34 Seventy Years a Master. 



the "Swan," the '^ Crown," and the ''Oak" 

 used to be the recognised coaching houses. 

 At the last-named there were at one time fifty 

 horses stalled, and about twenty-five to thirty 

 at the ''Rose." 



But it must by no means be thought that 

 the coaches, as a method of (as we then 

 thought) speedy locomotion, were to be des- 

 pised. Many of the crack whips on the road 

 would take their teams along at a spanking 

 average rate of from eleven to twelve miles an 

 hour, and some of the best-known coaches 

 were so prompt in their arrival and departure 

 that the country people used to set their 

 clocks by them. It was a rare sight, I can 

 tell you, and one to make a healthy youngster's 

 pulses bound, to see old Tom Crouch put his 

 team in the London and Lincoln Mail along 

 the London Road, tooling them through the 

 town at twelve to thirteen miles an hour, and 

 bringing them up at the " Rose " with the touch 

 of an artist, every horse of them on a level. 



Tom Crouch was one of the best whips on 

 the Great North Road, and he and his guard, 



