Page:Motors and motor-driving (1902).djvu/105

Rh and efficient rug which may be used with safety for motor-driving.

A Piccadilly tailor, again, is building a special motor-coat, which obviates the necessity for a rug by being cut very wide in the skirt and buttons at the side. The garment is of good appearance, and somewhat resembles a German officer's greatcoat. The motorist, therefore, has a choice of serviceable attire. One of the disagreeables of a long drive through rain is that the water is apt to accumulate on the seat of the carriage, so that its occupants are virtually sitting in a small bath. I was amused to see some correspondence on this matter in the 'Automobile Club Notes and Notices' of February 4, 1901, No. 32, p. 197. Mr. T. G. Carew-Gibson there gave the following amusing account of a device in common use in the back country of Australia by coach-drivers and others:—

It consists of a flat, circular, leather-covered cushion about 15 inches diameter, by, say, 2$1⁄2$ inches thick, having a hole 2 inches or 3 inches diameter right through the centre. In fine weather you sit on the cushion, which the coefficient of friction between trousers and cushion being greater than that between the cushion and coach seat does all the sliding about (N.B.—the coaches are hung on thorotraces instead of springs), and saves both person and garments from considerable wear and tear.

In wet weather you put the cushion inside your coat before sitting down, and thus preserve a dry seat. Should you at any time leave the cushion exposed to rain, the water will not form a pool in the centre and saturate it, but will run away at once through the hole.

Just after the break-up of the 1888 drought, I, one day, struck the salubrious township of Booligal, in the Riverina District of New South Wales, and about 4 next morning, in a nice steady rain, issued forth from the 'hotel' to take my seat on the coach bound for Hay.

A minute later out came an old bagman who had also camped there, and seeing the driver standing dripping under the verandah, whilst the five lean and drought-stricken horses were being yoked up, asked him to wait a minute whilst he went across to the store. He shortly returned and climbed up beside us on the box, having