DAWN OF THF COACHING AGE 79 



comjjany witli one servant, hiring post-horses from 

 Lyme to Salishury. It is quite clear that if there 

 had been a coach serving at the time, he would 

 have caught it at Charniouth, a mile and a half 

 from that little seaport ; but there was, for some 

 unexplained reason, a break in the service, and it 

 was not until Salisbury was reached, sixty miles 

 along the road, that he found a stage. The coach 

 fare from Salisbur}^ to London foi' self and servant 

 was 30s., and he spent, " at several stages, to 

 gratify coachmen," 4^. Oc/. 



With the existence of such a volume of trade 

 as that disclosed by De Laune, it is not surprising 

 to find that the scolding voices of opponents to 

 coaching had by this time died down to a mere 

 echo. Instead of reviling coaches, the writers of 

 the age extolled their use and convenience. Thus 

 Chamberlayne, in the 1684 edition of his Fresent 

 State of Great Britain, the JFhltakers Al- 

 manack of that period, says : " There is of late 

 such an admirable commodiousness for both men 

 and women to travel from London to the principal 

 towns in the country, that the like hath not been 

 known in the world ; and that is by stage-coaches, 

 wherein any one may be transported to any place, 

 sheltered from foul weather and foul ways, free 

 from endamaging of one's health and one's body 

 by hard jogging or over-violent motion, and this 

 not only at the low price of about a shilling for 

 every five miles, but with such velocity and speed 

 in one hour as tbat the post in some foreign 

 countries cannot make but in one day." Those 



