PEE F ACE. 



-•o^ 



The mail-coach period still has a firm, and possibly 

 an increasing, hold on the public mind, but the ofiicials 

 and others who actually took part in the work of that 

 stirring time — whether on the highroads or within 

 the walls of post-offices — are rapidly passing away. 



I have been eager to preserve what those who 

 remain, and some of those w^ho are no more, have 

 told me of matters within their own observation in 

 that remote epoch, as w^ell as what in other ways has 

 come to my knowledge. I have included, too, such 

 of my own recollections, not necessarily postal, as 

 should secure continuity and cohesion in the narrative. 



Not all that I had to relate could be included within 

 the limits of ' Forty Years at the Post-Office.' Many 

 omissions, I am but too conscious, still have to be 

 supplied. 



There is something yet to be written of interest 

 about the cross-posts and other lines of mail-coach 

 communication, and also about the coaching and 

 posting inns which maintain an existence on the 

 deserted mail-coach roads. 



