t6o STAGE-COACH AND MAIL IN DAYS OF YORE 



Immediately beneath this advertisement it is 

 amusing to see a counterblast, in the form of an 

 announcement by Pickwick, Weeks, and other 

 " Proprietors of the Coaches from Bristol, Bath, 

 and London," who "respectfully beg leave to 

 inform the Public that they continue to run their 

 Coaches from the Bush Tavern in Corn Street, 

 Bristol," and from other inns in that city and 

 at Bath, " with equal Expedition to any Coaches 

 that travel the Eoad." Stage-coach proprietors 

 in general were, not unnaturally, alarmed and 

 angered by the inauguration of a swift service of 

 subsidised mail-coaches, not only claiming to 

 perform their journeys in a specified time, but 

 actually doing so under contracts providing for 

 penalties when the official time-table was not 

 kept. They were under no such obligations, and 

 continually claimed to do things impossible to l)e 

 performed, secure from penalties. " What time 

 do you get to London ? " asked a passenger of a 

 stage-coachman. " Six o'clock, sir, is the proper 

 time, but I have been every hour of the four- 

 and-twenty after it," was the reply. 



The first mail-coaches were merely ordinary 

 light post coaches or diligences pressed into the 

 service ; but, unlike those of other and unofficial 

 coaches, wdiose stages ranged from ten to fifteen 

 miles or more, the horses were changed at stages 

 varying from six to eight miles. In this way it 

 was possible to attain a running speed of eight 

 miles an hour, to destroy the old reproach that 

 the mail Avas the slowest service in the kingdom. 



