The Merry Past 



became rare ; and as for post-chaises, they were 

 scarcely used, save in towns, and here but seldom. 

 In the country, when one of these " yellow ochres " 

 was seen, its inmate was more often than not an 

 accoucheur, or a churchwarden, with a job in hand 

 that the parish paid for. The great travelling public 

 had by this time taken freely to making use of the 

 public coaches. 



As railroads began to increase, nearly all the old 

 coaching and posting inns lost their business. The 

 advent of steam, indeed, caused a good deal of ruin 

 to numbers of people who had drawn their main 

 sources of livelihood from the road. 



Small towns and villages, hitherto kept alive by 

 the necessary accompaniments to stage-coach travel- 

 ling, began to assume a deserted look, and the in- 

 habitants, downcast and dejected, gloomily viewed 

 the fev/ remaining coaches merely as belated relics 

 which recalled to their memory " the brave doings of 

 bygone days." 



Fittingly enough, in 1838, just as the coaches were 

 disappearing before the triumphant forces of steam, 

 died that Prince of Jehus, old Sir John Lade, at the 

 age of eighty. Fifty-nine years before, when this 

 sporting Baronet had come into his inheritance, 

 Doctor Johnson had written the famous lines : 



Long expected one-and-twenty, 

 Ling'ring year at length is flown; 



Pride and pleasure, pomp and plenty, 

 Great (Sir John) are now your own. 



155 



