Hackney coaches were first used in England in 1605 [Plates 13, 14, and 22]. These were similar to the coaches used by the gentry; at first they did not ply for hire in the streets, but remained at the hiring-yards until they were wanted. As, however, many more persons wished to hire than could afford to keep a coach of their own, the demand increased rapidly. In 1635 the number was restricted to fifty. Still they increased in spite of the opposition of the court and king, who thought they would break up the roads, till, in 1650, there were as many as three hundred. In Paris they were introduced by Nicholas Sauvage, who lived in a street at the sign of St Fiacre, and from this circumstance hackney coaches were called in France “Fiacres,” and they became very common and popular. In 1772 the hire of fiacres in Paris was a shilling the first hour, and tenpence the second. In London, in 1662 there were four hundred hackney coaches, and the government began then to levy a yearly duty upon them of £5 each. In 1694 the number had increased to seven hundred, a substantial proof of their usefulness. Mr Pepys, in his amusing Diary, continually speaks of hiring coaches for use in London, and to go to Deptford and Woolwich, in his journeys to the dockyards in his business for the Admiralty. Many of these were the old coaches of the nobility and gentry, and it is not until 1790 that we hear from Mr Felton that the hackney coaches were generally built of a smaller size, and much shorter in the under carriage than those of the gentry. Their hire appears to have been very moderate, to judge by the records of Dean Swift, who resided in London for three years in the days of Queen Anne (1710 to 1713), and who made frequent use of hackney coaches, and on wet days did not venture out without a coach or a sedan chair. It would seem he could ride from the city to the neighbourhood of St Giles for one or two shillings. To return to stage coaches, we are told that in 1673 there were coaches from London to York, to Chester, and to Exeter, having each forty horses on the road, and carrying each six inside passengers. The coach occupied eight days in travelling to Exeter, but the fare was only forty shillings in the summer and fine weather; in winter the same coach was nearly ten days on the road, and the fare was increased to forty-five shillings. There were four-horse stage coaches going daily to places within twenty or thirty miles of London, and others that went to places within ten miles and returned the same day. In 1703, a stage coach went from London to Portsmouth, when the roads were good, in fourteen hours. In 1706, a coach went from London to York every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, which performed the journey in four days, allowing each passenger fourteen pounds of luggage free, and above that weight the charge was threepence per pound.