CHAP. II. KA1ILY MODKS OF CONVEYANCE 177 



advertised similar advantages. Foot passengers pro- 

 (, lino- towards Kensington and Paddington in the 

 ('vniiii^, would wait until a sufficiently numerous band 

 had collected to set footpads at defiance, and then 

 they started in company. Carriages were stopped in 

 broad daylight in Hyde Park, and even in Piccadilly 

 itself, and pistols presented at the breasts of fashionable 

 people, who were called upon to deliver up their purses. 

 Horace AValpole relates a number of curious instances of 

 tin's sort, he himself having been robbed in broad day, 

 with Lord Eglinton, Sir Thomas Robinson, Lady Albe- 

 1 1 1; t rle, and many more. A curious robbery of the Ports- 

 mouth mail, in 1757, illustrates the imperfect postal 

 communication of the period. The boy who carried the 

 post had dismounted at Hammersmith, about three miles 

 from Hyde Park Corner, and called for beer, when 

 some thieves took the opportunity of cutting the mail- 

 h;ig from off the horse's crupper and got away undis- 

 covered ! 



The means adopted for the transport of merchandise 

 were as tedious and difficult as those ordinarily em- 

 ployed for the conveyance of passengers. Corn and 

 wool were sent to market on horses' backs, 1 manure was 

 carried to the fields in panniers, and fuel was conveyed 

 from the moss or the forest in the same way. The little 

 coal used in the southern counties was principally sea- 

 borne, though pack-horses occasionally carried coal in- 

 land for the supply of the blacksmiths' forges. When 

 \Yollatoii Hall was built by John of Padua for Sir Francis 

 W i 1 long] 1 1 >y in 1580, the stone was all brought on horses' 



1 Tin- HMM! of London was then | straw, beans, ] eas, and oats, used in 



principally brought to town in pan- j London, were principally raised within 



niers. The Copulation Ix-iim mm pa- j a circuit of twenty miles of the mo 



ratively small, the feeding OI London j tropolis ; but large quantities were 



was still praeticable in this way; lx- also brought from Ilenley-on-Thames 



sides, the city always possessed the and other western parts, as well as 



ureat advantage of the Thai nes, which i from below < Jravcsend, l>y water; and 



secuivd a supply of food by sea. In 

 'The (irand Concern of Knuland Iv\- 

 plained,' it is stated that tin- hay. 



many ships laden with beans came 

 from Hull, and with oats from Lynn 

 ami Hnston. 



VOL. I. N 



