In 1662, when there were but six stage coaches, another writer of the day condemned them. “For,” he says, “these coaches make country gentlemen come to London on small occasion, which otherwise they would not do but upon urgent necessity; nay, the conveniency of the passage makes their wives often come up, who, rather than make such long journeys on horseback, would stay at home. Here, when they come to town, they must be in the fashion, get fine clothes, go to plays and treats, and by this means get such a habit of idleness and love of pleasure that they are uneasy ever after.”
Another writer in 1673 opposes stages. “Is it,” he asks, “for a man’s health to be laid fast in foul ways, and forced to wade up to the knees in mire; and afterwards sit in the cold till fresh teams of horses can be procured to drag the coach out of the foul ways? Is it for his health to travel in rotten coaches, and have their tackle, or perch, or axle-tree broken, and then to wait half the day before making good their stage?”
This gives us some idea of the badness of the roads, and the imperfection of the vehicles. These last, however, were not improved in the time of Hogarth, who, in 1730, painted a stage coach waiting in an inn-yard.
In the Diary of Sir William Dugdale we find records of his journeys by stage coaches between 1659 and 1680, to the towns of Norwich, Coventry, Chester, St Albans, Bedford, and Birmingham during the reign of Charles II.
Hackney coaches were first used in England in 1605 [Plates 13, 14, and 22]. These were similar to the coaches used by the gentry; at first they did not ply for hire in the streets, but remained at the hiring-yards until they were wanted. As, however, many more persons wished to hire than could afford to keep a coach of their own, the demand increased rapidly. In 1635 the number was restricted to fifty. Still they increased in spite of the opposition of the court and king, who thought they would break up the roads, till, in 1650, there were as many as three hundred. In Paris they were introduced by Nicholas Sauvage, who lived in a street at the sign of St Fiacre, and from this circumstance hackney coaches were called in France “Fiacres,” and they became very common and popular. In 1772 the hire of fiacres in Paris was a shilling the first hour, and tenpence the second. In London, in 1662 there were four hundred hackney coaches, and the government began then to levy a yearly duty upon them of £5 each. In 1694 the number had increased to seven hundred, a substantial proof of their usefulness. Mr Pepys, in his amusing Diary, continually speaks of hiring coaches for use in London, and to go to Deptford and Woolwich, in his journeys to the dockyards in his business for the Admiralty.