296 STAGE-COACH AND MAIL IN DAYS OF YORE 



roads from Leeds. The " True Blue " was tlie 

 name of the okl Leeds, Malton and Scarborough 

 coach, originating in the same year as the 

 " Rockingham," and lasting three years longer. 

 Three others ran between Leeds and Wakefield, 

 Knaresborough and Selby, and Leeds and Bradford. 

 " True Britons," too, were plentiful in the broad- 

 acred county of Yorkshire, where jiolitics and 

 patriotism kept parties at fever heat and divided 

 even travellers into parties to such an extent 

 that an ardent sujoporter of the " BufPs " would 

 almost rather walk or post than journey by a 

 "Blue" coach; while a True Blue Tory inn- 

 keeper would deny accommodation to a Buft' 

 Whig (supposing in the first instance that the 

 Whig had so far forgotten what was due to 

 his faction as to seek shelter there) and think 

 nothing of the custom lost. 



In I784i the " Expedition " coach is first 

 mentioned as running between London and 

 Norwich, by way of Newmarket and Thetford. 

 The " expedition " consisted in going 108 miles 

 in 17J hours, including stops, or a net running 

 speed of about seven miles an hour. 



" Balloon " coaches were first heard of in 

 1785, when a plentiful scattering of that name 

 over the country proved how deep an impression 

 had been made upon the public mind by the 

 balloon ascents of Lunardi in the previous year. 

 A stone monument marks the spot beside the 

 Cambridge Boad, near Ware, on which that 

 aerial traveller descended after his first flight 



