Road Scrapings: Coaches and Coaching

CHAPTER I.. The Revival--Magazine Magnificence--Death of

The revival--Magazine magnificence--Death of coaching--Resurrection--Avoid powder--Does the post pull?--Summering hunters--The "Lawyer's Daughter"--An unexpected guest.

To their honour be it said, that there are noblemen and gentlemen in the land, who willingly devote time, energy, and money, to keep the dust flying from the wheels of the real old stage coach. The importance of driving well, and the pleasure derivable therefrom, are both enhanced by the moral duty and responsibility involved in directing a public conveyance. The journey once advertised forms a contract which is most religiously observed, and the punctuality and precision noticeable in the coaches of the revival are among their most commendable features.

This is fortunate--since elderly critics may still be seen, grouped around the door of the White Horse Cellars, prepared to institute invidious comparisons, and difficult to be won over to believe in anything but "the old times," when Sir Vincent Cotton and Brackenbury worked the "Brighton Age," when Lord Edward Thynne piloted the "Portsmouth Rocket," when "Gentleman Dean" waggoned the Bath mail, and a hundred minor celebrities glistened in the coaching sphere. Although the interval between these old coaching days and the revival was a long one, the connecting-link was never entirely broken. The "how to do it" has been handed down by some of the most brilliant coachmen of the age, gentle and simple, who, although the obituary shows their ranks to have been grievously thinned, are still warm supporters of the revival, and who, by their example and practice, have restored in an amateur form a system of coaching which is quite equal (if not a little superior) to anything in the olden times. Where so many excel it would be invidious to particularise, but I have seen the "Oxford," the "Portsmouth," the "Guildford," the "Brighton," the "Windsor," "St. Albans," and "Box Hill," as well as sundry other short coaches, leave the White Horse Cellars as perfectly appointed in every particular as anything the old coaching days could supply. Coaching in England had well-nigh died a natural death--ay, and, what is worse, been buried! Poor "Old Clarke" (supported by a noble duke, the staunchest patron of the road) fanned the last expiring spark with the "Brighton Age," until his health broke down and he succumbed. Another coach started against him on the opposite days by Kingston and Ewell, called the "Recherché" (a private venture), but it did not last even so long as the "Age." Here was the interval! The end of everything.

In 1868 a coach was started to Brighton called the "Old Times," the property of a company composed of all the élite of the coaching talent of the day. It proved a great success, and became very popular; especially, it may be added, among its own shareholders, who, being all coachmen, in turn aspired to the box--those who could, as well as those who only fancied they could. The initiated will at once understand how fatal this was to the comfort of every fresh team which came under their lash.

At the end of the coaching season (October 30th, 1868) the stock was sold, and realised two-thirds more than had been invested in it. The goodwill and a large portion of the stock were purchased by Chandos Pole, who was afterwards joined by the Duke of Beaufort and "Cherry Angel," and these gentlemen carried on the coach for three years.

The second coach started in the revival was one to Beckenham and Bromley, horsed and driven by Charles Hoare, who afterwards extended it to Tunbridge Wells. It was very well appointed, and justly popular. The ball once set rolling, coaching quickly became a mania. The railings of the White Horse Cellars were placarded with boards and handbills of all colours and dimensions: "A well-appointed four-horse coach will leave Hatchett's Hotel on such and such days, for nearly every provincial town within fifty miles of London."

From the 1st May to the 1st September the pavement opposite to the coach-office was crowded by all the "hossy" gentlemen of the period. Guards and professionals might be seen busy with the coach-ladders, arranging their passengers, especially attentive to those attired in muslin, who seemed to require as much coupling and pairing as pigeons in a dovecot. Knots of gentlemen discussed the merits of this or that wheeler or leader, till, reminded by the White Horse clock that time was up, they took a cursory glance at their way-bills, and, mounting their boxes, stole away to the accompaniment of "a yard of tin."

A well-loaded coach with a level team properly handled, is an object which inspires even the passing crowd with a thrill of pleasurable approbation, if not a tiny atom of envy. Whyte Melville contended that a lady could never look so well as in a riding-habit and properly mounted. Other authorities incline to the fact that the exhilarating effect produced by riding upon a drag, coupled with the opportunity of social conversation and repartee, enhances, if possible, the charms of female attractiveness. Be this as it may, when the end of a journey is reached, the universal regret of the lady passengers is, not that the coachman has driven too quickly, but that the journey is not twice as long as it is. Interesting as the animated scene in Piccadilly during the summer months may be to those who have a taste for the road, there is another treat in store for the coaching man, afforded by a meet of the drags at the Magazine during the London season on special days, of which notice is given. We do not stop to inquire if the coach was built in Oxford Street, Park Street, Piccadilly, or Long Acre; whether the harness was made by Merry or Gibson; whether the team had cost a thousand guineas or two hundred pounds, but we say that the display of the whole stands unequalled and unrivalled by the rest of the world. This unbounded admiration and approval do not at all deteriorate from the merits of the well-appointed four-horse coaches leaving Piccadilly every morning (Sundays excepted), as there is as much difference between a stage-coach and a four-in-hand as there is between a mirror and a mopstick.

Horses for a road-coach should have sufficient breeding to insure that courage and endurance which enable them to travel with ease to themselves at the pace required, and if they are all of one class, or, as old Jack Peer used to say, "all of a mind," the work is reduced to a minimum. Whereas, horses for the parade at the Magazine must stand sixteen hands; and, when bitted and beared up, should not see the ground they stand upon. They must have action enough to kill them in a twelve-mile stage with a coach, even without a Shooter's Hill in it.

I do not say this in any spirit of disparagement of the magnificent animals provided by the London dealers at the prices which such animals ought to command.

I may here remind my patient reader that unless the greatest care and vigilance is exercised in driving these Magazine teams, it is three to one in favour of one horse, one showy impetuous favourite, doing all the work, whilst the other three are running behind their collars, because they dare not face their bits. It's a caution to a young coachman, and spoils all the pleasure of the drive. "He's a good match in size, colour, and action, but he pulls me off the box; I've tried a tight curb and nose-band, a high port, a gag, all in vain! If I keep him and he must pull, let him pull the coach instead of my fingers; run a side-rein through his own harness-terret to his partner's tug."

No amount of driving power or resin will prevent one "borer" from pulling the reins through your fingers. I hereby utterly condemn the use of anything of the sort. If your reins are new, they can be educated in the harness-room; but the rendering them sticky with composition entirely prevents the driver from exercising the "give and take" with the mouths of his team which is the key to good coachmanship. Let the back of the left hand be turned well down, the fingers erect; let the whip-hand act occasionally as a pedal does to a pianoforte, and, rely upon it, you are better without resin.

Whyte Melville, in his interesting work, "Riding Recollections," recites an anecdote, which I may be forgiven for quoting, as it combines both theory and instruction.

"A celebrated Mr. Maxse, celebrated some fifteen years ago for a fineness of hand that enabled him to cross Leicestershire with fewer falls than any other sportsman of fifteen stone who rode equally straight, used to display much comical impatience with the insensibility of his servants to this useful quality. He was once seen explaining to his coachman, with a silk handkerchief passed round a post. 'Pull at it,' says the master. 'Does it pull at you?' 'Yes, sir,' answered the servant, grinning. 'Slack it off then. Does it pull at you now?' 'No, sir.' 'Well then, you double-distilled fool, can't you see that your horses are like that post? If you don't pull at them, they won't pull at you.'"

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