In the belief that a high and short load possessed some mysterious property which made it easier to draw than a low long one, builders vied with each other in building lofty vehicles. “Hence in all probability,” says the authority we are quoting, “arose the preposterous elevation of public carriages.” OUTSIDE PASSENGERS. Dr. Lovell Edgeworth gives us to understand that the practice of carrying passengers on the roof of the coach followed the application of springs to stage coaches; and in view of the belief noticed above this seems exceedingly probable. The practice had clearly been in vogue for some years when the _Annual Register_ published the following paragraph:— “_September 7 (1770)._—It were greatly to be wished the stage coaches were put under some regulations as to the numbers of persons and quantity of baggage. Thirty-four persons were in and about the Hertford coach this day when it broke down by one of the braces giving way.” In 1775, we learn from the same publication, stage coaches generally carried eight persons inside and often ten outside passengers. On another page appears the statement that “there are now of these vehicles [stage coaches], flies, machines and diligences upwards of 400, and of other wheeled carriages 17,000.” In 1785 was passed George III.’s Act, which forbade the conveyance of more than six persons on the roof of any coach and more than two on the box. This Act was superseded in 1790 by another which permitted only one person to travel on the box and only four on the roof of any coach drawn by three or more horses. A coach drawn by less than three horses might carry one passenger on the box and three on the roof, but such vehicles might not ply more than twenty-five miles from the London Post Office. The first “long coaches” (_i.e._ long-stage vehicles) and those called diligences were superseded by what were called the “old heavies,” carrying six inside passengers and twelve out.[21] [21] _The Public Carriages of Great Britain._ J. E. Bradfield, London, 1855. ROADS IN GEORGE III’s TIME. The turnpike road had been improved by the year 1773, when Mr. Daniel Bourn wrote a pamphlet[22] answering some objections which had been urged against his waggon on rollers (see p. 79). Mr. Jacob had asserted that the roughness of the roads was an insuperable obstacle to the enormously wide wheels invented by Mr. Bourn; and the latter, while admitting the wretched condition of local roads, refutes this argument as applied to the great roads:— “A person might follow a waggon from London to York and meet with very few great stones ... let us now view this more agreeable turnpike road, yet even here you will find that there is less degrees of loose dirt and mangled materials.” [22] _Some Brief Remarks upon Mr. Jacob’s Treatise._ London, 1773. In this connection it will be remembered that the road roller had been brought into use in the previous year (see footnote p. 80).