22 THE BATH ROAD 



stationmustcr at Kiehmoncl, near Londou. From this 

 position he eventually retired on a pension, and died 

 about fifteen years ago. 



We all know the cantankerous passenger in tlic 

 railway carriage who makes himself objectionable in a 

 variety of ways, but a coach was a much more fruit- 

 ful source of contention. Fortunately, however, it 

 was not often that the incident of the strong man in 

 the Bath coach bound for London was repeated. A 

 corpulent person of prodigious strength tried to se- 

 cure a place in the mail, but, all the seats being 

 booked, he was told that it was impossible to convey 

 him that night. Relying upon his strength and the 

 unlikelihood of any one daring to disturb him, he got 

 in while the coach was still standing in the stable 

 yard, and waited. He had to wait so long, and had 

 dined so well, that he fell asleep, and the coachman, 

 finding him there, snoring, put his team into another 

 coach, leaving the fat man in peaceable possession of 

 his seat. He awoke in the middle of the night, still, 

 of course, in the stable yard of the " White Lion " at 

 Bath, while the road echoed with the laughter of the 

 coachman and his friends all the way up to London. 



In that incident the passengers were fortunate. 

 The "iusides" were less to be congratulated who 

 bore a part in the memorable journey down to Bath 

 from Piccadilly with an extra passenger. It is of the 

 Bath mail that the story is told. Mail coaches carried 

 four inside. One night, when the mail was ready to 

 start from Piccadilly, full up, inside and out, a 

 gentleman who wanted to go to Marlborough came 

 hurrying up. He was well known to coachman and 



