If we return to the other element we shall see that though improvements had taken place, to some extent, as early as the beginning of this century, still little had been effected before the year 1820. From that date great improvements were made in everything connected with road travelling, so much so, that we in England congratulated ourselves that it had pretty well arrived at perfection, when, lo and behold! a new power asserted itself, and produced such a metamorphosis that few persons not exceeding fifty years of age have ever taken a long road journey in their lives. Road travelling is as much a thing of the past as "pigtails," and if it were not for the few coaches running in the summer from Hatchett's and other places in London, the shape of such a thing would be forgotten by most people. As it is, those give but a slight notion of what a long coach used to look like when commencing its journey of 150 or 200 miles.
It would be looked upon as a curiosity if one was placed in the Baker Street Bazaar, or some other suitable site, loaded as they used to be. Probably there are not twenty of us now living who have put one of these loads on with our own hands, or would have any idea of how to build it up.
THE EXTRA COACH AT CHRISTMAS.
The loads, especially about Christmas, on the night coaches used to be "prodigious," as Dominie Samson would have said. An inexperienced eye would almost expect the coach to collapse under them when the load was of such dimensions that the ordinary luggage strap was not long enough to span the pile, but had to be supplemented with what was called a lengthening strap, which consisted of a strap about four feet long, with a buckle at one end, and the whole length perforated with holes.
Nothing saved them but their admirable construction, which combined the greatest strength with moderate weight; those built to carry the heaviest loads seldom exceeding a ton or twenty-two hundredweight, and the perch being short was favourable to draught. For a great many years they were nearly all perch coaches, as it was pretty well the universal opinion that under-spring coaches were not so steady or well calculated for heavy loads and high speed.
This opinion, however, was in later years considerably modified, and most coachmen that I was acquainted with had arrived at a conclusion favourable to the under-spring build. I can say this for them, that the fastest work I ever did was on one of them, and also that the heaviest load I ever drove was on another of that description; and I cannot but "speak well of the bridges which carried me safe over," for they performed their journeys admirably. They certainly possess the advantage of weighing two or three hundredweight less, and, from the splinter-bar being higher, the line of draught from the wheel horses' collars to the roller bolts is straighter. Though they are lighter, they lose nothing in strength when originally so constructed; but I would not recommend anyone to convert a perch coach, as I once did so with the result that the front boot came away from the body.
[2] ] Two works giving a vivid picture of convict life in Australia have appeared—The Broad Arrow, and For the Term of his Natural Life, by the late Marcus Clarke.
CHAPTER XXI.
DRIVING.
Those who aspire to distinction on the coach box now-a-days, are deprived of two great helps, perhaps the two greatest helps, which were enjoyed by their predecessors—I mean example and practice.