Taking these early carriages as a whole one may be inclined to feel surprise at the varieties displayed, yet there were not after all very great differences between them. They were two-or four-wheeled contrivances with a long pole in front, and it is only in mere size and decoration that discrimination can properly be made. “The Egyptians,” says Thrupp, “with all their learning and skill, appear to have made no change during the centuries of experience; as at the beginning, so at the end, the kings stand by the side of their charioteers, or hold the reins themselves. The Persians and Hindoos introduced luxurious improvements, and in lofty vehicles elevated the nobles above the heads of the people, and secluded their women in curtained carriages. The Greeks introduced no new vehicles, but perfected so successfully the useful waggon, that their model is still seen throughout Europe, without change of principle or structure. The Romans, on the other hand, in their career of conquest, gathered from every nation what was good, and, wherever possible, improved upon it.” After the fall of the Roman Empire, however, there was little further progress for several centuries. In the general retrogression, which, rightly or wrongly, one associates with those dark ages, the wheeled carriage, in common with a multitude of other adjuncts to civilisation, was to suffer. _Chapter the Second_ _THE AGE OF LITTERS_ “There is a litter; lay him in ’t and drive toward Dover, friend!” _King Lear._