44 STAGE-COACH AND MAIL IN DAYS OF YORE 



and Leamington. In 1879 Mr. Charles A. R. 

 Hoare, the banker, had it at Tunbridge Wells, 

 and also ordered a cojiv. Since then the old 

 mail-coach has been in retirement, emerging now 

 and again as the " Old Times " coach, to empha-- 

 sise the trophies of imj)rovement and progress 

 in the Lord Mayor's Shows of 1890, 1899 and 

 1901, in the wake of electric and petrol motor- 

 cars, driven and occupied by coachmen and 

 passengers dressed to resemble our ancestors of 

 a hundred years ago. 



The coach is substantially and in general lines 

 as built in 1830. The wlieels have been renewed, 

 the hind boot has a door inserted at the back, 

 and the interior has been relined ; but otherwise 

 it is the coacli that ran when William IV. was 

 king. It is a characteristic Waude coach, low- 

 hung, and built with straight sides, instead of 

 the bowed-out type common to the j)roducts 

 of Vidler's factory. It wears, in consequence, a 

 more elegant appearance than most coaches of 

 that time ; but it must be confessed that what 

 it gained in the eyes of passers-by it must have 

 lost in the estimation of the insides, for the 

 interior is not a little cramjied l)y tliose straight 

 sides. The guard's seat on the " dickey " — or 

 what in earlier times Avas more generally known 

 as the " backgammon-board " — remains, but his 

 sheepskin or tiger-skin covering, to protect his 

 legs from the cold, is gone. The trapdoor into 

 the hind boot can be seen. Through this the 

 mails were thrust, and the guard sat throughout 



