7 HE STAGE-WAGGON'S 135 



and parcels Avere carried at the rates of 2s. ikl. 

 and 3s. per cwt. 



Malachy Postlethwayt's Dictionary of Trade, 

 a work published in 1751, gives some eloquent 

 details on this subject of the carriage of goods. 

 Comparing that year, a\ hen turnpikes had improved 

 the roads, with the bad ways of thirty or forty 

 years earlier, it is stated that where six horses 

 could in former times scarcely draw 30 cwt. 

 sixty miles, they could then draw 50 or 60 cwt. 

 Carriage, too, was cheaper by 30 per cent, than 

 before. In 1750 there Avere from twenty-five to 

 thirty waggons sent Aveekly from Birmingham to 

 London, carrying goods at from £3 to £1 a ton ; 

 thirty years earlier the cost had been £7 a ton. 

 Between Portsmouth and London freights had 

 fallen from £7 to £4 or £5 ; and between Exeter 

 and London and other towns in the Avest of like 

 distance from £12 to £8. Postlethwayt cited these 

 figures with jiride, but he argued that the heavy 

 waggons AA^ore out the roads, and that they did not 

 pay sufficient toll. The manufacturers, he thought, 

 got too much advantage out of these low freights, 

 and although the public thereby could purchase 

 goods more cheaply, they paid their savings all 

 out again in the heavy repairs of the liighAvay and 

 the consequent extravagant highway rates rendered 

 necessary. RailAA^ay rates, Ave may here remark, 

 are a source of much bitter discussion to-day, but 

 they are fifteen times less than the reduced rates 

 of 1750, 



Even in the last days of the road, Avhen railways 



