THE OLD ENGLAND OF COACHING DAYS
This is the time, now that we have passed the threshold of a new
era, when old landmarks are disappearing everywhere around us as we
gaze, and the Old England that we have known is being dispossessed
and disestablished by a new and strange, an inhospitable and alien
England of foreign plutocrats--this is the psychological moment for a
brief review of what this England of ours was like in the old days of
stage-coach and mail.
If we could recapture those times we should find them spacious days,
of much fresh air, illimitable horizons, a great deal of solid,
unostentatious comfort for the stay-at-homes, and also of much
discomfort for the traveller; but although no sensible person, fully
informed of the conditions of life in the long ago, would wish he had
been born into those times, yet among their disadvantages and the
discomforts incidental to travel scarce more than two generations ago,
there were to be found, as a matter of course, not a few things which
would be looked upon with rapture by the modern sentimentalist. That
was the era when the Suburb was unknown anywhere else than around
London, and even London’s suburbs were sparse, scattered, sporadic,
and separated by great distances from one another. Taking coach from
the City, where the merchants and the shopkeepers commonly lived over
their business premises, you came presently, north, south, east, or
west, through suburban Stamford Hill, Sydenham, Clapton, or Kensington,
to rural Edmonton, Croydon, Romford, or Chiswick, and so presently
to the Unknown. _That_ was, of itself, a charm in the old order of
things--a charm lost long since in these crowded times, when constant
and intimate travel have made us familiar with distant towns, and
by consequence incurious and incapable of surprises. Everything is
known, if not at the first hand of personal observation, at least by
proxy of our reading in guide-book history, or by the debilitating
photograph, which leaves nothing to the imagination, and renders us
travelled in the uttermost nooks and corners of the land, even though
we be bedridden, or thoroughgoing _habitués_ of the armchair and
the fireside. The picture-postcard--the lowest common denominator
of the photograph--has come to give the last touch of satiety, the
final revulsion of repletion. The Land’s End has long since been
exploited, John o’ Groat’s is merely at the end of a cycle ride, the
“bottomless” caverns of the Peak have been plumbed, every unscalable
mountain climbed. “_Connu!_” we exclaim when we are told any fact. No
surprises are left. We may never before have journeyed to Edinburgh,
but photographs have rendered us so long familiar with its castle
and rock that we cannot recollect a time when we were not familiar
with the physical geography of the “modern Athens,” and we seem to
have been born with a knowledge of the geographical peculiarities of
every other place. We are, therefore, naturally bored and unresponsive
in situations where our grandfathers were surprised and delighted;
but although possessed thereby with a profound dissatisfaction with
ourselves, we cannot hope to win back to the unsophisticated joys of
old time.
Would that it could be done! The wish is everywhere evident, but only
Lethean waters could sweep away the useless lumber of mental baggage
that destroys imagination and blunts the senses. The many efforts made
to bring back the “properties”--to speak in the theatrical sense--of
old time are pitiful or ridiculous, as your humour wills it. These
are the days when things quaint and old-fashioned are revived for
sake of their quaintness, sometimes in spite of their inconvenience
and unsuitability; when ingle-nooks and open hearths with fire-dogs
are built into modern houses for effect, although slow-combustion
stoves are infinitely more comfortable and less wasteful of fuel.
Our forbears, who did not know slow-combustion stoves, were not the
creatures of sentiment that we are, and would soon have abolished open
hearths for the close stoves had they been given the chance, just as
they would have exchanged the tallow dip for electric lighting had
the opportunity offered. We do not know the feelings with which the
first gentlemen to use carpets abolished the old rush-strewn halls
and the manners and customs contemporary with them; but if their
sense of smell was as acute as our own, they must have noticed with
great relief the absence of the dirt and festering bones that found a
hiding-place beneath those rushes. All the marvellous changes in habits
of living--the cheapening of food, the conversion of the luxuries of
a former age into the ordinary requirements of this, and even the
alterations in the face of the country and the houses of towns and
villages--are due to those increased facilities of intercourse which,
owing to the gradual improvement in roads, the coaches and waggons
of yore were first able to give. When public vehicles began to ply
into the country, this England of ours was not only a land of wide
unenclosed heaths and commons, but the people of one county--nay, even
the inhabitants of towns and villages--were markedly different in
thought and prejudices, in speech and clothing, from those of others;
while local style in building, and the various building materials
obtained locally, gave each successive place that appearance of
something new and strange which the traveller does not always meet with
nowadays in far distant lands. As the drainage of lakes and fens, the
filling up of the valleys and the reduction of the hills, have quite
revolutionised the physical geography of wide areas, often changing the
natural history of the districts affected, so has cheap, constant and
quick travelling and conveyance of materials helped to reduce places
and people to one dead level. Romance flies abashed from the level,
monotonous road, where, years before, in some darkling hollow between
the hills, ringed in by dense woodlands, it lurked in company with the
highwayman. We do not desire the return of those gentry, but what would
literature have done without them? Highway and turnpike improvements
long ago sliced off the most aspiring hilltops, and, carrying the roads
through cuttings, used the material thus cut away for the purpose of
filling up the gullies and deep depressions. Where the early coaches
toiled, often axle-deep, through the watersplashes formed by the
little rills and streams that ran athwart the way, later generations
have built bridges, or have done things infinitely worse; so that a
watersplash has become a rare and curious object, noteworthy in a
day’s journey. Only recently, on the Dover Road, near Faversham, has
such a watersplash--one of the most picturesque in the country--been
abolished. Ospringe was a little Kentish Venice, with a clear-running
shallow stream occupying the whole of the roadway, with raised
footpaths for pedestrians at either side, and ancient gabled cottages
looking down upon the pretty scene. Alas! the sparkling stream now goes
under the road, in a pipe.
In the old days, no traveller going north along the Great North Road
left Alconbury without first seeing that the priming of his pistols
was in order, while the passengers by mail or stage secretly put their
watches and jewellery between their skin and their underclothing,
or deposited their purses in their boots, before the coach topped
Alconbury Hill. For at “Aukenbury,” as Ogilby in his old road-maps
styles it, you were on the threshold of a robbing-place only less
famous than Gad’s Hill, near Rochester, or those other notorious dark
or daylight lurks (for day or night mattered little in those times),
Hounslow Heath and Finchley Common. The name of this ill-reputed place
was “Stonegate Hole.” It is marked distinctly on the maps of Ogilby and
his successors, between the sixty-fourth and sixty-fifth milestones
from London, by the Old North Road, measured from Shoreditch, and
passing through Ware, Royston, and Caxton.
Passing Papworth Everard, you came in those days, on the left hand,
just before reaching the fifty-sixth milestone, to “Beggar’s Bush,”
where you probably saw the tramps, vagrants and footpads of that age
skulking, on the chance of robbing some traveller unable to take care
of himself. Here, in sight of these wretches, you ostentatiously toyed
with your pistol holsters, or loosened your sword in its scabbard, and
so passed on scathless. On leaving Alconbury, however, the horseman
generally preferred company, because the highwaymen of Stonegate Hole
were well armed, and, by consequence, courageous.
What, exactly, was Stonegate, or Stangate, Hole? It was the deep and
solitary hollow that then existed at the foot of the northward slope
of Alconbury Hill, known now as Stangate Hill. The name derived from
this road being a part of the old Roman “Ermine Street,” formerly a
stone-paved way, and the “Hole” was formed by a rise that immediately
succeeded the descent. Quite shut in by dense woods, it was an ideal
spot for highway robbery. When, in the later coaching era, the road was
lowered through the crest of the hill, and the earth was used to raise
it in the hollow, Stonegate Hole disappeared. Bones were found during
the progress of the works, supposed relics of unfortunate travellers
who had met their death at the hands of the highwaymen. A more or less
true story was long told of an ostler of the “Wheatsheaf,” the inn that
once stood on the hilltop. He, it seems, used to help in putting in the
coach-horses when the teams were changed, and would then take a short
cut across the fields, and be ready for the coach when it came down the
road. The coachman, guard, and passengers, who did not know that the
shining pistol-barrel he levelled at them was really a tin candlestick,
were duly impressed by it, and yielded their valuables accordingly.
A tale used to be told of one of the old “London riders,” or “bagmen,”
who lay at the “Wheatsheaf” overnight and set forth the next morning.
His saddle-bags were full, and so weighted with samples of his wares
that he could scarce sit his horse, and had to be helped into the
saddle by an ostler. Once up, his eyes only with difficulty peered
over this mountainous weight, but in this manner he set forth. He had
not gone far before he thought he had lost his way, when fortunately
he perceived another horseman, and hailed him. The stranger took
no notice; and so our traveller ranged up alongside him with the
question. Instead of replying, the stranger thrust his hand into
his breast-pocket and withdrew what the traveller imagined to be a
pistol. Recollections of the evil repute of the place suddenly rushed
into the traveller’s mind, and, putting spurs to his horse, he dashed
away from the supposed highwayman, and did not draw rein until in the
neighbourhood of Huntingdon.
There he met a party of horsemen, who determined to hunt the highwayman
down, and so, with the traveller, hurried on to Stonegate. “There he
is!” cried the traveller, as they came in view of a peaceful-looking
equestrian, ambling gently along.
“You are mistaken, sir,” said one of the party: “that is our Mayor, the
Mayor of Huntingdon.”
But the bagman asserted he was right, and so, to end the dispute,
the whole party rode up, and one wished “Mr. Mayor” good morning. It
was indeed that worthy man, and although he again, instead of making
answer, drew something from his pocket, it produced no alarm among his
fellow-burgesses, for _they_ at least knew him for a very deaf man, and
had often seen him reach for that ear-trumpet which he now drew forth,
clapped to his ear, and asked them what it was they said.
Swift, who, travelling between London, Chester, Holyhead and Dublin,
remarked upon the many nations and strange peoples he passed on the
way, serves to emphasise these notes upon the fading individuality of
places and people. The dialect of “Zummerzet” has not wholly decayed,
but it has become so modified that when old references to its Bœotian
nature are found, the reader who knows modern Somerset, and does not
consider these changes, concludes that its grotesque speech was greatly
exaggerated; just as he cannot be made to implicitly believe the
remarkable and oft-repeated story told by William Hutton of the visit
of himself and a friend to Bosworth in 1770, when the people set the
dogs at them, for the only reason that they were strangers; or that
other tale of the savagery of the Lancashire and Yorkshire villagers,
who, when a person unknown to them appeared, conversed as follow:--
“Dost knaw ’im?”
“Naya.”
“Is’t a straunger?”
“Ay, for sewer.”
“Then pause ’im; ’eave a stone at ’un; fettle ’im.”
No inoffensive stranger in country districts is likely to meet with
that reception nowadays. The stranger in those times was regarded,
as he generally is in savage countries, as necessarily an enemy; but
travel has changed all that, and it has been reserved for the London
“hooligan,” who has been taught better, to perpetrate, in the very
centre of civilisation, the barbarous methods of the uninstructed
peasantry of generations ago.
Stories like these are only incredible when the circumstances of the
age are unknown. In times when a stranger might easily enough prove to
be a highwayman, or at the very least, some Government emissary intent
upon collecting hearth-money, window-tax, or one of the very many
duties then levied upon necessaries of life, a strange face might be
that of an enemy, and at any rate was unlikely to be that of a friend.
Sightseers were unknown. No one stirred from home if he could find an
excuse for staying by his own fireside. “What do you want here?” asked
the Welsh peasants of the earliest tourists; and declined to believe
them when they said they journeyed to view the Welsh mountains. “For
Christianity’s sake, help a poor man!” implored an early traveller
in Scotland, fainting by the way. The door was slammed in his face.
“Surely you are Christians?” exclaimed the unhappy man. “There are no
Christians here,” replied the half-savage Scot: “we are all Grants
and Frasers.” That last is, perhaps, rather a savagely humorous than
a true story, but the mere existence of it is significant. More
authentic--nay, well established--is the statement that even so late
as 1749, in Glasgow, two people of the same name would commonly be
distinguished by some physical peculiarity; or else, if one was
travelled and the other not, the one who had been to the capital would
be “London John,” or James, according to what his Christian name might
be.
A course of reading in the “travels” of the authors and diarists
who ambled about England, on horseback or otherwise, in the old
days, sufficiently demonstrates the aloofness and isolation, and the
essential differences that divided the country districts. When the
Dukes of Somerset resided at Petworth, in Sussex, the roads were so bad
that it was next to impossible to get there, and when once there it
was equally difficult to get away. Petworth is only forty-nine miles
from London, but the Duke of Somerset maintained a house at Godalming,
sixteen miles along the road, where he could halt on the way and pass
the night. His steward generally advised the servants some time before
his Grace started, so that they might be on the road “to point out the
holes.” When the Emperor Charles VI. visited Petworth, his carriage was
attended by a strong escort of Sussex peasants, to save it from falling
over. In spite of their efforts, it was several times overturned, and
that was a very sore and bruised Emperor who supped that night with
the Duke. Similar adventures befel Prince George of Denmark, husband
of Queen Anne, visiting Petworth from Windsor. He went in some state,
with a number of carriages. “The length of way was only forty miles,
but fourteen hours were consumed in traversing it; while almost every
mile was signalised by the overturn of a carriage, or its temporary
swamping in the mire. Even the royal chariot would have fared no
better than the rest, had it not been for the relays of peasants who
poised and kept it erect by strength of arm, and shouldered it forward
the last nine miles, in which tedious operation six good hours were
consumed.”
The travellers of that era, knowing how strange the country must be
to most people, gravely and at length described places that in these
intimate times an author would feel himself constrained to apologise
for mentioning, except in a personal and impressionistic way; and they
not only so describe them, but there is every reason to believe their
writings were read with interest. More interesting than their dry
bones of topographical history are the accounts they give of manners,
customs, and thoughts common to the time when travellers were few
and little understood. When, in 1700, the Reverend Mr. Brome, rector
of the pleasant Kentish village of Cheriton, determined to make the
explorations of England that took him, in all, three years, he was
obliged, as a matter of course, to wait until the spring was well
advanced and the roads had again become passable. Setting forth at
last, one mild May day, his friends and parishioners accompanied him a
few miles, and then, with the fervent “God be with you’s” that were the
parting salutations of the time, instead of the lukewarm “Good-bye’s”
of to-day, turned back home-along, and expected to hear of him no more.
But he _did_ return, as his very dull and jejune book, chiefly of
stodgy historical and topographical information, published in 1726,
sufficiently informs us.
“Weeping Cross” is the name of a spot just outside Salisbury, supposed
to have taken its name from being the spot where friends and relatives
took leave of travellers, with little prospect in their minds of
seeing them again. There is another “Weeping Cross” on the London
side of Shrewsbury, near Emstrey Bank, about a mile from the town and
overlooking the descending road, whence the progress of the travellers
could be followed until distance at last hid them from view. There
are, doubtless, other places so named throughout the country. The
oft-repeated legendary statement that travellers usually made their
wills before setting out is thus seen to be reasonable enough, but it
is specifically supported by the author of _Letters from a Gentleman in
the North of Scotland_, who, writing about 1730, says: “The Highlands
are but little known, even to the inhabitants of the low country of
Scotland, for they have ever dreaded the difficulties and dangers of
travelling among the mountains; and when some extraordinary occasion
has obliged any one of them to such a progress, he has, generally
speaking, made his testament before he set out, as though he were
entering upon a long and dangerous sea-voyage, wherein it was very
doubtful if he should ever return.”
When Mrs. Calderwood, of Polton and Coltness, made a journey from
Scotland into England in 1756, she wrote a diary, a very much more
entertaining and instructive affair than the Reverend Mr. Brome’s
book--which, indeed, could have been compiled from other works without
the necessity of travelling, and, but for a few fleeting glimpses of
original observation, actually gives that impression. Mrs. Calderwood
tells us that at Durham she went to see the Cathedral, where the woman
who conducted her round the building did not understand her Scottish
ways (nor indeed did Mrs. Calderwood comprehend everything English). “I
suppose, by my questions, the woman took me for a heathen, as I found
she did not know of any other mode of worship but her own; so, that she
might not think the Bishop’s chair defiled by my sitting down in it,
I told her I was a Christian, though the way of worship in my country
differed from hers.” Mrs. Calderwood, quite obviously, had never heard
of St. Cuthbert and his antipathy to women, so respected at Durham that
womankind were not admitted within certain boundaries in his Cathedral
church; nor was she familiar with hassocks, for she narrates how the
woman “stared when I asked what the things were that they kneeled upon,
as they appeared to me to be so many Cheshire cheeses.”
The modern tourist along our roads finds a deadly sameness
overspreading all parts of the country. The same cheap little suburban
houses of stereotyped fashion, built to let at from £25 to £30 a year,
that sprawl in mile upon mile on the outer ring of London, are to be
found--nay, are insistently to the foreground--wherever he goes. They
form the approach to, the outpost of, every town, large or small, he
enters, and are built in the same way, and of the same materials,
whether he travels farther north, south, east, or west. It was not so,
need it be said, in the old times. Then the coach passenger with an eye
for the beautiful and the unusual had that sense abundantly gratified
along almost every mile of his course, for when men did not build on
contract, and when the contractor, had he existed, would not have
been able to work outside his own district, there was individuality
in building design. We all know the truth of the adage that “variety
is charming,” and of variety the travellers had their fill. And not
only was there variety in design, but an endless change of materials
gratified the eyes of those who cared for these things. London, with
its dingy brick, was succeeded, as one penetrated westwards, by the
weather-boarded cottages of Brentford and Hounslow, by the timber
framing and brick nogging of the next districts, by the chalk and
flint of Hampshire and Wilts; and at last, when one had come to the
stone country, by the yellow ferruginous sandstone of Ham Hill, that
characterises the houses and cottages between Shaftesbury, Crewkerne
and Chard. Coming into Devon, the yellow stone was replaced by the
rich red sandstone, or the equally red “cob” of that western land; and
a final change was found when, the Tamar passed and Plymouth left
behind, the massive granite churches, houses and cottages astonished
the new-comer to those parts. No one could build with other than local
materials in those days. The material might be, like the granite,
stubborn and difficult, and expensive to work, but it would have been
still more expensive to bring other materials to the spot, and so the
local men worked on their local stone, and in course of time acquired
that peculiar mastery of it and that way of expressing themselves which
originated that “local style” whose secret is so ardently sought by
modern architectural students. You cannot transplant the old style of a
locality. Like the wilding plucked from its native hedgerow, it dies,
or is cultivated into something other than its original old sweet self
and becomes artificial. Cynic circumstance has so decreed it that,
while these ancient local growths have in modern times been copied in
London and the great towns, the rural neighbourhoods have been cursed
with an ambition to copy London, while everywhere cheap red brick is
ousting the native stone, flint, or wood.
When the fashionables travelled down by coach to Bath, one might safely
have offered a prize for every brick house to be found there, for Bath
was, and is, built of the local oolite known as “Bath stone.” The prize
would never have been claimed; but something like a modern miracle is
now happening, for even at Bath red brick has underbid the native stone
and gained an entrance.
Nothing escapes the modern desecrating touch. “Auld Reekie”
itself--Edinburgh, that last stronghold of the Has Been--is not the
same “beloved town” that Sir Walter Scott knew. The French Renaissance
character of its grandiose new buildings does not alone tend to change
it into something alien to sentiment and ancient recollection; but that
which our ancestors would have thought a mere impossibility, that which
themselves would, and ourselves should, stigmatise as a crime committed
against History and the Picturesque, has almost come to pass. In
short, the deep ravine where the Nor’ Loch stagnated of old, where the
Waverley Station is now placed, has been deprived of something of its
apparent depth, and the Castle Rock of a corresponding height, by the
towering proportions of the vast buildings that fill up the valley and
desecrate the site of the northern capital.
Sturdy survivals of olden days are the local delicacies that first
obtained a wider fame from that time when they were set before the
coach passengers at the country inns where the coach dined, or had
tea, or supped, and were so greatly appreciated that supplies were
carried away for the benefit of distant friends. Some, however, of
these delicacies have disappeared. No longer does Grantham produce the
cakes mentioned by Thoresby in 1683. Grantham, he says, was “famous
in his esteem for Bishop Fox’s benefactions, but it is chiefly noted
of travellers for a peculiar sort of thin cake, called ‘Grantham
Whetstones.’” What precisely were the cakes known by this unpromising
name we cannot say, for the making of them is a thing of the past.
Stilton cheese, never made at Stilton, obtained its name exactly in
the manner already described. It was a cheese made at Wymondham,
in Leicestershire, but its merits were first discovered by the
coach-parties who dined at the “Bell” at Stilton, whose landlord
obtained his supply from Wymondham, and drove a roaring trade in old
cheeses sold to the coaches to take away. “Stilton” cheese is now only
a conventional name, like that of “Axminster” carpets, made nowadays at
Kidderminster.
To bring home with him bags and boxes of local delicacies was to the
old coach-traveller as much an earnest of his travels as the bringing
back of a storied alpenstock is to the tourist in Switzerland. The
Londoner, returning home from Edinburgh, could come back laden with a
number of things which, easily obtainable now, were then the spoils
only of travel. From Scotch shortbread the list would range to
Doncaster butterscotch, York hams, Grantham gingerbread, and Stilton
cheeses. On other roads he might secure the cloying Banbury cake, still
extant, and as sickly-sweet and lavish of currants as of yore; the
famous Shrewsbury cakes, manufactured by the immortal Pailin, who left
his recipe behind him, so that the cakes of Shrewsbury still continue
in the land; Bath buns, phenomenally adhesive and sprinkled with those
fragments of loaf sugar without which the exterior of no Bath bun is
complete; the cheese of Cheddar; the toffee of Everton; pork pies from
Melton Mowbray; or a barrel of real natives from Whitstable. All or any
of these, I say, he might carry home with him, while few places were so
unimportant in this particular way that he could not ring the changes
on gastronomic rarities as he went.
All these things were the products of that old English tradition of
good cheer and hospitality which lasted even some little way into
the railway age. Journeys were cold, but hearts were warm, and the
more rigorous your travelling the better your welcome. It would seem,
and actually be, absurd to surround a modern arrival by railway with
the circumstance that greeted the advent of the coach. In the bygone
times the guest had no sooner alighted at his inn and proceeded to his
room than a knock came at his door, and lo! on a tray a glass of the
choicest port or cordial the house contained. To this day the courteous
old custom survives at the “Three Tuns,” in Durham, whose traditional
glass of cherry brandy is famous the whole length of the great road to
the north.
[Illustration: “ALL RIGHT!” THE BATH MAIL TAKING UP THE MAIL-BAGS.
_From the contemporary lithograph._
]
For the little folks who travelled by coach, either with their own
people or, like Tom Brown, in charge of the guard, warm motherly
hearts beat in the bosoms of the stately landladies of the age, all
courteous punctilio to their grown-up guests, but sympathy itself to
the wearied youngsters. Such was Mrs. Botham, of the “Pelican,” at
Speenhamland, on the Bath Road--that “Pelican” of whose “enormous bill”
some waggish poet had sung at an early period. Mrs. Botham, an awesome
figure--like Mrs. Ann Nelson, of the “Bull,” Whitechapel, dressed in
black satin--unbent to the youngsters, for whom, indeed, she had always
ready a packet of brandy-snaps.
The earlier travellers were even more welcomed, not by the innkeepers
alone, whose welcome was not altogether altruistic, but by the country
folk in general.
The annual reappearance of the early stage-coaches was a much greater
event to the villagers and townsfolk of the more remote shires than we
moderns might suppose, or feel inclined to believe, without inquiry.
But we must consider the winter isolation of such places in those
remote times, and then some faint glimmering sense of their aloofness
from the world will give us an understanding of the relief with which
they again saw real strangers from the outer world. In the long winter
months, when days were short and roads only to be travelled by the
most daring horsemen, spurred to the rash deed only by the most urgent
necessity, the passing stranger was rare, and excited remark, and
the company in the inn parlour or by the ingle-nook discussed him,
both because of his rarity and by reason of their own raw material
for the making of conversation being run very low indeed. We should
be more thankful than we generally are that our lot was not cast in
a seventeenth-century village, for winter in such surroundings was
dulness incarnate. Because they could not obtain fodder to keep the
sheep and cattle in good condition through the winter, the farmers and
graziers of that time killed them before that season set in, and the
villagers lived upon salted meat. Every house had its salt-beef tub and
its bacon-cratch under the kitchen ceiling, well stocked with hams and
sides; but vegetables were so scarce as to be practically unobtainable.
Every household brewed its own beer and kept a stock of cider, and
most housewives were cunning in the preparation of metheglin, a
sickly-sweet and heavy drink that revolts the modern palate, but was
then greatly appreciated. Evenings were not long, even though it grew
dark before four o’clock, for folks went to bed by seven or eight.
There was little inducement to sit up late, because only the feeblest
illumination was possible to any but the very rich, and the yeomen, the
farmers and the cottagers had to rest content with the dim sputtering
glimmer of the tallow dips that every eight or ten minutes required
the attentions of the snuffers. “When the night cometh,” we read in
the Bible, “no man can work”; but that is a statement which, literally
true at the time when the Bible was done into English, can now only be
read and understood figuratively. No one could work by the artificial
illumination then possible.
Conceive, then, the joy with which returning spring was
greeted--spring, that brought back light and fresh food and intercourse
with the world, outside the rural parish. Mankind had travelled far
from those prehistoric times of annual terror, when the ignorant
savage saw the sun’s light going out with the coming of winter, and
so, with abject fear, passed the darkling months until the vernal
solstice brought him hope again. No one in the Old England of two
hundred and fifty years ago trembled lest the sun should not return at
his appointed time; but when the sap rose and the birds began to sing
again, and warmth and light had begun to replace the fogs and mists of
winter, the hearts of all rejoiced.
May Day was then the great merrymaking festival, but the first coach
that ventured along the roads, now beginning to set after the winter’s
rains, had a welcome of its own. At Sutton-on-Trent, on the Great North
Road, the springtide custom of welcoming the early coaches was royally
observed, and kept up for many years. No coach, during a whole week of
jollity, was suffered to proceed through that jovial village without it
halted and ate and drank as only Englishmen could then drink and eat.
Guards, coachmen and passengers were freely feasted, willy-nilly. Young
and old plied them with the good things, spread out upon a tray covered
with a beautiful damask napkin, and heaped with plum-cakes, tartlets,
gingerbread, and exquisite home-made bread and biscuits; while ale,
currant and gooseberry wines, cherry brandy, and occasionally spirits,
were eagerly pressed upon the strangers. Half a dozen damsels, all
enchanting young people, neatly clad, rather shy, but courteously
importunate, plied the passengers.
Thoresby records a similar custom at Grantham, near by, on one of his
journeys. Under date of May 4th, 1714, he says: “We dined at Grantham,
and had the usual solemnity, being the first passage of the coach this
season; the coachman and horses decked with ribbons and flowers, and
the town music and young people in couples before us.” The “town music”
was what we should nowadays call the Town Band.
When such courtesies obtained along the roads the coachmen and guards
would have been churlish not to have, in some prominently visible
manner, done honour to the season. And, indeed, May Day and springtime
decorations were features on most coaches. The coachman’s whipstock was
ornamented with gay ribbons and bunches of flowers, while the coachman
himself wore a floral nosegay that rivalled a prize cabbage in size.
The guard was no less remarkable a figure, and his horn was wreathed
with the most lively display of blossoms. Festoons of flowers and
sprays of evergreens so draped and covered the coach that the insides,
peering out upon the festivities, very closely resembled those antic
figures, the “Jacks-in-the-Green,” that used on May Day to prance and
make merry from the midst of an embowering canopy of foliage, even so
late as thirty years ago, in London streets. The horses, too, bore
their part. Their new harness and saddle-cloths, the rosettes and
wreaths of laurel on their heads, smartened them up so that even the
animals themselves were conscious of the occasion, and bore themselves
with becoming pride.
Those old customs are, as a matter of course, gone. Coaches no longer
dash through the old “thoroughfare” villages; and when, with the
advent of spring, the motorist appears upon the road, the villagers,
rather than welcoming his appearance, curse him for the clouds of dust
he leaves behind. Motor-cars, they tell us, are to repeople the old
coaching-roads, whose prosperity is, through them, to return, and the
picturesque old wayside inns, with their memories of the coaching age,
are to once again experience the rush of business. It may be so, but
no one will regret the fact more than the lover of Old England, who,
in the repeopling of the roads, sees their modernising inevitable, and
the equally inevitable bringing “up to date” of those quaint, quiet,
and comfortable hostelries so dear to the genuine tourist. It is
true, they do not dine you elaborately--as your extravagant motorist
complains--but life is not all chicken and champagne, and it will be a
sorry day when the plain man, fleeing the gaudy glories of hotels at
fashionable resorts, finds the unsophisticated inns of the countryside
remodelled on the same plan. Already the picturesqueness of the old
roads is threatened. They are, if you please, too hilly, too narrow,
or not straight enough for that new tyrant of the highways, the owner
of a high-powered motor-car, and plans have actually been drawn up
by irresponsible busybodies for straight and broad new tracks, or for
the remodelling of the old roads on the same principle. Roadside trees
and avenues keep the surface damp and muddy after rain, and so, as
rubber-tyred cars are apt to skid and side-slip on mud, the same voices
call for the abolition of wayside trees. Old England is in a parlous
state, when these things can be advocated and no indignant protests
rise.
CHRONOLOGICAL SUMMARY
1610. Patent granted for an Edinburgh and Leith waggon-coach.
1648. Southampton weekly stage casually mentioned.
1657. Stage-coaches introduced: the London and Chester Stage.
1658. First Exeter Stage.
” First York and Edinburgh Stage.
1661. First Oxford Stage.
” Glass windows first used in carriages: the Duke of
York’s carriage.
1662. Only six stage-coaches said to have been existing.
1665. Norwich Stage first mentioned.
1667. Bath Flying Machine established.
” London and Oxford Coach, in 2 days, established.
1669. London and Oxford Flying Coach, in 1 day, established.
1673. Stages to York, Chester, and Exeter advertised.
1679. London and Birmingham Stage, by Banbury, mentioned.
1680. “Glass-coaches” mentioned.
1681. Stage-coaches become general: 119 in existence.
1706. London to York in 4 days.
1710 Stage-coaches provided with glazed windows.
(about).
1730. “Baskets” or “rumble-tumbles” introduced about this period.
1734. Teams of horses changed every day, instead of coaches
going to end of journey with same animals.
” Quick service advertised: Edinburgh to London in 9 days.
1739. According to Pennant, gentlemen who were active
horsemen still rode, instead of going by coach.
1742. London to Oxford in 2 days.
” London to Birmingham, by Oxford, in 3 days.
1751. London to Dover in 1½ days.
1753. Outsides carried on Shrewsbury Stage.
1754. London and Manchester Flying Coach in 4½ days.
” Springs to coaches first mentioned: the Edinburgh Stage.
” London and Edinburgh in 10 days.
1758. London and Liverpool Flying Machine in 3 days.
1760. London and Leeds Flying Coach advertised in 3 days: took 4.
1763. London and Edinburgh only once a month, and in 14 days.
1776. First duty on stage-coaches imposed.
1780. Stage-coaches become faster than postboys.
1782. Pennant describes contemporary travelling by light
post-coaches as “rapid journeys in easy chaises, fit
for the conveyance of the soft inhabitants of Sybaris.”
1784. Mail-coach system established.
1800 Fore and hind boots, framed to body of coach, became general.
(about).
” Coaches in general carry outside passengers.
1805. Springs under driving-box introduced.
1819. “Patent Safety” coaches come into frequent use, to reassure
travelling public, alarmed by frequent accidents.
1824. Rise of the fast day-coaches: the Golden Age of coaching.
” Stockton and Darlington Railway opened: first beginnings
of the railway era.
1830. Liverpool and Manchester Railway opened: coaching first
seriously threatened.
1838. London and Birmingham Railway opened: first great blow to
coaching; coaches taken off Holyhead Road as far as
Birmingham.
1839. Eastern Counties Railway opened to Chelmsford.
1840. Great Western Railway opened to Reading.
” London and Southampton Railway opened to Portsmouth:
coaches taken off Portsmouth Road.
1841. Great Western Railway opened to Bath and Bristol: coaches
taken off Bath Road.
” Brighton Railway opened: coaching ends on Brighton Road.
1842. Last London and York Mail-coach.
1844. Great Western Railway opened to Exeter: last coaches
taken off Exeter Road.
1845. Railways reach Norwich.
” Eastern Counties Railway opened to Cambridge.
1846. Edinburgh and Berwick Railway opened.
1847. East Anglian Railway opened to King’s Lynn.
1848. “Bedford Times,” one of the last long-distance coaches
withdrawn.
” Eastern Counties Railway opened to Colchester.
” Great Western Railway opened to Plymouth.
1849. Shrewsbury and Birmingham Railway opened.
1850. Chester and Holyhead Railway opened.
1874. Last of the mail-coaches: the Thurso and Wick Mail gives
place to the Highland Railway.
INDEX
Accidents, i. 206, 274, 281, 307, 310;
ii. 28, 96–122
Allen, Ralph, Post Office reformer, i. 146
Amateur coachmen (for individuals, _see_ Coaching Notabilities)
” ” penalty for allowing them to drive, i. 209
” ” rise of, i. 231
” ” incident on the road with, ii. 91–3
” ” originated about 1800, ii. 239
” ” account of the, ii. 239–59
Balloon coaches, appear about 1785, i. 296
“Basket,” the, described, i. 96, 99;
miseries of travelling in, i. 101, 295
Baxendale, Joseph, ii. 127–43, 207
Besant, designer of mail-coaches, i. 178
Bonnor, Charles, i. 168, 171
“Booking,” i. 320–23
” -clerks, responsibilities of, i. 320
” ” described by Dickens, i. 322, 330
” -offices, i. 320–23
” ” described by Dickens, i. 122, 330
Boonen, Wm., Queen Elizabeth’s coachman, i. 5
Brighton, first coach to, 1756, i. 134;
first Sunday coach to, 1792, i. 198
Buckingham, Earl of, sets up a carriage, i. 7
Bugles (_see_ Key Bugles)
Byers, ----, professional informer, i. 214–17
Canals, ii. 130, 133
“Caravan,” origin of word, ii. 128, 129
Carriages, introduction of, i. 2–13;
become fashionable, i. 11
Carriers, the, i. 65;
antiquity of, i. 103;
account of, i. 103–45;
restrictions on, 1622–29, i. 195;
forbidden to travel on Sundays, 1627, i. 196
Cary, Robert, rides horseback to Edinburgh, 1603, i. 16
Coach and Harness Makers Company, founded 1677, i. 12
“Coach and six through Act of Parliament,” origin of saying, i. 86
Coaches:--
Mail-coaches, general account of, i. 146–80;
to be exempt from tolls, i. 156;
Post Office officials resist introduction of, i. 157;
established 1784, i. 158;
originally diligences, or light post-coaches, i. 160;
system extended 1785, i. 163;
continually breaking down, i. 174;
new type of, introduced, i. 178;
Besant’s patent coach, i. 178;
Besant’s coach condemned by Matthew Boulton 1798, i. 179;
always four-horsed, i. 180;
coachmen of, subject to severe penalties for misdemeanours,
i. 211;
used for illegal sale of game, i. 254;
for smuggling, i. 256;
outside passengers of, limited to three, i. 258;
bring early news, i. 260;
cross-country, shabby, ii. 2;
increased number of, injure roads, ii. 5;
stage-coaches unable to compete with, ii. 5;
exemption of from tolls injurious to Turnpike Trusts, ii. 4–9;
paid toll in Ireland from 1798 ii. 9;
exemption repealed as regards Scotland, 1813, ii. 9;
tyrants of the road, ii. 10;
exposed to dangers, ii. 10;
pre-eminence of declines from 1824, on introduction of fast
day-coaches, ii. 11;
additional number of passengers permitted, ii. 12;
mileage paid to contractors for, ii. 12–15;
contractors disinclined to do business with Post Office, ii. 15;
railways begin to supplant, 1830, ii. 16;
procession of, on King’s birthday, ii. 17–22;
list of, starting from London 1837, ii. 23;
the fastest, 1836, ii. 27;
number of, 1838, ii. 27;
West of England routes cut up by railways, ii. 36–9;
horses sold off, ii. 39;
last of the mails, ii. 40;
described, ii. 40–47
Waude’s mail-coach, 1830, ii. 43–7;
go seven days a week, ii. 148;
freedom of from attack, ii. 148;
robberies of, frequent, ii. 149;
attacked by lioness, ii. 151;
adventures of, in snow, ii. 152–5, 159–62, 166–9,
in floods ii. 162–6, 169;
West of England, started from Piccadilly, ii. 207
Mail-coaches:--
Banff and Inverness, ii. 165
Bath, ii. 22, 23
Birmingham, ii. 23
” and Liverpool, ii. 169
Brighton, ii. 23, 24, 101
” Day, ii. 313
Bristol, established 1784, i. 158–60; ii. 1, 17, 22, 23, 149, 207
Cambridge Auxiliary, ii. 215
Canterbury and Deal, ii. 27
Carlisle and Edinburgh, ii. 27
” ” Glasgow, ii. 23, 24, 27, 108
Carmarthen and Pembroke, ii. 15, 215
Cheltenham and Aberystwith, i. 264; ii. 119
Chester, ii. 15, 23, 215
Derby and Manchester, ii. 40
Devonport (Quicksilver), i. 246, 264, 303; ii. 22, 23, 28, 31–6,
39, 122, 182, 207, 227, 252, 295, 308, 312
Dover, ii. 15, 23, 24, 150
” Foreign, ii. 215
Edinburgh, ii. 23, 24, 39, 75, 295
” and Glasgow, ii. 166
Exeter, New, i. 264
” ii. 22, 23, 28, 31, 35, 106, 151
Falmouth, ii. 23, 31, 35
Glasgow, i. 247; ii. 1–3
Gloucester and Carmarthen, ii. 23
” ii. 22, 28, 215
Halifax, ii. 23, 106
Hastings, ii. 23, 24, 215, 237
Holyhead, ii. 15, 23, 207, 315
Hull, ii. 23
Ipswich, ii. 150, 312
Lancaster and Kirkby Stephen, ii. 152
Leeds, ii. 23, 24
Liverpool, ii. 23
” and Manchester, ii. 12
” and Preston, ii. 27
Louth, ii. 23, 28, 106, 235
Lynn and Wells, ii. 23, 235
Manchester, ii. 23
Norwich, by Newmarket, ii. 15, 23, 215
Plymouth and Falmouth, ii. 314
Poole, ii. 160
Portsmouth, ii. 23, 24, 160
Southampton, ii. 22, 23
Stroud, ii. 22, 23
Wick and Thurso, ii. 40
Worcester, ii. 23, 215, 318
Yarmouth, ii. 23, 24
York, ii. 150
Stage-coaches, first established 1657, i. 2;
considered vulgar, i. 25;
patent for Edinburgh and Leith waggon-coach granted, 1610, i. 56;
said to have begun about 1640, i. 57;
John Taylor travels by the Southampton coach, 1648, i. 58–60;
Chester Stage, first regular stage-coach, established 1657, i. 60;
Exeter, Okehampton, Plymouth, Newark, Darlington, Ferryhill,
York, Durham, Edinburgh and Wakefield stages
established 1658, i. 61;
itinerary varied to suit prospective travellers, i. 63;
Oxford coach, 1661, i. 63;
Preston, Lancashire, 1662, i. 63;
horses went whole journey, i. 63;
changed once a day, i. 63;
Norwich coach, 1665, i. 64;
lack of full information, about 1660–80, i. 64–74;
early stages described by Taylor, the Water Poet, i. 65;
described, i. 65–7, 82;
first provided with glazed windows, about 1710, i. 67;
agonies of travelling in, i. 63, 67, 72;
Bath Flying Machine, 1667, i. 68;
De Laune’s _Present State of London_, 1681, contains first lists
of, i. 77–9;
general in 1681, i. 77;
opposition to, dies down, i. 79;
fares moderate, 1684, i. 79;
winter still, in 1731, largely a season of no coaches, i. 82;
easily outpaced by pedestrians, about 1750, i. 82–85;
six horses and a postilion generally used, 1754–1783, i. 85, 86,
90;
horses changed oftener than once a day, i. 87;
consequent acceleration, i. 88;
beginnings of competition and rivalry, i. 89;
agreements between proprietors, i. 89;
consequent deceleration of coaches, i. 90;
Edinburgh stage a “glass machine on steel springs,” 1754, i. 89;
of 1750, described by Sir Walter Scott, i. 97;
outside passengers first provided with seats, about 1800, i. 181;
fore and hind boots introduced, about 1800, i. 181;
contempt of insides for outsides, i. 181, 210;
“Land Frigate,” London and Portsmouth, i. 182;
springs under driving-boxes introduced about 1805, i. 185;
ii. 240;
shorter stages adopted, about 1800, i. 186;
travel at night, from about 1780, i. 186; ii. 66;
speed increased, i. 189;
duty levied, 1776, i. 205;
duty increased 1783 and 1785, i. 206;
accidents increase, i. 206;
Gamon’s Acts, regulating number of passengers, 1788–90, i. 206–9;
severity of Acts of 1806 and 1811, regulating, i. 209–12;
the law constantly broken, i. 212;
rise and progress of the professional informers, i. 213–18;
duties reduced, 1839, i. 218–20;
provincial coaches despised, i. 245;
first begin to be named, i. 282;
opposition and rivalry of, i. 282–8;
“machine” becomes a favourite term, about 1754, i. 286;
introduction of “diligences,” about 1776, i. 287;
“diligences,” originally fast, become slow, i. 288–92;
Shillibeer’s Brighton Diligence, i. 290–92;
the Post-Coaches and Light Post-Coaches, a fast and exclusive
type, i. 292–5;
objectionable company in, i. 294;
“Accommodation” coaches, slow and capacious, introduced about
1800, i. 295;
generally acquire names from about 1780, i. 295;
the principles and system of naming described, i. 295–317;
the public alarmed by increasing accidents, 1810–20, i. 310;
“patent safety,” i. 309–16;
Waude’s coaches, ii. 16;
fast day coaches begin, 1824, ii. 173–87;
attain speed of eleven and twelve miles an hour, ii. 179, 185;
Cobbett on, ii. 182;
gas-lighting of, proposed, ii. 186;
Glasgow and Paisley coaches lit by gas 1827, ii. 186;
increased comfort and elegance of, ii. 186;
“short stages,” the, ii. 187–93;
threatened by railways, ii. 208;
rivalry, 1830–36, ii. 215–17;
threatened by steam-carriages, 1824–38, ii. 260–68;
run off by railways, ii. 269–74;
long survived on branch routes, ii. 281;
ended generally 1848, ii. 292
Stage-coaches (mentioned at length):--
Age, Brighton, ii. 247, 252
Amersham and Wendover stage, ii. 281
Bath Flying Machine, 1667, i. 68
Bedford Times, i. 2
Beehive, Manchester, ii. 162, 229–31
Birmingham Flying Coach, 1742, i. 92
” Improved Flying Coach, 1758, i. 92
” and Shrewsbury Long Coach, 1753, in 4 days, i. 95
” stage, 1697, by Banbury, i. 77;
in 2½ days, 1731, i. 80
Chesham stage, ii. 281
Chester stage, 1657, in 4 days, i. 60;
in 5 days, i. 62;
in 6 days, 1710, i. 73
Coburg, Brighton, ii. 97
” Edinburgh and Perth, ii. 108
Comet, Brighton, established 1815, i. 305–8, 312
” Southampton, ii. 207
“Confatharrat,” Norwich, 1695, i. 80, 282
Coronet, Brighton, ii. 251
Criterion, Brighton, ii. 105
Defiance, Exeter, ii. 235
” Manchester, ii. 207, 228
Derby Dilly, the, i. 239
Duke of Beaufort, Brighton, ii. 101
Edinburgh stage, once a fortnight, 1658, i. 61;
in 10 days summer, 12 winter, 1754, i. 89;
once a month, in 12 days, 1763, i. 90
Emerald, Bristol, ii. 207
Estafette, Manchester, ii. 186
Everlasting, Wolverhampton and Worcester, i. 238–40
Exeter Fly, in 6 days, 1700, i. 80
” Flying Stage, 1739, generally 6 days, i. 90
” Fast Coach, 1752, every Monday, in 3½ days summer,
6 winter, i. 91
Exeter stage, in 4 days, 1658, i. 61;
in 8 days summer, 10 winter 1673, i. 74
Expedition, Norwich, ii. 150
Fowler’s Shrewsbury stage, 1753, in 3½ days, i. 95
Glasgow and Edinburgh stage, 1678, in 3 days, i. 76; 1743, i. 76
” ” ” Caravan, 1749, in 2 days, i. 77
Glasgow and Edinburgh Fly, 1759, in 1½ days, i. 77
Gloucester Old Stage, ii. 240
Greyhound, Birmingham, ii. 207
Hull and York stage, 1678, i. 74
Independent Tally-Ho, Birmingham, ii. 215
Land Frigate, Portsmouth, i. 182
Lark, Leicester and Nottingham, ii. 110
Leeds Flying Coach, 1760, in 4 days, i. 93
Lewes and Brighthelmstone Flying Machine, 1762, i. 283
” stage, i. 283
Liverpool Flying Machine, 1758, in 3 days, i. 93
Magnet, Cheltenham, ii. 207
Maidenhead and Marlow Post-Coach, i. 294
Manchester Flying Coach, 1754, in 4½ days, i. 92
Nelson, Newcastle-on-Tyne, i. 67
Newcastle Flying Coach, 1734, in 9 days, i. 87
Nimrod, Shrewsbury, ii. 215
Norwich stage, 1665, i. 64
Oxford Flying Coach, 1669, in 1 day, i. 69
” stage, 1661, in 2 days, i. 63, 68
Peveril of the Peak, Manchester, ii. 107, 229, 237
Potter, Manchester and Stafford, ii. 150
Preston, Lancashire, stage, 1662, i. 63
Prince of Wales, Birmingham and Shrewsbury, i. 185, 231;
ii. 240, 307
Quicksilver, Brighton, ii. 102–5
Red Rover, Brighton, ii. 311
” Liverpool, ii. 207
” Manchester, ii. 162, 229, 277
Regent, Stamford, ii. 207
Rocket, London and Portsmouth, ii. 320
Rockingham, Leeds, ii. 81
Safety, Cambridge, i. 241
Salop Machine, the “original,” 1774, i. 98
Shrewsbury Caravan, 1750, in 4 days, i. 119
Sovereign, Patent Safety, Brighton, i. 311
Stag, Shrewsbury, ii. 216
Star, Cambridge, i. 241; ii. 257, 299
Taglioni, Windsor, i. 316
Tally-Ho, Birmingham, ii. 214, 237
” Plymouth and Falmouth, ii. 314
Tantivy, Birmingham, i. 278, 317; ii. 185, 207, 237
Telegraph, Cambridge, ii. 207, 299
” Exeter, i. 300–303; ii. 34, 39, 227, 295, 313
” Manchester, i. 300; ii. 185, 207, 227–9
Telegraph, Southampton, ii. 306
” Norwich, by Newmarket, ii. 15, 150
Times, Bedford, i. 2; ii. 217
” Brighton and Southampton, ii. 113
” Cambridge, i. 241
True Blue, Leeds and Wakefield, ii. 97
Umpire, Liverpool, ii. 217
Union, King’s Lynn, i. 250; ii. 300, 302–5
Wakefield stage, 1658, in 4 days, i. 61
Warwick ” 1694, once a week, in 2 days, i. 80
Wellington, Newcastle-on-Tyne, ii. 66–95
Wonder, Shrewsbury, ii. 49, 185, 215, 227, 306
Worcester Old Fly, ii. 241
York stage, 1658, in 4 days, i. 61;
1673, i. 74;
1706, i. 75
Coaching Age, began 1657, i. 2, 60;
end of, ii. 260–91;
long survived on branch routes, ii. 281;
ended generally by 1848, ii. 292
Coaching Notabilities:--
Barrymores, Earls of, ii. 241
Cotton, Sir St. Vincent, ii. 246–51, 257
Jones, C. Tyrwhitt, ii. 251
Kenyon, Hon. Thomas, ii. 233
Lade, Sir John, ii. 241
Lennox, Lord William, i. 278, 347
Mellish, Colonel, ii. 241, 245
Mytton, John, ii. 245
Peyton, Sir Henry, ii. 233
Stevenson, Henry, ii. 247, 251–4
Warburton, R. E. E., i. 317–19
Warde, John, i. 185, 231, 317; ii. 240
Worcester, Marquis of (afterwards 7th Duke of Beaufort),
ii. 101, 251
Coachmen, forbidden to allow amateurs to drive, i. 209;
penalties on, for misdemeanours, i. 209–11;
the early, i. 221–30;
the later, i. 231–48;
the “flash men,” i. 235;
denounced violently by Borrow, i. 235–8;
described, ii. 72–4, 83–7, 91–4; ii. 174–7;
“shoulder” fares and “swallow” passengers, ii. 200–203;
contempt of, for railways, 1833–37, ii. 268;
lose their occupation, ii. 278–81;
what became of the, ii. 292–321
Coachmen:--
Abingdon, John, ii. 318
Bailey, Jack, i. 231; ii. 240
Brewer, Sampson, ii. 315
Carter, Philip, ii. 311
Clements, Wm., ii. 311
Cracknell, E., i. 318; ii. 185
Creery, Jack, ii. 152
Cross, Thomas, i. 238;
ii. 299–306
Emmens, Joe, i. 228
Hayward, Sam, ii. 306
Holmes, Charles, ii. 316
Howse, Jerry, ii. 186
Jobson, John, ii. 307
Layfield, Tom, ii. 91
Marsh, Matthew, ii. 308
Parker, ----, ii. 319
Peers, Jack, ii. 306
Pickett, A., i. 315; ii. 306
Pointer, Robert, ii. 320
Salisbury, Harry, ii. 185
Salter, Wm., ii. 316
Simpson, Harry, ii. 308
Thorogood, John, i. 238
Vaughan, Dick, ii. 299
Vickers, Dick, ii. 315
Walton, Jo, i. 241; ii. 257, 299
Ward, Charles, i. 238; ii. 120, 311–15
” Harry, i. 238, 246; ii. 311
Williams, Bill, ii. 257–9
Wilson, John, i. 238–40
” William, i. 240
Coachmen killed:--
Aiken, ----, ii. 106
Austin, ----, ii. 106
Burnett, ----, ii. 107
Cherry, ----, ii. 116
Crouch, Thomas, ii. 107
Draing, James, ii. 115
Eyles, ----, ii. 116
Fleet, ----, ii. 101
Frisby, ----, ii. 110
Roberts, Thomas, ii. 106
Skinner, Henry, ii. 317
Upfold, William, ii. 113
Vaughan, Dick, ii. 299
Walker, Joseph, ii. 98
Wilkes, John, ii. 318
Coach-proprietors, alarmed by establishment of mail-coaches, 1784,
i. 160;
provide driving-boxes with springs, 1805, i. 185;
petition against Bill regulating stage-coaches, 1788, i. 208;
liabilities of, i. 208–10; prosecuted and fined, i. 216;
relief of, at close of coaching age, by reduction of duties,
i. 218–20;
begin to name their coaches, i. 282;
indisposed to adopt “safety” coaches, 1805, i. 309;
obliged by public opinion to do so, 1819, i. 311–16;
hazardous business of, from 1824, ii. 173;
cut fares in competition, 1834, ii. 187;
bitter rivalry among, i. 283, ii. 215–18;
of short stages, ii. 187;
business of, described, ii. 194–238;
spirited struggle of, against railways, ii. 273–8;
misled by irresponsible newspaper talk, ii. 274–7
Coach-proprietors:--
Alexander, Israel, ii. 102
Batchelor, James, of Lewes, i. 283–5
Brawne, S., i. 283
Bretherton, of Liverpool, ii. 238
Capps, Thomas Ward, of Brighton, ii. 253
Carter, of Shrewsbury, i. 109
Chaplin, William, of the “Swan with Two Necks,” Lad Lane, ii. 34,
141, 173–5, 195–210, 212, 228, 238, 312
Chaplin, William Augustus, ii. 210
Chaplin & Horne, ii. 209
Cooper, Thomas, of Thatcham, ii. 173
Costar & Waddell, of Oxford, ii. 186
Cripps, William, of Brighton, ii. 251
Cross, John, of the “Golden Cross,” Charing Cross, ii. 300
Fagg, Thomas, of the “Bell and Crown,” Holborn, ii. 235
Gilbert, William, of the “Blossoms” Inn, Lawrence Lane, ii. 237
Goodman, S., of Brighton, ii. 102–5
Grey, Robert, of the “Bolt-in-Tun,” Fleet Street, ii. 237
Hearn, Joseph, of the “King’s Arms,” Snow Hill, ii. 237
Hine, ----, of Brighton, ii. 181
Horne, Benjamin Worthy, of the “Golden Cross,” Charing Cross,
ii. 15, 141, 208, 210–25
Horne, Henry, ii. 223
” William, ii. 210–13, 215
Jobson, J., of Shrewsbury, ii. 215, 307
Mountain, Mrs. Sarah Ann, of the “Saracen’s Head,” Snow Hill,
ii. 214, 236
Nelson, Mrs. Ann, of the “Bull” Inn, Whitechapel, i. 300;
ii. 227, 232–5, 236; ii. 313, 343
Nelson, John, ii. 235
” Robert, of the “Belle Sauvage,” Ludgate Hill, ii. 215,
229–35
Roberts, ----, of the “White Horse,” Fetter Lane, ii. 213
Rothwell, Nicholas, of Warwick, i. 80–85
Sherman, Edward, of the “Bull and Mouth,” St. Martin’s-le-Grand,
ii. 186, 207, 215, 216, 217, 226–8, 229, 231, 273–8
Shillibeer, George, i. 290–92
Taylor, Isaac, of Shrewsbury, ii. 215, 216, 307
Teather, Edward, of Carlisle, ii. 238
Tubb, J., i. 283–5
Waddell, of Birmingham, ii. 238
Ward, Charles, ii. 313–15
Waterhouse, William, of the “Swan with Two Necks,” Lad Lane, ii. 196
Webb, Frederic, of Bolton, ii. 238
Wetherald, J. & Co., of Manchester, ii. 238, 278
Whitchurch, Best & Wilkins, of Brighton, i. 312–15
Willans, Wm., of the “Bull and Mouth,” St. Martin’s-le-Grand,
ii. 227
Worcester, Marquis of (afterwards 7th Duke of Beaufort), ii. 101
Coach travelling, on the roof, described by Moritz, 1782, i. 99–102;
by mail, 1798, described by Boulton, i. 179;
passengers booked in advance, i. 321;
miseries of early morning, i. 325–32;
about 1750, described in _Roderick Random_, i. 333;
courtesies to ladies, 1714, i. 335;
romance of, i. 336;
severe test of a gentleman, i. 337;
humours of coach-dinners, i. 337–47;
coach-breakfasts, i. 347–51;
social gulf between inside and outside passengers, i. 351;
described by De Quincey, i. 351–3;
humour in, i. 353;
adventures described, i. 355;
savage idea of humour, i. 356–8;
practical joking, i. 357;
outside the most desirable place in summer, ii. 67;
in 1772, ii. 48–65;
in 1830, ii. 66–95;
miseries of, in winter, ii. 155–8, 169
“Comet” coaches, begin about 1811, i. 304–8
Commercial travellers, known successively as “riders,” “bagmen,”
“travellers,” “commercial gentlemen,”
“ambassadors of commerce,” and “representatives,”
i. 56;
come into existence about 1730, i. 118;
adventure of a, ii. 328
“Common stage-waggons,” a term specified by General Turnpike Act
of 1766, i. 204
Cornets-à-piston, popular with guards, i. 280
Cresset, John, denounces stage-coaches, 1662, i. 26, 70–74
Darwin, Dr. Erasmus, prophesies railways and balloons, ii. 260, 282
“Derby Dilly,” the, i. 289
Dickens, Charles, on coach booking-offices, i. 322;
on miseries of early morning travelling, i. 325–32;
on coaching prints, ii. 110;
Christmas stories, ii. 162;
at the “Bull,” Whitechapel, ii. 234
Diligences, a species of Light Post-Coach, i. 160, 287–92;
originally fast, and carried three inside passengers only, i. 287;
became slow, i. 288–90;
Shillibeer’s Brighton Diligence, i. 290–92
“Double Horse,” the, i. 53
Eliot, George, foreshadows tube railways, ii. 282–5
Elizabeth, Queen, suffers from riding in carriage, i. 5;
prefers riding horseback, i. 5
Fares, by stage-coach, a shilling for every five miles, 1684, i. 79;
London and Bath, £1 5s., 1667, i. 69;
Bath Flying Machine, 3d. a mile, 1667, i. 69;
London and Oxford, 12s., 1669, i. 71;
10s., 1671, i. 71;
Liverpool Flying Machine, about 2½d. a mile, 1758, i. 93;
reduced in competition on Brighton Road, 1762, i. 284;
in competition with railways, 1838, ii. 273;
Shrewsbury and London Long Coach, 18s., 1753, i. 95;
Shrewsbury and London Caravan, 15s., 1750, i. 119;
Shrewsbury and London Stage, inside, £1 1s., 1753, i. 119;
Shrewsbury and London Machine, inside, 30s., 1764, i. 120;
Newcastle and London, 1772, ii. 63;
1830, ii. 67, 95;
reduced all round, 1834, ii. 187
Fares, Short stages, ii. 189
” Waggon, from ½d. to 1d. a mile, i. 69, 139;
½d. a mile, or 1s. a day, i. 120, 131
Floods, ii. 165–70
Fly Boats, i. 140; ii. 130
” Vans, London and Falmouth, 1820, i. 136–9
“Flying Coach,” the first, 1669, i. 69
“Flying Machines,” the first, 1667, i. 68;
described, i. 68–93, 283–5
Flying Stage-waggon, London and Shrewsbury, in 5 days, 1750, i. 118
Gamon, Sir Richard, legislates on coaching, i. 206–8
Gay, John, the Poet, his _Journey to Exeter_, 1715, i. 28–33
Goods, carriage of, by pack-horses, i. 106–111; ii. 124;
by sledges, called “Truckamucks,” i. 107;
pack-horses partly replaced by waggons about 1730, i. 117;
cost of carriage, 1750, i. 135;
by road and canal, about 1830, i. 140;
carrying firms, ii. 123–43, 207–10
Guards, generally, “shoulder” fares and “swallow” passengers,
ii. 200–203
Guards of mails, not to fire off blunderbusses unnecessarily, i. 209;
servants of General Post Office, i. 249;
gross excesses of early, i. 250–52;
Post Office responsible for excesses, i. 251;
how armed and equipped, i. 251–60;
extravagant behaviour restricted, i. 252;
appointments eagerly sought, i. 252;
salary small, 10s. 6d. weekly, i. 253;
“tips” render appointments valuable, i. 253;
illegal purveyors of game, i. 254;
trusted and confidential messengers, i. 255;
as smugglers, i. 256;
bravery of, and devotion to duty, i. 256;
number of, i. 256;
responsibilities of, i. 258;
purveyors of news, i. 259;
their duties, i. 261;
instructions to, i. 262;
prosperity of, i. 262;
position poor on cross-country mails, i. 263;
salaries raised, 1842, i. 263;
forbidden to play key-bugle, i. 280;
devoted to duty, ii. 160;
rashness of, ii. 165
Guards of mails:--
Couldery, --, i. 265; ii. 120
Kent, Luke, ii. 319
Murrell, “Cocky,” i. 271
Nobbs, Moses J., i. 264–71; ii. 119
Guards of stage-coaches, i. 272–81;
stages not always provided with, i. 272;
versatile accomplishments of, i. 273;
annual festivities of, i. 275–8;
snowbound at Dunchurch, ii. 162
Guards of stage-coaches:--
Faulkner, Francis, ii. 320
Goodwin, Jack, ii. 162
Hadley, Robert, i. 274, 276
Lord, Joe, ii. 152
Russell, Thomas, i. 281
Young, George, i. 273
Guide-posts obligatory, 1690, i. 112
Gurney, Sir Goldsworthy, inventor of steam-carriages, ii. 261–5, 285
Hackney coaches, denounced by Taylor, i. 9;
established 1605, i. 9–13
“Hammercloth,” derivation of the term, i. 68, 97
Hancock, Walter, inventor of steam-carriages, ii. 261, 264–8, 285
Hazlett, Robert, highwayman, ii. 53
Highwaymen, the, i. 85, 116, 120–23, 157, 186, 332–5; ii. 53, 59–61,
144–50, 326, 327–9
Hobson, Thomas, the Cambridge carrier, i. 65, 103–5, 205; ii. 124
Hoby, Sir Thos., sets up a carriage, 1566, i. 4
Horsemen, the, i. 14–56
Horses, generally six to a coach until about 1783–90, i. 85, 86, 90;
usually same horses from beginning to end of journey until
1734, i. 63, 87;
the “Double Horse,” i. 53;
“parliamentary horse,” i. 218;
fast coaches wear horses out quickly, 1824, ii. 173;
average price paid for, 1824, ii. 176;
system of working improved, 1824, ii. 176;
bad-tempered, bought cheap, ii. 177
Informers, i. 213–18
Inns (mentioned at length):--
Bell and Crown, Holborn, ii. 235
Belle Sauvage, Ludgate Hill, i. 323, 324; ii. 229, 237
Blossoms, Lawrence Lane, ii. 185, 229, 237
Boar and Castle, Oxford Street, ii. 189
Bolt-in-Tun, Fleet Street, ii. 215, 237
Bull, Whitechapel, i. 324; ii. 227, 232–5, 343
Bull and Mouth, St. Martin’s-le-Grand, i. 323, 324; ii. 67, 68, 147,
178, 214, 215, 226, 231, 273, 277
Four Crosses, Willoughby, i. 46
George, Huntingdon, ii. 74
Golden Cross, Charing Cross, i. 322, 323, 324, 329; ii. 210,
213, 214
Goose and Gridiron, St. Paul’s Churchyard, ii. 189, 296
Green Man and Still, Oxford Street, ii. 190
Hardwicke Arms, Arrington Bridge, ii. 73
King’s Arms, Snow Hill, ii. 237
Lion, Shrewsbury, ii. 215
Old Bell, Holborn, ii. 190, 282
Pelican, Speenhamland, ii. 340, 343
Saracen’s Head, Snow Hill, i. 324; ii. 67, 214, 236
Swan with Two Necks, Lad Lane, i. 323, 324; ii. 178, 195–9, 204, 228
Talbot, Shrewsbury, ii. 215
Three Tuns, Durham, ii. 340
Wheatsheaf, Rushyford Bridge, ii. 94
Winterslow Hut, ii. 151
“Journey,” original meaning of word, i. 107
Key-bugles, popular with guards, i. 279–81
Legislation, i. 194–220
Long coaches (an intermediate class of vehicle, between stage-coaches
and waggons), i. 95, 119, 210, 286
Long Coach, Birmingham and Shrewsbury, 1753, 3½ days to London, i. 119
“Machines” introduced 1667, i. 68;
the term in general use about 1740, i. 69, 120, 282;
a favourite term, i. 286
Mail-coaches--_see_ “Coaches: Mail-coaches”
Mary, Queen, her State Coach, 1553, i. 3
Matthews’ Patent Safety Coach, i. 312
Milton, Rev. W., inventor of Patent Safety Coach, 1805, i. 309; ii. 96
Motor-cars, early (1823–38), ii. 260–68;
modern, ii. 285–9, 347
Northumberland, Earl of, sets up a carriage, 1619, i. 8
Nunn, James, buyer of horses for Chaplin, ii. 204–7
Old-time travellers:--
Brome, Rev.--, tour of, 1700, ii. 333
Calderwood, Mrs., of Bolton and Coltness, 1756, ii. 334
Cary, Robert, rides from London to Edinburgh, 1603, i. 16
Charles VI., Emperor, visits Petworth, ii. 332
Clarendon, Henry, Earl of, travels from Chester to Holyhead, 1685,
i. 21
Cobbett, Richard, rides horseback, i. 55;
on coaches, ii. 181
Denmark, Prince George of, visits Petworth, ii. 332
De Quincey, Thomas, on contempt of inside passengers for outsides,
i. 210, 351–3;
prefers outside of coaches, ii. 67
Dugdale, Sir William, mentions Birmingham coach of 1697, i. 77
Fiennes, Celia, in Lancashire, 1691, surprised at finding
sign-posts, i. 115
Gay, John (the poet) _A Journey to Exeter_, 1715, i. 28–33
Hawker, Col., on travelling in 1812, i. 245;
on cost of journey, London to Glasgow, 1812, ii. 1–3, 4;
on “Bull and Mouth” inn, 1812, ii. 227
Johnson, Dr., i. 52–3
Macready, William C. (the actor), on incredibly slow journey,
Liverpool to London, 1811, i. 294
Moritz, Rev. C. H., on miseries of outside passengers, 1782,
i. 98–102
Murray, Rev. James, describes a journey from Newcastle-on-Tyne to
London, 1772, ii. 48–65
Parker, Edward, on miseries of coach journey from Preston,
Lancashire, 1662, i. 25–63
Pepys, Samuel, often loses the road, i. 112
Somerset, Dukes of, and Petworth, ii. 332
Sopwith, Thomas, on discontinuance of York Mail, ii. 39
Sorbière, Samuel de, on waggoners, 1663, i. 127
Swift, Jonathan, Dean, his couplets for inn signs on Penmaenmawr,
i. 21;
on horseback journey, Chester to London, 1710, i. 33, 73;
on journey London to Holyhead and Dublin, 1726, i. 33;
diary of journey, London to Holyhead, 1727, i. 34–47;
epigram at Willoughby, i. 46;
travels by stage-waggon, i. 132;
on travelling, ii. 330
Taylor, John (the “Water Poet”), travels to Southampton,
1648, i. 58–60
Thoresby, Ralph, travels by York stage to London, 1683, i. 27, 73;
finds the Hull to York stage discontinued for winter season,
1678, i. 74;
going horseback, often misses his way, i. 112;
describes custom of treating lady passengers in coaches,
1714, i. 335;
on spring festivities, 1714, ii. 346
Wesley, John, generally travelled horseback, i. 47;
describes his adventures, i. 47–52;
finds unpleasant company in a coach, i. 293
Omnibuses, displace “short stages,” ii. 193;
“Wellington,” Stratford and Westbourne Grove, ii. 235;
of Richmond Conveyance Co., ii. 296
Outside passengers first heard of, and probable origin of carrying,
i. 95;
miseries of, i. 98–102;
first provided with seats, i. 181;
treated with contempt by inside passengers, i. 210, 351–3; ii. 181
Pack-horses, i. 106–9, 111, 118;
partly replaced by waggons about 1730, i. 117;
pack-horse trains, ii. 124
Palmer, John, Post Office reformer, account of, i. 148–80 (Appendix,
Vol. I., p. 359);
proposes a service of mail-coaches, i. 155;
plan for, matured 1782, i. 156;
establishes first mail-coach, 1784, i. 158;
proposes to extend system to France, i. 163;
appointed Comptroller-General 1786, i. 164;
contentions with Postmasters-General, i. 165–72;
his character, i. 166;
betrayed by Bonnor, i. 168;
dismissed, i. 172;
grant to, i. 173;
death of, i. 174;
ancestry of, Appendix, Vol. I., p. 359;
descendants, 359
“Parliamentary Horse,” the, i. 218
“Patent Safety” coaches, i. 309–16; ii. 109
Pepys, Samuel, sets up a carriage, 1668, i. 11;
in travelling, often loses the road, i. 112
“Pickaxe” team, _i.e._ three horses, ii. 270
Pickford & Co., i. 139; ii. 123–43, 208
” Matthew, ii. 125–7
” Thomas, ii. 125–7
Poor people, how they travelled, i. 115, 131–3, 139;
find it cheaper to go by rail, i. 144
Postboys, _i.e._ mail-carriers, i. 146, 152;
went toll-free, ii. 5
Postes, Master of the, i. 14
Post-horses, State monopoly of, i. 14–23;
monopoly abolished, 1780, i. 23;
mileage charges for, i. 15;
increased, i. 18
Postmaster-General, office of created, 1657, i. 18
Postmasters, _i.e._ keepers of post-horses, i. 15–18, 147
“Post Office of England” created, 1657, i. 17;
re-established, 1660, i. 22
Post Office, General, i. 14–19, 20, 22–4, 46–180;
declines Hancock’s offer to convey mails by steam-carriage, ii. 268
Railways:--
Mails first carried by, 1830, ii. 16;
authorised to convey mails, 1838, ii. 16;
run York coaches off road, 1840, ii. 39;
run waggons off, ii. 138;
threaten coaching, ii. 208;
projected railways criticised, 1838, ii. 209;
ruin the early steam-carriages, ii. 268;
ridiculed, 1837, ii. 268;
cut up the coach routes, ii. 270–74;
bad service of trains, 1838, ii. 274;
insolence of officials, ii. 274–7;
public dissatisfaction with, 1838, ii. 274–7;
tube railways foreshadowed by George Eliot, ii. 282–5
Grand Junction, ii. 141, 274
Highland, ii. 40
Liverpool and Manchester, ii. 16, 96, 138
London and Birmingham (now London and North-Western), ii. 141, 208,
222–5, 273, 278
London and Manchester, ii. 16, 96, 138
London and Southampton (now London and South-Western), ii. 17,
36, 209, 299
Metropolitan extended to Aylesbury 1892, ii. 281
North British, ii. 40
“Ride and Tie,” custom of, i. 54
Rippon, Walter, carriage-maker to Queen Mary, i. 4
Roads, bad state of, 1568, i. 5;
dreadful condition in North Wales in eighteenth century, i. 20–22;
Exeter Road described in 1752 as “dreadful,” i. 91;
first General Highway Act, 1555, i. 106;
mere tracks and unenclosed, 1739, i. 111;
not safe for solitary travellers, i. 115;
gradually improve from 1700, i. 117;
growth of heavy traffic cuts them up, i. 123;
ignorance of road-surveyors, i. 123;
legislation to protect, 1760, i. 123–6;
1622–29, 194–6;
1752, i. 199–202;
General Turnpike Act, 1766, i. 202–5;
improve generally, ii. 3;
shocking state of, between Carlisle and Glasgow, 1812, ii. 4;
wear and tear of, by mails, ii. 4–9;
and early steam-carriages, ii. 262;
vulgarised by modern “improvements,” ii. 326;
terrible state of, in Sussex, ii. 332;
picturesqueness of, threatened by coming changes, ii. 347
Robberies from coaches, ii. 144–50
“Rumble-tumble,” i. 96, 97, 99;
miseries of travelling in the, i. 101, 139
Rutland, Earl of, sets up a carriage, 1555
Shillibeer, George, his “Brighton Diligence,” i. 290–92;
his omnibuses, ii. 193
Short stages, the, ii. 188–93
“Short Tommy,” the, ii. 175
“Shouldering,” _i.e._ stealing, fares, ii. 200–203
Sign-posts obligatory, 1690, i. 112
Silver, Anthony, carriage-maker to Queen Mary, i. 3
Smollett, Tobias, i. 108, 110;
on travelling in 1748, i. 115–17, 334
Snowstorms, i. 261, 264–9; ii. 137, 157, 159–62, 166–9
Stage-coaches--_see_ “Coaches: stage-coaches”
Stage-waggons, established about 1500, i. 2: _see_ “Waggons”
Steam-carriages, 1823–38, ii. 217, 260–68
Sunday, a day of rest, i. 29, 90
” Trading Acts, i. 196–9; ii. 148
“Swallowing,” _i.e._ stealing, fares, ii. 200–203
Talbot, the old English hound, i. 109
“Tantivy,” meaning of the word, ii. 185
“Tantivy Trot,” coaching song, ii. 185
Telegraph coaches established, from about 1781, i. 300–303
Telegraph springs introduced, ii. 228
“Tipping,” origin and progress of, i. 228–30;
of mail-guards, i. 253, 262;
forbidden, i. 263;
of coachmen, i. 345; ii. 1
_Tom Brown’s Schooldays_, i. 347
“Travel,” origin of the word, i. 107
“Truckamuck,” a kind of sledge, i. 107
Turnpike Acts, growth of, 1700–1770, i. 117;
penalise narrow and encourage broad wheels, i. 124–6, 202–205;
General Turnpike Act, 1766, i. 202–205
Turnpike keepers, i. 24, 208, 212;
prosecuted by informers, i. 217;
sleepy, ii. 79
Turnpike roads, not in favour with waggoners, i. 126
Turnpike tolls, i. 124;
levied on waggons, i. 200–205;
doubled on Sundays about 1780, ii. 147;
heavy discriminatory charges against steam-carriages, ii. 262, 263
Turnpike Trusts, grievances of, against Post Office, ii. 4–9;
action of, against steam-carriages, ii. 262, 263
“Unicorn” team, _i.e._ three horses, ii. 270
Van, origin of the name, ii. 129
Van proprietors:--
Chaplin & Horne, ii. 209, 229
Pickford & Co., i. 123–43
Russell & Co., i. 136–9
Van proprietors prosecuted for technical offences, i. 216
Vidler & Parratt, mail-coach manufacturers, i. 178; ii. 17, 18, 44
Waggons, i. 103–45;
established about 1500, i. 103;
increase in number and weight about 1760, i. 123;
legislation directed against 1766, i. 124–6, 202–204;
only disappear so late as 1860, i. 144;
four-wheeled waggons forbidden 1622, i. 194;
loads over 20 cwt. forbidden 1622, i. 195;
restrictions on teams, i. 195–200;
on loads, i. 200
Waggoners, character of the, i. 126–31;
forbidden to ride on their waggons, i. 205;
preyed upon by informers, i. 212–14
Waude, ----, coach-builder, ii. 16, 43–7, 228
Weller, Tony, as typical coachman, i. 221
Witherings, Thomas, Master of the Postes, i. 17
Yard-porters, status of, ii. 178
York, James, Duke of, sets up a “glass coach,” 1661, i. 11, 66
_Printed by Hazett, Watson & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury._
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant
preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation marks
remedied.
Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained; occurrences of
inconsistent hyphenation have not been changed.
Index not checked for proper alphabetization or correct page references.
The symbol on page 278 is a hand, pointing to the right (“white
right-pointing index”).
Shillings and pence abbreviations (s. and d.) were italicized in the
original book but, for readability, that is not indicated here. Other
italicized text is enclosed in _underscores_.
Volume I is available at Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org)
as eBook number 58667 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/58667).