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The jaunting car was not much good for families travelling with luggage and they were uncomfortable in cold or wet weather. But in Dublin and other Irish cities customers had the option of using enclosed, four-wheel cabs (called "growlers" as in London) when the need arose.
Source:
Going to the Kildare Hunt Meet at Johnstown Inn. Photo by Lafayette.
Outing magazine, vol. XLV, December, 1904, p. 297.
Vance Thompson's Cab Drivers / 26
How Pat Travels / 5
Barney, it seems, believes that animosities should be cultivated. Being a good man with his hands and blithe and gay in battle, he colors the week's end with riot. "'Tis for love of you, agrah," says Barney, winking. "Go 'long out o' that, Barney!" "'Tis all for the swateness of comin' home to ye, darlint, an' seein' the tear in yer eye for love av me." "It's for shame av ye, Barney," says Mrs. O'Hea, "ye onmainin' man!" I drank a cup of boiled tea to Barney's reformation and beneficed Mistress O'Hea with a Venetian charm, infallible against the evil eye – which is very prevalent in Dublin – and we drove away, the little mare trotting under us. "Where'll ye be goin'?" Barney asked with friendly interest. "The Kildare Club." "There's many fortunes been won an' lost there," he remarked, "thrue, Sir, why shud I carry lies abroad? You'll be betther home." It is always pleasant to offer disinterested (and unsolicited) advice about matters that are none of one's business; my brave Barney took a great deal of pleasure that way. "If you were thinkin' of takin' the could av the tay off your stomach," he added, "I'll drive ye to Higgins's." Mr. Higgins's tap-room adjoins the office of the "Freeman's Journal." In the bar-parlor Mr. Higgins introduced me to Mr. Geraghty. Mr. Geraghty was a dirty, handsome, old buck – the raggedest, dirtiest gentleman I ever met in my life. He assured me that he was an "Irish gentleman and a Catholic," and that he had an estate – at least he hadn't spent it quite all. He went out into the street and bought me a nosegay and presented it with a grace that would have raised the black envy in Lord Chesterfield; then with equal grace he borrowed half-a-crown. "It's bestowin' it, you are," said Barney, as he drove me to the Kildare. En route he explained to me certain secrets of the jarvey's craft. Thus: it shows that one is not Dublin-wise to speak of a car being on the stand or on the rank; 'tis "on the hazard*" Thus also: Decayed jarveys take to the trade of "caller" or "*whistler"; their duty is to call or whistle up the jarveys who, while on the hazard, may be having a drop across the way; his pay is tuppence a week from each driver. "That ould man is Pat O'Grady," said Barney, pointing out a whistler by Stephen's Green, "a good driver he was too, he was. But sure he niver was the same man afther he tuk to dhrink." *Whistler. In large cities today, hotel doormen routinely summon cabs from nearby stands by blowing a whistle. In 19th century London, where frequent fogs made cab riders and drivers invisible to one another, two blasts on a whistle summoned a hansom and one blast summoned a four-wheeled growler. Stores offered special cab whistles for sale to cab riders whose innate whistling skills left something to be desired.
*Hazard. A cab stand in Ireland. In all cities cab stands were a potential hazard, especially when they were located in the centers of wide streets to keep the curb lanes clear. But streets had plenty of other hazards, so why the word became attached to cab stands is a mystery.