TRAMCAR VERSUS BUGGY.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXII, Issue 7344, 3 June 1885, Page 5

TRAMCAR VERSUS BUGGY.

!An amusing contest, if. it had not •»' serious as well as » comical aspect, took place last evening on the Ponsonby-road, between a tramcar and a boggy, as to which shonld be i'! King of ; the road.". ■ The , circumstances appear to be almost incredible, if they were not vouched for on good authority, and bring obstruction to the tramcars to that climax, when the magistrate should settle the point 1 decisively. ' The following are * the circumstances, so far as we could ascertain them: The five o'clock tramcar from town for Ponsonby left to time in charge of driver Graham and conductor Jenkins. As the car passed round the bend at the Richmond Road siding (where, by the way, a gas lamp is badly needed to prevent accidents), driver Graham noticed in the darkness what appeared to be a white or grey horse across the track. He at once put his brakes hard down, -and suaceeded in preventing the oar from going slap into a buggy showing no lights; containing three men, and which was standing across the line at the "points." But for his promptitude there is little doubt from the position of the buggy across the line that some of the . occupants of it would have received serious if not fatal injuries. . As the driver of the baggy pulled off the line, Graham concluded the incident might only have been . a piece of carelessness, and drove on. Presently the buggy came on after him at a gallopping pace, and just as he was landing two male passengers near Eata-atreet, the men had to leap to the aide of the road to escape being struck by the shafts of the buggy, as it rapidly come down on them. The driver of the baggy, on getting to the front, got on the track, and thus compelled the tramcar." to move at a ; walking pace as far:.as All Saints' Church. 4 ' Graham thinking, the fur. had lasted long enough, gave the reins of his, team to a passenger to hold, and jumped down and got hold of one of the wheels of the buggy, while the conductor caught the horse's head, and both demanded his name. He declined to give it, and his companions in the buggy, who were strictly neutral, declined to interfere in any way or give any information. ,In the meantime a crowd had gathered on the road, and most of the male passengers in the tramcar had jumped out. One of them, of exciteable temperament, proposed to pull the driver of the buggy out of his seat, but Graham would not listen to the man taking the law into his own hands, and sent down a messenger to the Three Lamps to look for Constable Collis, but that officer , was not about at the time, being otherwise engaged. Graham, having got some of his passengers to take a good lpok at the driver of the buggy, bo that he could be identified again, resumed his seat on the tramcar ; but. Conductor Jenkins did not get off so easily, for, as he let go the horse's head and passed the buggy to resume his post, the driver, of the buggy drew the whip and struck him with the lash across the face. At this juncture the driver of the Ponsonby tramcar for town (Lawlor), who had left his car in charge of his conductor, and come up the road to see what was the cau§e of the tramcar not coming on, put in an appearance. He at once seized the head of the horse in the buggy, and forced the . vehicle back over . the line till the tramcar got clear. One would have thought that would have been the last of the matter, but not so. As soon as Graham started back from the Three Lamps for town his friend in the buggy was ready for him. He had in the interval lighted his lamps, and as soon as the car started kept in front . some little distance, crossing and reorossing the track. At Richmond crossing he swerved into the Richmond-road, apparently to .do something to his lamps, but. he was soon on the trail again, and " shepherded" the tramcar to the Reservoir, when he stood in between the car and the gas-lamp, and then pulled off sharp across the road. : Driver Graham being apprehensive that the shafts of the baggy would strike the side of the car, whipped up his horses and got clear, the buggy man steering right across the thoroughfare, and the last that was seen of him he was making good time down the Newton Road towards the gully I Graham's car was delayed on the up trip ten minutes through the buggy driver's freak, and Lawlor's car was similarly delayed on the down trip, as was also Graham on returning to town.