STAGE-CARRIAGES. 209 



sight, and on a pouring wet day there is nothing more 

 pitiful than to observe the reluctance with which he 

 quits his seat and divests himself of the seedy old 

 horse-cloth that covers his knees, when called upon to 

 open the cab-door, or ring a street bell. 



There is one thin^ to be said in favour of four- 

 wheel cabs. If the horse, by some extraordinary 

 chance, should be a good one, they will carry a mar- 

 ^ellous amount of luggage, and think nothing of 

 trotting along with it as freely as though they were 

 harnessed to a light cart ; to see the enormous trunks 

 which are yearly brought to London by American 

 ladies, and packed on to the roof of four-wheel cabs, is 

 a sight that fills us with astonishment. 



It must not be supposed that a hackney-carriage 

 is a stage-carriage. Four-horse coaches are stage- 

 carriages, so are omnibuses and tramways, so in fact 

 are trains, since they run an allotted, defined, or pre- 

 arranofed distance. 



A stage is a place of rest upon a public road or 

 where a relay of horses is taken, the distance between 

 two places upon a public road, a degree of advance or 

 of progression. 



A stage-carriage is a carriage for conveying goods 

 and passengers, at stated times, a certain appointed 

 distance. Omnibus is a Latin word, meaning "for 

 all " being the dative case of Oinnis, all. The carriage 

 to which it has given a name, is a long-bodied, 

 enclosed, four-wheeled vehicle, the seats being 

 arranged along the sides ; this is the definition given 

 to it by lexicographers. 



The people who are constantly regretting stage- 

 coaches should remember that in point of comfort they 

 were not equal to a well-constructed omnibus. The 

 idea of such a conveyance as an omnibus is ascribed to 



p 



