The million-peopled city
Garwood, John
1853
The Paris and London Omnibuses of the present day compared.
Although we have copied the French in the extensive use of omnibuses in the metropolis, it is not very creditable to us that in many particulars of comfort and convenience with reference to these vehicles, we have yet to imitate them. It is true, indeed, that in our horses and their trappings, | |
204 | as also in the celerity of their movement, we are superior to our models; but we are yet without the advantage of the cachet de correspondance, which shall carry us from almost any one point to any other point of the metropolis for the six sous, a lower sum than will carry us in London from one end to the other of almost any direct route of street. We are also yet without the very great convenience of our neighbours in their bureaux, or waiting-rooms, at special places in the routes, and the scarcely less important convenience of admission to the omnibus on its arrival, by the number of the ticket received in the waiting-room, to denote the priority of the entrance of the respective passengers there; so that the rude man who comes last on a wet day does not, as with us, by his obtrusiveness obtain a seat, while ladies and retiring persons wait in vain for their turn of accommoda- tion. We seem also most remarkably and obstinately to adhere to the inconvenience peculiar to ourselves of omni- buses so narrow that the knees of the passengers, near the door, almost effectually prevent their comrades from entering or departing, while the hand-rail at the top, to steady us in the difficult passage, is still omitted, with a prejudice as if it was really hurtful, although the scanty width of our vehicles, and the English rudeness of our conductors, who will start before we can possibly reach our seat, render so small and inexpensive a convenience, so far more important in our vehicles. Nor have we yet copied the exhibition of the important sign-board of complet, when the omnibus is full; but we are still left to run after the vehicle, in rain and mud, while the conductor, with all the independence of a man who can serve no more customers, scarcely deigns to intimate to us that he has no room remaining, after we have striven to keep pace with his rapid movement, and to render more audible our wants than we foolishly supposed, from his silence, we had failed to do in the first effort we made. |
205 | Nor, again, with all our eager desire for hurrying onwards in our journeys without delays, and with something more than speed, have we (which is, perhaps, the most remarkable of all,) yet copied the practice of our French friends, so far preferable to our own, of the fare being paid as soon as the passenger is conveniently seated; but with each passenger that alights there is still with us the sometimes very tedious process, especially on a cold day, to be gone through, of fumbling for some stray shilling carefully con- cealed in some inside pocket, for which, when found, the silver and the copper change have also to be counted out, while all the passengers within are left patiently to wait the completion of the reckoning before they can advance on their journey. Some day, and it is to be hoped at no distant one, we shall probably be wise enough not to stop short in our imitation at the present point. But as we were foolish enough to wait ten years before we would consent to imitate at all the omnibuses of the French metropolis, we seem disposed to wait another thirty years before we are willing to make the arrangement of our omnibuses resemble theirs, when theirs are so manifestly superior. |
