46 ANNALS OF THE ROAD. 



quite well that when she lived at Kegworth, in Leicester- 

 shire, ' the guard of the mail used to enliven the village 

 by playing airs as the mail passed through.' This letter 

 called forth a second from ' Ex-Mail-Coachman,' in which 

 he disavows any wish to doubt the statement of L. R. P. 

 as to having heard the bugle played by the guard of the 

 Holyhead Mail, but he adheres to his former assertion 

 that ' the bugle was no part of the mail. The tin horn,' 

 he says, ' was there, whether for the purpose of raising 

 up the old pikeman in the dead of night to have his gate 

 open, to warn the next change, or to let the market 

 gardener who was fast asleep on the shafts of his cart 

 know that the whole of the road was not his perquisite, 

 and also to inform him that Her Majesty's mail, half an 

 hour late, and going at twelve miles an hour, was close 

 behind him. Let L. R. P. look at the mail pictures 

 painted by Henderson, so correct in every detail, from 

 the check rein on the raking leader to the drab overalls 

 of the guard, and tell me if he can find the slightest trace 

 of a bugle.' It is then pointed out by the writer of the 

 original communication to ' The Field,' which gave rise 

 to the correspondence, that he spoke of the use of key- 

 bugles on a special occasion, namely that of the procession 

 of mail coaches from Millbank, Westminster, to the 

 General Post Office. He adds that he remembers seeing 

 when a boy, in the shop of a musical instrument maker 

 in Westminster, on more than one occasion, a lot of key- 

 bugles laid out ready for the use of the mail guards on 

 the occurrence of the annual procession. He admits 

 ' that the mail regulations limited the guards to the post- 



