Whilst all our profit runs away on wheels."
The London shopkeepers, too, bitterly complained.
"Formerly," they said, "when ladies and gentlemen walked in the streets there was a chance of obtaining customers to inspect and purchase our commodities; but now they whisk past in the coaches before our apprentices have time to cry out 'What d'ye lack?'"
Taylor above referred to, does not appear to have entertained a very high opinion of the tradesmen of his day, for he writes:—
"When Queen Elizabeth came to the crowne,
A coach in England then was scarcely knowne.
Then 'twas as rare to see one as to spye
A tradesman that had never told a lie."
Hackney-coaches were admitted into Hyde Park before the year 1694, but were expelled at that period, through the singular circumstance of some persons of distinction having been insulted by several women in masks; riding there in that description of vehicle.
In 1728, the robberies were so frequent in the streets of London, Westminster, and parts adjacent, that Lord Townshend issued a notice offering a reward of £40 "for each felon convict returned from transportation before the expiration of the term for which he or she was transported, who shall, by the means of such discovery, be brought to condign punishment." It appears by the above, that the murders, beatings, and robberies were perpetrated in a great degree by returned convicts, Hackney-coaches being their special mark, as the following paragraph which appeared in the "Postman" of the 19th of October, 1728, will prove:—