The place principally hinted at in the above Grant, or Patent, seems to have been the City of _Sedan_ in Champagne; where, we are at liberty to suppose, these covered Chairs being most in use, they obtained with us the name of _Sedan Chairs_, like the local names of _Berlin_ and _Landau_[363]. [363] Mr. Reed, the Editor of the Old Plays [2d Edit. 1780], from the above account, must therefore certainly be in an error, when he supposes that _Sedan Chairs_ were the introduction of the Duke of Buckingham, about the year 1619. [See Note to vol. V. p. 475.] _Sedan_--mentioned by the name only in the Life of Dr. Thomas Fuller, 1661, 18mo. p. 57. These new Vehicles, hitherto unseen in our orbit, had, doubtless, patrons among the beaus and fine gentlemen of the age; though, in their general utility, they manifestly could not be so commodious as Coaches, were it for no other reason than that they could carry but one person. They might prevail with persons of a certain rank and description; but the opulent Merchant, and others in a similar line of family life, still were in want of a conveyance of greater capacity; a circumstance which would depress the _Chairs_, and gradually hasten the re-introduction of the _Coaches_, and which, as has been observed, took place accordingly in little more than two years. The following special commission was therefore granted by the King, A. D. 1637, wherein the number of the Coaches seems rather to have enlarged, and the management of them was placed in the department of the Master of the Horse. It runs essentially in the following words: "That we, finding it very requisite for our Nobility and Gentry, as well as for Foreign Ambassadors, Strangers, and others, that there should be a competent number of Hackney Coaches allowed for such uses, have, by the advice of our Privy Council, thought fit to allow _Fifty Hackney Coachmen_ in and about London and Westminster; limiting them not to keep above Twelve Horses a-piece. We therefore grant to you [the Marquis] during your Life, the Power and Authority to license _Fifty_ Hackney Coachmen, who shall keep no more than Twelve good Horses each, for their, or any of their, Coach and Coaches respectively. You also hereby have Power to license so many in other Cities and Towns of England as in your wisdom shall be thought necessary; with power to restrain and prohibit all others from keeping any Hackney Coach to let to hire, either in London or elsewhere. Also to prescribe _Rules_ and _Orders_ concerning the daily _Prices_ of the said licensed Hackney Coachmen, to be by them, or any of them, taken for _our own_ particular service, and in their employment for our Subjects; provided such orders be first allowed by us, under our Royal Hand."[364] [364] Rymer, tom. XX. fol. 159.