Hackney cab

“ Though on the principle of "Hear both sides," we have no objection to allow even the hoarse voice of a cab-driver to address itself to the polite ears of the public on the great question of Cab Reform, we must protest against many, if not all, of the positions taken up and set down by the editor of the New Hackney Carriage Act, in the following edition of that useful measure. We have not taken the trouble to answer the arguments of the unlearned annotator, inasmuch as we feel it to be quite unnecessary; for every one will see at a glance what the cabman is driving at. ”

“ In 1836, hackney-coaches, "outrigger" cabriolets, and back-door cabs were still plying for hire, but the immediate and continued success of Chapman's cab prompted the proprietors of those decaying vehicles to start similar conveyances. Cabs painted and lettered in close imitation of the new patented vehicle were soon as plentiful as the real ones. Some proprietors who prided themselves on being very smart, always had the word "not" painted in very small letters before the inscription, "Hansom's Patent Safety," believing that this would save then from being prosecuted. ”

“ His cabriolet was gorgeously painted—a bright red; and wherever we went, City or West End, Paddington or Holloway, North, East, West, or South, there was the red cab, bumping up against the posts at the street corners, and turning in and out, among hackney-coaches, and drays, and carts, and waggons, and omnibuses, and contriving by some strange means or other, to get out of places which no other vehicle but the red cab could ever by any possibility have contrived to get into at all. Our fondness for that red cab was unbounded. ”

“ It was registered under the Friendly Societies Acts in July, 1878, and in January, 1887, its title was changed to the “Hackney Carriage Proprietors’ Provident Institution.” For an annual subscription of £1 1s. a member is able to make provision against misfortune. Many a cab proprietor has, through no fault of his own, been reduced from comfortable circumstances to want. One of his horses may have contracted glanders in consequence of the driver foolishly permitting it to drink at a public trough; the disease spreads through his stables and a number of his horses have to be destroyed. ”

“ To be able to travel cheaply and quickly was a pleasing novelty to Londoners, but many of them lived to regret having trusted themselves in a cab, for the drivers, proud of being able to pass hackney and private coaches, were fond of showing the superior speed, and while doing so frequently ran against street posts or collided with other vehicles; and when either of these things happened, or the horse fell, the "fare" was usually pitched forward into the road. This danger, coupled with the difficulty of climbing into a cab, prevented old men and women from patronising the new vehicle. ”

“ The act of 1869 defined a hackney carriage as any carriage for the conveyance of passengers which plies for hire within the metropolitan police district and is not a stage coach, i.e. a conveyance in which the passengers are charged separate and distinct fares for their seats. Every cab must be licensed by a licence renewable every year by the home secretary, the licence being issued by the commissioner of police. ”

“ The coachman rode his horse, postillion fashion, and used whip and spurs. There was constant rivalry between the chairmen of the sedans and coachmen of that age, and good-humoured chaff and jeers were bandied from one to another as freely as between the omnibus drivers and chauffeurs of motor cars to-day.
Many transformations have taken place since the first hackney carriage plied for hire in 1615 and the advent of the first public motor cab at Hyde Park Corner in 1906. ”

“ With their advantages of greater speed and carrying capacity over the horsed vehicles, their introduction was a most important development, though their working at first imposed a severe financial strain on many companies.
Cabs.—The horse-drawn cabs which ply for hire in the streets, or wait at authorized “cab-stands,” are of two kinds, the “hansom,” a two-wheeled vehicle so named after its inventor (1834) and the “four-wheeler.” “Hackney coaches” for hire are first mentioned in 1625, when they were kept at inns, and numbered 20. ”

“ In official language, an omnibus is “a Metropolitan Stage-carriage,” and a “cab” a “Metropolitan Hackney” one: the legal distinction being that the stage-carriages pursue a given route, and the passengers are mixed, while the fare is fixed by the proprietor; whereas the hackney-carriage plies for hire at an appointed “stand,” carries no one but the party hiring it, and the fare for so doing is regulated by law. It is an offence for the omnibus to stand still and ply for hire, whereas the driver of the cab is liable to be punished if he ply for hire while his vehicle is moving. ”

“ It would not cost £2, it would save endless altercations, it would save typographying a table of hackney-coach fares, it would save a man’s money and temper, and go far towards saving the souls of hackney-coachmen born, or to be born—and the trouble of the commissioners. Our invention is the best of all possible inventions, and therefore it will not be adopted.”
“Jehu” did not make a mistake—his suggestion was not adopted, and hackney-coachmen, soured by the rivalry of the newly introduced omnibuses and cabs, became more extortionate and abusive than ever they had been. ”

“ A writer in the Monthly Magazine gives a less graphic but more denunciatory account of the hackney-coaches of that period.
“Nothing in nature or art can be so abominable as those vehicles at this hour. We are quite satisfied that, except an Englishman, who will endure anything, no native of any climate under the sky would endure a London hackney-coach ”

“ No person could obtain a licence to possess a hackney-coach unless he was recommended by a peer, a Member of Parliament, or some other influential being; consequently, a large number of hackney-coach proprietors were men who had been gentlemen’s servants. And in the interests of these men the hackney-coach business was not allowed to become overcrowded. The number of licence-plates issued never exceeded one thousand, in spite of the fact that, in the early part of last century, the public were complaining constantly that there were not sufficient hackney-coaches plying for hire. ”

“ A few proprietors, believing that the new vehicles were doomed to failure, kept their hackney-coaches in good repair and made it a rule to have respectable men for drivers, but these clean coaches were not numerous enough to prevent hackney-coaches as a body from being termed dirty and disreputable. ”

“ It is true that the vehicle has its merits, if variety of uses can establish them. The hackney-coach conveys alike the living and the dead. It carries the dying man to the hospital, and when doctors and tax-gatherers can tantalize no more, it carries him to Surgeons' Hall and qualifies him to assist the 'march of mind' by the section of body. If the midnight thief finds his plunder too ponderous for his hands, the hackney-coach offers its services, and is one of the most expert conveyances. ”

“ In 1711 Parliament once more altered the regulations concerning hackney-coaches. The annual tax of £4 was changed to a weekly one of five shillings, and the number of licences was increased to eight hundred. The fares which the hackney-coach men were authorised to charge were fixed at a shilling for one mile and a half, eighteenpence for two miles, and sixpence for every additional mile or portion of a mile.
Under the new regulations hackney-coaches enjoyed almost unbroken prosperity for over fifty years, and, on the whole, gave satisfaction to the public. ”

“ On the sides of four-wheelers were depicted strange monsters unknown to heraldry, zoology, or mythology. These were in imitation of the armorial bearings so conspicuous on the panels [Pg 228] of the old hackney-coaches, which, as already stated, were generally discarded family coaches.
In 1838, cabmen were compelled by Act of Parliament to take out a licence and wear a badge. On the day of the distribution of badges, many of the cabmen, attired in their best clothes, took a holiday. Some half a dozen of them walked along the Strand with their badges fixed conspicuously on their chests. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Frequently she summoned men who took what she offered without demur, for she had practically appointed herself an inspector of cabs and cabmen, and was as successful in discovering breaches of the hackney-carriage regulations as the most energetic paid official could have been. ”

“ At one time there was much discussion in England as to the desirability of legalizing on cabs the use of a mechanical fare-recorder such as, under the name of taximeter or taxameter, is in general use on the continent of Europe. It is now universal on hackney carriages propelled by mechanical means, and it has also extended largely to those drawn by animal power. ”

“ The police established useful regulations, by which the safety and cleanliness of these carriages were promoted; marks were affixed to them, by which they might be known; and young persons and women of the town were forbidden to use them192, &c.
A particular kind of hackney carriage, peculiar to the Parisians, in the opinion of some does no great honour to their urbanity. I mean the brouettes, called sometimes roulettes, and by way of derision vinaigrettes. The body of these is almost like that of our sedans, but rolls upon two low wheels, and is dragged forwards by men. ”

“ Mr. John Chapman, the projector of the Great Indian Peninsular Railway, was, when Mr. Hansom patented his cab, the secretary of the Safety Cabriolet and Two-wheel Carriage Company. He discovered quickly the weak points in Hansom’s cab, and, setting to work, invented a far superior one. The driver’s seat was placed at the back, the sliding window still in use was [Pg 220] introduced, and the framework under the body of the vehicle was constructed to rest on the ground when tilted forwards or backwards. A cranked axle passing under the body of the cab was also introduced. ”

“ As it is common for Persons on their Arrival in Town to take a Hackney Coach when they come on the Stones, in the Boot of which they generally deposit their Luggage, they should be cautious never to send the Coachman from his Box, to make an Enquiry, &c. for if he be absent a Minute his Fare will be in great danger of losing his Property, by some of the above Offenders, who attend at the Inns at the Entrance of the Town, in order to follow Hackney Coaches to the Places where they set down or stop, to watch an Opportunity to plunder. ”

“ Outside in the darkness, gray with whirling snowflakes, he saw the wet lamps of cabs shining, and he darted along the line of hansoms and coupés in frantic search for his own.
“Oh, there you are!” he panted, flinging his suit-case up to a snow-covered driver. “Do your best now; we’re late!” And he leaped into the dark coupé, slammed the door, and sank back on the cushions, turning up the collar of his heavy overcoat.
There was a young lady in the farther corner of the cab, buried to her nose in a fur coat. At intervals she shivered and pressed a fluffy muff against her face. ”

“ You never take a four-wheeler if you are alone, or if the party consists of only two persons. You must engage one if you have a trunk, but if you are going to catch a train or boat you had better allow a half hour’s margin.
The London cab service is the best and cheapest in the world. I say this, notwithstanding that I remember hiring a cab in Key West, in the Gulf of Mexico, for a{13} dime. But such cabs and such horses! The rate in a hansom is sixpence per mile for one or two persons, no fare less than one shilling (twenty-five cents) ”

“ It was mad work, and in that reeling, dizzy cab no man spoke. The sweep of the singing wind, the wild tattoo of beating trucks, the sullen whir of flying drivers was in their ears; while behind, the derrick crane, the tool car and the coaches writhed and wriggled, swayed and lurched, tearing at their couplings, bouncing on their trucks, jerking viciously as each slue took up the axle play, rolling, pitching crazily like cockleshells tossed on an angry sea. ”

“ The smart-liveried young chauffeur of the “taxi” is a strong contrast to the picturesque but decidedly gruff and untidy old driver, who for so long has figured conspicuously among the motley types of London.
A larger cab than the hansom, built like a brougham, came into use in 1836, and from that the familiar four-wheeled “growler” has developed,*362 *—backwards to a more remote ancestor, as some curious student of evolution might surmise. ”

“ If a man desired to ride through the streets at night unobserved, he did not hire an electric cab. And it does not follow that because a man wishes to escape notice that he is ashamed of being seen. But, as before stated, the electric cabs, or “humming birds,” as they were named by the cabmen, were well patronised while on the streets, and certainly it was not for want of support that they were withdrawn. Those indiarubber tyres which so constantly needed attention were no doubt the cause of their withdrawal. ”