Hackney coach

“ What an interesting book a hackney-coach might produce, if it could carry as much in its head as it does in its body! The autobiography of a broken-down hackney-coach, would surely be as amusing as the autobiography of a broken-down hackneyed dramatist ”

“ Our acquaintance with hackney-coach stands is of long standing. We are a walking book of fares, feeling ourselves, half bound, as it were, to be always in the right on contested points. We know all the regular watermen within three miles of Covent-garden by sight, and should be almost tempted to believe that all the hackney-coach horses in that district knew us by sight too, if one-half of them were not blind. We take great interest in hackney-coaches, but we seldom drive, having a knack of turning ourselves over when we attempt to do so. ”

“ Thou hast contained as many different passions in thee as a human heart; and for the sake of the human heart, old body, thou art venerable. Thou shalt be as respectable as a reduced old gentleman, whose very slovenliness is pathetic. Thou shalt be made gay, as he is over a younger and richer table, and thou shalt be still more touching for the gaiety.
We wish the hackney-coachman were as interesting a machine as either his coach or horses ”

“ We have been frequently amused with the intense delight with which ‘a servant of all work,’ who is sent for a coach, deposits herself inside; and the unspeakable gratification which boys, who have been despatched on a similar errand, appear to derive from mounting the box. But we never recollect to have been more amused with a hackney-coach party, than one we saw early the other morning in Tottenham-court-road. ”

“ Take a regular, ponderous, rickety, London hackney-coach of the old school, and let any man have the boldness to assert, if he can, that he ever beheld any object on the face of the earth which at all resembles it, unless, indeed, it were another hackney-coach of the same date. ”

“ 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 find his plunder too ponderous for his hands, the hackney coach offers its services, and is one of the most expert conveyances. ”

“ Hackney coaches drawl, and cabriolets make their way, and jostle each other, and private carriages swiftly roll, and draw up to the box door with a vigorous sweep, which the horses of hired vehicles are too aged, or too low in condition to achieve. Within a hundred yards of either playhouse, hands are continually thrust into each coach window, with “a bill of the play,” and repeated cries of “only a penny!” ”

“ The grenadiers could not keep back the people; one unlucky hackney coach that stopped for a moment was instantly covered with men, who clambered on the spokes of the wheels, and on the roof, and on the box, swarming on it like ants, so that the coachman, unable to drive on without becoming a murderer, was forced to wait quietly where he was. ”

“ We have recently observed on certain stands, and we say it with deep regret, rather dapper green chariots, and coaches of polished yellow, with four wheels of the same colour as the coach, whereas it is perfectly notorious to every one who has studied the subject, that every wheel ought to be of a different colour, and a different size. These are innovations, and, like other miscalled improvements, awful signs of the restlessness of the public mind, and the little respect paid to our time-honoured institutions. Why should hackney-coaches be clean? ”

“ His love also? That must be judged on the consequences.
“It is time for us to start for Cavendish Square, Emma, and the hackney coach waits,” says Greville, alert and clean-shaven, one bright May morning. “Romney is to study you for Circe to-day. Bring the white robe he desired.”
A fair dishevelled head looks round the door with dismay in its eyes.
“What, not ready yet? ’Tis most inconsiderate in you, especially when you are aware the coachman charges for his time. I hate unpunctuality.” ”

“ The stage-coachman likes the boys on the road, because he knows they admire him. The hackney-coachman knows that they cannot admire him, and that they can get up behind his coach, which makes him very savage. ”

“ That gentleman and lady have called to a coachman to take them home; and the waterman, who attends on hackney-coaches and their employers, seems to be enquiring where they are going. We would recommend every person who hires a hackney coach in London, to notice what number is on the door, which, on many occasions, has been found very useful. ”

“ To the office late, and then home to bed. It struck me very deep this afternoon going with a hackney coach from my Lord Treasurer’s down Holborne, the coachman I found to drive easily and easily, at last stood still, and come down hardly able to stand, and told me that he was suddenly struck very sicke, and almost blind, he could not see; so I ‘light and went into another coach, with a sad heart for the poor man and trouble for myself, lest he should have been struck with the plague, being at the end of the towne that I took him up; but God have mercy upon us all! ”

“ His man should get her a coach and go with her. And the coach being at the door of the hotel, Amelia made George a little disappointed curtsey after looking vainly into his face once or twice, and went sadly down the great staircase, Captain Dobbin after, who handed her into the vehicle, and saw it drive away to its destination. The very valet was ashamed of mentioning the address to the hackney-coachman before the hotel waiters, and promised to instruct him when they got further on. ”

“ There certainly may be some excuse made for those who dislike hackney coaches pulling up at their doors, when we look at the disgusting turn-outs of the London stands, at one time filled with drunken men and women, at others carrying diseased people to the hospital, or dead bodies to the Surgeons’ Hall. An English hackney coach is a type of misery, as regards the horses’ outsides, and a cloaca within ”

“ In the Diary of Sir William Dugdale we find records of his journeys by stage coaches between 1659 and 1680, to the towns of Norwich, Coventry, Chester, St Albans, Bedford, and Birmingham during the reign of Charles II.
Hackney coaches were first used in England in 1605 [Plates 13, 14, and 22] . These were similar to the coaches used by the gentry; at first they did not ply for hire in the streets, but remained at the hiring-yards until they were wanted. As, however, many more persons wished to hire than could afford to keep a coach of their own, the demand increased rapidly. ”

“ Frail.—Pooh, here’s a clutter!—Why should it reflect upon you?—I don’t doubt but you have thought yourself happy in a hackney coach before now. If I had gone to Knightsbridge, or to Chelsea, or to Spring Garden, or Barn Elms, with a man alone—something might have been said. ”

“ 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. ”

“ That said, and in the hope of something or other, either that he should see the man emerge or other men enter, he posted himself on the watch behind a heap of rubbish, with the patient rage of a pointer.
The hackney-coach, which regulated all its movements on his, had, in its turn, halted on the quay above him, close to the parapet. The coachman, foreseeing a prolonged wait, encased his horses' muzzles in the bag of oats which is damp at the bottom, and which is so familiar to Parisians, to whom, be it said in parenthesis, the Government sometimes applies it. ”

“ Many of these were the old coaches of the nobility and gentry, and it is not until 1790 that we hear from Mr Felton that the hackney coaches were generally built of a smaller size, and much shorter in the under carriage than those of the gentry. Their hire appears to have been very moderate, to judge by the records of Dean Swift, who resided in London for three years in the days of Queen Anne (1710 to 1713) , and who made frequent use of hackney coaches, and on wet days did not venture out without a coach or a sedan chair. ”

“ There were no side walks for foot-passengers in those days, and thus the standing coach might be so placed as to block the entrance to a shop.
Mons. Misson has the following passage concerning the hackney coachman; it is interesting as an illustration of contemporary manners:—
“If a coachman has a dispute about his fare with a gentleman that has hired him, and the gentleman offers to fight him to decide the quarrel, the coachman consents with all his heart. ”

“ Maitland.
124Hackney Coach Office, in Surry street in the Strand, was erected according to an act of parliament passed in the year 1696, for licensing hackney coaches and chairs, and to put them under the government of five Commissioners, who have a salary of 150l. a year each. The number of coaches is limited to eight hundred; out of which two hundred are to ply every Sunday in their turn, on the forfeiture of 5l. for every coachman who plies out of his turn. ”

“ 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. ”

“ He drives a hackney-coach, and I use his stable every other morning. Me an’ my missus live out at Hendon, and I come in three nights a week.”
“But you mustn’t saddle these people with me. Let me get down at once!”
“Mustn’t I?” chuckled the waggoner. “I’ll take the blame then. We’re very near there; and dashed if that isn’t Jim on his way home to breakfast. Jim! Jim!”
And a hackney-coach, crawling leisurely along in front, was pulled up as the coachman turned round and recognised Butterfield. ”

“ Those often get good prizes left in their coaches, by people who carelessly leave their boxes or parcels behind, in the hurry to meet their friends; or what is more general, those who take out their papers, money, pocket-book, &c. to look over in a hackney coach, in order, as they thiuk, to save time, too often leave some part behind them; or, by the motion of the coach get it jostled out ef their hands. At no time has a hackney man been known to restore to its rightful owner such things as may have been so left, at the earliest opportunity, nor unless a handsome reward is offered. ”

“ The ordinary hackney coaches do not seem to have been provided with glasses. 'For want of Glasses to our Coach, having drawn up our Tin Sashes, pink'd like the bottom of a Cullender, that the Air might pass thro' the holes, and defend us from Stifling.'
By the 5 & 6 Will. and Mary, cap. 22, the number of hackney coaches was fixed at 700, and a tax was imposed of 4l. per annum each, 1l. to be paid every quarter day, besides a fine of 50l. for their first licence for 21 years; and 8l. per annum on stage coaches. ”

“ Prejudice against this most useful class of persons is strong, and it is only fair to record an instance of integrity which, after all, is as general, perhaps, among hackneymen, as among those who ride in their coaches.
Honesty Rewarded.—A circumstance took place on Tuesday, (July 4, 1826,) which cannot be made too generally known among hackney-coachmen, and persons who use those vehicles.
A gentleman took a coach in St. Paul’s churchyard, about twenty minutes before twelve, and was set down in Westminster exactly at noon. ”

“ We therefore grant to you [the Marquis] during your Life, the Power and Authority to license Fifty Hackney Coachmen, [292] who shall keep no more than Twelve good Horses each, for their, or any of their, Coach and Coaches respectively. You also hereby have Power to license so many in other Cities and Towns of England as in your wisdom shall be thought necessary; with power to restrain and prohibit all others from keeping any Hackney Coach to let to hire, either in London or elsewhere. ”

“ 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 doubt many of these hackney carriages had formerly been the private property of gentlemen, which when old and shabby were sold cheaply to ply for hire in the streets.
Coaches with boots were being replaced by the improved “glass coach” a few years later, and of course the relative merits of the old and new styles of vehicle were weighed by all who were in the habit of using hackney coaches. It was one of the old kind to which Pepys refers in the following passage:—
August 23, 1667. ”

“ Why should we, with a feverish wish to ‘keep moving,’ desire to roll along at the rate of six miles an hour, while they were content to rumble over the stones at four? These are solemn considerations. Hackney-coaches are part and parcel of the law of the land ”