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.