28 RACING 



might be called the pedantic, but caution not to be despised, 

 and, as has been seen, not at all times injudicious. 



But the most serious accident of this descriiDtion on 

 that road at the time I sjDeak of, "svas the overturn of the 

 Holyhead mail, by which one of the passengers was 

 killed. An inquest was held at the " Peahen," St. Albans, 

 as it occurred just on the descent, before you come 

 on what is called the New Road, and a verdict of 

 manslaughter was returned against the drivers of the 

 Holyhead mail and of the Chester. They, it appeared, 

 had been racing ; and one, in endeavouring to pass the 

 other on the wrong side, was driven up the bank, 

 and consequently overturned into the road. They were 

 both committed to jail at St. Albans, to await their trial 

 at the next Hertford assizes, and as they were both old 

 servants of my father's or mine — one of them, too, having 

 married a servant of my mother's — I felt interested 

 in their fate, and walked one morning from Redbourn 

 to see them. 



I found them ironed like felons ; of this indignity they 

 both complained, and one wept bitterly. It struck me 

 as being very strange that men should be degraded as 

 felons, when their utmost punishment, if convicted, could 

 not exceed a twelvemonths' imprisonment. I remon- 

 strated with the jailer against the ornaments that then 

 adorned their limbs. He replied that it Avas so ordered by 

 the Mayor. I then waited on his worship, whom I knew, 

 as he had migrated from my native county, and was in 

 full practice at St. Albans as a surgeon. From him I got 

 no redress, as he could only in such a case refer me to 

 his legal adviser, the town-clerk, but he believed the 



