FOUR IN HAND. 149 



stages are taken off Fifth avenue tlie better it will be 

 for the driving public. Take, for instance, Fifth ave- 

 nue any afternoon during the season. There are strings 

 of vehicles of every description. The private carriages 

 of course predominate. Four lines (not as they ought 

 to be on a straight road) trotting along, but at almost 

 all times what a London cabby would call "a full 

 stretch walk." And I have no doubt there is not one 

 person in a hundred of the driving public that has the 

 slightest conception of what causes it. The men them.- 

 selves who drive stages don't knoAV they are at fault. 

 There being no bye-laws ol the city ordinance to compel 

 them to pull into the off side or near side, according 

 tx) the way in which they are going, when i)ulling up 

 to set down or take up passengers, consequently they 

 pull up as they would on a plain or desert^ — sharp and 

 in their tracks — never for one moment thinking or car* 

 ing what is following behind or whether that which is 

 behind has sufficient room to pass, which it frequently 

 happens there is not. The consequence is that the 

 vehicle following has to pull up short, and everything 

 behind, for perhaps a block, has to do likewise. If the 

 stage driver was compelled to pull to the side of the 

 road before coming to a full stop the driver of the 

 vehicle following would Iniow what the stage driver 

 intended to do, and instead of pulling up himself and 



