348 DRIVING. 



and mail coaches, letters being now carried with greater speed 

 and safety in four-horse coaches, instead of as in former times 

 in saddle-bags by mounted postmen. Highwaymen and foot- 

 pads had been almost driven off the. road, partly by arming 

 the guards of the coaches carrying the mails, and by a more 

 speedy administration of justice on offenders. The less fre- 

 quent breakdown of coaches on the improved roads, and the 

 more rapid pace of travelling, also rendered the highwayman's 

 calling more uncertain. 



During the reigns of Georges III. and IV. it was the custom 

 to serve out the new scarlet and gold-laced liveries to the 

 drivers and guards of the royal mail-coaches on the King's 

 birthday, and the coaches were driven in procession through 

 the London streets. It was a pretty sight, that Londoners 

 dearly loved ; they turned out in large numbers to admire and 

 criticise the horses, men, and coaches, and there was great emu- 

 lation among all concerned in obtaining a favourable opinion 

 from those who were proud of them, and almost gloried in their 

 achievements and the punctual performance of their duties. 



At the commencement of the reign of Her Majesty Queen 

 Victoria, travelling on English roads had undergone a vast 

 change ; posting for the upper classes, and stage-coach travel- 

 ling by the middle classes, had reached a punctuality and 

 perfection that could hardly have been imagined a genera- 

 tion or two before. Working men travelled from town to town 

 (always on foot) in search of employment, acquiring an amount 

 of knowledge and experience they could not otherwise have 

 obtained. 



At this time, the great day for seeing and being seen in 

 one's carriage was Sunday, and on a fine Sunday afternoon the 

 road from the Marble Arch to Hyde Park Corner was filled 

 with the chariots, coaches, landaus, barouches, britzskas and 

 cabriolets of the nobility and gentry of England who spent the 

 season in London, and on other afternoons the same road was 

 almost as well filled with hundreds of well-appointed carriages 

 of the same class. 



