A pleasant way of getting along is that of getting in a Hansom, and bidding the driver drive on. A great improvement, undoubtedly, on the old Hackney coach, or on that first species of cab—consisting of a gig with a very dangerous hood—on one side of which sat the driver, while on the other was suspended yourself. Now as you dash merrily along, with a civil driver, a luxurious equipage, and not a bad sort of horse, little do you think that you may be driving far further than you intended, to a dangerous illness and an early grave. A terrible danger threatens all who live in London, or who visit it, by means of a custom—which ought not to be tolerated for an instant—of carrying sick persons in cabs to hospitals. No doubt the increase of smallpox in the metropolis may be referred to this source. Put a case of smallpox into a comfortable cab for an hour, then send the vehicle into the streets; first a merchant sits in it for a quarter of an hour, then a traveller from the railway gets his chance of catching the disease, and so on for the next week or two. When it takes, the victims have had no warning of their impending danger, and wonder where they got it. They in their turn become new centres of disease, and for the next few weeks they infect the air they breathe, the houses they inhabit, the clothing sent to the laundress, and everybody and everything which comes within their influence, and it is impossible to say where the infection ceases. The following arrangements would easily, cheaply, and effectually do away with the evil:—1. Make it penal to let or to hire a public vehicle for the conveyance of any person affected with contagious disease. 2. Every institution for the reception of contagious disease should undertake to fetch the patient on receipt of a medical certificate as to the nature of the case.