EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY CARRIAGES
Italy, but likewise have it so contrived as to be easily taken to pieces where it must inevitably be disjoined in order to pass a mountain or to be put into a felucca; that is, in going over mount Cenis, or from some part of southern France to Genoa."[1]
In more detail Mariana Starke advises that "those Persons who design to travel much in Italy should provide themselves with a strong, low-hung, doubled-perched English coach or post-chaise, with well-seasoned corded springs,[2] and iron axle-trees, two drag-chains with iron shoes, … tools for repairing … a carriage, … a sword-case … two moderate-sized trunks,"[3] etc.
Arthur Young, however, was warned by men who had traveled much in Italy, that he must not think of going thither in his own one-horse chaise.[4] "To watch my horse being fed would, they assured me, take up abundantly too much time, and if it was omitted, with respect to hay, as well as oats, both would be equally stolen. There are also parts of Italy where travelling alone, as I did, would be very unsafe, from the number of robbers that infest the roads. Persuaded by the opinions of persons, who I suppose must know much better than myself, I had determined to sell my mare and chaise, and travel in Italy by the veturini, who are to be had it seems everywhere, and at a cheap rate."[5]
When he arrived at Toulon, Young accordingly tagged his chaise with a large label, "A vendre," and finally sold it and his mare for twenty-two louis — ten louis less than they had cost him at Paris. "I had next to consider the method to get to Nice [from Toulon]; and will it be believed, that from Marseilles with 100,000 souls, and Toulon with 30,000, living in the great road to Antibes, Nice, and Italy, there is no diligence or regular voiture. A gentleman at the table d'hôte assured me they asked him three louis for a place in a voiture to Antibes, and to wait till some other person would give three more for another seat. To a person accustomed to the infinity of machines that fly about England, in all directions, this must appear
62
- ↑ Manners and Customs of Italy, ii, 313.
- ↑ Carriages with springs were by no means universal, as we see from the complaints of Horace Walpole, in 1740: "You will wonder, my dear Hal, to find me on the road from Rome. … We have been jolted to death; my servants let us come without springs to the chaise, and we are worn threadbare." Letters, i. 50.
- ↑ Starke, Letters from Italy (1798) ii, 265.
- ↑ Cf. Lady Mary Montagu's experience. She is writing from Naples: "Here I am arrived at length, after a most disagreeable journey. I bought a chaise at Rome, which cost me twenty-five good English pounds; and had the pleasure of being laid low in it the very second day after I set out. I had the marvellous good luck to escape with life and limbs; but my delightful chaise broke all to pieces, and I was forced to stay a whole day in a hovel, while it was tacked together in such a manner as would serve to drag me hither. To say truth, this accident has very much palled my appetite for travelling." Letters, ii, 38.
- ↑ Young, Travels in France, pp. 265–66.
