in state through London she was borne in a litter followed -by ladies in a chariot. From these records it is clear that the -horse-litter was considered the more dignified conveyance. - -The litter used by princesses and ladies of high degree on state -occasions was very richly furnished. The poles on which it was -supported were covered with crimson velvet, the pillows and cushions -with white satin, and the awning overhead was of cloth of gold. The -trappings of the horses and dress of the grooms who led them were -equally splendid. Ancient records contain minute particulars of the -materials purchased for litters on special occasions, and these show -with what luxury the horse-litter of a royal lady was equipped. - -In this connection we must note that Markland, in his _Remarks on the -Early Use of Carriages in England_, discriminates between the “chare” -and the horse-litter: the chare gave accommodation to two persons or -more and was used for ordinary purposes of travel, and he believes -that it ran on wheels; whereas the horse-litter accommodated only one -person, and that usually a lady of high rank, on ceremonial occasions. - -The chariot was clearly rising in esteem at this period, for when Queen -Mary went in state to be crowned in the year 1553, she herself occupied -a chariot. It is described as “a chariot with cloth of tissue, drawn -with six horses”; and it was followed by another “with cloth of silver -and six horses,” in which were seated Elizabeth and Anne of Cleves. - - -FIRST USE OF CARRIAGES; CALLED COACHES. - -We are now come to the period when the coach proper was introduced into -England. Stow, in his _Summary of the English Chronicles_, says that -carriages were not used in England till 1555, when Walter Rippon built -one for the Earl of Rutland, “this being the first ever made.” Taylor, -the “Water Poet,” in his life of Thomas Parr, states that Parr was 81 -years old “before there was any coach in England.” Parr was born in -1483, so the year in which he reached 81 would be 1564; in that year -William Boonen, a Dutchman, brought from the Netherlands a coach which -was presented to Queen Elizabeth; and Taylor, on Parr’s authority, -mentions this as the “first one ever seen here.” - -The obvious inference is that Parr had not heard of or (what is more -probable considering his advanced age) had forgotten the coach built -eleven years earlier for a much less conspicuous person than the -sovereign. There is also mention in the Burghley Papers (III., No. 53) -quoted by Markland, of Sir T. Hoby offering the use of his coach to -Lady Cecil in 1556. It is quite likely that the coach brought by Boonen -from the Netherlands served as a model for builders in search for -improvements, as we read in Stow’s _Summary_: “In 1564, Walter Rippon -made the first _hollow, turning coach_, with pillars and arches, for -her Majesty Queen Elizabeth.” What a “hollow, turning” coach may have -been it is difficult to conjecture. Drawings of a hundred years later -than this period show no mechanism resembling a “turning head” or -fifth wheel. Captain Malet[2] says that the Queen suffered so much in -this vehicle, when she went in it to open Parliament, that she never -used it again. The difference between the coach for ordinary travel -and the chariot for ceremony is suggested by the next passage in the -_Summary_: “In 1584 he (Rippon) made a _chariot throne_ with four -pillars behind to bear a crown imperial on the top, and before, two -lower pillars whereon stood a lion and a dragon, the supporters of the -arms of England.” - -[2] _Annals of the Road_, London, 1876. - -Queen Elizabeth, according to Holinshed, used a “chariot” when she went -to be crowned at Westminster in 1558. - - -COACHES IN FRANCE. - -By way of showing how the old authorities differ, mention may be made -of the coach which Henry Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel, brought from France -and presented to the Queen, it is said, in 1580. This vehicle is cited -as the first coach ever seen in public but inasmuch as we have ample -evidence to prove the last statement incorrect, apart from the fact -that the Earl died in 1579, nothing more need be said about it. - -France does not seem to have been very far ahead of Britain in the -adoption of coaches. In 1550 there were only three in Paris; one -belonged to the Queen of Francis I., another to Diana of Poitiers, and -the third to René de Laval, who was so corpulent that he could not -ride. Mr. George Thrupp, in his _History of the Art of Coach Building_ -(1876), observes that “there must have been many other vehicles in -France, but it seems only three covered and suspended coaches.” - - -COACHES FIRST USED BY QUEEN ELIZABETH. - -Queen Elizabeth travelled in a coach, either the one built by Walter -Rippon or that brought by Boonen (who, by the way, was appointed her -coachman), on some of her royal progresses through the kingdom. When -she visited Warwick in 1572, at the request of the High Bailiff she -“caused every part and side of the coach to be opened that all her -subjects present might behold her, which most gladly they desired.” - -The vehicle which could thus be opened on “every part and side” is -depicted incidentally in a work executed by Hoefnagel in 1582, which -Markland believed to be probably the first engraved representation of -an English coach. As will be seen from the reproduction here given, the -body carried a roof or canopy on pillars, and the intervening spaces -could be closed by means of curtains. - -[Illustration: QUEEN ELIZABETH’S TRAVELLING COACH. - -About the year 1582.] - -Queen Elizabeth seems to have preferred riding on a pillion when she -could; she rode thus on one occasion from London to Exeter, and again -we read of her going in state to St. Paul’s on a pillion behind her -Master of the Horse. Sir Thomas Browne, writing to his son on October -15, 1680, says: “When Queen Elizabeth came to Norwich, 1578, she came -on horseback from Ipswich by the high road to Norwich, but she had a -coach or two in her train.” - -Country gentlemen continued to travel on horseback, though ladies -sometimes made their journeys by coach. The _Household Book_ of the -Kytson family of Hengrave in Suffolk contains the following entry under -date December 1, 1574: “For the hire of certain horses to draw my -mistress’ coach from Whitsworth to London 26 shillings and 8 pence.” - -Other entries show that “my mistress” occupied the coach: whence it -would appear that not all our country roads in Queen Elizabeth’s time -were impassable during the winter, as we might reasonably infer from -many contemporary records. The horse-litter, as we may well suppose, -was an easier conveyance than the early springless coach: for example, -in Hunter’s _Hallamshire_ we find mention of Sir Francis Willoughby’s -request in 1589 to the Countess of Shrewsbury to lend her horse-litter -and furniture for his wife, who was ill and unable to travel either on -horseback or in a coach. - -It may be observed here that the latest reference we have found to the -use of the horse-litter occurs in the _Last Speech of Thomas Pride_ -(Harleian Miscellany): in 1680 an accident happened to General Shippon, -who “came in a horse-litter wounded to London; when he paused by the -brewhouse in St. John Street a mastiff attacked the horse, and he was -tossed like a dog in a blanket.” - -Owing no doubt to their patronage by royalty, coaches grew rapidly -popular. William Lilly, in a play called “Alexander and Campaspes,” -which was first printed in 1584, makes one of his characters -complain of those who had been accustomed to “go to a battlefield on -hard-trotting horses now riding in easy coaches up and down to court -ladies.” Stow, referring to the coach brought to England by Boonen, -says:— - -“After a while divers great ladies, with as great jealousy of the -Queen’s displeasure, made them coaches and rid in them up and down the -countries, to the great admiration of all the beholders, but then by -little and little they grew usual among the nobilitie and others of -sort, and within twenty years became a great trade of coach making.” - -This confirms the statement of Lilly above quoted: it is quite clear -therefore that, about 1580, coaches had come into general use among the -wealthy classes. Their popularity became a source of anxiety to those -who saw in the use of a coach the coming degeneracy of men and neglect -of horsemanship. - - -DUKE OF BRUNSWICK, 1588, FORBIDS USE OF COACHES. - -In 1588, Julius Duke of Brunswick issued a proclamation forbidding -the vassals and servants of his electorate to journey in coaches, -but on horseback, “when we order them to assemble, either altogether -or in part, in times of turbulence, or to receive their fiefs, or -when on other occasions they visit our court.” The Duke expressed -himself strongly in this proclamation, being evidently resolved that -the vassals, servants and kinsmen who “without distinction young and -old have _dared_ to give themselves up to indolence and to riding in -coaches,” should resume more active habits. - -The same tendency on the one side and the same feeling on the other -in this country led to the introduction of a Bill in Parliament in -November, 1601, “to restrain the excessive use of coaches,” but it was -rejected. Whereupon:— - -“Motion was made by the Lord Keeper, that forasmuch as the said -Bill did in some sort concern the maintenance of horses within this -realm, consideration might be had of the statutes heretofore made and -ordained touching the breed and maintenance of horses. And that Mr. -Attorney-general should peruse and consider of the said statutes, and -of some fit Bill to be drawn and prefered to the house touching the -same, and concerning the use of coaches: which motion was approved of -the House.” - -It does not appear, however, that any steps were taken by the -Parliament of the time to check the liberty of those who could afford -it to indulge in coaches. - -They were probably little used except in London and large towns where -the streets afforded better going than country roads: though, as -we have seen, Queen Elizabeth took coaches with her when making a -progress. The coach seems to have been unknown in Scotland till near -the end of the century, for we read that when, in 1598, the English -Ambassador to Scotland brought one with him “it was counted a great -marvel.” - - -THE STAGE WAGGON. - -About 1564 the early parent of the stage coach made its appearance. -Stow says: “And about that time began long waggons to come in use, such -as now come to London from Canterbury, Norwich, Ipswich, Gloucester, -&c., with passengers and commodities.” These were called “stages”: they -were roomy vehicles with very broad wheels which prevented them sinking -too deeply into the mud: they travelled very slowly, but writers of the -period make frequent allusions to the convenience they provided. Until -the “long waggon” came into use the saddle and pack horse were the only -means of travelling and carrying goods: this conveyance was largely -used by people of small means until late in the eighteenth century, -when stage coaches began to offer seats at fares within the reach of -the comparatively poor. - -Some confusion is likely to arise when searching old records from the -fact that words now in current use have lost their original meaning. -Thus in an Act passed in the year 1555 for “The amending of High -Ways,” the preamble states that certain highways are “now both very -noisome and tedious to travel in and dangerous to all passengers and -‘cariages.’” We might read this to mean vehicles for the conveyance -of passengers; but the text (which empowers local authorities to make -parishioners give four days’ work annually on the roads where needed) -shows us that the “cariage” or “caryage” is identical with the “wayne” -or “cart” used in husbandry. “Carriage” is used in the same sense in a -similar Act of Elizabeth dated 1571, which requires the local authority -to repair certain streets near Aldgate which “become so miry and foul -in the winter time” that it is hard for foot-passengers and “caryages” -to pass along them. - - -THE INTRODUCTION OF SPRINGS. - -It is impossible to discover when builders of passenger vehicles first -endeavoured to counteract the jolting inseparable from the passage of -a primitive conveyance over rough roads by means of springs. Homer -tells us that Juno’s car was slung upon cords to lessen the jolting: -and the ancient Roman carriages were so built that the body rested on -the centre of a pole which connected the front and rear axles, thus -reducing the jolt by whatever degree of spring or elasticity the pole -possessed. - -To come down to later times, Mr. Bridges Adams in _English Pleasure -Carriages_ (1837) refers to a coach presented by the King of Hungary to -King Charles VII. of France (1422-1461), the body of which “trembled.” -Mr. George Thrupp considers that this probably indicates a coach-body -hung on leather straps or braces, and was a specimen of the vehicle -then in use in Hungary. At Coburg several ancient carriages are -preserved: one of those built in 1584 for the marriage ceremony of Duke -John Casimir, the Elector of Saxony, is hung on leather braces from -carved standard posts which, says Mr. Thrupp, “are evidently developed -from the standards of the common waggon. The body of this coach is six -feet four inches long and three feet wide: the wheels have wooden rims, -but over the joints of the felloes are small plates of iron about ten -inches long.” - -In regard to these iron plates it will be remembered that the wheels -of the coach represented in the “Flemish Chronicle” of the first half -of the fourteenth century referred to on pp. 8-9, is furnished with -complete iron tires. Neither this vehicle, nor that of Queen Elizabeth, -a sketch of which is given on p. 17 are furnished with braces of any -kind. It would not be judicious to accept these drawings as exactly -representing the construction of the carriages, but if the artist has -given a generally accurate picture it is difficult to see how or where -leather braces could have been applied to take the dead weight of the -coach body off the under-carriage. - - -STEEL SPRINGS INTRODUCED. - -Mr. Thrupp states that steel springs were first applied to wheel -carriages about 1670,[3] when a vehicle resembling a Sedan chair on -wheels, drawn and pushed by two men, was introduced into Paris. This -conveyance was improved by one Dupin, who applied two “elbow springs” -by long shackles to the front axle-tree which worked up and down in -a groove under the seat. The application of steel springs to coaches -drawn by horses was not generally practised until long afterwards: in -1770 Mons. Roubo, a Frenchman, wrote a treatise on carriage building, -from which we learn that springs were by no means universally employed. - -[3] See page 84. - -When used, says Mr. Thrupp, - -“They were applied to the four corners of a perch carriage and placed -upright, and at first only clipped in the middle to the posts of the -earlier carriages, while the leather braces went from the tops of the -springs to the bottoms of the bodies without any long iron loops such -as we now use; and as the braces were very long we find that complaints -were made of the excessive swinging and tilting and jerking of the -body. The Queen’s coach is thus suspended. Four elbow springs, as we -should call them, were fastened to the bottom of the body, but again -the ends did not project beyond the bottom, and the braces were still -far too long; and Mons. Roubo doubts whether springs were much use.” - -The doubt concerning the value of springs was shared in this country; -for Mr. Richard Lovell Edgeworth, in his _Essay on the Construction -of Roads and Carriages_ (1817), tells us that in 1768 he discovered -that springs were as advantageous to horses as to passengers, and -constructed a carriage for which the Society of English Arts and -Manufactures presented him with a gold medal. In this carriage the -axletrees were divided and the motion of each wheel was relieved by a -spring. - -Travel in a springless coach over uneven streets and the roughest of -roads could not have been a sufficiently luxurious mode of progress -to lay the traveller open to charge of effeminacy. Taylor, the Water -Poet, was no doubt biased in favour of the watermen, but he probably -exaggerated little when he wrote, in 1605, of men and women “so tost, -tumbled, jumbled and rumbled” in the coach of the time. - - -THE FIRST HACKNEY COACHES. - -It was in the year 1605 that hackney coaches came into use; for several -years these vehicles did not stand or “crawl” about the streets to -be hired, but remained in the owners’ yards until sent for. In 1634 -the first “stand” was established in London, as appears from a letter -written by Lord Stafford to Mr. Garrard in that year:— - -“I cannot omit to mention any new thing that comes up amongst us -though ever so trivial. Here is one Captain Bailey, he hath been a -sea captain, but now lives on land about this city where he tries -experiments. He hath created, according to his ability, some four -hackney coaches, put his men into livery and appointed them to stand -at the Maypole in the Strand, giving them instructions at what rate to -carry men into several parts of the town where all day they may be had. -Other hackney men veering this way, they flocked to the same place and -performed their journeys at the same rate so that sometimes there is -twenty of them together which dispose up and down, that they and others -are to be had everywhere, as watermen are to be had at the waterside.” - -Lord Stafford adds that everybody is much pleased with the innovation. -It may here be said, on the authority of Fynes Morryson, who wrote -in 1617, that coaches were not to be hired anywhere but in London at -that time. All travel (save in the slow long waggons) was performed on -horseback, the “hackney men”[4] providing horses at from 2½d. to 3d. -per mile for those who did not keep their own. - -[4] See _Horses Past and Present_, by Sir Walter Gilbey, Bart. Vinton & -Co., 1900. - -The number of coaches increased rapidly during the earlier part of the -seventeenth century. - - -EXCESSIVE NUMBER OF COACHES IN LONDON. - -The preamble of a patent granted Sir Saunders Duncombe in 1634 to -let Sedan chairs refers to the fact that the streets of London and -Westminster “are of late time so much encumbered and pestered with the -unnecessary multitude of coaches therein used”; and in 1635 Charles -I. issued a proclamation on the subject. This document states that -the “general and promiscuous use” of hackney coaches in great numbers -causes “disturbance” to the King and Queen personally, to the nobility -and others of place and degree; “pesters” the streets, breaks up the -pavements and cause increase in the prices of forage. For which reasons -the use of hackney coaches in London and Westminster and the suburbs -is forbidden altogether, unless the passenger is making a journey of -at least three miles. Within the city limits only private coaches were -allowed to ply, and the owner of a coach was required to keep four good -horses or geldings for the king’s service. - -[Illustration: HACKNEY COACHES IN LONDON, 1637.] - -This proclamation evidently produced the desired effect, for in 1637 -there were only sixty hackney carriages in London: the majority of -these were probably owned by James Duke of Hamilton, Charles’ Master -of the Horse, to whom was granted in July of that year power to license -fifty hackney coachmen in London, Westminster and the suburbs, and “in -other convenient places”; and this notwithstanding the fact that in -1636 the vehicles “in London, the suburbs and within four-mile compass -without are reckoned to the number of six thousand and odd.”[5] - -[5] _Coach and Sedan Pleasantly Disputing for Place and Precedence, the -Brewer’s Cart being Moderator._ Published at London by Robert Raworth -for John Crooch in 1636. - -Charles I. can hardly have shared the dislike exhibited by some of his -subjects to wheel passenger traffic, for in 1641 we find him granting -licenses for the importation of horses and enjoining licensees to -import _coach_ horses, mares, and geldings not under 14 hands high and -between the ages of three and seven years. - - -HACKNEY CARRIAGES AND THE THAMES WATERMEN. - -The number of cabs, then called hackney coaches, soon produced an -effect upon the earnings of the Thames watermen, who, until these -vehicles were introduced, enjoyed the monopoly of passenger traffic. -Thomas Dekker[6] refers to the resentment felt by the watermen in 1607, -two years after the hackney couch made its appearance:— - -“The sculler told him he was now out of cash, it was a hard time; he -doubts there is some secret bridge made over to hell, and that they -steal thither in coaches, for every justice’s wife and the wife of -every citizen must be jolted now.” - -[6] _A Knight’s Conjuring Done in Earnest._ By Thomas Dekker. London: -1607. - -There seems to have been good reason for the preference given the -hackney coach over the waterman’s wherry. The preamble of an Act passed -in 1603 “Concerning Wherrymen and Watermen” shows that the risks -attending a trip on the Thames were not inconsiderable, and that love -of novelty was not the only motive which caused the citizens of London -to take the hackney coach instead of the wherry. This Act forbade the -employment of apprentices under 18 years of age, premising that:— - -“It hath often happened that divers and sundry people passing by water -upon the River of Thames between Windsor and Gravesend have been put -to great hazard and danger of the loss of their lives and goods, and -many times have perished and been drowned in the said River through the -unskilfulness and want of knowledge or experience in the wherrymen and -watermen.” - -In 1636, when, as we have seen, there were over 6,000 coaches, private -and hackney, in London, Sedan chairs also were to be hired in the -streets; and the jealousy with which the hackney coachman regarded the -chairman was only equalled by the jealousy with which the waterman -regarded them both. We quote from “Coach and Sedan,” the curious little -publication before referred to:— - -“Coaches and Sedans (quoth the waterman) they deserve both to be thrown -into the Thames, and but for stopping the Channel I would they were, -for I am sure where I was wont to have eight or ten fares in a morning, -I now scarce get two in a whole day. Our wives and children at home -are ready to pine, and some of us are fain for means to take other -professions upon us.” - - -HACKNEY CARRIAGES A NUISANCE IN LONDON. - -By the year 1660, the number of hackney coaches in London had again -grown so large that they were described in a Royal Proclamation as -“a common nuisance,” while their “rude and disorderly handling” -constituted a public danger. For these reasons the vehicles were -forbidden to stand in the streets for hire, and the drivers were -directed to stay in the yards until they might be wanted. We can well -understand that the narrowness of the streets made large numbers of -coaches standing, or “crawling,” to use the modern term, obstacles -to traffic; and it is interesting to notice that the earliest patent -granted in connection with passenger vehicles (No. 31 in 1625) was to -Edward Knapp for a device (among others) to make the wheels of coaches -and other carriages approach to or recede from each other “where the -narrowness of the way may require.” - - -LICENSED HACKNEY CARRIAGES. - -In 1662, there were about 2,490 hackney coaches in London, if we may -accept the figures given by John Cressel in a pamphlet, which we shall -consider on a future page. It was in this year that Charles II. passed -a law appointing Commissioners with power to make certain improvements -in the London streets. One of the duties entrusted to them was that of -reducing the number of hackney coaches by granting licenses; and only -400 licenses were to be granted. - -These Commissioners grossly abused the authority placed in their hands, -wringing bribes from the unfortunate persons who applied for licenses, -and carrying out their task with so little propriety that in 1663 they -were indicted and compelled to restore moneys they had wrongfully -obtained. In regard to this it is to be observed that one of the 400 -hackney coach licenses sanctioned by the Act was a very valuable -possession. We learn from a petition submitted by the hackney coachmen -to Parliament that holders of these licenses, which cost £5 each, sold -them for £100. The petition referred to is undated, but appears to have -been sent in when William III.’s Act to license 700 hackney coaches -(passed in 1694) was before Parliament. - -The bitterness of the watermen against Sedan chairs seems to have died -out by Pepys’ time, but it was still hot against the hackney coaches, -as a passage in the _Diary_ sufficiently proves. Proceeding by boat to -Whitehall on February 2, 1659, Samuel Pepys talked with his waterman -and learned how certain cunning fellows who wished to be appointed -State Watermen had cozened others of their craft to support an address -to the authorities in their favour. According to Pepys’ informant, nine -or ten thousand hands were set to this address (the men were obviously -unable to read or write) “when it was only told them that it was a -petition against hackney coaches.” - - -COACHES WITH “BOOTS.” - -From _Coach and Sedan_ (see page 30), we obtain a quaint but fairly -graphic description of the coach of this period:— - -“The coach was a thick, burly, square-set fellow in a doublet of black -leather, brasse button’d down the breast, back, sleeves and wings, with -monstrous wide boots, fringed at the top with a net fringe, and a round -breech (after the old fashion) gilded, and on his back an atchievement -of sundry coats [of arms], in their proper colours.” - -[Illustration: COACH OF QUEEN ELIZABETH’S LADIES. Showing near-side -“Boot.”] - -The “boots” were projections at the sides of the body between the front -and back wheels, as shown in the drawing of the coach occupied by Queen -Elizabeth’s ladies; and there is much evidence to support the opinion -that these boots were not covered. Taylor in _The World Runnes on -Wheeles_ describes the boot with picturesque vigour:— - -“The coach is a close hypocrite, for it hath a cover for any knavery -and curtains to veil or shadow any wickedness; besides, like a -perpetual cheater, it wears two boots and no spurs, sometimes having -two pairs of legs in one boot, and often-times (against nature) most -preposterously it makes fair ladies wear the boot; and if you note, -they are carried back to back like people surprised by pirates, to be -tied in that miserable manner and thrown overboard into the sea.” - -These two fanciful descriptions explain very clearly what the “boot” -was and how occupied. The “monstrous width” referred to in _Coach and -Sedan_ confirms the statement by Taylor that sometimes “two pairs of -legs” occupied it, the proprietors of the legs sitting back to back. -“No trace of glass windows or perfect doors seems to have existed up -to 1650” (Thrupp), so we can well understand that the passengers who -were obliged to occupy the boot of a stage coach (for these as well as -hackney coaches were so built) on a prolonged journey would have an -exceedingly uncomfortable seat in cold or wet weather. - -It was no doubt an open boot which was occupied by the writer of the -curious letter quoted by Markland. Mr. Edward Parker is addressing his -father, who resided at Browsholme, near Preston, in Lancashire; the -letter is dated November 3, 1663:— - -“I got to London on Saturday last; my journey was noe ways pleasant, -being forced to ride in the boote all the waye. Ye company yt came -up with mee were persons of greate quality as knights and ladyes. My -journey’s expense was 30s. This traval hath soe indisposed mee yt I am -resolved never to ride up againe in ye coatch. I am extreamely hott and -feverish; what this may tend to I know not, I have not as yet advised -with any doctor.” - -Sir W. Petty’s assertion that the splendour of coaches increased -greatly during the Stuart period recalls a passage in Kennett’s -_History of England_. George Villiers, the great favourite of James I. -who created him Duke of Buckingham, had six horses to draw his coach -(“which was wondered at then as a novelty and imputed to him as a -mast’ring pride”). The “stout old Earl of Northumberland,” not to be -outdone by the upstart favourite, “thought if Buckingham had six, he -might very well have eight in his coach, with which he rode through the -city of London to the Bath, to the vulgar talk and admiration.” The -first coaches were drawn by two horses only; love of display led to the -use of more for town use, but the deplorable condition of the country -roads justified the use of as many as quagmires might compel. - -How much a coach weighed in these early days we do not know: Mr. R. L. -Edgeworth, writing in 1817, says, “now travelling carriages frequently -weigh above a ton;” and as carriages had undergone vast improvements by -that date, we are justified in concluding that those of a hundred or a -hundred and fifty years earlier weighed a great deal more. - - -CARRIAGES IN HYDE PARK. - -During the Commonwealth (1649-1659), it was the fashion to drive in -“the Ring” in Hyde Park. The Ring is described by a French writer,[7] -as two or three hundred paces in diameter with a sorry kind of -balustrade consisting of poles placed on stakes three feet from the -ground; round this the people used to drive, in Cromwell’s time, -at great speed, as appears from a letter dated May 2, 1654, from a -gentleman in London to a country friend, quoted by Mr. Jacob Larwood in -his _Story of the London Parks_, (1872):— - -[7] M. Misson. _Memoirs and Observations of a Journey in England_, -1697. - -“When my Lord Protector’s coach came into the Park with Colonel Ingleby -and my Lord’s three daughters, the coaches and horses flocked about -them like some miracle. But they galloped (after the mode court-pace -now, and which they all use wherever they go) round and round the Park, -and all that great multitude hunted them and caught them still at the -turn like a hare, and then made a lane with all reverent haste for them -and so after them again,[8] and I never saw the like in my life.” - -[8] The following sentence from Misson explains this reference. He says -of the way people drive in the Ring: “When they have turned for some -time round one way they face about and turn the other.” - -There is an interesting letter from the Dutch Ambassadors to the States -General, dated October 16, 1654, which is worth quoting here. The -Ambassadors give particulars of the accident to explain why no business -has been done lately:— - -“His Highness [Oliver Cromwell], only accompanied with Secretary -Thurloe and some few of his gentlemen and servants, went to take the -air in Hyde Park, where he caused some dishes of meat to be brought, -where he had his dinner; and afterwards had a mind to drive the coach -himself. Having put only the Secretary into it, being those six grey -horses which the Count of Oldenburgh[9] had presented unto His Highness -who drove pretty handsomely for some time. But at last, provoking these -horses too much with the whip, they grew unruly and ran so fast that -the postilion could not hold them in, whereby His Highness was flung -out of the coach box upon the pole.... The Secretary’s ankle was hurt -leaping out and he keeps his chamber.” - -[9] This suggests that the North German province of Oldenbourg was -famed then, as now, for its breed of coach horses. - -From this it is evident that when six horses were used a postillion -rode one of the leaders and controlled them; while the driver managed -the wheelers and middle pair. When four horses were driven it was the -custom to have two outriders, one to ride at the leaders’ heads and -one at the wheelers’; in town this would be merely display, but on a -journey the outrider’s horses might replace those of the team in case -of accident, or more frequently, be added to the team to help drag the -coach over a stretch of bad road. - - -COACH AND CART RACING. - -John Evelyn in his Diary refers to a coach race which took place in -the Park on May 20, 1658, but gives no particulars. Mr. Jacob Larwood -observes that at this period and for a century later coach-racing was -a national sport; some considerable research through the literature of -these times, however, has thrown no light upon this sport, and while -we need not doubt that coaches when they chanced to meet on suitable -ground did make trials of speed, it is open to question whether the -practice was ever developed into a sport. It may be that Mr. Larwood -had in mind the curious cart-team races described by Marshall in his -_Rural Economy of Norfolk_, published in 1795. - -This writer tells us that before Queen Anne’s reign the farmers of -Norfolk used an active breed of horses which could not only trot but -gallop. He describes as an eyewitness the races which survived to his -day; the teams consisted of five horses, which were harnessed to an -empty waggon:— - -“A team following another broke into a gallop, and unmindful of the -ruts, hollow cavities and rugged ways, contended strenuously for the -lead, while the foremost team strove as eagerly to keep it. Both were -going at full gallop, as fast indeed as horses in harness could go -for a considerable distance, the drivers standing upright in their -respective waggons.” - - -REGULATIONS FOR HACKNEY CARRIAGES. - -The Act of 1662 has already been referred to in connection with the -number of hackney coaches in London; we may glance at it again, as -it gives a few interesting particulars. No license was to be granted -to any person following another trade or occupation, and nobody -might take out more than two licenses. Preference was to be given to -“ancient coachmen” (by which expression we shall doubtless be right -in understanding, not aged men but men who had followed the calling in -previous years), and to such men as had suffered for their service to -Charles I. or Charles II. - -Horses used in hackney coaches were to be not less than fourteen hands -high. The fares were duly prescribed by time and distance; for a day -of twelve hours the coachman was to be paid not over 10s.; or 1s. 6d. -for the first and 1s. for every subsequent hour. “No gentleman or other -person” was to pay over 1s. for hire of a hackney coach “from any of -the Inns of Court or thereabouts to any part of St. James’ or the city -of Westminster (except beyond Tuttle Street)”; and going eastwards -the shilling fare would carry the hirer from the Inns of Court to the -Royal Exchange; eighteenpence was the fare to the Tower, to Bishopsgate -Street or Aldgate. This Act forbade any hackney coach to ply for hire -on Sunday; thus the hackney carriage was placed in the same category as -the Thames wherries and barges. The restrictions concerning the persons -to whom licenses might be granted obviously afforded the Commissioners -opportunity for the malpractices we have already mentioned. - - -PEPYS ON CARRIAGES. - -For further information concerning this period we naturally turn to Mr. -Pepys, who patronised the hackney coach so frequently that when he was -considering the propriety of setting up his own private carriage, he -justified his decision to do so by the fact that “expense in hackney -coaches is now so great.” Economy was not the only motive; on the -contrary, this entry in his Diary appears to have been merely the -salve to a conscience that reproached his vanity. In 1667 he confides -more than once to the Diary that he is “almost ashamed to be seen in a -hackney,” so much had his importance increased: and on July 10, 1668, -he went “with my people in a glass hackney coach to the park, but was -ashamed to be seen.” The private carriage he set up in December of that -year will be referred to presently. - -The public conveyance available for hire in Pepys’ time was evidently -a cumbrous but roomy conveyance; as when a great barrel of oysters “as -big as sixteen others” was given him on March 16, 1664, he took it in -the coach with him to Mr. Turner’s: a circumstance that suggests the -vehicle was built with boots. - -No doubt many of these hackney carriages had formerly been the private -property of gentlemen, which when old and shabby were sold cheaply to -ply for hire in the streets. - -Coaches with boots were being replaced by the improved “glass coach” a -few years later, and of course the relative merits of the old and new -styles of vehicle were weighed by all who were in the habit of using -hackney coaches. It was one of the old kind to which Pepys refers in -the following passage:— - -August 23, 1667. “Then abroad to Whitehall in a hackney coach with -Sir W. Pen, and in our way in the narrow street near Paul’s going the -back way by Tower Street, and the coach being forced to put back, he -was turning himself into a cellar [parts of London were still in ruins -after the Great Fire], which made people cry out to us, and so we were -forced to leap out—he out of one and I out of the other boote. _Query_, -whether a glass coach would have permitted us to have made the escape?” - -Other objections to glass coaches appear in the following entry:— - -September 23, 1667. “Another pretty thing was my Lady Ashley speaking -of the bad qualities of glass coaches, among others the flying open -of the doors upon any great shake; but another was that my Lady -Peterborough being in her glass coach with the glass up, and seeing a -lady pass by in a coach whom she would salute, the glass was so clear -that she thought it had been open, and so ran her head through the -glass and cut all her forehead.” - -The usage of the time appears to have been for the driver of a hackney -carriage to fill up his vehicle as he drove along the streets somewhat -after the manner of a modern ‘bus conductor, if we correctly understand -the following entry in the Diary:— - -February 6, 1663. “So home: and being called by a coachman who had a -fare in him he carried me beyond the Old Exchange, and there set down -his fare, who would not pay him what was his due because he carried a -stranger [Pepys] with him, and so after wrangling he was fain to be -content with sixpence, and being vexed the coachman would not carry me -home a great while, but set me down there for the other sixpence, but -with fair words he was willing to it.” - -Whence it also appears that some members of the public objected to this -practice. The cabman of that time was evidently an insolent character, -for Pepys refers contemptuously to a “precept” which was drawn up in -March, 1663, by the Lord Mayor, Sir John Robinson, against coachmen who -“affronted the gentry.” - - -GLASS WINDOWS IN CARRIAGES. - -Glass was used in carriages at this time, as the entries quoted from -Pepys’ Diary on pages 43 and 44 tell us. Mr. Thrupp states that “no -trace of glass windows or perfect doors seem to have existed up to -1650.” Glass was in common use for house windows before that date, -and Mr. Thrupp refers to the statement that the wife of the Emperor -Ferdinand III. rode in a glass carriage so small that it contained only -two persons as early as 1631. The manufacture of glass was established -in England in 1557[10] (Stow), but plate glass, and none other could -have withstood the rough usage which coaches suffered from the wretched -roads, was not made in England until 1670; previous to that date it was -imported from France. A patent (No. 244) was granted in 1685 to John -Bellingham “for making square window glasses for chaises and coaches.” - -[10] James I., by Proclamation, in 1615, forbade the manufacture of -glass if wood were used as fuel, on the ground that the country was -thereby denuded of timber. In 1635 Sir Robert Maunsell perfected a -method of manufacturing “all sorts of glass with sea coale or pitt -coale,” and Charles I. forbade the importation of foreign glass in -order to encourage and assist this new industry. - -Pepys writes in his Diary, December 30, 1668: “A little vexed to be -forced to pay 40s. for a glass of my coach, which was broke the other -day, nobody knows how, within the door while it was down: but I do -doubt that I did break it myself with my knees.” Forty shillings for a -single pane seems to indicate that it was plate glass. This passage -also shows us that the lower part of the coach door must have received -the glass between the outer woodwork and a covering of upholstery of -some kind. Had there been wooden casing inside Pepys would not have -broken it with his knees, and had it been uncovered the accident could -not have escaped discovery at the moment. - - -IMPROVEMENTS IN CARRIAGES. - -With reference to the introduction of springs: the patent granted to -Edward Knapp in 1625 protected an invention for “hanging the bodies -of carriages on springs of steel”: the method is not described. -Unfortunately, the Letters Patent of those days scrupulously refrain -from giving any information that would show us _how_ the inventor -proposed to achieve his object. Knapp’s springs could not have been -efficacious, for forty years later ingenious men were working at this -problem. On May 1, 1665, Pepys went to dine with Colonel Blunt at -Micklesmarsh, near Greenwich, and after dinner was present at the - -“... trial of some experiments about making of coaches easy. And -several we tried: but one did prove mighty easy (not here for me to -describe, but the whole body of the coach lies upon one long spring), -and we all, one after another, rid in it; and it is very fine and -likely to take.” - -These experiments were made before a committee appointed by the Royal -Society, from whose records it appears that on a previous date Colonel -Blunt had “produced another model of a chariot with four springs, -esteemed by him very easy both to the rider and horse, and at the same -time cheap.” - -This arrangement of springs evidently did not give such satisfactory -results as the one mentioned above by Pepys. On May 3, 1665, we learn -from Birch’s _History of the Royal Society_:— - -“Mr. Hook produced the model of a chariot with two wheels and short -double springs, to be drawn with one horse; the chair [seat] of it -being so fixed upon two springs that the person sitting just over or -rather a little behind the axle-tree was, when the experiment was made -at Colonel Blount’s house, carried with as much ease as one could be in -the French chariot without at all burthening the horse.” - -Mr. Hook showed:— - -“Two drafts of this model having this circumstantial difference, one -of these was contrived so that the boy sitting on a seat made for him -behind the chair and guiding the reins over the top of it, drives the -horse. The other by placing the chair clear behind the wheels, the -place of entry being also behind and the saddle on the horse’s back -being to be borne up by the shafts, that the boy riding on it and -driving the horse should be little or no burden to the horse.” - -It seems to have been this latter variety of Colonel Blount’s -invention, or a modification of it, which Pepys saw on January 22, -1666, and describes as “a pretty odd thing.” - -On September 5, 1665, Pepys writes:— - -“After dinner comes Colonel Blunt in his new chariot made with springs. -And he hath rode, he says now, this journey many miles in it with one -horse and outdrives any coach and outgoes any horses, and so easy, he -says. So for curiosity I went into it to try it and up the hill to the -heath and over the cart ruts, and found it pretty well, but not so easy -as he pretends.” - -Colonel Blunt, or Blount, seems to have devoted much time and ingenuity -to the improvement of the coach, for on January 22, 1666, the committee -again assembled at his house - -“—to consider again of the business of chariots and try their new -invention which I saw my Lord Brouncker ride in; where the coachman -sits astride upon a pole over the horse but do not touch the horse, -which is a pretty odd thing: but it seems it is most easy for the -horse, and as they say for the man also.” - -On February 16, 1667, a chariot invented by Dr. Croune was produced -for inspection by the members of the Royal Society and “generally -approved.” No particulars of the vehicle are given: we are only told -that “some fence was proposed to be made for the coachman against the -kicking of the horse.” - - -PEPYS’ PRIVATE CARRIAGE. - -On October, 20, 1668, Pepys went to look for the carriage he had so -long promised himself “and saw many; and did light on one [in Cow Lane] -for which I bid £50, which do please me mightily, and I believe I shall -have it.” Four days later the coach-maker calls upon him and they agree -on £53 as the price. But on the 30th of the same month Mr. Povy comes -“to even accounts with me:” and after some gossip about the court, - -“—— he and I do talk of my coach and I got him to go and see it, where -he finds most infinite fault with it, both as to being out of fashion -and heavy, with so good reason that I am mightily glad of his having -corrected me in it: and so I do resolve to have one of his build, and -with his advice, both in coach and horses, he being the fittest man in -the world for it.” - -Mr. Povy had been Treasurer and Receiver-General of Rents and Revenues -to James, Duke of York: Evelyn describes him as “a nice contriver of -all elegancies.” The opinion of such a personage on a point of fashion -would have been final with a man of Pepys’ temperament, and we hear no -more about the coach with which Mr. Povy “found” most infinite fault. - -On 2 November, 1668, Pepys goes “by Mr. Povy’s direction to a -coach-maker near him for a coach just like his, but it was sold this -very morning.” Mr. Povy lived in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and Lord -Braybrooke remarks, “Pepys no doubt went to Long Acre, then, as now, -celebrated for its coach-makers.” On November 5, - -“With Mr. Povy spent all the afternoon going up and down among the -coach-makers in Cow Lane and did see several, and at last did pitch -upon a little chariot whose body was framed but not covered at the -widow’s that made Mr. Lowther’s fine coach; and we are mightily pleased -with it, it being light, and will be very genteel and sober: to be -covered with leather and yet will hold four.” - -The carriage gave great satisfaction when it came home, but the horses -were not good enough for it: and on December 12 Pepys records that -“this day was brought home my pair of black coach-horses, the first I -ever was master of. They cost me £50 and are a fine pair.” - - -CARRIAGE PAINTING IN PEPYS’ DAY. - -Pepys’ position as an official at the Navy Office was not considered by -his detractors to give him the social status that entitled him to keep -his own coach, and soon after he became the owner of it a scurrilous -pamphlet appeared which, incidentally, gives us a description of the -arms or device with which it was decorated. After denouncing Pepys for -his presumption in owning a carriage at all the writer proceeds:— - -“First you had upon the fore part of your chariot tempestuous waves -and wrecks of ships; on your left hand forts and great guns and ships -a-fighting; on your right hand was a fair harbour and galleys riding -with their flags and pennants spread, kindly saluting each other. -Behind it were high curled waves and ships a-sinking, and here and -there an appearance of some bits of land.” - -If this is a true description, it would seem as though Pepys’ idea of -the “very genteel and sober” cannot be measured by modern standards of -sober gentility: however that may be, the Diarist takes no notice of -the pamphlet and continues to enjoy possession “with mighty pride” in a -vehicle which he remarks (March 18, 1669), after a drive in Hyde Park, -he “thought as pretty as any there, and observed so to be by others.” - -In the following April, however, we find him resolving to have “the -standards of my coach gilt with this new sort of varnish, which will -come to but forty shillings; and contrary to my expectation, the doing -of the biggest coach all over comes not to above £6, which is not very -much.” One morning, a few days later: “I to my coach, which is silvered -over, but no varnish yet laid on, so I put it in a way of doing.” -Again, in the afternoon:— - -“I to my coach-maker’s and there vexed to see nothing yet done to my -coach at three in the afternoon, but I set it in doing and stood by it -till eight at night and saw the painter varnish it, which is pretty to -see how every doing it over do make it more and more yellow, and it -dries as fast in the sun as it can be laid on almost, and most coaches -are nowadays done so, and it is very pretty when laid on well and not -too pale as some are, even to show the silver. Here I did make the -workmen drink, and saw my coach cleaned and oiled.” - -There is a passage in the Diary (April 30, 1669), which suggests that -it was not unusual for people of station and leisure to superintend the -painting of their carriages; as Pepys found at the coach-maker’s “a -great many ladies sitting in the body of a coach that must be ended -[finished] by to-morrow; they were my Lady Marquess of Winchester, -Lady Bellassis and other great ladies, eating of bread and butter and -drinking ale.” - -On the day after that he spent at the coach-maker’s, Pepys, on his -return from office, takes his wife for a drive: “We went alone through -the town with our new liveries of serge, and the horses’ manes and -tails tied with red ribbons and the standards there gilt with varnish, -and all clean, and green reins, that people did mightily look upon us; -and the truth is, I did not see any coach more pretty, though more gay, -than ours, all the day.” - -Samuel Pepys’ child-like pride in his carriage was no doubt a source of -amusement to his contemporaries, but it has had the result of giving us -more minute details concerning the carriages of Charles II.’s time than -we can obtain from the pages of any other writer. - - -THE FIRST STAGE COACHES. - -We must now turn to the stage coach which had come into vogue about the -year 1640.[11] Chamberlayne,[12] writing in 1649, says:— - -[11] _History of the Art of Coach Building._ By George A. Thrupp, 1876. - -[12] _The Present State of Great Britain._ By Chamberlayne, 1649. - -“There is of late such an admirable commodiousness, both for men and -women, to travel from London to the principal towns of the country -that the like hath not been known in the world, and that is by stage -coaches, wherein any one may be transported to any place sheltered from -foul weather and foul ways, free from endamaging one’s health and one’s -body by hard jogging or over violent motion on horseback, and this not -only at the low price of about a shilling for every five miles, but -with such velocity and speed in one hour as the foreign post can make -but in one day.” - -There were two classes of coach in the seventeenth century. Mons. -Misson[13] says, “There are coaches that go to all the great towns -by moderate journeys; and others which they call flying coaches that -will travel twenty leagues a day and more. But these do not go to -all places.” He also refers to the waggons which “lumber along but -heavily,” and which he says are used only by a few poor old women. Four -or four miles and a half in the hour was the speed of the ordinary -coach. - -[13] _Memoirs and Observations of a Journey in England_, 1697. - -The coaches that travelled between London and distant towns were -similar in construction to the hackney coach, which plied for hire -in the streets, but were built on a larger scale. They carried eight -passengers inside, and behind, over the axle, was a great basket for -baggage and outside passengers, who made themselves as comfortable as -they might in the straw supplied. The “insides” were protected from -rain and cold by leather curtains; neither passengers nor baggage were -carried on the roof; and the coachman sat on a bar fixed between the -two standard posts from which the body was hung in front, his feet -being supported by a footboard on the perch. - -Mr. Thrupp states that in 1662 there were only six stage coaches in -existence; which assertion does not agree with that of Chamberlayne, -quoted on a previous page; the seventeenth century writer tells us that -in his time—1649—stage coaches ran “from London to the principle towns -in the country.” It seems, however, certain that the year 1662 saw a -great increase in the number of “short stages”—that is to say, coaches -running between London and towns twenty, thirty, forty miles distant. - - -OBJECTIONS RAISED TO STAGE COACHES. - -This is proved by the somewhat violent pamphlet written by John -Cressel, to which reference was made on page 33. This publication, -which was entitled _The Grand Concern of England Explained_, appeared -in 1673. It informs us that the stage coaches, to which John Cressel -strongly objects:— - -“Are kept by innkeepers ... or else ... by such persons as before the -late Act for reducing the number of hackney coaches in London [_see_ -page 33] to 400, were owners of coaches and drove hackney. But when -the number of 400 was full and they not licensed, then to avoid the -penalties of the Act they removed out of the city dispersing themselves -into every little town within twenty miles of London where they set up -for stagers and drive every day to London and in the night-time drive -about the city.” - -[Illustration: “THE MACHINE.” A.D. 1640-1750.] - -These intruders,[14] whose number John Cressel says is “at least -2,000,” paid no £5, and took bread from the mouths of the four hundred -licensed hackney coachmen. - -[14] Owing to the profitable nature of the business these unlicensed -hackney coaches increased until on November 30, 1687, a Royal -Proclamation was issued appointing new Commissioners with authority to -make an end of them. - -John Cressel’s purpose in writing his pamphlet was to call the -attention of Parliament to the necessity which, in his opinion, existed -for the suppressing all or most of the stage coaches and caravans -which were then plying on the roads; and incidentally he gives some -interesting particulars concerning the stage coach service of his time. -Taking the York, Chester and Exeter coaches as examples, he says that -each of these with forty horses apiece carry eighteen passengers per -week from London.[15] In the summer the fare to either of these places -was forty shillings and in winter forty-five shillings; the coachman -was changed four times on the way, and the usual practice was for each -passenger to give each coachman one shilling. - -[15] The stage coach carried six passengers, and a coach left London -for each of the towns named three times a week. - -The journey—200 miles—occupied four days. These early “flying -coaches” travelled faster than their successors of a later date. The -seventeenth century London-Exeter coach did the journey, one hundred -and seventy-five miles, in ten days, whereas in 1755, according to -“Nimrod,” proprietors promised “a safe and expeditious journey in a -fortnight.” - -The “short stages,” _i.e._, those which ran between London and places -only twenty or thirty miles distant, were the hackney coaches which had -not been fortunate enough to obtain licenses under Charles II.’s Act. -These were drawn by four horses and carried six passengers, making the -journey to or from London in one day. There were, John Cressel states, -stage coaches running to almost every town situated within twenty or -twenty-five miles of the capital; and it is worth observing that at -this date letters were sent by coach. Coaches ran on both sides of the -Thames from Windsor and Maidenhead, and “carry all the letters, little -bundles and passengers which were carried by watermen.” - -This writer’s arguments against coaches are worthless as such, but -they throw side lights on the discomforts of travel at the time. He -considered it detrimental to health to rise in the small hours of the -morning to take coach and to retire late to bed. With more reason he -enquired, - -“Is it for a man’s health to be laid fast in foul ways and forced to -wade up to the knees in mire; and afterwards sit in the cold till fresh -teams of horses can be procured to drag the coach out of the foul ways? -Is it for his health to travel in rotten coaches and have their tackle, -or perch, or axle-tree broken, and then to wait half the day before -making good their stage?” - -John Cressel was prone to exaggeration, but there is plenty of reliable -contemporary evidence to show that his picture of the coach roads was -not overdrawn. Yet when this advocate for the suppression of coaches -seeks to rouse public sentiment, he reproaches those men who use them -for effeminacy and indulgence in luxury! One of his quaintest arguments -in favour of the saddle horse is that the rider’s clothes “are wont to -be spoyled in two or three journies”; which is, he urges, an excellent -thing for trade as represented by the tailors. - -John Cressel, it will be gathered from this, viewed the innovation from -a lofty stand-point. He describes the introduction of stage coaches as -one of the greatest mischiefs that have happened of late years to the -King. They wrought harm, he said: - -(1) By destroying the breed of good horses, the strength of the nation, -and making men careless of attaining to good horsemanship, a thing so -useful and commendable in a gentleman. - -(2) By hindering the breed of watermen who are the nursery for seamen, -and they the bulwarks of the kingdom. - -(3) By lessening His Majesty’s revenues; for there is not the fourth -part of saddle horses either bred or kept now in England that there was -before these coaches set up, and would be again if suppressed. - -Travelling on horseback was cheaper than by coach. The “chapman” or -trader could hire a horse from the hackneyman at from 6s. to 12s. per -week. John Cressel estimates that a man could come from “York, Exeter -or Chester to London, and stay twelve days for business (which is the -most that country chapmen usually do stay), for £1 16s., horse hire and -horse meat 1s. 2d. per day.” From Northampton it cost 16s. to come to -London on horseback, from Bristol 25s., Bath 20s., Salisbury 20s. or -25s., and from Reading 7s. - -If men would not ride, John Cressel urged them to travel in the long -waggons which moved “easily without jolting men’s bodies or hurrying -them along as the running coaches do.” The long waggon was drawn by -four or five horses and carried from twenty to twenty-five passengers. -He proposed that there should be one stage per week from London to -each shire town in England; that these should use the same team of -horses for the whole journey, that their speed should not exceed thirty -miles a day in summer and 25 in winter, and that they should halt at -different inns on each journey to support the innkeeping business. If -these proposals were carried out, the writer thought stage coaches -would “do little or no harm.” - -John Cressel’s pamphlet was answered by another from the pen of a -barrister, who showed up the futility of his arguments and deductions, -but did not find great fault with his facts and figures. - - -SEVENTEENTH CENTURY HIGH ROADS. - -It is commonly believed that the introduction of stage coaches produced -the first legislative endeavour to improve the country roads; this is -not the case: nor had the sufferings of travellers by “long waggon” any -influence upon legislators if comparison of dates be a reliable test; -for it was not until 1622 that any attempt was made to save the roads. -In that year James I. issued a Proclamation in which it was stated that -inasmuch as the highways were ploughed up by “unreasonable carriages,” -and the bridges shaken, the use of four-wheeled carts for carrying -goods and agricultural produce was forbidden, carts with two wheels -only being allowed. - -In 1629 Charles I. issued a Proclamation confirming that of his father, -and furthermore forbidding common carriers and others to convey more -than twenty hundredweight in the two-wheeled vehicles which were -lawful, and also forbidding the use of more than five horses at once; -the avowed object being to prevent destruction of the road. - -We may fairly reason from the terms of this Proclamation that it was -recognised that on occasion five horses might be required to draw one -ton along the roads; and from this we can form our own idea of the -condition to which traffic and rains might reduce the highways. - -In 1661 the restrictions on cart traffic were modified by Charles -II.’s Proclamation, which permitted carts and waggons with four -wheels, and drawn by ten or more horses, to carry sixty or seventy -hundredweight, and forbade more than five horses to be harnessed to -any four-wheeled cart unless the team went in pairs. The orders issued -thus by Proclamation were made law by two Acts of Charles II. in 1670; -the second of which forbade the use of more than eight horses or oxen -unless harnessed two abreast. - -In 1663 the first turnpike gate was erected; this novelty was put on -the Great North Road to collect tolls for repair of the highway in -Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Huntingdon, where in places it had -become “ruinous and almost impassable.” The turnpike was so unpopular -that for nearly a century no gate was erected between Glasgow and -Grantham. - -Nothing more clearly proves the badness of the roads in the -seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, than the number of patents -granted to inventors for devices calculated to prevent carriages from -over-turning. The first invention towards this end was patented in -1684, and between that date and 1792 nine more patents were granted for -devices to prevent upsetting, or to cause the body of the vehicle to -remain erect though the wheels turned over. - -Few thought it worth trying to discover a method of improving the roads -which caused accidents. In 1619, one John Shotbolt took out a patent -for “strong engines for making and repairing of roads”; another was -issued in 1699 to Nathaniel Bard, who also protected “an engine for -levelling and preserving roads and highways”; and in the same year -Edward Heming was granted a patent for a method of repairing highways -“so as to throw all the rising ridges into the ruts.” History omits -to tell us what measure of success rewarded these inventions: if the -Patent Specification files form any guide to an opinion, inventors gave -up in despair trying to devise means of keeping the roads in order, -for not until 1763 does another ingenious person appear with a remedy -thought worthy of letters patent. - -Repairs to the highways were effected by forced labour when their -condition made improvement absolutely necessary. Thus, in 1695, -surveyors were appointed by Act of Parliament to require persons to -work on the road between London and Harwich, which in places had become -almost impassable. Labourers were to be paid at local rates of hire, -were not to be called upon to travel more than four miles from home, -nor to work more than two days in the week: nor were they liable to be -summoned for road-mending during seed, hay and harvest-time. This Act -also revised the system of tolls on vehicles: any stage, hackney, or -other coach and any calash or chariot was to pay 6d. toll; a cart 8d. -and a waggon 1s. - -The Company of Coach and Coach Harness Makers was founded in 1677 -by Charles II. The foundation of the company shows that the trade -of coach-building was by this time large and important, while the -interest taken by the King must have given an impetus to the business. -We have evidence that coaches of English build were appreciated on -the Continent in an old “List of the Names of all the Commodities -of English Product and Manufacture that was Exported to France from -England during what may be called the Interval of Peace from Christmas, -1698, to Christmas, 1702.” The list includes both coaches and harness -for coaches. - -In this connection it is to be observed that by the terms of its -charter the Coachmakers’ Company was empowered to seek out and destroy -bad work wherever they might find such. Under these conditions it is -not surprising that English workmanship became famous. - -Hyde Park, as Pepys and other writers show us, was the best place -in London to see the coaches of the gentry. In an undated petition, -submitted by “a great number of licensed hackney coachmen,” there is -reference to the “four hundred licensed coachmen in Hyde Park,” from -which it might be inferred that these formed a body of license-holders -distinct from the four hundred licensed by Charles II. in 1663. - - -HACKNEY CABS AS A SOURCE OF REVENUE. - -In 1694, when the Parliament was hard pressed for money to carry on -the French war, the London cabs or hackney coaches were more heavily -taxed under a new system of licenses; the number licensed to ply for -hire was raised from 400 to 700, and for each license, which held good -for twenty-one years, the sum of £50 was to be paid down, while £4 per -annum was to be paid as “rent.” All stage coaches in England and Wales -were to pay a tax of £8 a year. This Act confirmed the old tariff of -fares for hackney coaches in London (_see_ p. 42), and the prohibition -against plying on Sundays, which had been in force since 1662, was -partially withdrawn. The new Act allowed 175 cabs to ply for hire on -Sundays; the Commissioners were enjoined to arrange matters so that the -700 licensed cabmen should be employed in turn on Sunday. - -This Act caused great discontent among the original 400 licensed -coachmen, as it made them equally liable with the additional 300 -licensees to the £50 impost; their grievances found vent in a petition, -wherein they prayed that they, the Original Four Hundred, might be -“incorporated” (presumably as a guild or company), and that all stage -coaches running between London and places thirty miles therefrom might -be suppressed. - -The Act of 1693 compelled the hackney coachman to carry a fare ten -miles out of London if required, and doubtless the uncertainty of -finding a “fare” to bring back was partly owing to the short stages, -which ran on every road. - -The five Commissioners who were appointed to carry out the provisions -of this law discharged their duties with no greater integrity than -their predecessors. Yet another Petition from the 700 hackney coachmen -refers incidentally to the circumstance that in 1694 three of the five -were dismissed for accepting bribes from tradesmen who wanted licenses; -the petition also prays for better regulations to control the “many -hundred coaches and horses let for hire without license, likewise -shaises, hackney chairs and short stages.” - -The “shaise” or chaise was evidently a vehicle of a different type -from the hackney coach. The post-chaise for hire was introduced into -England about this time from France by John, a son of Mr. Jethro -Tull, the famous agriculturist who in 1733 published a work, entitled -“Horse Hoeing Husbandry,” which attracted great attention and laid the -foundation of the use of implements in farming and improvements in -methods of cultivation. In 1740 John Tull was granted a patent for a -sedan chair fixed on a wheel carriage for horse draught. - - -MANNERS OF THE CABMAN. - -The licensed coachmen had good grounds for complaint, as we learn -from an edict issued in 1692 by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen that the -law was systematically evaded; in that year only 160 hackney coachmen -applied for licenses and the number plying in the streets was about one -thousand. The men were a turbulent set; several, we read, were indicted -for “standing of their coaches [in the streets] as a common nuisance, -for assaulting constables and tradesmen who attempt to remove them from -before their shops.” There were no side walks for foot-passengers in -those days, and thus the standing coach might be so placed as to block -the entrance to a shop. - -Mons. Misson has the following passage concerning the hackney coachman; -it is interesting as an illustration of contemporary manners:— - -“If a coachman has a dispute about his fare with a gentleman that has -hired him, and the gentleman offers to fight him to decide the quarrel, -the coachman consents with all his heart. The gentleman pulls off his -sword, lays it in some shop with his cane, gloves and cravat, and boxes -in the manner I have described. If the coachman is soundly drubbed, -which happens almost always, that goes for payment, but if he is the -_beator_ the _beatee_ must pay the money about which they quarrelled. -I once saw the late Duke of Grafton at fisticuffs in the open street, -the widest part of the Strand, with such a fellow whom he lamm’d most -horribly.” - -The same author says that the London squares are enclosed with railings -to keep the coaches from crossing them. - - -CAB DRIVING A LUCRATIVE OCCUPATION. - -It has been remarked on a previous page that the hackney coachman -drove a thriving business; how profitable it was we may learn from -two petitions which were evoked by Queen Anne’s Act of 1710, which -increased the number of licenses to 800 on payment of 5s. a week, such -licenses to hold good for thirty-two years. Seven hundred coaches were -more than profitable employment could be found for, if we might believe -the inevitable petition put in against this Act; but nevertheless the -new 800 licensees joined in petitioning that their licenses “may again -be made assets” as under the Act of 1694. “In consideration of which, -notwithstanding the rent of 5s. per week, we most humbly offer to raise -£16,000 as a fine of £20 on each license for the use of His Majesty -King George.” - -That there was money to be made in the business is shown even more -clearly by a petition submitted by James, Lord Mordington and others -about this time. The petitioners offer to “farm the 800 hackney -coaches which are now thought necessary” at £6 per license for 21 -years; they were also prepared to pay £2,000 a year during that period, -on which the King might raise a sum of £20,000; to pay £500 a year -to the orphans of the City of London; and also to raise and equip a -regiment of foot at a cost of £3,000! - -The Act of 1710, it should be observed, altogether removed the -prohibition against plying on Sunday. It licensed 200 hackney chairs -and fixed the chair tariff at two-thirds of that in force for the -coach (1s. for one and a half miles, and 1s. 6d. for two miles). An -injunction to the Commissioners to fix at the Royal Exchange a table of -distances must have been appreciated by the users of hackney coaches -in London. It also repeated the injunction to use horses of fourteen -hands at least; which repetition seems to have been very necessary, as -Misson remarks that the regulation at the time of his visit was “but -ill obeyed.” - -It was about this time that a curious system of wig stealing was -adopted by the London thieves. We read in the _Weekly Journal_ of March -30, 1713, that:— - -“The thieves have got such a villainous way now of robbing gentlemen, -that they cut holes through the backs of hackney carriages, and take -away their wigs or the fine headdresses of gentlewomen.” - -The writer counsels persons travelling alone in a hackney coach to sit -on the front seat to baffle the thieves. - -In vol. 3 of the _Carriage Builders’ and Harness Makers’ Art Journal_ -(1863) was published an advertisement from an old newspaper; this -was thought by the contributor who discovered it to be the first -advertisement of the practical application of springs to coaches; it -refers to a patent granted for fourteen years to Mr. John Green in -1691:— - -“All the nobility and gentry may have the carriages of their coaches -made new or the old ones altered, after this new invention, at -reasonable rates; and hackney and stage coachmen may have licenses from -the Patentees, _Mr. John Green_ and _Mr. William Dockwra_, his partner, -at the rate of 12_d._ per week, to drive the roads and streets, some of -which having this week began, and may be known from the common coaches -by the words Patent Coach being over both doors in carved letters. -These coaches are so hung as to render them easier for the passenger -and less labour to the horses, the gentleman’s coaches turning in -narrow streets and lanes in as little or less room than any French -carriage with crane neck, and not one third part of the charge. The -manner of the coachman’s sitting is more convenient, and the motion -like that of a sedan, being free from the tossing and jolting to which -other coaches are liable over rough and broken roads, pavements or -kennels. These great Conveniences (besides others) are invitation -sufficient for all persons that love their own ease and would save -their horses draught, to use these sort of carriages and no other, -since these carriages need no alteration.” - -This advertisement is the more noteworthy as it clearly refers to some -kind of turning head; however valuable the improvements thus offered, -the springs at least do not appear to have been appreciated, for their -use did not become general till the latter half of the eighteenth -century. - - -COACHES AND ROADS IN QUEEN ANNE’S TIME. - -From the advertisements in old newspapers we obtain some particulars -of the speed made by stage coaches in the early part of the eighteenth -century. In 1703, when the roads were good, the coach from London to -Portsmouth did the journey, about ninety miles, in fourteen hours. -In 1706, the York coach left London on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, -performing the 200 mile journey in four days; each passenger was -allowed 14 lbs. of luggage and overweight was charged for at 3d. per -lb. In winter the cross-roads were execrable, as appears from the -_Annals of Queen Anne_ (London, 1704). In December, 1703, the King -of Spain slept at Petworth in Sussex, on his way from Portsmouth -to Windsor, and Prince George of Denmark went to meet him there: -concerning the journey one of the Prince’s attendants writes:— - -“We set out at six o’clock in the morning to go to Petworth, and did -not get out of the coaches (save only when we were overturned or stuck -fast in the mire) til we arrived at our journey’s end. “’Twas hard -service for the prince to sit fourteen hours in the coach that day -without eating anything and passing through the worst ways that I ever -saw in my life; we were thrown but once indeed in going, but both our -coach, which was the leading, and his highnesse’s body-coach would have -suffered very often if the nimble boors of Sussex had not frequently -poised it or supported it with their shoulders from Godalmin almost to -Petworth; and the nearer we approached to the Duke’s house the more -unaccessible it seemed to be. The last nine miles of the way cost us -six hours time to conquer them, and indeed we had never done it if our -good master had not several times lent us a pair of horses out of his -own coach, whereby we were enabled to trace out the way for him.” - - -COACHING IN GEORGE I.’S AND GEORGE II.’S REIGNS. - -Markland,[16] referring to the above passage, states on the authority -of a correspondent that in 1748 persons travelling from Petworth to -Guildford were obliged to make for the nearest point of the great road -from Portsmouth to London; plainly indicating that the main arteries of -traffic were much superior to the cross-roads. - -[16] _Remarks on the Early Use of Carriages in England._ - -Dean Swift, writing to Pope on August 22, 1726, refers to the -“closeness and confinement of the uneasy coach.” At this period there -was still considerable prejudice against the use of carriages by men -who were physically able to ride, as appears from a letter written by -Swift to his friend Mr. Gay, on September 10, 1731:— - -“If your ramble was on horseback I am glad of it on account of your -health; but I know your arts of patching up a journey between stage -coaches and your friends’ coaches; for you are as arrant a cockney as -any hosier in Cheapside ... you love twelve-penny coaches too well, -considering that the interest of a whole thousand pounds brings you but -half-a-crown a day ... a coach and six horses is all the exercise you -can bear.” - -The reference to Mr. Gay’s income indicates that the saddle was a much -cheaper means of travelling than the coach. Six horses seem to have -been the number used in private coaches during the first half of the -eighteenth century, if we may judge by the frequency with which Swift -refers to “to coach and six.” - -An agreement made in 1718 between a Mr. Vanden Bampde and Charles -Hodges, a job-master, is worth noticing. Under this contract Hodges -undertook to maintain for Mr. Bampde “a coach, chariot, and harness -neat and clean, and in all manner of repair at his own charge, not -including the wheels.” If the coachman should break the glass when -the carriage was empty, Hodges was to make good the damage. He was -to supply at a charge of 5s. 6d. a day, a pair of “good, strong, -serviceable, handsome well-matched horses of value between £50 and -£60”; also a “good, sober, honest, creditable coachman,” who, with the -horses, should attend as Mr. Bampde or his lady might require in London -or Westminster. If Mr. Bampde went into the country Hodges was to find -him one or more pairs of horses at half-a-crown per pair per day extra. - - -DEAN SWIFT ON COACHES AND DRIVERS. - -The hackney coachmen appear to have been quite as independent and -offensive a class in Swift’s time as they were in Pepys’. Writing from -Dublin on July 8, 1733, he compares the advantages of residence in that -city with residence in London, and gives prominence to the following -items:— - -“I am one of the governors of all the hackney coaches, carts and -carriages round this town; who dare not insult me like your rascally -waggoners or coachmen, but give me the way.” - -It may be observed here that there was still plenty of work for the -wherrymen on the Thames in the middle of the eighteenth century. Swift -writes on April 16, 1760, praying Mr. Warburton to leave London and pay -him a visit at Twickenham, and by way of inducement he adds: “If the -press be to take up any part of your time, the sheets may be brought -you hourly thither by my waterman.” - -The Dean’s _Humorous Advice to Servants_ contains some sarcastic -observations addressed to the coachman, which shed light upon what we -must suppose was the usual character of that servant. He is advised -that “you are strictly bound to nothing but to step into the box and -carry your lord and lady;” and he is enjoined to take every opportunity -of drinking. The following passage shows how wheels of carriages -suffered from the battering on the roads:— - -“Take care that your wheels be good; and get a new set bought as often -as you can whether you are allowed the old as your perquisite or not; -in one case it will turn to your honest profit and on the other it will -be a just punishment on your master’s covetousness, and probably the -coach-maker will consider you too.” - - -ROADS IN THE 18TH CENTURY. - -Every author of the time has something to say about the roads. Daniel -Bourn[17] says:— - -“So late as thirty or forty years ago [_i.e._, 1723-33] the roads of -England were in a most deplorable condition. Those that were narrow -were narrow indeed, often to that degree that the stocks of the wheels -bore hard against the bank on each side, and in many places they were -worn below the level of the neighbouring surface, many feet, nay, yards -perpendicular; and a wide-spreading, brushy hedge intermixed with -old half-decayed trees and stubbs hanging over the traveller’s head -intercepting the benign influence of the heavens from his path, and -the beauties of the circumjacent country from his view, made it look -more like the retreat of wild beasts and reptiles than the footsteps -of man. In other parts where the road was wide, it might be, and often -was too much so, and exhibited a scene of a different aspect. Here the -wheel-carriage had worn a diversity of tracks which wore either deep, -or rough and stony, or high or low as Mother Nature had placed the -materials upon the face of the ground; the space between these were -frequently furzy hillocks of thorny brakes, through or among which the -equestrian traveller picked out his entangled and uncouth steps. - -“To these horrible, stony, deep, miry, uncomfortable, dreary roads the -narrow-wheel waggon seems to be best adapted, and these were frequently -drawn by seven, eight, or even ten horses, that with great difficulty -and hazard dragged after them twenty-five or thirty hundredweight, -seldom more.” - -[17] _Treatise of Wheeled Carriages_, London, 1763. - -Bourn’s reference to the “narrow-wheel waggon” touches a matter which -formed the subject of hot debate for generations. It was urged that -the narrow wheels of waggons were largely the means of cutting up the -roads, and no doubt these did contribute to the general condition -of rut and ridge that characterised them. This view was adopted by -Parliament, and to encourage the use of wide wheels a system of -turnpike tolls was adopted which treated the wide tire far more -leniently than the narrow; anything under 9 inches in width being -considered narrow. - -[Illustration: MR. DANIEL BOURN’S ROLLER WHEEL WAGGON, A.D. 1763.] - -Bourn was a warm advocate for wide wheels, and the book from which -the above passage is taken describes an improved waggon invented by -himself; the drawing is from the inventor’s work. The wheels of this -vehicle resemble small garden rollers; they are 2 feet high and 16 -inches wide. Each is attached independently to the body of the waggon -and the fore wheels being placed side by side in the centre, while the -hind wheels are set wide apart, the waggon is practically designed to -fulfil the functions of a road-roller.[18] It does not appear that -Bourn’s invention obtained any general acceptance, which is perhaps not -very surprising. - -[18] In the _St. James’s Chronicle_ of December 30, 1772, a -correspondent “observes with particular pleasure the good effects of -the rolling machine on the turnpike road to Stony Stratford. For this -important improvement Mr. Sharp is responsible.” The writer proceeds -to describe with the exactness and appreciation due to so useful an -invention, the first patent of the familiar road-roller. - - -SPEED OF THE 18TH CENTURY STAGE COACH. - -In 1742, the Oxford coach, leaving London at seven in the morning, -reached High Wycombe (about forty miles) at five in the evening, -remained there the night, and concluded the journey on the following -day. The Birmingham coach made its journey at about the same pace, -forty miles per day, resting half a day at Oxford. Night travel -does not seem to have been at all usual. Apart from the badness of -the roads, the audacity of highwaymen was a sufficient reason for -refraining from journeys by night. - -Some improvements were made in private carriages at this period, but -there was little change for the better in the stage coaches, which -differed slightly from the “machine” of a century earlier; the driver’s -seat was safer and less uncomfortable, and that was the only noteworthy -alteration. An advertisement of 1750 announces “accommodation behind -the coach for baggage and passengers; fares 21s., and servants 10s. -6d., riding either in the basket behind or on the box beside the -driver.” - -Endeavour to expedite the service between the great towns of the -kingdom is shown in an advertisement of the “Flying Coach,” which was -put on the London and Manchester road in 1754. This informs possible -patrons that “incredible as it may appear, this coach will actually -arrive in London in four days and a half after leaving Manchester.” The -distance between the two cities is about 187 miles, making the rate of -speed a little over 44 miles per day. - -The stage coach of 1755 is thus described by Mr. Thrupp. - -“They were covered with dull black leather, studded by way of ornament -with broad-headed nails, with oval windows in the quarters, the frames -painted red. On the panels were displayed in large characters the -names of the places where the coach started and whither it went. The -roof rose in a high curve with an iron rail around it. The coachman -and guard sat in front upon a high narrow boot, often garnished with -a spreading hammer-cloth with a deep fringe. Behind was an immense -basket supported by iron bars in which passengers were carried at lower -fares. The whole coach was usually drawn by three horses, on the first -of which a postillion rode, in a cocked hat and a long green-and-gold -coat. The machine groaned and creaked as it went along with every tug -the horses gave it, and the speed was frequently but four miles an -hour.” - -Three horses may have done the work in summer, but there is no reason -to suppose that the roads of 1755 were any better than they had been -sixteen years earlier, when Thomas Pennant thus described a journey in -March from Chester to London. The stage, he says:— - -“was then no despicable vehicle for country gentlemen. The first day, -with much labour, we got from Chester to Whitchurch, twenty miles; -the second day to the Welsh Harp; the third to Coventry; the fourth -to Northampton; the fifth to Dunstable; and as a wondrous effort on -the last, to London, before the commencement of night. The strain -and labour of six good horses, sometimes eight, drew us through the -sloughs of Mireden and many other places.” - -[Illustration: TRAVELLING POSTING CARRIAGE, 1750.] - - -THE APPLICATION OF SPRINGS. - -In the year 1768 Dr. R. Lovell Edgeworth, who had devoted much -attention to the subject, and had made numerous experiments,[19] -succeeded in demonstrating that springs were as advantageous to the -horses of, as to the passengers in a coach; and he constructed a -carriage for which the Society of English Arts and Manufactures awarded -him three gold medals. In this conveyance the axletrees were divided -and the motion of each wheel was relieved by a spring. Just one dozen -patents for springs were granted during the eighteenth century, and it -is impossible to say which invention had most influence on methods of -building coaches. In 1772 a patent was granted to James Butler for a -new coach-wheel the spokes of which were constructed of springs; but -this curious contrivance is mentioned nowhere—so far as the writer’s -investigations have shown—but in the Patent Office files, whence we may -conclude it was a failure. - -[19] _An Essay on the Construction of Roads and Carriages._ London, -1817. - -[Illustration: TRAVELLING POSTING CARRIAGE, 1750.] - -The adoption of springs was certainly gradual. It is probably right -to assume that wealthy men led the way by having coaches built on -springs or altering their vehicles. It is impossible to draw a hard and -fast line between the period of the coach without and the coach with -springs. The illustrations show that travelling carriages on springs -and braces were built in 1750. These drawings prove that, clumsy though -the public conveyances were, private carriages were both tolerably -light and comfortable. The “whip springs” to which the braces are -attached were in general use ten years later. - -A curious error arose from the application of springs to public -conveyances, according to Dr. Lovell Edgeworth. Their introduction, it -must be premised, led to the accommodation of passengers and loading of -baggage on top of the stage coach, and coachmen, finding the vehicle -drew more easily, attributed the fact, not to the springs, but to the -increased height and reduced length of the load.[20] - -[20] Abolition of the basket on the hind axle would have materially -reduced the length of the load. - -In the belief that a high and short load possessed some mysterious -property which made it easier to draw than a low long one, builders -vied with each other in building lofty vehicles. “Hence in all -probability,” says the authority we are quoting, “arose the -preposterous elevation of public carriages.” - - -OUTSIDE PASSENGERS. - -Dr. Lovell Edgeworth gives us to understand that the practice of -carrying passengers on the roof of the coach followed the application -of springs to stage coaches; and in view of the belief noticed above -this seems exceedingly probable. The practice had clearly been in vogue -for some years when the _Annual Register_ published the following -paragraph:— - -“_September 7 (1770)._—It were greatly to be wished the stage coaches -were put under some regulations as to the numbers of persons and -quantity of baggage. Thirty-four persons were in and about the Hertford -coach this day when it broke down by one of the braces giving way.” - -In 1775, we learn from the same publication, stage coaches generally -carried eight persons inside and often ten outside passengers. On -another page appears the statement that “there are now of these -vehicles [stage coaches], flies, machines and diligences upwards of -400, and of other wheeled carriages 17,000.” - -In 1785 was passed George III.’s Act, which forbade the conveyance of -more than six persons on the roof of any coach and more than two on the -box. This Act was superseded in 1790 by another which permitted only -one person to travel on the box and only four on the roof of any coach -drawn by three or more horses. A coach drawn by less than three horses -might carry one passenger on the box and three on the roof, but such -vehicles might not ply more than twenty-five miles from the London Post -Office. - -The first “long coaches” (_i.e._ long-stage vehicles) and those called -diligences were superseded by what were called the “old heavies,” -carrying six inside passengers and twelve out.[21] - -[21] _The Public Carriages of Great Britain._ J. E. Bradfield, London, -1855. - - -ROADS IN GEORGE III’s TIME. - -The turnpike road had been improved by the year 1773, when Mr. Daniel -Bourn wrote a pamphlet[22] answering some objections which had been -urged against his waggon on rollers (see p. 79). Mr. Jacob had -asserted that the roughness of the roads was an insuperable obstacle to -the enormously wide wheels invented by Mr. Bourn; and the latter, while -admitting the wretched condition of local roads, refutes this argument -as applied to the great roads:— - -“A person might follow a waggon from London to York and meet with very -few great stones ... let us now view this more agreeable turnpike road, -yet even here you will find that there is less degrees of loose dirt -and mangled materials.” - -[22] _Some Brief Remarks upon Mr. Jacob’s Treatise._ London, 1773. - -In this connection it will be remembered that the road roller had been -brought into use in the previous year (see footnote p. 80). - -The improvement was by no means universal, however. Arthur Young[23] -writes:— - -“I know not in the whole range of language terms sufficiently -expressive to describe this infernal road. To look over a map, and -perceive that it is a principal one, not only to some towns, but even -whole counties, one would naturally conclude it to be at least decent; -but let me most seriously caution all travellers who may accidentally -purpose to travel this terrible country, to avoid it as they would the -devil, for a thousand to one but they break their necks or their limbs -by overthrows or breakings down. They will here meet with ruts, which -I actually measured, four feet deep, and floating with mud, only from -a wet summer; what, therefore, must it be after the winter? The only -mending it receives, in places, is the tumbling in loose stones, which -serve no other purpose but jolting the carriage in a most intolerable -manner. These are not merely opinions, but facts, for I actually passed -three carts broken down in these eighteen miles of execrable memory.” - -[23] _Tour in the North of England._ London, 1770. - - -IMPROVEMENTS IN STAGE COACHES. - -The last twenty-five years of the eighteenth century saw great increase -of the coaching industry and many important improvements. The “long -stages” were still slow; the _Edinburgh Courant_, of 1779, contains -an advertisement of the London Coach which “will run every Tuesday, -occupying ten days, resting all Sunday at Barrowbridge; for the better -accommodation of passengers will be altered to a new genteel two-end -coach machine hung upon steel springs, exceeding light and easy.” At -this period the newspapers often contained advertisements inviting -a companion to share with the advertiser the risks and expenses of -posting to London. - -It was no doubt the love of Englishmen for privacy which led a Mr. -Crispus Claggett to patent in 1780 his “Imperial Mercury.” This vehicle -had the outward appearance of one carriage, but it was divided into -four equal compartments with space in each for four persons. Each -compartment was entered by its own door and was partitioned off from -the others by doors and glasses, This curious conveyance must have -somewhat resembled an early railway coach. - - -THE MAIL COACH. - -Mr. John Palmer’s[24] “diligences” were put upon the road in 1783, -and with these the proprietor laid the first crude foundation of the -mail service. The ordinary post was carried by boys on horseback and -was both slow and uncertain owing to the poor quality of the horses, -the badness of the roads and not least to the untrustworthiness of the -boys. Every letter for which expedition was necessary was now sent by -diligences where they were established, and they ran from nearly all -the towns in the kingdom to London and between many of the principal -towns. Postage by these was very expensive: a letter by the ordinary -post from Bath to London cost fourpence, whereas it cost two shillings -for “booking, carriage and porterage” if sent by diligence. The -greater speed and safety were the inducements to use the diligence for -important letters, as on the stage coaches both guard and coachman were -well armed; the former sat on the box with the driver, and, says a -writer of the time, “always sat with his carbine cocked on his knees.” - -[24] The story of John Palmer’s work in connection with the postal -service, may be read in Joyce’s _History of the Post Office_ (1893), -and in many histories and other works dealing with Bath. Palmer became -Member of Parliament for Bath in 1801. - -The conveyance of letters by diligence or “coach diligence” from Bath, -where Mr. Palmer resided, to London was an experiment on the success of -which that gentleman depended largely in his battle with the officials -of Parliament and Parliamentary Committees when he sought to bring -about change in the method of carrying letters. For a considerable -time those in authority refused to admit the possibility of a coach -travelling from Bath to London, 108 miles, in eighteen hours; but after -a hard struggle Mr. Palmer triumphed, and the first mail coach ran -from Bristol to London on August 2, 1784. Six miles an hour had been -promised, but the journey, 117 miles, was performed in seventeen hours, -or at a rate of nearly seven miles an hour, about double the speed of -the mounted post-boy. - -[Illustration: JOHN PALMER. - -(_From a portrait in the possession of Henry G. Archer, Esq._)] - -These early mail coaches (the “old heavies”) were cumbrous vehicles, -and by no means remarkable for strength of construction: indeed, until -Mr. Palmer took the matter firmly in hand and compelled the contractors -to replace their worn-out coaches by new ones (which were built by -Besant), three or four breakdowns or upsets were daily reported to -the Post-master General. They were drawn by four horses; carried -six inside passengers and, until the law of 1785 already noticed, -twelve “outsides.” Their speed on the principal roads was gradually -accelerated about this time, and after the mail coaches began to work -the pace of “fly stage coaches,” or flying coaches, was increased to -eight miles an hour. - -On some roads the old slow coaches remained; as late as the year 1798 -the Telegraph left Gosport at one o’clock in the morning and reached -Charing Cross at eight in the evening, thus occupying nineteen hours -over a journey of 80 miles; a speed of little over four miles an hour. - -In 1792 sixteen mail coaches left London daily; and seven years later -these had increased to about eighty. - - -REGULATIONS FOR MAIL AND STAGE COACHES. - -During George III’s reign, three Acts of Parliament had been passed -defining the number of outside passengers that any stage coach might -carry, and making other regulations in the public interest; these three -Acts were repealed by a fourth placed on the statute book in 1810, -which enacted that any “coach, berlin, landau, chariot, diligence, -calash, chaise-marine or other four-wheeled vehicle,” employed as -a public carriage and drawn by four horses might carry ten outside -passengers including the guard but not the coachman; that only one -person might share the box with the coachman; and of the remaining -nine, three should sit in front and six behind. No passenger might sit -on the baggage. Stages drawn by two or three horses might carry not -more than five outside passengers; “long coaches” or “double-bodied -coaches” might carry eight. - -The social distinction between “inside” and the “outside” is betrayed -by a clause of this law which forbade any outside passenger to travel -inside unless with the consent of one inside passenger; and the -“inside” who gave consent was to have the “outside” placed next him. - -This Act also prescribed important limitations to the height of -coaches: neither passenger nor luggage might be carried on the roof of -any coach the top of which was over 8 feet 9 inches from the ground and -whose width was under 4 feet 6 inches measured from the centre of one -wheel track to the centre of the other. On a four-horse coach 8 feet 9 -inches high the baggage might be piled to a height of two feet; on one -drawn by two or three horses, to a height of eighteen inches. As it was -considered expedient to encourage low-hung coaches with the view of -attaining greater immunity from accidents, it was legal to pile baggage -up to a height of 10 feet 9 inches from the ground. Any passenger might -require any turnpike keeper to count the “outsides” or to measure -the height of the luggage on the roof. At a later date the fast mail -coaches were prohibited by the Post-master General from carrying any -baggage at all on the roof. - - -MAIL COACH PARADE ON THE KING’S BIRTHDAY. - -Mr. Thrupp gives the following description of the mail coaches as they -appeared at the “King’s Birthday Parade,” an interesting display which -appears to have been held for the first time in the year 1799, and -which remained an annual function until 1835. The coaches assembled -in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and drove through the streets past St. James’ -Palace and back to the General Post Office, then in Lombard Street:— - -“Each coach was new or turned out to look like new and was painted red -with the Royal Arms on the door panel, and on the smaller panel above -the name of the town to which the coach went; on the boot the number -of the mail, and on each upper quarter one of the stars of the four -Orders of the Knighthood of the United Kingdom, the Garter, the Bath, -the Thistle and St. Patrick. The coaches were built just big enough to -contain four inside and three or four outside, and coachman and guard. -The body was hung upon a perch carriage and eight telegraph springs, -the underworks being both solid and simple in construction.” - -A writer in _Baily’s Magazine_ (June, 1900), gives a description of -this parade; only the coachmen and guards, in new uniforms, were -allowed on the coaches, for which gentlemen used to lend their best -teams; the procession generally consisted of about twenty-five coaches -and was prolonged by the presence of a horseman between every two -coaches. - - -THE MAIL COACHMAN AND GUARD. - -The mail coaches in their daily routine assembled in Lombard Street -between 8 and 8.20 p.m. every evening to receive the mails, and drew up -in double file. Each was known by the name of the town to which it ran, -and on the call of “Manchester,” “Liverpool,” or “Chester,” the coach -bound thither broke rank and came up to the post-office door to receive -the mails; the bags were tossed into the boot and the slamming of the -lid of the boot was the signal to start. - -Most of the mails for the Western counties started at 7 p.m. from the -Gloucester Coffee House in Piccadilly, the mail bags being brought -thither from the General Post Office in gigs drawn by fast-trotting -horses, The stages for the West started from Hatchett’s; for the North, -from the Peacock, Islington. - -The mail guard was a considerable personage; when the modern style -of build was adopted, the hind seat over the mail boot was strictly -reserved to him, nobody being allowed to share it, as a precaution -against robbery of the mails. To obtain an appointment as guard on a -mail coach the applicant had to produce a recommendation from a Member -of Parliament showing that he bore a high character, and a medical -certificate to effect that he was of good constitution (exceedingly -necessary in view of the nature of his work); if accepted as a -probationer he had to spend a term in a coach factory and there learn -how to repair a broken pole and patch up any other fracture that might -occur on the road. His pay was only 10s. per week, but his perquisites -were considerable; he might make as much as £3 or £4 a week, by taking -charge of plate chests and valuables entrusted to his care; and it was -the custom to allow the guard and coachman to divide all fares of 3s. -or less between them. - -The guard went the whole way with his coach; the coachman’s “stage” was -generally forty or fifty miles out and home again. The latter’s wages -were supplemented by tips from the passengers, who were admonished -that the time had come to open their purses by the coachman’s polite -“Gentlemen, I leave you here.” - -The money thus collected by the driver of a first-class coach amounted, -it is said, to £200 or £300 a year. The coachman was subject to -numerous regulations which aimed at the security of passengers and -mails. He might not allow anyone else to drive, without the consent of -the coach proprietor or against the wishes of the other passengers; he -might not leave his box unless a man was at the leaders’ heads; and -there were many such minor instructions to be observed. - -Until about 1815 the coachman’s box was not part of the body of the -vehicle, and while the passengers rode comfortably on springs the -unfortunate driver had a seat as comfortless as want of springs could -make it. When this was done away with, it was quite in accord with -British traditions that strong objections should be made, the chief -being founded on the idea that if the coachman were made so comfortable -he would go to sleep on his box. The Manchester Telegraph, celebrated -as one of the smartest coaches of the day, was the first which was thus -altered. - -The guard was responsible for the punctuality of the coach, and each -evening when leaving the General Post Office he was handed a watch -officially set and officially locked in a case in such wise that it -could not be tampered with. The guard also carried what was called a -“snow book” from the fact that entries therein were most usually caused -by heavy snowstorms. In this he recorded any such incidents as the hire -of extra horses when these might be needed, of saddle horses to carry -the mail bags forward if the coach came to grief, or of any other -outlay. - - -“THE ROAD” IN WINTER. - -Mention of the guard’s “snow book” suggests that a winter’s journey -in the coaching days was an undertaking not to be lightly faced. One -morning in March, 1812, the Bath coach arrived at Chippenham with two -outside passengers frozen to death in their seats, and a third in a -dying state. A snow shovel strapped behind his seat was a regular -item of the guard’s winter equipment, but only too often a shovel was -useless. In the winter of 1814, the Edinburgh mail had to be left in -the snow and the mail bags forwarded to Alnwick on horseback; in the -same week eight horses were needed to draw the York coach to Newcastle. -When a coach was snow-bound it was the guard’s duty to get the mails -forward; this he did when possible by taking two of the horses and -riding one while the other carried the bags. Some of the best of -Pollard’s coaching pictures represent such incidents as occurred in the -severe winters of 1812, 1814, and 1836. - -The winter of 1814 was long remembered for the great and prolonged fog -which disorganised traffic; the fog was followed by a singularly severe -snow storm which continued for forty-eight hours; while it lasted -no fewer than thirty-three mails in one day failed to arrive at the -General Post Office. - -The Christmas season of 1836 is historical in meteorological annals -for the unprecedented severity of the snowfall. The storm lasted for -the best part of the week, and for ten days travelling was suspended. -Christmas night was the worst, and scarcely a single coach ventured -to quit London on the 26th and 27th, St. Albans was literally full of -mails and stages that could not get forward; on December 27, no fewer -than fourteen mail coaches were abandoned snow-bound on various roads; -and the Exeter mail, on December 26, was dug out five times on the way -to Yeovil. In flat and open country all traces of the roads were lost, -and the coachman had to trust the safety of the vehicle to his horses’ -instinct. In some places the snow drifts gathered to an enormous depth -and made the roads utterly impassable. - -It was an article of the coaching creed to “get forward” if humanly -possible; and the feats of endurance and courage accomplished by guards -and coachmen in these old times prove them to have been a remarkably -fine class of public servant, deserving all that has been written of -them. - - -PASSENGER FARES. - -Passenger fares by mail coach were higher than by the ordinary stage; -on the former the rates were from 4d. to 5d. per mile for “outsides,” -and 8d. to 10d. per mile for “insides”; on the stage coach the outside -passenger paid from 2½d. to 3d. per mile, and the inside from 4d. -to 5d. Posting cost about eighteenpence per mile, and was therefore -reserved to rich men. - - -DIFFERENCE BETWEEN STAGE AND MAIL COACH. - -In the early days of the century, though the actual rate of travel was -about eight miles an hour by the ordinary stage coach, much time was -occupied over the journey. There appears to have been no such thing -as a “time bill.” The coachman would go out of his way to set down or -pick up a passenger: he would wait to oblige a friend if desired, and -“Nimrod” in his famous article on “The Road” cites, as an example of -the leisurely fashion prevalent, the civility of “Billy” Williams, who -drove the Shrewsbury-Chester coach in his school days, and took twelve -hours to cover the forty miles, Two hours were allowed for dinner at -Wrexham, but this obliging coachman would come into the parlour and -say, “The coach is ready, gentlemen, but don’t let me disturb you if -you wish for another bottle.” - -Very different was the case with the Royal Mail: every second was -economised: at some places horses were changed within the space of a -minute, and so jealously punctual were the coachmen that the village -people set their clocks by the mail as it sped along the street. The -Royal Mail paid no tolls, and if a turnpike keeper had not his gate -open ready for its passage he was fined 40s. The passing of the London -coach was the event of the day in quiet villages during the coaching -age, as the guard performed the functions now discharged by the -newspaper and telegraph wire. “The grandest chapter in our experience,” -says a regular traveller during the stirring times of 1805-1815, -“was on those occasions when we went down from London with news of a -victory.” - - -THE “GOLDEN AGE” OF COACHING. - -The adoption of Macadam’s system of road-making gave birth to the brief -“golden age” of coaching. John Macadam, an Ayrshire man, born in 1756, -had devoted many years to the subject of road improvement, and between -the years 1798 and 1814 travelled over some 30,000 miles of highway in -Great Britain, His method of spreading small broken fragments of hard -stone, none ever six ounces in weight, stamped or rolled into a compact -crust, was finally approved in 1818, and “macadamised” roads were -rapidly made all over the kingdom. The inventor was awarded a grant of -£10,000, and in 1827 he was appointed Surveyor-General of Roads. He -died in 1836, when fast coaching was at the zenith of its prosperity. - -The portrait of which a reproduction is here given is believed to be -the only one in existence. It was painted by Raymond, about the year -1835, and was given by Mr. Macadam’s widow to Mr. Allen of Hoddesdon, -Essex, who for several years had made road-mending tools and appliances -to the great road-maker’s patterns. The portrait was bequeathed to Mr. -Allen’s granddaughter, by whom it was sold in 1902, to the present -owner, Major McAdam. - -[Illustration: JOHN LOUDON MACADAM. - -(_From a painting in the possession of his great-grandson, Major J. J. -L. McAdam, of Sherborne, Dorset._)] - -To fully appreciate the enormous value of Macadam’s work it must be -considered in conjunction with that of Telford the engineer, and -with knowledge of the earlier methods of road-making. The original -high-roads in England were the tracks made by travelling chapmen or -pedlars, who carried their goods on pack horses. These naturally -selected routes over the hills when they sought to avoid the bogs and -quagmires of low-lying ground; and these routes, becoming in time the -regular coach roads, left much to be desired in point of gradient and -contour. Telford cut through the hills to obtain an easier ascent, -and when Macadam had “made” the new road thus outlined it was as -widely different from the original track it replaced as it is possible -to conceive. “Nimrod,” writing in 1826, said, “Roads may be called -the veins and arteries of a country through which channels every -improvement circulates. I really consider Mr. Macadam as being, next -to Dr. Jenner, the greatest contributor to the welfare of mankind that -this country has ever produced.” - -With good, firm and level roads the speed of the mail and stage coaches -increased, and the endeavour to combine speed with safety brought -about numerous minor but important improvements in coach-building, -proprietors sparing neither pains nor money to insure the best -materials and workmanship. The greatest improvements, says Mr. Thrupp, -were those begun in 1820 by Mr. Samuel Hobson. He reduced the height -of the wheels to 3 feet 3 inches in front, and 4 feet 5 inches behind, -lengthened the coach body to better proportions and hung it lower, -so that a double step would give access to the door instead of a -three-step ladder. He wrought great improvements in the curves of the -carriage, and did much to strengthen the details of the underworks. - - -FAST COACHES. - -Coach driving became a favourite occupation among men of good birth who -had run through their patrimony and could turn their hands to nothing -more congenial. “Horsing” coaches was a business to which all sorts and -conditions of men devoted themselves, and which did much to promote the -spirit of rivalry that made for good service. Innkeepers and others -contracted to supply horses for one, two, three, or more stages of a -journey, and thus acquired a personal interest in the coach. The best -coaches now ran at ten or ten and a half miles an hour, and faster -over favourable stretches of road. The Quicksilver mail from London -to Devonport, “Nimrod” tells us, was half a mile in the hour faster -than most of the coaches in England, and did the fastest stage of the -journey, four miles near Hartford Bridge, in twelve minutes. This coach -on one occasion accomplished its journey of 216 miles in twenty-one -hours, fourteen minutes, including stoppages. - -The mail coaches, it should be said, carried three outside passengers -at most, and no luggage at all on the roof. Of course these rates of -speed, so much higher than had been known theretofore, called forth -protests. “Old Traveller,” writing to the _Sporting Magazine_ in 1822, -objects to the encouragement given such hazardous work by “Nimrod.” In -his younger days, he says, when about to start on a journey, his wife’s -parting hope was that he would not be robbed; now she had changed it -to the hope that he would not get his neck broken. It was no uncommon -thing, at the beginning of the century and earlier, for a Birmingham -merchant to make his will before he set out on a journey; and with all -respect to the “Old Traveller,” the risks he encountered on the road -in the days before Macadam were as great from ruts and holes as from -highwaymen. - -[Illustration: ROYAL MAIL COACH.] - -Travelling on May-day was avoided by those who objected to fast work, -for it was customary for rival stages to race each other the whole -journey on that day, and old sporting papers contain occasional record -of the fact that a coach had accomplished its entire journey at a -rate of fifteen miles an hour. A law passed in 1820, to put an end to -“wanton and furious driving or racing,” by which coachmen were made -liable to criminal punishment if anyone were maimed or injured, did -not stop this practice. For on May 1, 1830, the Independent Tallyho -ran from London to Birmingham, 109 miles, in 7 hours, 39 minutes. The -writer in _Baily’s Magazine_ of June, 1900, before referred to, gives -a graphic account of a May-day race between two of the smartest West -country coaches, the Hibernia and l’Hirondelle, from which it appears -that these contests were not always free from foolhardiness, though it -must be admitted that they produced wonderful displays of coachmanship. -Captain Malet gives the following as the fastest coaches in England in -1836:— - -London and Brighton, 51½ miles, time five hours, fifteen minutes; -London and Shrewsbury, 154 miles, time fifteen hours; London and -Exeter, 171 miles, time seventeen hours; London and Manchester, 187 -miles, time nineteen hours; London and Liverpool, 203 miles, time -twenty hours, fifty minutes; London and Holyhead, 261 miles, time -twenty-six hours, fifty-five minutes. - -Some of the smartest coaches in England ran from London to Brighton, -which, owing to George III’s patronage, had since 1784 risen from a -mere fishing village to the most fashionable of seaside resorts. In -1819, says Bradfield, upwards of 70 coaches visited and left Brighton -every day; in 1835, says Bradfield, there were 700 mail coaches and -rather under 3,300 stages running in England; he estimates the number -of horses used at over 150,000, while 30,000 men were employed as -coachmen, guards, horse-keepers, ostlers, &c. Mr. W. Chaplin, the -member for Salisbury, was the largest proprietor; he had five “yards” -in London and owned 1,300 horses. Messrs. Horne and Sherman ranked next -to Mr. Chaplin; each had about 700 horses. - - -HEAVY TAXATION OF COACHES. - -The heavy taxes laid upon the stage coaches were a fruitful source -of complaint among proprietors. In 1835 a coach conveying eighteen -passengers paid 3½d. per mile run to the revenue. To show the decline -of coaching, it may be said that in 1835 the total revenue from the -stage coaches amounted to £498,497 and in 1854 it had fallen to -£73,903. The taxes were estimated to be one-fifth of the receipts, and -this being the case it is not remarkable that, in the earlier days of -the railroad, the people in country districts remote from railways -should have suffered more inconvenience than they had ever known. It -no longer paid to run a coach in such districts; and persons in the -humbler walks of life found themselves set down at the station, ten, -fifteen or twenty miles from home, with no means of getting there other -than their own legs. Such districts saw a revival of old postal methods -in the shape of boys mounted on ponies. - -The unequal competition between coach and train was continued for -many years, ruinous taxation of the former notwithstanding. While the -coaches were paying 20 per cent. of their earnings to the revenue, the -railways paid 5 per cent., and carried passengers more rapidly and more -cheaply. The coaches held their place with great tenacity, aided no -doubt by the innate British tendency to cling to old institutions. - -The _Quarterly Review_ of 1837 mentions as a curious and striking -instance of enterprise and the advantages of free competition that a -day coach then performed the journey between London and Manchester in -time which exceeded by only one hour that occupied by the combined -agency of coaches and the Liverpool and Birmingham railway. The Act for -transmitting the mails by railway was passed in 1838, eight years after -the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester railway, and then it may -be said coach proprietors recognised that their industry was doomed; -but they maintained fares at the old scales until the coach was nearly -extinguished. - - -EARLY CABS. - -We must now retrace our steps and endeavour to trace the progress made -in vehicles other than stage and mail coaches. In 1740 the first patent -was granted for a two-wheeled carriage; it is briefly described as a -“double shaft and pole carriage with two wheels drawn by two horses -harnessed abreast.” Another “coach with two wheels” was patented in -1786. Mr. Thrupp states that 27,300 two-wheeled vehicles paid duty in -the year 1814, a fact which shows how rapidly they grew in favour. It -is therefore somewhat curious that the first two-wheeled hackney cab in -London should not have appeared in London until 1823, when Mr. David -Davis built twelve of these vehicles. - -“The body was a little like a hansom cab but smaller; it had a head, -of which the hinder half was stiff and solid, and the fore part made -to fold. This arrangement was probably an imitation of the gentleman’s -cabriolet, the hood of which was rarely put down altogether, as the -groom had to hold on by it. Outside the head on one side was a seat for -the driver of the cab, and the whole was hung upon stiff shafts. These -cabs were, I think, painted yellow, and stood for hire in a yard in -Portland Street close to Oxford Circus.” - -Cabs of this kind stood for hire in the streets, a few years later, -if we may accept the authority of Charles Dickens. Readers of the -_Pickwick Papers_ which was published (in monthly parts) in 1837 and -1838, will remember how Mr. Pickwick, when he set out upon his travels -took a cab from “the coach stand at St. Martins-le-Grand”; and took -notes of the driver’s account of his horse as he drove to Charing -Cross. On another page we find Mr. and Mrs. Raddle and Mrs. Cluppins -“squeezed into a hackney cabriolet, the driver sitting in his own -particular little dickey at the side.” This vehicle was perhaps the -light two-wheeled cab with a fixed panel top, built to carry only two -persons inside, which was introduced about 1830. The driver sat on a -little seat over the off-side wheel. - -This vehicle was succeeded by Mr. Boulnois’ patent cab, of which an -illustration is given. It opened at the back, and the driver’s seat -was on the roof; the passengers sat facing one another. This cab was -light and convenient, but appears to have fallen into disuse because -the fore part was within too easy reach of the horse’s heels to make -it quite acceptable to nervous passengers, Harvey’s “Quarto Bus” to -carry four was the next popular conveyance, but it was superseded about -1836 by the “brougham cab” for two. This cab was rather smaller than -the vehicle to which Lord Brougham’s name was given in 1839. From this -conveyance was developed the “clarence cab,” which remains with us -still as the familiar “four-wheeler.” It should be mentioned that the -first four-wheeled cabs appeared in London about 1835; these however, -carried only two passengers inside. The modern hansom belongs to a -later period. In 1802 there were 1,100 hackney carriages in London, -and in 1855 the number was 2,706. - -[Illustration: LONDON HACKNEY CAB (BOULNOIS’ PATENT) ABOUT 1835.] - -In 1824 was published _The Hackney Coach Directory_; this book, which -must have been hailed as a real boon to the users of cabs in London, -was compiled by James Quaife, “Surveyor to the Board of Hackney -Coaches.” It set forth the “Distances checked from actual admeasurement -from eighty-four coach stands in and about the Metropolis,” and the -title page tells us “The number of fares set forth is nearly eighteen -thousand.” - - -PRIVATE AND STATE COACHES, 1750-1830. - -A volume might easily be filled with the particulars of private -carriages which came into use between the middle of the eighteenth -century and the end of the coaching era. Great ingenuity and a great -deal of art of a florid kind was expended on the private coaches -of the upper classes. A patent granted in 1786 gives us an idea of -the materials used for the purpose; the patent was for a method of -“ornamenting the outsides of coaches and other carriages with foil -stones, Bristol stones, paste and all sorts of pinched glass, sapped -glass and every other stone, glass and composition used in or applied -to the jewellery trade.” Mr. Larwood writes of the carriages in Hyde -Park:— - -“The beautiful and somewhat vain Duchess of Devonshire had a carriage -which cost 500 guineas without upholstery. That of the Countess of -Sutherland was grey, with her cypher in one of Godsell’s newly-invented -crystals. A Mr. Edwards had a _vis-à-vis_ which cost 300 guineas, and -was thought ‘admirable’; while another nameless gentleman gladdened -the eyes of all beholders with a splendid gig lined with looking -glass; while the artistic curricle, with shells on the wheels, of Romeo -Coates, was one of the features of Hyde Park.” - -Six horses were not uncommonly driven. Sir John Lade drove a phaeton -and six greys. The Prince of Wales, in 1781, drove a pair caparisoned -with blue harness stitched in red, the horses’ manes being plaited with -scarlet ribbons while they wore plumes of feathers on their heads. - -The decorative art as applied to vehicles naturally found greatest -scope in State coaches. The State carriage of Queen Victoria was built -in 1761 for George III. from designs by Sir William Chambers, a famous -architect, who was born in 1726. The length of this coach is 24 feet, -the height 12 feet, the width 8 feet, and the weight is between 3 and -4 tons; the various panels and doors are adorned with allegorical -groups by Cipriani. This superb carriage, having only been used on rare -occasions, is still in a good state of preservation. It cost £7,562 to -build and adorn. The State coach of the Lord Mayor of London has been -of necessity more frequently used, and alterations and repairs have -left comparatively little of the original vehicle built in 1757. In -style it is generally similar to the Royal State coach, - -While money and artistic talent were lavished freely on the adornment -of the carriages built for pleasure or display in London, it must not -be supposed that sound workmanship was neglected. The highly decorated -vehicles driven in the Park were well built, but the best and strongest -work was necessarily put into carriages which were required for more -practical purposes, and we must therefore discriminate between the -pleasure carriage and that used for travelling. - -The mail and stage coaches were used by nearly all classes of society, -but these worked only the main roads throughout the kingdom; therefore -country gentlemen who resided off the coach routes had to find their -own way to the nearest stage or posting house; moreover, wealthy men -who could afford the luxury of taking their own time over a journey, -were still much addicted to the use of private travelling carriages -drawn by their own horses or, more often, horsed from stage to stage -along the route by the post masters. - -For many years after Mr. McAdam’s methods had been applied to the main -highways, the narrower and less used by-roads left much to be desired; -and however good the roads it is obvious that lavishly adorned -carriages would have been out of place for travel in all weathers. -A single day’s journey through mud or dust would play havoc with -ornamentation contrived of “foil stones, Bristol stones, sapped glass” -and similar materials; what was required in the travelling carriage, -such as that so well portrayed by the late Charles Cooper Henderson, -was the combination of strength and lightness. Hence the best of -the coach-builder’s art, the finest workmanship in the practical, -as opposed to the decorative sense, was applied to the travelling -carriage, which was constructed to secure the greatest comfort to the -occupants, together with the greatest strength to withstand rapid -travel over roads of all kinds with the least weight. - -[Illustration: - -_After the Picture by Chas. Cooper Henderson._ - -TRAVELLING POST, 1825-1835.] - -The picture by Cooper Henderson, from which the illustration is -reproduced, refers to the period about 1825-35, and it will be observed -that while the body of the carriage is hung lower than the posting -carriage of seventy years earlier, the general plan is not greatly -dissimilar. - - -VARIETIES OF CARRIAGE. - -About 1790 the art of coach-building had arrived at a very high degree -of perfection,[25] and carriages in great variety of shape were built. -A feature common to all, or nearly all, was the height of the wheels. -The highest were 5 feet 8 inches in diameter; these had 14 spokes, and -the number of spokes were reduced in ratio with the size of the wheel, -till the smallest, 3 feet 2 inches in diameter, had only 8 spokes. A -good example of the coach of 1790 may be seen in the South Kensington -Museum; it belonged to the Lord Chancellor of Ireland, and, save for -the greater size of the body, the flatness of its sides and greater -length above than below, is not widely dissimilar from coaches of the -present day. - -[25] _Treatise upon Carriages and Harness._ W. Felton, London, 1794. - -The Landau, invented at Landau in Germany, in 1757, was, about 1790, -made to open in the middle of the roof or “hood,” and became very -popular as combining the advantages of a closed coach with an open -carriage; the chief objection to Landaus was the greasiness and smell -of the blacking leather of which the hoods were constructed. The name -of the phaeton first occurs in a patent granted in 1788. Phaetons -of various shapes came into fashion later: all were built to be driven -by the owner, and probably gained much in popular esteem from the fact -that George IV., when Prince of Wales, used to drive a “Perch High -Phaeton” in the Park and to race meetings. Some of these vehicles were -extravagantly high, and it was the correct thing to drive four horses -in them at the fastest trot. The “Perch High Phaeton” was shaped like a -curricle and had a hood. “The centre of the body was hung exactly over -the front axle-tree, the front wheels were 4 feet high, and the hind -wheels 5 feet 8 inches” (Thrupp). - -[Illustration: - -_By J. Doyle._ - -KING GEORGE IV. IN HIS PONY PHAETON.] - -The pony phaeton owed its popularity to King George IV., who, in 1824, -desired to possess a low carriage into which he could step without -exertion; old pictures show us that the pony phaeton of the present day -is very like the original vehicle. Such a phaeton was built for our -late Queen, then Princess Victoria, in 1828. It should be said that C -springs were first used by English coach builders about the year 1804. - -Among other curious carriages was the “Whisky,” a two-wheeled gig with -a movable hood, the body connected with the long horizontal springs by -scroll irons, The “suicide gig” was an absurdly high vehicle which -was popular in Ireland; in this the groom was perched on something -resembling a stool 3 feet above his master who drove. - -Dr. R. Lovell Edgeworth, writing in 1817, says that a sudden -revolution in the height of private carriages had taken place a few -years previously. Such as might be seen in Bond Street were so low -that gentlemen on foot could hold conversation with ladies in their -carriages without the least difficulty; but it was soon discovered that -other people over-heard their conversation, and carriages “immediately -sprang up to their former exaltation.” It is difficult to believe that -such a reason accounted for a revolution in the method of carriage -building. - -Driving as a pastime came into vogue about the beginning of the -century, when it became fashionable for ladies to display their skill -on the coach box, The “Benson Driving Club” was founded in 1807, and -survived until 1853 or 1854; the Four Horse Club came into existence in -1808, but only continued for eighteen years. The Four-in-Hand Driving -Club was founded in 1856, and the Coaching Club in 1870. - - - - -Works by SIR WALTER GILBEY, Bart., - -Published by Vinton & Co., 9 New Bridge Street, London, E.C. - - -Modern Carriages _Published April, 1904_ - -The passenger vehicles now in use, with notes on their origin. -Illustrations. Octavo, cloth gilt, price 2s. net; post free, 2s. 3d. - - -Poultry-Keeping on Farms and Small Holdings _Published 1904_ - -Being a practical treatise on the production of Poultry and Eggs for -the Market. By Sir WALTER GILBEY, Bart. Illustrated. Price 2s.; post -free, 2s. 3d. - - -Early Carriages and Roads _Published 1903_ - -In this publication attention has been given to the early history of -wheeled conveyances in England and their development up to recent -times. With Seventeen Illustrations. Octavo, cloth gilt, price 2s. net; -post free 2s. 4d. - - -Thoroughbred and Other Ponies _Published 1903_ - -With Remarks on the Height of Racehorses since 1700. Being a -Revised and Enlarged Edition of PONIES PAST AND PRESENT. With Ten -Illustrations. Octavo, cloth gilt, price 5s. net; post free, 5s. 4d. - - -Hunter Sires _Published 1903_ - -Suggestions for Breeding Hunters, Troopers and General-Purpose Horses. -By I. Sir WALTER GILBEY Bart. II. CHARLES W. TINDALL. III. Right Hon. -FREDERICK W. WRENCH. IV. W. T. TRENCH. Octavo, paper covers, 6d.; post -free, 7d. - - -Horses for the Army—a suggestion _Published 1902_ - -Octavo, paper covers, 6d. - - -Horse-breeding in England and India, and Army Horses Abroad -_Published 1901_ - -Seventeen Chapters, Horse-breeding, in England; Eight Chapters, -Horse-breeding Abroad; Thirteen pages, Horse-breeding in India. Nine -Illustrations. Octavo cloth, price 2s. net; post free, 2s. 3d. - - -Riding & Driving Horses, their Breeding & Rearing _Published 1901_ - -An Address delivered in London on March 2, 1885, and Discussion thereon -by the late Duke of Westminster, Earl Carrington, Sir Nigel Kingscote, -the late Mr. Edmund Tattersall and others. Reprint 1901. Octavo, Price -2s. net; post free, 2s. 3d. - - -Small Horses in Warfare _Published 1900_ - -Arguments in favour of their use for light cavalry and mounted -infantry. Illustrated. Octavo, cloth gilt, price 2s. net; post free 2s. -3d. - - -Horses Past and Present _Published 1900_ - -A sketch of the History of the Horse in England from the earliest -times. Nine Illustrations. Octavo, cloth gilt, price 2s. net; post -free, 2s. 3d. - - -Animal Painters of England _Published 1900_ - -The lives of fifty animal painters, from the year 1650 to 1850. -Illustrated. Two vols. quarto, cloth gilt, Two Guineas net. - - -The Great Horse or War Horse _Published 1899_ - -From the Roman Invasion till its development into the Shire Horse. New -and Revised Edition, 1899. Seventeen Illustrations. Octavo, cloth gilt, -price 2s. net; post free, 2s. 3d. - - -Harness Horses _Published 1898_ - -The scarcity of Carriage Horses and how to breed them. 3rd Edition. -Twenty one Chapters. Seven full-page Illustrations. Octavo, cloth gilt, -price 2s, net; post free, 2s. 3d. - - -Young Race Horses—suggestions _Published 1898_ - -For rearing, feeding and treatment. Twenty-two Chapters. With -Frontispiece and Diagrams. Octavo, cloth gilt, price 2s. net; post -free, 2s. 3d. - - -Life of George Stubbs, R.A. _Published 1898_ - -Ten Chapters. Twenty-six Illustrations and Headpieces. 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