the great
lines of road, the fares by which were very high, and quite beyond the
reach of the poorer or middle-class people.

People did not know what to make of Bianconi's car when it first
started. There were, of course, the usual prophets of disaster, who
decided that it "would never do." Many thought that no one would pay
eighteen-pence for going to Cahir by car when they could walk there for
nothing? There were others who thought that Bianconi should have stuck
to his shop, as there was no connection whatever between
picture-gilding and car-driving!

The truth is, the enterprise at first threatened to be a failure!
Scarcely anybody would go by the car. People preferred trudging on
foot, and saved their money, which was more valuable to them than their
time. The car sometimes ran for weeks without a passenger. Another
man would have given up the enterprise in despair. But this was not
the way with Bianconi. He was a man of tenacity and perseverance.
What should he do but start an opposition car? Nobody knew of it but
himself; not even the driver of the opposition car. However, the rival
car was started. The races between the car-drivers, the free lifts
occasionally given to passengers, the cheapness of the fare, and the
excitement of the contest, attracted the attention of the public. The
people took sides, and before long both cars came in full. Fortunately
the "great big yallah horse" of the opposition car broke down, and
Bianconi had all the trade to himself.

The people became accustomed to travelling. They might still walk to
Cahir; but going by car saved their legs, saved their brains, and saved
their time. They might go to Cahir market, do their business there,
and be comfortably back within the day. Bianconi then thought of
extending the car to Tipperary and Limerick. In the course of the same
year, 1815, he started another car between Clonmel, Cashel, and
Thurles. Thus all the principal towns of Tipperary were, in the first
year of the undertaking, connected together by car, besides being also
connected with Limerick.

It was easy to understand the convenience of the car system to business
men, farmers, and even peasants. Before their establishment, it took a
man a whole day to walk from Thurles to Clonmel, the second day to do
his business, and the third to walk back again; whereas he could, in
one day, travel backwards and forwards between the two towns, and have
five or six inter