Considerable more romance about this than a departure from the Grand Central or Jersey City depots. There was much fun on the road in those days, and the jehu generally had a stock of old jokes that he let off at the box-seat passenger day after day. For instance, a crusty and stingy old curmudgeon who had neglected to “dampen the whistle” of the driver in the proper fashion, and who grumbled at the wet weather, would be greeted with, “Why don’t you invest a penny in a Yarmouth bloater? and you’ll be dry all day, I’ll warrant.” Things are more staid now, and the Irish coachman who demanded “Shall I pay the ‘pike’ or drive at it?” is happily gathered to his fathers, and life and limb are in the hands of a less humorous but more sober set of drivers.
From one source I learn coaches were first introduced into England in 1580 by Fitzallan, Earl of Arundel, before which time the customary mode of travel was on horseback. The Queen used to ride on a pillion behind her chamberlain. Another history says that in 1564, Booner, a Dutchman, became Queen Elizabeth’s coachman, proving that she must have had a coach. In 1619, however, things had so improved that Buckingham drove a coach and six.
A very authentic history says that the first coach in England was built in 1555, for the Earl of Rutland, by Walter Rippon. This maker must have been the Brewster of his day, as he made a coach for Queen Mary, and in 1564 built a state-coach for Queen Elizabeth, presumably the one that the above Booner drove. Hackney-coaches came into vogue in 1605, and in 1640 the stage-coach was first adopted. It was built to carry six or eight persons, and was hung upon leather straps.
In 1662 six stage-coaches were running, and in 1673 stage communication was started between Exeter and Chester and London. No less an authority than Sir Walter Scott says that in 1755 the speed of a stage was frequently but four miles an hour. A year previous to this, however, steel springs had been invented, and in 1784 it is authentically stated that the average speed was eight miles an hour. Prior to this rapid increase of speed, the Lord Mayor of London’s state-coach was built in 1757, and weighed the trifle of three tons, sixteen hundred-weight. In 1762 a royal state-coach was built for George III. which weighed four tons, and which is still used on full state occasions, being drawn by eight cream-colored horses.
Through the efforts of Mr. John Palmer, M.P. for Bath, in 1784 the mails were entrusted to the care of the coaches, the first mail-coach leaving London on the 8th of August of that year. Until 1834 the mail-coaches were not allowed to carry more than three outside passengers, while the ordinary stages carried four inside and fourteen outside.
STATE-COACH OF KING CHARLES II. OF ENGLAND.
It was at this period that gentlemen began to “tool” not only their own but public coaches, and the amusement, which in many cases combines business with pleasure, has been continued ever since. Smedley, the novelist, creates a character in “Frank Fairleigh,” under the name of the Hon. George Lawless, who shows how thirty to fifty years ago this fashion had come into vogue.
The spirit of the times was such that in 1807 the first club was established, under the name of the Bensington (Oxonicé Benson) Driving Club, the number of members being limited to twenty-five. There were four meets in a year—two at the White Hart, Bensington, near Oxford, and two at the Black Dog, Bedfont, near Hounslow. There was no annual subscription; but each member paid £10 on his election. After the first sixteen years of the club’s life, the meetings were entirely confined to Bedfont, as being more easy of access. Here it was that the wine of the club was kept, and hence it was that, after dining, the members “dashed home in a style of speed and splendor equal to the spirit and judgment displayed by the noble, honorable, and respective drivers.” Among these were the “Squire of Squerries,” the father of fox-hunting; Sir Henry Peyton, who, like his descendant Sir Thomas, drove grays, and introduced the second ferrule on the whip; the Marquis of Worcester, Sir Bellingham Graham, Mr. Charles Jones, and Mr. John Walker, who drove the Bognor coach.
