AN IMPROVED REGISTERING AND CONTROLING APPARATUS FOR HACKNEY COACH AND OTHER PUBLIC CARRIAGES
Year: 1857

page_text: application for Letters Patent was not given within the time prescribed
by the Act.)
PROVISIONAL SPECIFICATION left by Guillaume Ther-Katz at the
Office of the Commissioners of Patents, with his Petition, on the 10th
December 1857.
I, GUILLAUME THER-KATZ, of Paris, Merchant, do hereby declare the nature
of the said Invention for "AN IMPROVED REGISTERING AND CONTROLING APPARATUS
FOR HACKNEY COACH AND OTHER PUBLIC CARRIAGES," to be as follows:-
My improved registering and controling apparatus is fitted in the common
coach side lantern. The annexed Drawing shows the said lantern Fig. 1 on
the outside. This side is made of a glass plate divided somewhat like a
compass card into a suitable number of radii, every other one of which is
painted with an opaque white colour, whilst the intermediate ones are left
unpainted. A moveable glass disc divided in the same manner as the former,
is placed behind this glass plate inside the lantern on an axis which is under
the command of the coachman; every other radius of the said disc is painted
red or any other colour, whilst the intermediate ones have merely a number
begining from one up to the highest. When there is no passenger in the
carriage, the moveable disc should be turned as shown on the left side of Fig. 1.
where only red and white rays are to be seen, whilst when the carriage is
occupied, the disc should be turned as shown on the right side of Fig. 1,
where the red rays are hidden and all the figurs are visible.
When the

page_text: coachman starts in the morning, tho lantern is set up by a special controller
with the red rays visible; on the first person stepping in, the coachman bears
on a small handle, causing the disc to move round only one tooth at a time,
showing No. 1 up under the arrow, at the same time the coachman presents
a card folded in two, Fig. 2 and 3, having a printed dial similar to that of a
watch with the 12 hours and 60 minutes, and holding this card doubled up
he pricks it through with a pin opposite to the hour and minute at which the
passenger steps into the carriage; the time as shewn, Fig. 2, would be VIII.
hours and 10 minutes. The card is then torn in half; one of the pieces is
given to the passenger, whose interest it is to ascertain whether the time has
been rightly marked. The second part of the card is slipped by the coachman
into a small narrow glass case under the lid L, where it remains visible as
long as the carriage is occupied. When the passenger steps out, the conch-
man must present him with a similar card, but of a different colour, on which
ho pricks the hour and minute at which the passenger leaves the coach; the
card thus given to the passenger is worth one penny, and may be exchanged
by him on the same day either for a postage stamp or a cigar, thus furnishing
a means of checking the number of half cards which will be found in the
evening in the lantern. When the passenger has left, the coachman turns
the disc to show the next red ray, which causes at the same time the first
card put in at L to fall down into the locked box B, and the second coloured
card is slipped through the apperture L. This is repeated with each passenger
stepping in or out of the carriage; the coloured or numbered rays showing at
any moment whether the coach is occupied or empty, whilst the cards found
in the evening in the locked box B permits to control the number of passengers
registered by the arrow on the moveable dise, a double control being thus
effected by comparison with the coloured cards found every day at the cigar
merchants.