The Express.
London, England, 1867-09-12 00:00:00

UAYMAItRi.T.

TRIS EVRSISO, ROME(TAIUrIEIifr. Meru. Chippendale.
Howe, Rogers, Kendal, Clark, Weathereby, rke. ; Meslainea
Stott Sid.lrms, Lars, ke.—TO PARIS AND BACK
11011 46. ]lr. Buckatoae.—And FISH OUT OF WATER.

rsiwcitmrt

Tills ICTirsnio. POOR PILLICODDY. Messrs. Dominick
Murray t Omsk= ; Miss Polly Marshall. —And TIIK '.TRL'RI`d
01, LONLioN. Mr. Yining, Mews. M•Leaa, D. Murray, k.;
31eadames Stuart, Barnett, and Marston.

samutwiA.

Tin Evian's, THE ORAY LADVE 0? PERNI.EA. Mina
E Coartenay —MM. Coutelller and kanreolo Mr. Plampum
Mr. and Mrs. Coleman and Mr. Brown—And THE WIDOW'S
WIRE•MDE. Mr. E. Courtesy.

WWII WATER AT LONDON BRIDGE.
Ten Day —maniac ob. Nos..—..Altoriaoon. lh. 20m.
To-lloatow—hlorelag. lb. Ws-- —Afternoon, lh. 57m.

LONDON, THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 12.

Tits Omnibus is one of the established institu-
tions not only of the streets of London, but of all
our large provincial towns. It has everywhere
become one of the essential conveniences of city
life, and it is difficult to imagine any of our large
towns, especially this metropolis, without it. Yet
there must be thousands of persons going about
the streets of London every day who well remem-
ber the aspect of those streets before the intro-
duction of omnibuses. But if we ask them how
they managed to get backwards and forwards with-
out them, we are at once reminded that at that
time London distances were not so great as they
are now, and that the suburbs in which many of
us now reside were country places to which the
Londoner only thought of going on high days and
holidays. The old two-horse Hackney coach began
to give way to the present cab about the year
1823, and the state of very many of those vehicles
suggests that the very first generation of them can
hardly be extinct. It was about the time of the
first fierce debates on the Bill which afterwards
became the Reform Act of 1832 that omnibuses
began to come into general use. They had been
introduced in Paris in 1827, but :4.: was about four
years later when they began to swell the traffid 6f
the London streets. From that tir,te to the present
they have gone on increasing as the metropolis
itself has spread Luther and f arther on every side,
and not even the conr-„etitioo of the railways
with which London is
penetrated in every direc-
tion seems to mat-J
any appreciable difference in
+heir nu mber-
4L+-. • •-•• Nor do times and seasons appear
to affect them, excepting in their more private
function of e aiming dividends for shareholders.
London may be empty, as it is at present, but the
omnibuses : ae as numerous, as noisy, and nearly as
full as at • .ny period of the year. Thatvast majority
of the population to whom London is home, who
are here, as a rule, the whole year round, are just
those to whom the omnibus is a necessity. And as
there are some two millions and three-quarters of
people here even in the times of London's moat
desolate emptiness, " Society " might possibly
learn a lesson if it know from the point of view of
the omnibuses how little it is missed. There are
probably a few hundred thousands at the upper)
and lower ends of the social scale who make no
use of the omnibus, but the rest of the London
population make more or leas constant use of it.
It takes them to business in the morning, and
home again in the evening. In the middle of the
day it takes their wives and daughters calling or
shopping, and is the medium of such social inter-
course and communication as they and their
families enjoy. There are, in fact, comparatively
few of the constant dwellers in London to whom
the omnibus is not one of the greatest social con-
veniences of the time.

The omnibus, as we have said, came into use
about the time of the first Reform Bill. For
many years it remained as the Reform Bill did, an
example of the natural conservatism of the English
people. The outcry for a reform in our London
omnibuses is, however, quite as old as the agita-
tion for a second Reform Bill, but unlike that it
is not satisfied as yet. We may, however, note
several improvements which have been gradually
introduced, and which have made the present race
of omnibuses at least something better than those of
twenty years ago. The removal of the cross-seat at
the end and the reduction of the number of imide
passengers to twelve, the placing of a lamp in the
vehicle at night, and of an intelligible table of
fares at all times, are improvements which have
been forced on the omnibus proprietors by the
legislature. The heightening of the roof along
the middle, allowing as it does a better
ventilation, an easier egress and ingress, and
a far better top seat, is an improvement for
which we are indebted to the London General
Omnibus Company. But these are only small
improvements, and even now there are many
omnibuses in the streets which have the
old form of roof, and are as ill ventilated and
awkward as they ever were. Such vehicles gene-
rally belong to small private owners, who have no
capital to invest in their improvement, and who
can only drive them till—as was the case the
other day with one of the King's Cross omm'b•ses—
the wheels break down of rottenness. But the
Omnibus Company, which is just now looking
anxiously round for means to create a dividend,
and is therefore in the mood to receive suggestions
of improvement, has the means in its bands of
running all these crazy, broken down, inconve-
nient competitors off the road by adopting such
improvements in their vehicles as are needful to
the full development of the omnibus traffic. Our
London omnibuses are, as a whole, behind those
of all the towns in the kingdom. Leaving out of
consideration the worn out and untidy appearance
which many of them present inside, they are not
fundamentally designed with a view to the conve-

nience of passengers. The method of climbing to
the roof is quite primitive in its clumsiness and
danger. The moans of catching hold of the omni-
bus in getting in and out are entirely insufficient,
and in most cases the step is inconveniently and
needlessly high. Inside there is not sufficient
width to leave a convenient passage between the
knees of the seated passengers, and as the custom
is to make the latest corner go up to the highest
seat, the process frequently has to be accomplished
with much difficulty. Nor is there any means of
communicating with the conductor, except by a
series of signs and nudges which are passed on
from passenger to passenger, after the fashion of
schoolboys passing a pinch or a blow all down a
form. Aa to the conductor himself, nothing can
be more inconvenient than his position both for
himself and for passengers. He is entirely with-
out shelter, is perched up on a little board as high
as though his one function was to watch the pas-
sengers on the roof, is obliged to hold on by a strap,
and is only at all in an easy attitude when his face
is turned in the direction the omnibus is going, and
when he cannot possibly be looking out for intend-
ing passengers, who may be in vain shouting after
him from the street behind. Not one of these in-
conveniences exists in the Manchester omnibuses,
nor in some which have been very sparingly intro-
duced into our London streets. It has been
pleaded that three-horse 'buses do not suit the
streets of London ; but the most convenient of
all the Manchester omnibuses are those which ply
on the route to Pendleton, and are drawn
by two horses. With a railed stair on
each side to the roof, there is not the slightest diffi-
culty in ascending or descending. Instead of one
step behind there are two, or the floor of the
omnibus is lower than that of our London vehicles,
and there is an ample rail on each aide, which
renders it so easy to get on or off that a Man-
chester omnibus very rarely stops except for
ladies and strangers. The conductor stands on the
step under a canopy which shelters the doorway,
and is thus conveniently placed for passengers and
for persons hailing him from the street, and com-
fortably for himself. There is ample headway in-
side, sufficient width to render a progress from the
doorway t) the end between the knees of the pas-
sengers comparatively easy, and ample ventilation.
In short, Manchester has adopted all the improve-
ments which experience and observation have sug-
gested, and London only those which law and
public opinion have enforced. Possibly there may
be something more than a distant connexion be-
tween this fact and one which will at least interest
the shareholders in the London General Omnibus
Company. Good accommodation, highly appre-
ciated and gladly used, pays well in Manchester;
bad accommodation, disliked and only resorted to
as a necessity, pays badly in London.

OUR CONTEMPORARIES.
(THIS DAY.)