1822.] 
the staves. Which staves, brought out 
of the toll-house, and placed upright 
on the opposite sides of a coach, in 
such situations as would stretch. the 
attached cord tight, over or close by 
the side of the highest parts of the 
Inggage, would, without more than 
two minuies detaining of the coach, 
give the means of seeing, whether the 
luggage was within the statutable 
height, by its passing freely under the 
level whip-cord (at ten feet nine inches 
above the road), or, the means of mea- 
suring with the rule, any inches of ex- 
cess of height which might appear ; 
and, of which latter fact, notes should 
be taken by various of the passengers, 
who should not hesitate in giving their 
addresses ; which combined proceed- 
ings, would soon awe coach-proprie- 
tors and drivers into a respectful com- 
pliance with this useful law. 
. The vans, or caravans, established a 
few years ago for carrying parcels of 
goods only (and no passengers,) with 
similar regularity, dispatch, and safety, 
as by the stage-coaches, between the 
metropolis andthe chief manufacturing 
and trading towns, are an excellent re- 
lief, to the stage-coaches, from a mass 
of heavy and cumbrous packages, 
which, before these vans came into use, 
impeded these coaches, and greatly 
endangered the lives of passengers. 
It has been with concern, therefore, 
that the writer has of late noticed va- 
rious newspaper attacks on these vehi- 
cles (merely because one of them had 
the misfortune to overturn in the 
Strand), which ought to receive the sup- 
port of the public, as the mode of send- 
ing all heavy and cumbrous goods; re- 
serving, at the same time, to the stage 
and mail coaches, the small and light 
parcels, as the means of enabling them 
to extensively carry passengers and 
their laggage at reasonable rates. 
In the autumn of 1819, Mr. Henry 
Burgess proposed a plan for more 
expeditiously conveying of letters 
between the metropolis and the chief 
manufacturing and trading towns, in 
light two-wheeled carriages, drawn by 
pairs of horses, the particulars of 
whose scheme is fully detailed in our 
48th volume, p. #385; but, as the con- 
veyance of passengers, on which it has 
been mainly our present purpose to 
treat, formed no part of Mr. Burgess’s 
plan, and the same having been laid 
aside, after a trial which has cost the 
public several thousand pounds, we 
shall not enlarge further thereon. 
Montnzy Mac. No. 373. 
Mr. Lacey on Joe Miller's Grave. 
217 
In pursuance of the new Turnpike 
Act, ‘‘every stage-coach carrying pas- 
sengers at separate fares,” has since 
the Ist of the present month (Septem- 
ber) borne a number, furnished from 
the stamp-office in Somerset-house, on 
each of its doors; the penalty for neg- 
lect of which, is 201. per day! These 
numbers will prove very useful to a 
traveller for identifying the particular 
coach by which he may have taken or 
booked a place, especially if, as in 
Scotland, a ticket(containing the num- 
ber, sum paid, and time of starting,) 
were given by the book-keeper to the 
traveller, to be by him afterwards 
produced to the coachmen or book- 
keepers on the road, as occasions 
might require; or useful to them, or 
the public, in case of over-loading, or 
any criminal misconduct by the coach- 
man. The names given to  stage- 
coaches, since they multiplied so much, 
have had their use towards identifying 
these vehicles, although less perfectly 
so than the numbers in conjunction 
therewith will now do: one of the ear- 
liest named coaches which the writer 
recollects, was “the Hope,” running 
to Sheffield, something more than thirty 
years ago. 
——— 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
SIR, 
ANY a would-be wit, who has 
Joe Miller constantly on his 
lips, might probably be induced to 
make a pilgrimage to his grave, if he 
knew that it was as near to him as the 
place called the Green Church-yard, 
or burying-ground, in Portugal-street, 
Lincoln’s Inn fields, belonging to the 
parish of St. Clement Dane, and close 
by the once celebrated Lincoln’s Inn- 
fields Theatre, where Garrick became 
so famous, and now as celebrated for 
being Spode’s depét for china, &c,— 
Miller’s epitaph, by Stephen Duck, is 
on a handsome stone, on the left-hand 
side as you enter the burial-ground, 
nearly under the windows of the work- 
house; which inscription was original- 
ly on another stone, but time had taken 
such liberties with it, that in the year 
1816 the churchwarden for the time 
being, greatly to his credit, as I think, 
caused the present one to be erected. 
He certainly has tacked himself to 
Joe Miller by his explanation at the 
bottom of the stone; and probably 
hopes, and in some degree deserves, 
to share a little of his immortality ; 
though at present he is on this side the 
Ff grave, 
