see also James Grant in Lights and Shadows of London Life- click here
THE CAB-STAND.
The cab-stand, as an institution long established in
London and in other large towns, must be familiar
to most of our readers, though, few of them, probably,
regard it as an object of any peculiar interest. A
string of cabs in single file, each with its "speculative" steed, drowsily resting his weary legs one at
a time; a few drivers, some asleep on the box, others
in straggling groups, exchanging rough compliments, or, with hands buried in their pockets, and
coats buttoned to the chin, padding the sloppy
ground, and peering wistfully about for customers;
some fifty yards of macadam in solution, or of
granite paving-stones ankle-deep in mud, on the
surface of which lie fragmentary whisps of hay
and patches of scattered chaff, with here and there
a pewter pot and scraps of tobacco-pipe; such, and
nothing more, is the cab-stand to the common eye.
Perhaps, if we look at it it little nearer, we may see
a little more. Let us try.
The cab-stand which is the subject of our contemplation stands a little way in the suburbs
— it
matters not in what direction — and its site runs
parallel, not with a row of shops, of private houses,
or even with a brick wall, but with the wooden
palings which divide the garden-grounds of a
nursery-man from the public road, The vehicles,
in close rank, touch the kerb, and the long narrow
avenue between that and the palings is, to all
intents and purposes, cabbie's private domain and
park ; the "public in general" having by tacit consent made it over to him, and chosen the other
side of the way for themselves. We have noticed,
for years past, that this particular Stand is a favourite with the professors of the whip, and that, let
the weather be what it will, and though the cabs
may have vanished from all other Stands, you are pretty certain to meet with one there. There are,
in truth, more reasons than one for this preference.
In the first place, the spot is rural and pleasant;
a the second place, it is situate at a point just over
the mile from the two great railway stations, and
therefore is hardly liable to the abomination of a
sixpenny fare; in the third place, the beer at the
neighbouring "public" is of the kind for which
cabmen have a predilection ; and fourthly, the
Stand is not plagued by a table of fares and distances stuck up on a board, which at other places
is apt, by its gratuitous information, to mar the
speculations of the members of the brotherhood.
We might add, as another reason, that the site is
almost clear of the omnibus routes, and thus the
cab-drivers suffer little from the competition of
conductors.
The above reasons may perhaps account for the
partiality of the cabmen for this particular Stand.
At any rate, here you will find them in considerable
force all the day long, and, for the matter of that,
all the night too. What they do in the pauses—and they are very long pauses sometimes—between
the fares, it is not easy to declare. There is a good
deal of barter going on at times; we have seen
exchanges of a rather singular kind. take place,
which have quite puzzled. our powers of valuation;
such as two capes from a many-caped coat, in compensation for a dog-collar — a catch-'em-alive rat-trap against a nose-bag
— a pair of gaiters, rather shreddy from wear, for a curry-comb — and a razor,
not by any means warranted to shave, in lieu of a
tobacco-box, The occupations of an industrial kind
are many, but are all pursued in an off-hand kind
of way, as though it did not much matter if they
were neglected in toto. There is polishing of plate
harness, a little greasing of wheels, some dusting of
cushions, ditto cleaning of panels and muddy spokes,
with a show at least of sweeping out and ventilating
their vehicles, which are, for the most part, sadly in
want of renovation. Then there is the plaiting of
whips, and the renewal of whip-ends, and much
chaffering on the score of whip-handles. But the
chief pastime of all is conversation, and exchange of;
ideas on matters public and private. We are or
opinion that it would be extremely difficult for any
other than a cabman to come at the real sentiments
of the fraternity, even if he were admitted to these
open-air but private conclaves ; because the discussions are carried on in a
phraseology so wonderfully abbreviated as to be intelligible only to
themselves. Their utterances are the veriest samples of the multum in parvo
ever met with. Take a
specimen which we overheard accidentally the other
day.
"Seen Brimble, Ned ?"
" Reyther !"
"How about his old 'ooman?
"All right four o'clock 's mornin."
"Bwoy?"
" Gal."
"That makes five on 'em ?"
"Six."
"Wh-whew !"
Thus is the narrative of Mr. Brimble's domestic
felicity shorn of its fair proportions on the cab-stand, and thus curtly is expressed the brotherly
sympathy in his paternal embarrassments. There
s a valid ground, however, for this brevity of
speech and it will be found in the peculiar circumstances of the man who drives a cab. He
cannot dwell at any length upon details, or indulge
in the luxury of exordium or peroration, for a very
obvious reason: he is liable to be called off the
Stand at any moment to take up a fare. The cry
of "Cab— cab!" or the uplifted finger of a patron a
furlong down the street, would cut short his argument, however long, and spoil his logic in an instant; so he steers clear of such contingencies
by
avoiding circumlocutions, and talking plump at the
bull's eye. He deals much in monosyllables am
in significant ejaculations, and will express himself
at times in a kind of short-hand, which is partly
speech and partly gesticulation, but all wonderfully
comprehensive and perfectly intelligible to the
initiated. When on duty at night, however, he can afford to relax a little, and wag his tongue at
any length he likes. Truth to say, he is apt to do
this rather too much on occasions, and to expatiate
with a warmth inconvenient to the slumbering inmates of the genteel dwellings over the way; and
the police have been more than once obliged to
interfere to abate these nocturnal discussions.
Part and parcel of the Stand is the waterman,
who, however is anything but a fixture, and is
given to sudden appearances and disappearances,
and who has a scarecrow of a deputy in
of an unkempt lad, who makes a show
the shape
of doing
duty in his absence. Waterman, we suspect, is a
pluralist, keeping this ragged curate as temporary locum tenens ; we happen to know that the man of
tubs has a connection in the carpet-beating line,
and have, further, caught him in the act both of
putting up and pulling down shutters in the long
business street round the corner, which runs at
right angles with the road. Then he is not above
sweeping the crossing, or making his deputy do it,
when foul weather renders it impassable to clean
boots, and there is a chance of remuneration for
the job. If you do see our waterman at the Stand,
it is because there is something to be done there,
though he is often unaccountably absent even
at a busy time.
Far more of a fixture than
the waterman is the Stand-dog, Smut. Smut is
an ill-looking mongrel, close-haired, and of a black-brown hue, whom
the refinements of civilization have deprived of the
best part of his tail, while the chances of war have
rent his flap ears into shreds. He belongs to the
Stand in general, and to nobody in particular.
How he became naturalized there originally, we
cannot say; probably a born vagabond, doomed
to wander the world without a master, he found
among the scraps and leavings of the cabmen, who
are of necessity often diners-out, a solace for his
hunger, and beneath the shelter of their wheels a
substitute for what he had never yet possessed — a
home. Be that as it may, Smut has long been
free of the Stand, and a privileged favourite of the
drivers. In fine weather he roams the neighbourhood on foraging expeditions, or starts on a hunt
or vermin over the palings and into the nursery-ground. When the season is inclement, he is
given to leaping up to the foot-board beneath the driver's seat, where, pillowing his ugly head on a
nose-bag, he will doze away as much of the dreary time as he may. One thing will rouse him from
his lair, and bring him down like a tiger, and that
is, the intrusion of any other vagabond dog on his
peculiar domain: trim spaniels, genteel puppies,
lapdogs, and promenading pets, he takes no notice
of, knowing well enough that he needs expect no
rivalry from them ; but should any stray mongrel
or unmastered cur come prowling that way, woe betide him if he want either pluck or power to defend
himself, for Smut will descend upon him like an
avalanche, and he must either fight or run. If
Smut happens to be asleep when the cab in which
he has taken shelter rolls off with a fare, the
motion wakes him up, and then no blandishments
will induce him to retain his position ; down he
leaps, and returns to the Stand, of which he has
constituted himself the guardian.
On a close tropical day in July or August, the
picture of our Stand is one of almost still life.
Look down the long avenue, and you see the
drowsy cabbies, with the doors of their vehicles
opened on the shady side, each sitting on the step,
(if he does not happen to be curled up asleep inside,) smoking his short pipe and spelling over the
columns of a cheap newspaper. The waterman is
absent, perhaps thrashing away at some dusty
carpet ; but there lies his tattered deputy, fast
asleep and snoring, with his back against the rails.
Smut, whose tongue has been hanging out to dry
all day, comes lazily up to the water tubs, laps a
mouthful or two, and, curling himself round, snores
in his turn. But let that black cloud sail up from
the horizon, and the big spattering thunder-drops
come splashing on the pavement and lo! what a
sudden change. Up leaps Smut, shaking his remnants of ears and barking in triplets; up jumps
the deputy, and begins detaching the nose-bags
from .the heads of the mumbling hacks; up jumps every cabman to his box, whip in
hands; the whole rank is galvanized into sudden motion ; there is a clattering
of hoofs, a jarring of rusty axles, a creaking of panels from one end of the rank to the other,
and a slow progressive motion of the vehicles forward and forward, as one moves away after the
other, and the whole site is clear ; the avenue has
vanished, and all that is left of the Stand is three or
four tubs of water, the ragged deputy counting his
coppers over and over, and Smut wagging a forlorn
stump of tail in the midst of his desolate home.
There is no power so effectual in the clearance
of a cab-stand as a sudden and drenching shower.
Other causes, such as the break-up of a popular
assembly, or the advent of its hour of meeting,
may diminish its numbers more or less ; but a good
tempest of rain is the grand blessing for the cabs
man, who laughs at the wetting of his skin that
comes with the silver lining for his pocket.
Such are some of the aspects of our Stand.
There are other aspects, however, presented by the
Stand, wherever it may be, which may not be of so
picturesque a character. When Brimble, for instance, with his " six young 'uns," dependent on
his whip, "puts on" at the tail-end of the rank in the morning, only to move off after he has worked
up to the head, the Stand can hardly appear so
amusing to him as it does to us, What will Providence send to-day for him and his little ones ?
After waiting an hour or two, when his time to
move off does come, to what sort of a tune will he
have to drive his cab? He may have to trot away
for sixpence, or he may do business to the amount
of as many shillings. Brimble, it is plain, must
regard the Stand as very speculative ground and
it need not be wondered at if with him and his
congeners there should be prejudices and predilections in regard to lucky and unlucky Stands, as
we have good reason to know there are ; nor need
we marvel that, weary of the fortune of some unpropitious Stand, Brimble, recalling to mind his
hungry family, dashes out of the Stand in despair,
and, albeit it is contrary to the regulations, commences crawling the road for
customers, and competing with the omnibuses along their routes.
Meanwhile, it is time we should pull up, and
come to a stand ourselves.
The Leisure Hour, 1860
CAB STANDS .—Though the metropolitan cabman has not of late years enlisted much public sympathy, we cannot but feel some satisfaction that philanthropists, in pity for his exposure to many hours in wet and cold in the winter and extreme heat of summer, have interested themselves in providing him with shelter during the time he is waiting for a fare on his stand. The Westminster Board of Works have accepted the plans proposed for the erection of a shelter-house made of glass and iron for the cab-stand in Knightsbridge at the top of Sloane-street, and it will be commenced forthwith. At one end a waiting- room for the drivers, and at the other a kind of coffee-house will be provided, and thus it is hoped many of their number will be saved from the temptation, which it is almost impossible for them to resist, of continually refreshing or muddling themselves at some neighbouring public-house with beer or spirits. The cabman’s life is doubtless a hard one and as he is often but badly clad to endure rainy or cold weather, this shelter will doubtless be a great boon to him, unless—as it may be argued by another class of philanthropists—the sudden change he may experience when he gets a job will make him too susceptible of cold. The public will also be gainers by the arrangement, as it frequently happens that late in the evening and at night a driver is not to be got for some minutes, though there may be half-a- dozen or more cabs on a stand. They are in the public-houses. But our own sympathies extend to the poor horses, who, perhaps, are almost as much to be pitied as their drivers. At Liverpool the shelter-house system has been put into practice by the erection of three such edifices, with facilities provided for the men to cook their own dinners. Perhaps this movement will be extended to the metropolis.
The Leisure Hour, 20th April 1872, quoting the 'Globe'