60 ANNALS OF THE ROAD. 



travelling was nearly at a standstill. ' Never before,' 

 writes a correspondent of the ' Times ' of that day, ' never 

 before within recollection was the London mail stopped 

 for a whole night at a few miles from London, and never 

 before have we seen the intercourse between the southern 

 shores of England and the Metropolis interrupted for 

 two whole days.' The guards represented the night of 

 Sunday, December 25, of that year as one of the severest 

 they had ever experienced, and this was saying a great 

 deal. Scarcely a single stage-coach left London either 

 on the 26th or the 27th, and arrivals from the country 

 were as rare. For the heavy fall of snow during Christ- 

 mas night was not limited to the Metropolis, but extended 

 generally over the whole kingdom. The roads leading 

 to Portsmouth and Poole were the only ones that 

 remained open throughout this storm. The depth of the 

 drifts in the hollows of most roads was reported to be 

 from twelve to twenty feet. Some passengers described 

 the drifts as ' mountains high,' and some of the coachmen 

 stated that the snow in places was higher than their 

 heads as they sat on the box. The King was, at the 

 time, at Brighton, and it was with the greatest difficulty 

 that the despatches were transmitted between London 

 and the Pavilion. The few guards and coachmen who 

 were fortunate enough to reach London on the 28th 

 stated that it was not so much the quantity of snow 

 fallen which created the difficulty, as the strong wind, 

 which drove all the snow off the high lands into the 

 hollows The Brighton mail, a pair-horse coach, left 

 town on the night of the 25th with four horses. The 



