Oddly enough, though the ubiquitous hansom cabs have been replaced by taxis and the telegram by text message, nothing about the transition feels jarring.
The first hackney-carriage licences date from 1662, and applied literally to horse-drawn carriages, later modernised as hansom cabs (1834), that operated as vehicles for hire.
The images -- like the stories -- evoke a vast, polluted metropolis of foggy streets and horse-drawn hansom cabs, bustling crowds and screams in the night.
