--- title: Toad's Edwardian England: early motor cars, caravans, steam trains, wash day and gold sovereigns — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Toad's Edwardian England: early motor cars, caravans, steam trains, wash day and gold sovereigns», a lesson of the history course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: «The Wind in the Willows» came out in 1908, when King Edward VII was on t --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [History](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/) / Toad's Edwardian England: early motor… # Toad's Edwardian England: early motor cars, caravans, steam trains, wash day and gold sovereigns Lesson 83 of the history course of Mova's primary school: 20 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/0/) — «The Wind in the Willows» came out in 1908, when King Edward VII was on the throne, so that time is called the Edwardian age. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/1/) — Motor cars were new, noisy and rare, most people still travelled by horse, on foot, by bicycle or by steam train, and washing clothes took a whole day. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/2/) — Toad's motor-car craze was a real craze of rich people at the time. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/3/) — Cars had no roof and no windscreen, and roads were dusty, so drivers wore goggles, gauntlets, caps and long coats, and the car's horn really went «poop-poop» when you squeezed its rubber bulb. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/4/) — Before the car, Toad tries a horse-drawn caravan holiday, which was also a new fashion: the first caravan club in Britain was started the year before the book came out. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/5/) — Toad escapes from prison on a steam engine, dressed as a washerwoman, with no money in his pocket, and pays a gipsy in shillings for breakfast. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/6/) — Each of those things tells us how people lived then. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/7/) — When you read an old book, look for the old world inside it: it is like a time machine with jokes. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/8/) — The Edwardian age is the reign of King Edward VII, from 1901 to 1910; «The Wind in the Willows» by Kenneth Grahame was published in 1908. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/9/) — In 1908 only quite rich people owned motor cars; most people walked, cycled, rode in horse-drawn carts and buses or took the train. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/10/) — Early cars had open tops and roads were mostly dust and stones, so motorists wore goggles, caps, gauntlets (long gloves) and long dust coats, just like Toad's «motor-clothes». - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/11/) — Many early cars were started by turning a starting handle at the front; it could kick back and hurt the driver's arm, and electric starters only came in from about 1912. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/12/) — From 1904 a new law in Britain set a speed limit of 20 miles an hour, made every car carry a number plate and made drivers get a licence, though there was no driving test until 1935. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/13/) — Rich car owners often paid a chauffeur to drive and look after the car; the word comes from French and first meant a man who stoked the fire of a steam engine. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/14/) — Romany families had lived and travelled in painted horse-drawn wagons for many years, and in 1907 the Caravan Club was started in Britain, so caravan holidays for fun, like Toad's, were a new fashion. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/15/) — The book calls a traveller a «gipsy»; the Romany people came to Britain about 500 years ago, and judging a whole people by an old idea, such as «they all love horse-dealing», is unfair. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/16/) — A steam engine had a driver and a fireman, who shovelled coal into the firebox, and a guard who waved a flag and blew a whistle to start the train; riding on the engine, as Toad does, was against the rules. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/17/) — Before washing machines, Monday was usually wash day: clothes were boiled in a big tub called a copper, scrubbed on a washboard, squeezed through a mangle with two rollers and pressed with heavy irons heated on the stove. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/18/) — Many poorer women earned money as washerwomen, washing other families' clothes by hand; washing machines only became common in British homes in the 1950s and 1960s. - [19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/83-toad-s-edwardian-england-early-motor-cars-caravans-steam-trains-wash-day-and-gold-sovereigns/19/) — A gold sovereign was a coin worth one pound; a guinea was worth 21 shillings, and the word was still used for prices long after the coin stopped being made; sixpence was half a shilling. - ← previous: [How writing began: from tally marks and pictures to the alphabet](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/82-how-writing-began-from-tally-marks-and-pictures-to-the-alphabet/) - next →: [Gaols, magistrates and old punishments: from the stocks to the Children Act of 1908](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/84-gaols-magistrates-and-old-punishments-from-the-stocks-to-the-children-act-of-1908/) - ↑ back to [History](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/history/)