In France, we learn from M. Roubo’s work, that in 1760 the Diligences (their stage coaches) were constructed much as ours, with large bodies having three small windows on each side and hung by leather braces on long perch carriages, with high hind wheels and low front wheels, without any driving box, and fitted with large baskets, back and front, for passengers or luggage; they were drawn by five horses, and driven by a postillion on the off wheeler instead of the near wheeler, as in England. One of their Diligences running to Lyons had springs [Plate 35], and it is noted by M. Roubo as the only Diligence in France with springs, and also the most speedy. It performed the journey to Lyons, about three hundred and twenty miles, in five days during the summer and six in winter. Deducting the time allowed for refreshments, changing horses, and resting at night, the speed of the Diligence appears to have been between five and six miles an hour. M. Roubo also describes a large stage coach called a Gondola, holding twelve persons inside, ten sitting sideways and one at each end; this vehicle may be considered as the grandfather of the omnibus, which was first made at Paris. Another coach was called a coupè Berlin, having four doors and three seats, the middle seat corresponding to the third inside seat of the so-called stage coaches used in America at the present time. There was, however, a backboard to lean against, but I believe that in the American stage coach the back of the middle seat is only a wide strap. The other travelling public carriage in France was the “chaise de poste” upon two wheels [Plate 25], which I have already described in a former chapter. I remember to have seen one of these at Amiens thirty years ago painted yellow like so many of the English post-chaises. There are probably many of these vehicles still in France. They are much like our gentlemen’s cabriolets, but larger and heavier, and are drawn by one stout horse in the shafts, with a second horse ridden by the postillion, attached to an out-rigger-bar on one side of the shafts. The chaise de poste was first made in France in 1664. To return to our own country. Stage coaches had increased so much in speed that in 1780 they were quicker than the post which carried the letters.