Mr. Rice's advice and instruction set and kept Bianconi in the right
road.  He helped the young foreigner to learn English. Bianconi was no
longer a dunce, as he had been at school; but a keen, active,
enterprising fellow, eager to make his way in the world.  Mr. Rice
encouraged him to be sedulous and industrious, urged him to carefulness
and sobriety, and strengthened his religions impressions.  The help and
friendship of this good man, operating upon the mind and soul of a
young man, whose habits of conduct and whose moral and religious
character were only in course of formation, could not fail to exercise,
as Bianconi always acknowledged they did, a most powerful influence
upon the whole of his after life.

Although "three removes" are said to be "as bad as a fire," Bianconi,
after remaining about two years at Waterford, made a third removal in
1809, to Clonmel, in the county of Tipperary. Clonmel is the centre of
a large corn trade, and is in water communication, by the Suir, with
Carrick and Waterford. Bianconi, therefore, merely extended his
connection; and still continued his dealings with his customers in the
other towns.  He made himself more proficient in the mechanical part of
his business; and aimed at being the first carver and gilder in the
trade.  Besides, he had always an eye open for new business.  At that
time, when the war was raging with France, gold was at a premium.  The
guinea was worth about twenty-six or twenty-seven shillings.  Bianconi
therefore began to buy up the hoarded-up guineas of the peasantry.  The
loyalists became alarmed at his proceedings, and began to circulate the
report that Bianconi, the foreigner, was buying up bullion to send
secretly to Bonaparte! The country people, however, parted with their
guineas readily; for they had no particular hatred of "Bony," but
rather admired him.

Bianconi's conduct was of course quite loyal in the matter; he merely
bought the guineas as a matter of business, and sold them at a profit
to the bankers.

The country people had a difficulty in pronouncing his name.  His shop
was at the corner of Johnson Street, and instead of Bianconi, he came
to be called "Bian of the Corner."  He was afterwards known as "Bian."

Bianconi soon became well known after his business was established.  He
became a proficient in the carving and gilding line, and was looked
upon as a thriving man.  He began to employ assistants in his trade,
and had three German gilders at work. While they were working in the
shop he would travel about the country, taking orders and delivering
goods--sometimes walking and sometimes driving.

He still retained a little of his old friskiness and spirit of
mischief.  He was once driving a car from Clonmel to Thurles; he had
with him a large looking-glass with a gilt frame, on which about a
fortnight's labour had been bestowed.  In a fit of exuberant humour he
began to tickle the horse under his tail with a straw!  In an instant
the animal reared and plunged, and then set off at a gallop down hill.
The result was, that the car was dashed to bits and the looking-glass
broken into a thousand atoms!

On another occasion, a man was carrying to Cashel on his back one of
Bianconi's large looking-glasses.  An old woman by the wayside, seeing
the odd-looking, unwieldy package, asked what it was; on which
Bianconi, who was close behind the man carrying the glass, answered
that it was "the Repeal of the Union!"  The old woman's delight was
unbounded!  She knelt down on her knees in the middle of the road, as
if it had been a picture of the Madonna, and thanked God for having
preserved her in her old age to see the Repeal of the Union!

But this little waywardness did not last long.  Bianconi's wild oats
were soon all sown.  He was careful and frugal.  As he afterwards used
to say, "When I was earning a shilling a day at Clonmel, I lived upon
eightpence."  He even took lodgers, to relieve him of the charge of his
household expenses.  But as his means grew, he was soon able to have a
conveyance of his own.  He first started a yellow gig, in which he
drove about from place to place, and was everywhere treated with
kindness and hospitality. He was now regarded as "respectable," and as
a person worthy to hold some local office.  He was elected to a Society
for visiting the Sick Poor, and became a Member of the House of
Industry.  He might have gone on in the same business, winning his way
to the Mayoralty of Clonmel, which he afterwards held; but that the old
idea, which had first sprung up in his mind while resting wearily on
the milestones along the road, with his heavy case of pictures by his
side, again laid hold of him, and he determined now to try whether his
plan could not be carried into effect.

He had often lamented the fatigue that poor people had to undergo in
travelling with burdens from place to place upon foot, and wondered
whether some means might not be devised for alleviating their
sufferings.  Other people would have suggested "the Government!"  Why
should not the Government give us this, that, and the other,--give us
roads, harbours, carriages, boats, nets, and so on.  This, of course,
would have been a mistaken idea; for where people are too much helped,
they invariably lose the beneficent practice of helping themselves.
Charles Bianconi had never been helped, except by advice and
friendship.  He had helped himself throughout; and now he would try to
help others.

The facts were patent to everybody.  There was not an Irishman who did
not know the difficulty of getting from one town to another.  There
were roads between them, but no conveyances. There was an abundance of
horses in the country, for at the close of the war an unusual number of
horses, bred for the army, were thrown upon the market.  Then a tax had
been levied upon carriages, which sent a large number of jaunting-cars
out of employment.

The roads of Ireland were on the whole good, being at that time quite
equal, if not superior, to most of those in England.  The facts of the
abundant horses, the good roads, the number of unemployed outside cars,
were generally known; but until Bianconi took the enterprise in hand,
there was no person of thought, or spirit, or capital in the country,
who put these three things together horses, roads, and cars and dreamt
of remedying the great public inconvenience.

It was left for our young Italian carver and gilder, a struggling man
of small capital, to take up the enterprise, and show what could be
done by prudent action and persevering energy.  Though the car system
originally "grew out of his back," Bianconi had long been turning the
subject over in his mind.  His idea was, that we should never despise
small interests, nor neglect the wants of poor people.  He saw the
mail-coaches supplying the requirements of the rich, and enabling them
to travel rapidly from place to place.  "Then," said he to himself,
"would it not be possible for me to make an ordinary two-wheeled car
pay, by running as regularly for the accommodation of poor districts
and poor people?"

When Mr. Wallace, chairman of the Select Committee on Postage, in 1838,
asked Mr. Bianconi, "What induced you to commence the car
establishment?" his answer was, "I did so from what I saw, after coming
to this country, of the necessity for such cars, inasmuch as there was
no middle mode of conveyance, nothing to fill up the vacuum that
existed between those who were obliged to walk and those who posted or
rode.  My want of knowledge of the language gave me plenty of time for
deliberation, and in proportion as I grew up with the knowledge of the
language and the localities, this vacuum pressed very heavily upon my
mind, till at last I hit upon the idea of running jaunting-cars, and
for that purpose I commenced running one between Clonmel and Cahir."[2]

What a happy thing it was for Bianconi and Ireland that he could not
speak with facility,--that he did not know the language or the manners
of the country!  In his case silence was "golden." Had he been able to
talk like the people about him, he might have said much and done
little,--attempted nothing and consequently achieved nothing.  He might
have got up a meeting and petitioned Parliament to provide the cars,
and subvention the car system; or he might have gone amongst his
personal friends, asked them to help him, and failing their help, given
up his idea in despair, and sat down grumbling at the people and the
Government.

But instead of talking, he proceeded to doing, thereby illustrating
Lessona's maxim of Volere e potere.  After thinking the subject fully
over, he trusted to self-help.  He found that with his own means,
carefully saved, he could make a beginning; and the beginning once
made, included the successful ending.

The beginning, it is true, was very small.  It was only an ordinary
jaunting-car, drawn by a single horse, capable of accommodating six
persons.  The first car ran between Clonmel and Cahir, a distance of
about twelve miles, on the 5th of July, 1815--a memorable day for
Bianconi and Ireland.  Up to that time the public accommodation for
passengers was confined to a few mail and day coaches on 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 intermediate hours for the purpose of doing his business.
Thus two clear days could be saved.

Still carrying out his scheme, Bianconi, in the following year (1816),
put on a car from Clonmel to Waterford.  Before that time there was no
car accommodation between Clonmel and Carrick-on-Suir, about half-way
to Waterford; but there was an accommodation by boat between Carrick
and Waterford.  The distance between the two latter places was, by
road, twelve miles, and by the river Suir twenty-four miles.  Tom
Morrissey's boat plied two days a week; it carried from eight to ten
passengers at 6 1/2d. of the then currency; it did the voyage in from
four to five hours, and besides had to wait for the tide to float it up
and down the river.  When Bianconi's car was put on, it did the
distance daily and regularly in two hours, at a fare of two shillings.

The people soon got accustomed to the convenience of the cars. They
also learned from them the uses of punctuality and the value of time.
They liked the open-air travelling and the sidelong motion.  The new
cars were also safe and well-appointed.  They were drawn by good horses
and driven by good coachmen. Jaunting-car travelling had before been
rather unsafe.  The country cars were of a ramshackle order, and the
drivers were often reckless.  "Will I pay the pike, or drive at it,
plaise your honour?" said a driver to his passenger on approaching a
turnpike-gate.  Sam Lover used to tell a story of a car-driver, who,
after driving his passenger up-hill and down-hill, along a very bad
road, asked him for something extra at the end of his journey.

"Faith," said the driver, "its not putting me off with this ye'd be, if
ye knew but all."  The gentleman gave him another shilling.  "And now
what do you mean by saying, 'if ye knew but all?'"  "That I druv yer
honor the last three miles widout a linch-pin!"

Bianconi, to make sure of the soundness and safety of his cars, set up
a workshop to build them for himself.  He could thus depend upon their
soundness, down even to the linch-pin itself. He kept on his carving
and gilding shop until his car business had increased so much that it
required the whole of his time and attention; and then he gave it up.
In fact, when he was able to run a car from Clonmel to Waterford--a
distance of thirty-two miles--at a fare of three-and-sixpence, his
eventual triumph was secure.

He made Waterford one of the centres of his operations, as he had
already made Clonmel.  In 1818 he established a car between Waterford
and Ross, in the following year a car between Waterford and Wexford,
and another between Waterford and Enniscorthy.  A few years later he
established other cars between Waterford and Kilkenny, and Waterford
and Dungarvan.  From these furthest points, again, other cars were
established in communication with them, carrying the line further
north, east, and west.  So much had the travelling between Clonmel and
Waterford increased, that in a few years (instead of the eight or ten
passengers conveyed by Tom Morrissey's boat on the Suir) there was
horse and car power capable of conveying a hundred passengers daily
between the two places.

Bianconi did a great stroke of business at the Waterford election of
1826.  Indeed it was the turning point of his fortunes.  He was at
first greatly cramped for capital.  The expense of maintaining and
increasing his stock of cars, and of foddering his horses was very
great; and he was always on the look-out for more capital.  When the
Waterford election took place, the Beresford party, then all-powerful,
engaged all his cars to drive the electors to the poll.  The popular
party, however, started a candidate, and applied to Bianconi for help.
But he could not comply, for his cars were all engaged.  The morning
after his refusal of the application, Bianconi was pelted with mud.
One or two of his cars and horses were heaved over the bridge.

Bianconi then wrote to Beresford's agent, stating that he could no
longer risk the lives of his drivers and his horses, and desiring to be
released from his engagement.  The Beresford party had no desire to
endanger the lives of the car-drivers or their horses, and they set
Bianconi free.  He then engaged with the popular party, and enabled
them to win the election.  For this he was paid the sum of a thousand
pounds.  This access of capital was greatly helpful to him under the
circumstances.  He was able to command the market, both for horses and
fodder.  He was also placed in a position to extend the area of his car
routes.

He now found time, amidst his numerous avocations, to get married!  He
was forty years of age before this event occurred. He married Eliza
Hayes, some twenty years younger than himself, the daughter of Patrick
Hayes, of Dublin, and of Henrietta Burton, an English-woman.  The
marriage was celebrated on the 14th of February, 1827; and the ceremony
was performed by the late Archbishop Murray.  Mr. Bianconi must now
have been in good circumstances, as he settled two thousand pounds upon
his wife on their marriage-day.  His early married life was divided
between his cars, electioneering, and Repeal agitation--for he was
always a great ally of O'Connell.  Though he joined in the Repeal
movement, his sympathies were not with it; for he preferred Imperial to
Home Rule.  But he could never deny himself the pleasure of following
O'Connell, "right or wrong."

Let us give a picture of Bianconi now.  The curly-haired Italian boy
had grown a handsome man.  His black locks curled all over his head
like those of an ancient Roman bust.  His face was full of power, his
chin was firm, his nose was finely cut and well-formed; his eyes were
keen and sparkling, as if throwing out a challenge to fortune.  He was
active, energetic, healthy, and strong, spending his time mostly in the
open air.  He had a wonderful recollection of faces, and rarely forgot
to recognise the countenance that he had once seen.  He even knew all
his horses by name.  He spent little of his time at home, but was
constantly rushing about the country after business, extending his
connections, organizing his staff, and arranging the centres of his
traffic.

To return to the car arrangements.  A line was early opened from
Clonmel--which was at first the centre of the entire connection--to
Cork; and that line was extended northward, through Mallow and
Limerick.  Then, the Limerick car went on to Tralee, and from thence to
Cahirciveen, on the south-west coast of Ireland.  The cars were also
extended northward from Thurles to Roscrea, Ballinasloe, Athlone,
Roscommon, and Sligo, and to all the principal towns in the north-west
counties of Ireland.

The cars interlaced with each other, and plied, not so much in
continuous main lines, as across country, so as to bring all important
towns, but especially the market towns, into regular daily
communication with each other.  Thus, in the course of about thirty
years, Bianconi succeeded in establishing a system of internal
communication in Ireland, which traversed the main highways and
cross-roads from town to town, and gave the public a regular and safe
car accommodation at the average rate of a penny-farthing per mile.

The traffic in all directions steadily increased.  The first car used
was capable of accommodating only six persons.  This was between
Clonmel and Cahir.  But when it went on to Limerick, a larger car was
required.  The traffic between Clonmel and Waterford was also begun
with a small-sized car.  But in the course of a few years, there were
four large-sized cars, travelling daily each way, between the two
places.  And so it was in other directions, between Cork in the south;
and Sligo and Strabane in the north and north-west; between Wexford in
the east, and Galway and Skibbereen in the west and south-west.

Bianconi first increased the accommodation of these cars so as to carry
four persons on each side instead of three, drawn by two horses.  But
as the two horses could quite as easily carry two additional
passengers, another piece was added to the car so as to carry five
passengers.  Then another four-wheeled car was built, drawn by three
horses, so as to carry six passengers on each side.  And lastly, a
fourth horse was used, and the car was further enlarged, so as to
accommodate seven, and eventually eight passengers on each side, with
one on the box, which made a total accommodation for seventeen
passengers.  The largest and heaviest of the long cars, on four wheels,
was called "Finn MacCoul's," after Ossian's Giant; the fast cars, of a
light build, on two wheels, were called "Faugh-a-ballagh," or "clear
the way"; while the  intermediate cars were named "Massey Dawsons,"
after a popular Tory squire.

When Bianconi's system was complete, he had about a hundred vehicles at
work; a hundred and forty stations for changing horses, where from one
to eight grooms were employed; about a hundred drivers, thirteen
hundred horses, performing an average distance of three thousand eight
hundred miles daily; passing through twenty-three counties, and
visiting no fewer than a hundred and twenty of the principal towns and
cities in the south and west and midland counties of Ireland.
Bianconi's horses consumed on an average from three to four thousand
tons of hay yearly, and from thirty to forty thousand barrels of oats,
all of which were purchased in the respective localities in which they
were grown.

Bianconi's cars--or "The Bians"--soon became very popular. Everybody
was under obligations to them.  They greatly promoted the improvement
of the country.  People could go to market and buy or sell their goods
more advantageously.  It was cheaper for them to ride than to walk.
They brought the whole people of the country so much nearer to each
other.  They virtually opened up about seven-tenths of Ireland to
civilisation and commerce, and among their other advantages, they
opened markets for the fresh fish caught by the fishermen of Galway,
Clifden, Westport, and other places, enabling them to be sold
throughout the country on the day after they were caught.  They also
opened the magnificent scenery of Ireland to tourists, and enabled them
to visit Bantry Bay, Killarney, South Donegal, and the wilds of
Connemara in safety, all the year round.

Bianconi's service to the public was so great, and it was done with so
much tact, that nobody had a word to say against him. Everybody was his
friend.  Not even the Whiteboys would injure him or the mails he
carried.  He could say with pride, that in the most disturbed times his
cars had never been molested.  Even during the Whiteboy insurrection,
though hundreds of people were on the roads at night, the traffic went
on without interference. At the meeting of the British Association in
1857, Bianconi said: "My conveyances, many of them carrying very
important mails, have been travelling during all hours of the day and
night, often in lonely and unfrequented places; and during the long
period of forty-two years that my establishment has been in existence,
the slightest injury has never been done by the people to my property,
or that entrusted to my care; and this fact gives me greater pleasure
than any pride I might feel in reflecting upon the other rewards of my
life's labour."

Of course Bianconi's cars were found of great use for carrying the
mails.  The post was, at the beginning of his enterprise, very badly
served in Ireland, chiefly by foot and horse posts. When the first car
was run from Clonmel to Cahir, Bianconi offered to carry the mail for
half the price then paid for "sending it alternately by a mule and a
bad horse."  The post was afterwards found to come regularly instead of
irregularly to Cahir; and the practice of sending the mails by
Bianconi's cars increased from year to year.  Dispatch won its way to
popularity in Ireland as elsewhere, and Bianconi lived to see all the
cross-posts in Ireland arranged on his system.

The postage authorities frequently used the cars of Bianconi as a means
of competing with the few existing mail-coaches.  For instance, they
asked him to compete for carrying the post between Limerick and Tralee,
then carried by a mail-coach.  Before tendering, Bianconi called on the
contractor, to induce him to give in to the requirements of the Post
Office, because he knew that the postal authorities only desired to
make use of him to fight the coach proprietors.  But having been
informed that it was the intention of the Post Office to discontinue
the mail-coach whether Bianconi took the contract or not, he at length
sent in his tender, and obtained the contract.

He succeeded in performing the service, and delivered the mail much
earlier than it had been done before.  But the former contractor,
finding that he had made a mistake, got up a movement in favour of
re-establishing the mail-coach upon that line of road; and he
eventually induced the postage authorities to take the mail contract
out of the hands of Bianconi, and give it back to himself, as formerly.
Bianconi, however, continued to keep his cars upon the road.  He had
before stated to the contractor, that if he once started his cars, he
would not leave it, even though the contract were taken from him.  Both
coach and car therefore ran for years upon the road, each losing
thousands of pounds.  "But," said Bianconi, when asked about the matter
by the Committee on Postage in 1838, "I kept my word:  I must either
lose character by breaking my word, or lose money.  I prefer losing
money to giving up the line of road."

Bianconi had also other competitors to contend with, especially from
coach and car proprietors.  No sooner had he shown to others the way to
fortune, than he had plenty of imitators.  But they did not possess his
rare genius for organisation, nor perhaps his still rarer principles.
They had not his tact, his foresight, his knowledge, nor his
perseverance.  When Bianconi was asked by the Select Committee on
Postage, "Do the opposition cars started against you induce you to
reduce your fares?" his answer was, "No; I seldom do.  Our fares are so
close to the first cost, that if any man runs cheaper than I do, he
must starve off, as few can serve the public lower and better than I
do."[3]

Bianconi was once present at a meeting of car proprietors, called for
the purpose of uniting to put down a new opposition coach. Bianconi
would not concur, but protested against it, saying, "If car proprietors
had united against me when I started, I should have been crushed.  But
is not the country big enough for us all?"  The coach proprietors,
after many angry words, threatened to unite in running down Bianconi
himself.  "Very well," he said, "you may run me off the road--that is
possible; but while there is this" (pulling a flower out of his coat)
"you will not put me down."  The threat merely ended in smoke, the
courage and perseverance of Bianconi having long since become generally
recognised.

We have spoken of the principles of Mr. Bianconi.  They were most
honourable.  His establishment might be spoken of as a school of
morality.  In the first place, he practically taught and enforced the
virtues of punctuality, truthfulness, sobriety, and honesty. He also
taught the public generally the value of time, to which, in fact, his
own success was in a great measure due.  While passing through Clonmel
in 1840, Mr. and Mrs. S. C. Hall called upon Bianconi and went over his
establishment, as well as over his house and farm, a short distance
from the town.  The travellers had a very pressing engagement, and
could not stay to hear the story of how their entertainer had contrived
to "make so much out of so little."  "How much time have you?" he
asked. "Just  five minutes."  "The car," says Mr. Hall, "had conveyed
us to the back entrance.  Bianconi instantly rang the bell, and said to
the servant, 'Tell the driver to bring the car round to the front,'
adding, 'that will save one minute, and enable me to tell you all
within the time.' This was, in truth the secret of his success, making
the most of time."[4]

But the success of Bianconi was also due to the admirable principles on
which his establishment was conducted.  His drivers were noted as being
among the most civil and obliging men in Ireland, besides being
pleasant companions to boot.  They were careful, punctual, truthful,
and honest; but all this was the result of strict discipline on the
part of their master.

The drivers were taken from the lowest grades of the establishment, and
promoted to higher positions according to their respective merits as
opportunity offered.  "Much surprise," says Bianconi, "has often been
expressed at the high order of men connected with my car establishment
and at its popularity; but parties thus expressing themselves forget to
look at Irish society with sufficient grasp.  For my part, I cannot
better compare it than to a man merging to convalescence from a serious
attack of malignant fever, and requiring generous nutrition in place of
medical treatment"[5]

To attach the men to the system, as well as to confer upon them the due
reward for their labour, he provided for all the workmen who had been
injured, worn out, or become superannuated in his service.  The drivers
could then retire upon a full pension, which they enjoyed during the
rest of their lives.  They were also paid their full wages during
sickness, and at their death Bianconi educated their children, who grew
up to manhood, and afterwards filled the situations held by their
deceased parents.

Every workman had thus a special interest in his own good conduct.
They knew that nothing but misbehaviour could deprive them of the
benefits they enjoyed; and hence their endeavours to maintain their
positions by observing the strict discipline enjoined by their employer.

Sobriety was, of course, indispensable--a drunken car-driver being
amongst the most dangerous of servants.  The drivers must also be
truthful, and the man found telling a lie, however venial, was
instantly dismissed.  Honesty was also strongly enforced, not only for
the sake of the public, but for the sake of the men themselves.  Hence
he never allowed his men to carry letters.  If they did so, he fined
them in the first instance very severely, and in the second instance
dismissed them.  "I do so," he said, "because if I do not respect other
institutions (the Post Office), my men will soon learn not to respect
my own. Then, for carrying letters during the extent of their trip, the
men most probably would not get money, but drink, and hence become
dissipated and unworthy of confidence."

Thus truth, accuracy, punctuality, sobriety, and honesty being strictly
enforced, formed the fundamental principle of the entire management.
At the same time, Bianconi treated his drivers with every confidence
and respect.  He made them feel that, in doing their work well, they
conferred a greater benefit on him and on the public than he did on
them by paying them their wages.

When attending the British Association at Cork, Bianconi said that, "in
proportion as he advanced his drivers, he lowered their wages."
"Then," said Dr. Taylor, the Secretary, "I wouldn't like to serve you."
"Yes, you would," replied Bianconi, "because in promoting my drivers I
place them on a more lucrative line, where their certainty of receiving
fees from passengers is greater."

Bianconi was as merciful to his horses as to his men.  He had much
greater difficulty at first in finding good men than good horses,
because the latter were not exposed to the temptations to which the
former were subject.  Although the price of horses continued to rise,
he nevertheless bought the best horses at increased prices, and he took
care not to work them overmuch.  He gave his horses as well as his men
their seventh day's rest.  "I find by experience," he said, "that I can
work a horse eight miles a day for six days in the week, easier than I
can work six miles for seven days; and that is one of my reasons for
having no cars, unless carrying a mail, plying upon Sundays."

Bianconi had confidence in men generally.  The result was that men had
confidence in him.  Even the Whiteboys respected him.  At the close of
a long and useful life he could say with truth, "I never yet attempted
to do an act of generosity or common justice, publicly or privately,
that I was not met by manifold reciprocity."

By bringing the various classes of society into connection with each
other, Bianconi believed, and doubtless with truth, that he was the
means of making them respect each other, and that he thereby promoted
the civilisation of Ireland.  At the meeting of the social Science
Congress, held at Dublin in 1861, he said: "The state of the roads was
such as to limit the rate of travelling to about seven miles an hour,
and the passengers were often obliged to walk up hills.  Thus all
classes were brought together, and I have felt much pleasure in
believing that the intercourse thus created tended to inspire the
higher classes with respect and regard for the natural good qualities
of the humbler people, which the latter reciprocated by a becoming
deference and an anxiety to please and oblige.  Such a moral benefit
appears to me to be worthy of special notice and congratulation."

Even when railways were introduced, Bianconi did not resist them, but
welcomed them as "the great civilisers of the age."  There was, in his
opinion, room enough for all methods of conveyance in Ireland.  When
Captain Thomas Drummond was appointed Under-Secretary for Ireland in
1835, and afterwards chairman of the Irish Railway Commission, he had
often occasion to confer with Mr. Bianconi, who gave him every
assistance.  Mr. Drummond conceived the greatest respect for Bianconi,
and often asked him how it was that he, a foreigner, should have
acquired so extensive an influence and so distinguished a position in
Ireland?

"The question came upon me," said Bianconi, "by surprise, and I did not
at the time answer it.  But another day he repeated his question, and I
replied, 'Well, it was because, while the big and the little were
fighting, I crept up between them, carried out my enterprise, and
obliged everybody.'"  This, however, did not satisfy Mr. Drummond, who
asked Bianconi to write down for him an autobiography, containing the
incidents of his early life down to the period of his great Irish
enterprise.  Bianconi proceeded to do this, writing down his past
history in the occasional intervals which he could snatch from the
immense business which he still continued personally to superintend.
But before the "Drummond memoir" could be finished Mr. Drummond himself
had ceased to live, having died in 1840, principally of overwork. What
he thought of Bianconi, however, has been preserved in his Report of
the Irish Railway Commission of 1838, written by Mr. Drummond himself,
in which he thus speaks of his enterprising friend in starting and
conducting the great Irish car establishment:--

"With a capital little exceeding the expense of outfit he commenced.
Fortune, or rather the due reward of industry and integrity, favoured
his first efforts.  He soon began to increase the number of his cars
and multiply routes, until his establishment spread over the whole of
Ireland.  These results are the more striking and instructive as having
been accomplished in a district which has long been represented as the
focus of unreclaimed violence and barbarism, where neither life nor
property can be deemed secure.  Whilst many possessing a personal
interest in everything tending to improve or enrich the country have
been so misled or inconsiderate as to repel by exaggerated statements
British capital from their doors, this foreigner chose Tipperary as the
centre of his operations, wherein to embark all the fruits of his
industry in a traffic peculiarly exposed to the power and even to the
caprice of the peasantry.  The event has shown that his confidence in
their good sense was not ill-grounded.

"By a system of steady and just treatment he has obtained a complete
mastery, exempt from lawless intimidation or control, over the various
servants and agents employed by him, and his establishment is popular
with all classes on account of its general usefulness and the fair
liberal spirit of its management. The success achieved by this spirited
gentleman is the result, not of a single speculation, which might have
been favoured by local circumstances, but of a series of distinct
experiments, all of which have been successful."

When the railways were actually made and opened, they ran right through
the centre of Bianconi's long-established systems of communication.
They broke up his lines, and sent them to the right and left.  But,
though they greatly disturbed him, they did not destroy him.  In his
enterprising hands the railways merely changed the direction of the
cars.  He had at first to take about a thousand horses off the road,
with thirty-seven vehicles, travelling 2446 miles daily.  But he
remodelled his system so as to run his cars between the
railway-stations and the towns to the right and left of the main lines.

He also directed his attention to those parts of Ireland which had not
before had the benefit of his conveyances.  And in thus still
continuing to accommodate the public, the number of his horses and
carriages again increased, until, in 1861, he was employing 900 horses,
travelling over 4000 miles daily; and in 1866, when he resigned his
business, he was running only 684 miles daily below the maximum run in
1845, before the railways had begun to interfere with his traffic.

His cars were then running to Dungarvan, Waterford, and Wexford in the
south-west of Ireland; to Bandon, Rosscarbery, Skibbereen, and
Cahirciveen, in the south; to Tralee, Galway, Clifden, Westport, and
Belmullet in the west; to Sligo, Enniskillen, Strabane, and Letterkenny
in the north; while, in the centre of Ireland, the towns of Thurles,
Kilkenny, Birr, and Ballinasloe were also daily served by the cars of
Bianconi.

At the meeting of the British Association, held in Dublin in 1857, Mr.
Bianconi mentioned a fact which, he thought, illustrated the increasing
prosperity of the country and the progress of the people.  It was, that
although the population had so considerably decreased by emigration and
other causes, the proportion of travellers by his conveyances continued
to increase, demonstrating not only that the people had more money, but
that they appreciated the money value of time, and also the advantages
of the car system established for their accommodation.

Although railways must necessarily have done much to promote the
prosperity of Ireland, it is very doubtful whether the general
passenger public were not better served by the cars of Bianconi than by
the railways which superseded them.  Bianconi's cars were on the whole
cheaper, and were always run en correspondence, so as to meet each
other; whereas many of the railway trains in the south of Ireland,
under the competitive system existing between the several companies,
are often run so as to miss each other. The present working of the
Irish railway traffic provokes perpetual irritation amongst the Irish
people, and sufficiently accounts for the frequent petitions presented
to Parliament that they should be taken in hand and worked by the State.

Bianconi continued to superintend his great car establishment until
within the last few years.  He had a constitution of iron, which he
expended in active daily work.  He liked to have a dozen irons in the
fire, all red-hot at once.  At the age of seventy he was still a man in
his prime; and he might be seen at Clonmel helping, at busy times, to
load the cars, unpacking and unstrapping the luggage where it seemed to
be inconveniently placed; for he was a man who could never stand by and
see others working without having a hand in it himself.  Even when well
on to eighty, he still continued to grapple with the immense business
involved in working a traffic extending over two thousand five hundred
miles of road.

Nor was Bianconi without honour in his adopted country.  He began his
great enterprise in 1815, though it was not until 1831 that he obtained
letters of naturalisation.  His application for these privileges was
supported by the magistrates of Tipperary and by the Grand Jury, and
they were at once granted.  In 1844 he was elected Mayor of Clonmel,
and took his seat as Chairman at the Borough Petty Sessions to dispense
justice.

The first person brought before him was James Ryan, who had been drunk
and torn a constable's belt.  "Well, Ryan," said the magistrate, "what
have you to say?"  "Nothing, your worship; only I wasn't drunk."  "Who
tore the constable's belt?"  "He was bloated after his Christmas
dinner, your worship, and the belt burst!"  "You are so very pleasant,"
said the magistrate, "that you will have to spend forty-eight hours in
gaol."

He was re-elected Mayor in the following year, very much against his
wish.  He now began to buy land, for "land hunger" was strong upon him.
In 1846 he bought the estate of Longfield, in the parish of Boherlahan,
county of Tipperary.  It consisted of about a thousand acres of good
land, with a large cheerful house overlooking the river Suir.  He went
on buying more land, until he became possessor of about eight thousand
English acres.

One of his favourite sayings was: "Money melts, but land holds while
grass grows and water runs."  He was an excellent landlord, built
comfortable houses for his tenantry, and did what he could for their
improvement.  Without solicitation, the Government appointed him a
justice of the peace and a Deputy-lientenant for the county of
Tipperary.  Everything that he did seemed to thrive.  He was honest,
straightforward, loyal, and law-abiding.

On first taking possession of his estate at Longfield, he was met by a
procession of the tenantry, who received him with great enthusiasm.  In
his address to them, he said, amongst other things:  "Allow me to
impress upon you the great importance of respecting the laws.  The laws
are made for the good and the benefit of society, and for the
punishment of the wicked.  No one but an enemy would counsel you to
outrage the laws.  Above all things, avoid secret and unlawful
societies.  Much of the improvement now going on amongst us is owing to
the temperate habits of the people, to the mission of my much respected
friend, Father Mathew, and to the advice of the Liberator.  Follow the
advice of O'Connell; be temperate, moral, peaceable; and you will
advance your country, ameliorate your condition, and the blessing of
God will attend all your efforts."

Bianconi was always a great friend of O'Connell.  From an early period
he joined him in the Catholic Emancipation movement.  He took part with
him in founding the National Bank in Ireland.  In course of time the
two became more intimately related. Bianconi's son married O'Connell's
granddaughter; and O'Connell's nephew, Morgan John, married Bianconi's
daughter.  Bianconi's son died in 1864, leaving three daughters, but no
male heir to carry on the family name.  The old man bore the blow of
his son's premature death with fortitude, and laid his remains in the
mortuary chapel, which he built on his estate at Longfield.

In the following year, when he was seventy-eight, he met with a severe
accident.  He was overturned, and his thigh was severely fractured.  He
was laid up for six months, quite incapable of stirring.  He was
afterwards able to get about in a marvellous way, though quite
crippled.  As his life's work was over, he determined to retire finally
from business; and he handed over the whole of his cars, coaches,
horses, and plant, with all the lines of road he was then working, to
his employes, on the most liberal terms.

My youngest son met Mr. Bianconi, by appointment, at the Roman Catholic
church at Boherlahan, in the summer of 1872.  Although the old
gentleman had to be lifted into and out of his carriage by his two
men-servants, he was still as active-minded as ever. Close to the
church at Boherlahan is Bianconi's mortuary chapel, which he built as a
sort of hobby, for the last resting-place of himself and his family.
The first person interred in it was his eldest daughter, who died in
Italy; the second was his only son. A beautiful monument with a
bas-relief has been erected in the chapel by Benzoni, an Italian
sculptor, to the memory of his daughter.

"As we were leaving the chapel," my son informs me, "we passed a long
Irish car containing about sixteen people, the tenants of Mr. Bianconi,
who are brought at his expense from all parts of the estate.  He is
very popular with his tenantry, regarding their interests as his own;
and he often quotes the words of his friend Mr. Drummond, that
'property has its duties as well as its rights.' He has rebuilt nearly
every house on his extensive estates in Tipperary.

"On our way home, the carriage stopped to let me down and see the
strange remains of an ancient fort, close by the roadside.  It consists
of a high grass-grown mound, surrounded by a moat.  It is one of the
so-called Danish forts, which are found in all parts of Ireland.  If it
be true that these forts were erected by the Danes, they must at one
time have had a strong hold of the greater part of Ireland.

"The carriage entered a noble avenue of trees, with views of prettily
enclosed gardens on either side.  Mr. Bianconi exclaimed, 'Welcome to
the Carman's Stage!' Longfield House, which we approached, is a fine
old-fashioned house, situated on the river Suir, a few miles south of
Cashel, one of the most ancient cities in Ireland.  Mr. Bianconi and
his family were most hospitable; and I found him most lively and
communicative.  He talked cleverly and with excellent choice of
language for about three hours, during which I learnt much from him.

"Like most men who have accomplished great things, and overcome many
difficulties, Mr. Bianconi is fond of referring to the past events in
his interesting life.  The acuteness of his conversation is wonderful.
He hits off a keen thought in a few words, sometimes full of wit and
humour.  I thought this very good:  'Keep before the wheels, young man,
or they will run over you:  always keep before the wheels!' He read
over to me the memoir he had prepared at the suggestion of Mr.
Drummond, relating to the events of his early life; and this opened the
way for a great many other recollections not set down in the book.

"He vividly remembered the parting from his mother, nearly seventy
years ago, and spoke of her last words to him: 'When you remember me,
think of me as waiting at this window, watching for your return.' This
led him to speak of the great forgetfulness and want of respect which
children have for their parents nowadays.  'We seem,' he said, 'to have
fallen upon a disrespectful age.'

"'It is strange,' said he, 'how little things influence one's mind and
character.  When I was a boy at Waterford, I bought an old second-hand
book from a man on the quay, and the maxim on its title-page fixed
itself deeply on my memory.  It was, "Truth, like water, will find its
own level."' And this led him to speak of the great influence which the
example and instruction of Mr. Rice, of the Christian Brothers, had had
upon his mind and character.  'That religions institution,' said he,
'of which Mr. Rice was one of the founders, has now spread itself over
the country, and, by means of the instruction which the members have
imparted to the poorer ignorant classes, they have effected quite a
revolution in the south of Ireland.'

"'I am not much of a reader,' said Mr. Bianconi; 'the best part of my
reading has consisted in reading way-bills.  But I was once
complimented by Justice Lefroy upon my books.  He remarked to me what a
wonderful education I must have had to invent my own system of
book-keeping.  Yes,' said he, pointing to his ledgers, 'there they
are.'  The books are still preserved, recording the progress of the
great car enterprise.  They show at first the small beginnings, and
then the rapid growth--the tens growing to hundreds, and the hundreds
to thousands--the ledgers and day-books containing, as it were, the
whole history of the undertaking--of each car, of each man, of each
horse, and of each line of road, recorded most minutely.

"'The secret of my success,' said he, 'has been promptitude, fair
dealing, and good humour.  And this I will add, what I have often said
before, that I never did a kind action but it was returned to me
tenfold.  My cars have never received the slightest injury from the
people.  Though travelling through the country for about sixty years,
the people have throughout respected the property intrusted to me.  My
cars have passed through lonely and unfrequented places, and they have
never, even in the most disturbed times, been attacked.  That, I think,
is an extraordinary testimony to the high moral character of the Irish
people.'

"'It is not money, but the genius of money that I esteem,' said
Bianconi; 'not money itself, but money used as a creative power.'

And he himself has furnished in his own life the best possible
illustration of his maxim He created a new industry, gave employment to
an immense number of persons, promoted commerce, extended civilisation;
and, though a foreigner, proved one of the greatest of Ireland's
benefactors."

About two years after the date of my son's visit, Charles Bianconi
passed away, full of years and honours; and his remains were laid
beside those of his son and daughter, in the mortuary chapel at
Boherlahan.  He died in 1875, in his ninetieth year. Well might Signor
Henrico Mayer say, at the British Association at Cork in 1846, that "he
felt proud as an Italian to hear a compatriot so deservedly eulogised;
and although Ireland might claim Bianconi as a citizen, yet the
Italians should ever with pride hail him as a countryman, whose
industry and virtue reflected honour on the country of his birth."


Footnotes for Chapter IX.

[1] This article originally appeared in 'Good Words.'  A biography of
Charles Bianconi, by his daughter, Mrs. Morgan John O'Connell, has
since been published; but the above article is thought worthy of
republication, as its contents were for the most part taken principally
from Mr. Bianconi's own lips.