THE FIRST MAIL COACH ii 



He drew up a sclieme for ca mail-coach to carry four 

 inside passengers, a coachman, and a guard, and 

 to be drawn by four horses at the rate of between 

 eis^ht and nine miles an hour. In this manner, he 

 argued, the journey between Bath and London should 

 be accomplished, including stoppages, in sixteen 

 hours. This plan, which he made as an instance, 

 to be extended, if successful, to the other main roads 

 throuo;hout the kinQ;dom, he communicated to the 

 General Post Office. Two years passed before Palmer 

 could get his proposals tried, but arrangements were 

 eventually made, agreements entered into with five 

 innkeepers along the London, Bath, and Bristol Road, 

 for the horsing of the coach, and the first mail de- 

 spatched from Bristol to London, August 2, 1784. 

 The mounted post-boy's day was neariug its close, 

 and by the summer of 1786, the trunk roads knew 

 him and his post-horn no more. 



The mail-coaches enjoyed great privileges, of which 

 the greatest was their exemption from all turnpike 

 tolls, and the right exercised by the Post Office of 

 indicting roads which might be out of repair or in 

 any way dangerous. By the year 1810, mail-coaches 

 had increased so greatly that the estimated annual 

 loss of the various turnpike trusts on this exemption 

 was £50,000. And all the while the postal business 

 was increasing by leaps and bounds, although the 

 price of postage was increased from time to time 

 to help supply the Government, which speedily came 

 to recognize the Department as a milch cow, and to 

 demand increasing annual payments from it, to help 

 pay the costs of waging Continental wars. 



