Page:Calcutta, Past and Present.djvu/193

 was something between a barouche and a phaeton, there have been a variety of names for different styles of conveyance which have been in fashion at different times. The writer of an article in the Calcutta Review, in 1844, drew a series of comparisons between Calcutta as it was in his day, and as it had been fifty years earlier; and, with much complacency and pride, enumerated the variety of carriages to be seen in the town—"britzskas, barouches, landaulets, chariots, phaetons, buggies, palanquins, palki-gharries, brownberries, and crahanchys."

A great deal of emulation and rivalry used to be shown in the decoration and appointments of these fine carriages, and the chariots especially were very gorgeous affairs, with their great springs, and deep bodies, the handsome hammer-cloth, and silver-mounted harness: the coachman, in flat disc-like turban, with crested band across, and full cummerbund, or waist-cloth; and the running footmen with their chowries, or fly-whisks of great yaks' tails, mounted on silver handles, slung across the shoulder. A handsome carriage of her own was the ambition of every young lady of proper spirit, which led to a bachelor's fine equipage being called a "wife-trap" by the wits of the day. An amusing story in this connection is given in the Calcutta Gazette of the