2-888-411 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Travelling in India - Officers joining the Indian Army on Service, 1850. '...the new arrangement for dak travelling, which has superseded the palankeen, being neither more nor less than a palankeen on wheels. It has a well, so that the passengers may be able to sit as well as lie down. The bearers find it easier to drag this, than to carry the palankeen. With this contrivance, five miles an hour can be done easily. About 20 men are employed at a time - some carrying the banglues or boxes slung to a bamboo, and the remainder are at the carriage. In this way, travelling day and night, allowing a little rest at the various stage bungalows, one hundred miles in twenty-four hours can be got over. It carries two, and is sufficiently large to enable both to lie down. It is called an Equirotal. A servant is sometimes carried on the box'. From "Illustrated London News", 1850.