Coaches at this period were hung comparatively high, being necessarily above the perch. Berlin Coaches or Vis-à-vis were hung between two perches, and therefore nearer to the ground. The body of some Berlins also had a solid top or roof, but the sides and ends were of leather, which could be rolled up to admit of more air. These may have given the idea of a singular carriage which preceded the Landau. [Plate 23.] Some coaches had windows in the side quarters. A few were still made to hold eight persons inside. The shapes admitted of considerable variety; the elbow line was straight or in three or four curves; the quarters either what we call the britchka quarters, or a concave single sweep from the elbow to the end of the bottom side, like the shape of Her Majesty’s State Coach. Chariots were made with the hind quarter similar in shape to the front pillar, that is with a concave sweep. M. Roubo goes on to tell us that chariots, being smaller than coaches and lighter, were at first called diligences. But in consequence of the speedy passage of a stage coach from Paris to Lyons, it obtained the name of diligence, which has since remained to those large double coaches still in use on the Continent. We also find the drawing of an invalid or Dormeuse coach, very ingeniously contrived, and descriptions of the different summer open carriages, some with and some without springs; there are a few of really elegant shapes. He enumerates [Illustration: PLATE 24. CHARIOT À L’ANGLAISE, AFTER M ROUBO] chaises, phaetons, cabriolets, caleches, “_Anglaises desobligeants_” (or what we should call sulkies, that would only contain one person), lastly and the wourst, a vehicle introduced from Germany for sporting, and which is a Russian drosky, but very much longer than those we have seen in England, there is a crane neck in the perch to allow the wheel to turn, and the seat, which is hung on braces, is very narrow, for the passengers to sit on it astride. M. Roubo describes at length, and gives a plan of the Anglaise. It is a chariot, with the modern curved lower quarter panel suspended upon a double swan-necked perch, rather high front wheels, and four whip springs, and with a small hammer-cloth in front. [Plate 24.] There is one very similar preserved in the Museum of the Hotel Cluny at Paris. But on this vehicle M. Roubo remarks, “I see no beauty nor grace in the _voiture à l’Anglaise_, but it is no doubt sufficient that the invention of this vehicle comes from England, to make all the world desire to have them, as if there existed some law which obliges us to be the servile imitators of a nation who is our rival, and which, although it is respectable, and admirable even, in some respects, can never be equal to us for works of taste in general, and above all in Coachbuilding.”