GOING BY COACH: BOOKING OFFICES 321 



secured their x^laces, until the mere work of 

 entering these details became too great. 



The booking-clerks in coach-offices had their 

 resiionsibilities, and were kept up to the highest 

 mark of efficiency by the knoAvledge that if they 

 fell into such an error as overbooking a coach on 

 any particular journey, not only would the pro- 

 prietors be bound in law to by some means convey 

 those passengers for whom there was no room, 

 but that the extra cost of so doing would infallibly 

 be deducted from their wages. The loss in such 

 cases would inevitably be heavy, but dependent 

 upon the length of the journey. Mistakes of this 

 kind generally meant that the extra passengers 

 were conveyed by post-chaise, at anything from 

 ninepence to a shilling a mile ; and it was the 

 difference between these rates and the coach-fares 

 of from twopence to fivepence a mile that the 

 clerks had to make good, unless the overbooked 

 passengers were sufficiently good-natured to wait 

 for another coach. 



The usual practice on securing a place was to 

 pay a proportion — generally one-half of the fare — 

 down, and the other half on taking one's seat, 

 as noted in the contemporary doggerel, which 

 declared: — 



When to York per mail you start, 

 Four-caped, like other men, 

 To the book-keeper so smart 

 You pay three pounds, in part : 

 Two pounds ten before you start : 

 Sum total, five-pound-ten." 

 VOL. I. 21 



