Abroad and at Home; Practical Hints for Tourists. Morris Phillips
or nearing these special stopping-places, not even if a passenger expresses a desire to alight. I remember once, simply for information, asking the driver to stop in the middle of Trafalgar square, just as we were passing Nelson’s monument, on the way to the Strand, cityward. “Well,” said the polite but uneducated Jehu, “you carn’t expect me to get a four-shilling summons for a penny fare, can you?” meaning that if he pulled up where I indicated he would be summoned the next day on the complaint of a vigilant “bobby” and be obliged to pay four shillings for accommodating me.
In American street cars or omnibuses—excepting, as I remember in San José, California, a passenger who rides only a few blocks helps to pay the fare of the man who rides the full length of the road, for the charge to both is the same. It is not so (mis) managed in England. The charge there is by distance, about one penny (two cents) a mile and you pay according to the distance you ride. There are two or three lines of omnibuses whose only fare is a half-penny (one cent). One line runs between Westminster bridge and Trafalgar square. They pick up no passengers between the two points. They each carry only twelve passengers; there are no outside seats.
There is a great deal of pilfering going on among omnibus conductors, and drivers also, for they divide the spoils; and the company winks at it, knowing that the pay of these men is too small. The company is satisfied if it receives a fair average return, but in this way it puts a premium on dishonesty. There is no check against the conductors—no mechanical contrivance to record fares. They are supposed to enter every fare and the exact amount they receive from each passenger on a paper slip placed in a frame, the frame being fastened to the inside of the omnibus door, but it is only a supposition. Passengers are requested to see that the amount paid is properly entered, but the request is wholly unheeded. It is, to say the least, a very careless way of keeping accounts, and invites dishonesty. On some lines they use tickets showing the amount each passenger pays, but a conductor sometimes forgets to hand you a ticket. An Inspector will occasionally mount a ’bus to see that all the passengers are supplied with tickets, and then the conductor with a treacherous memory has reason to be sorry. Keep out of a “pirate ’bus.” The rate in these ’buses is not uniform, and overcharges are not uncommon.
ON THE TOP OF A ’BUS.
The driver is generally a jolly, red-faced fellow and very smartly dressed, especially on Sunday. He then always wears a “top hat:” in winter it is of black silk, in summer a pearl gray felt with a wide mourning band to set it off. His coat is often a double-breasted drab cassimere, and in the top buttonhole of the left lapel is a large and loud nose-gay. A showy scarf and a pair of heavy, tan-colored driving gloves complete his costume. He makes quite a picture as he sits on the box, with a leather strap across his waist which holds him securely in his seat, and a black leather apron to protect the lower part of his body from wind and rain. He carries a showy whip with a very long and loose thong, with the end of which he can pick off a fly from the ear of his leader.
The ’bus driver is permitted to smoke while on duty. He comforts himself with a briarwood pipe unless a generous passenger treats him to a cigar, for he is not above accepting a small present.
Leopold Rothschild, who lives on a street through which omnibuses pass, has taken a great fancy to these men and in the autumn he presents a pair of pheasants to every omnibus driver and conductor who passes his door.
Everybody who has visited London knows that the best way of seeing the city is from the top of a ’bus. Get a front seat, next to the driver, hand him a tip in the shape of a sixpence and ask him a few questions. You will find that he is intelligent, well-informed on every-day subjects, quick-witted and a judge of human nature.
I had a very interesting ride last summer on the top of a “Kilburn” ’bus. These ’buses start from Victoria station, and run northwest to Kilburn, through some very beautiful thoroughfares, in which reside many titled people and some prominent members of London society.
In Grosvenor place, soon after starting from the station, the driver will point out, for instance, the residences of the Dukes of Northumberland, Grafton and Portland; that of the Earl of Scarborough, at No. 1 Grosvenor place; the Dowager Lady de Rothschild; Sir Edward Cecil Guinness; that of the late Right Hon. William H. Smith; also the homes of a number of members of parliament, more or less well-known.
The ’bus goes a short distance through Piccadilly and passes the residences of Baron Ferdinand Rothschild, Lord Rothschild, the Duke of Wellington and the Duke of Hamilton, in Hamilton place.
Then it turns into one of London’s most aristocratic streets, Park Lane (alongside Hyde Park), where reside the Duchess of Somerset, the Marquis of Londonderry, Lord Brassey, Alfred Rothschild, Lord Dudley, the Countess of Dudley, Lord Grosvenor, cousin to the Duke of Westminster, and the Duke of Westminster himself. The Duke’s wealth is untold, and he owns miles of valuable land in this and the adjacent districts.
A ’bus marked “Hammersmith” will take you westward, through Piccadilly, past the clubs, the parks, some stylish shops, and fashionable residences. You will see St. James’s Palace and historic Addison Road, en route, and you can ride across Hammersmith Bridge. You can also go to Kew Gardens and to the famous “Star and Garter,” at Richmond, by ’bus.
Here’s another very interesting ride. If you are at Oxford Circus you will see omnibuses with the horses’ heads turned eastward, and you will hear the Cockney conductor calling out “Benk, benk, Charing Cross, benk.” Take a ride with him. The vehicle goes through Regent street, Trafalgar Square, the Strand, Fleet street, then down Cheapside (which is anything but cheap), and Cornhill, where there is neither corn nor hill. At the end of Cornhill you see the most crowded and bustling crush of vehicles you ever saw in your life. To the right is the Mansion House (corresponding with our City Hall); a little further on “The Monument,” with its gold torch at top, looms up; immediately in front is The Royal Exchange, with its Peabody statue, while to the left stands the demure Bank of England, as solid from a financial point of view as it is architecturally. On this route you pass and have in view The National Gallery, Landseer’s lions, several famous hotels and theatres, the Law Courts, Temple Bar, the principal newspaper establishments, and St. Paul’s Church. The same ’bus, if you wish to pursue your journey eastward, will take you through Leadenhall street and into the very heart of Whitechapel—even to Blackwall and the docks, if your taste lies in that direction.
There is no better way of seeing London than from the top of a ’bus if you get a seat next to an old and wide-awake driver, and the cost is but a few pennies. There are one hundred and forty different routes in the whole city to choose from.
THE CITY TRAFFIC.
One of the busiest thoroughfares is that narrow street called “the Strand,” where it is crossed by Wellington street. You drive north, through Wellington street, past the Lyceum Theatre to get to Holborn, Covent Garden Market and elsewhere; southward there is great traffic over Waterloo Bridge, leading to the Surrey side of London, while from the east and west come continuous streams of omnibuses, cabs, carriages and heavy wagons and freight trucks. Policemen stand in the middle of the roadway and regulate this enormous traffic by merely raising a white-cotton-gloved hand. They are calm and immovable, and seem to pay not the slightest heed to their own safety amid the crowded crush of vehicles about them. All come to a standstill before the stiff and fearless “bobby.” When by waving his hand he directs that a certain stream of vehicles may proceed this way or that, it proceeds, but not until he gives permission.
London Bridge is said to be the greatest thoroughfare in the world. More vehicles and foot passengers cross it than pass through any other street, and special provision is made for vehicular traffic. In New York, for instance, a heavily laden four-horse truck or wagon may block Broadway for a great distance. If you are behind it in a phaeton or light carriage,