56 OX THE TRACK OF THE MAIL-COACH 



^Yith snow ; and a train, ^Yhich was sent to the relief 

 of other blocked trains, strove to penetrate the ob- 

 struction, with the only result that its snow-plough, 

 two engines, and the intrepid superintendent and 

 assistant-engineer of the Highland line, crashed into 

 wreaths of snow twelve to fifteen feet high, and there 

 remained until a rescue-party arrived. AYhere it was 

 jjossible, the local mails were put on board steamers, 

 and forwarded to the Northern ports by sea. One 

 block in Caithness continued for eight days. 



On the Skve line, the mail-train, after cuttinoj 

 through hea^'^^ drifts, encountered a twelve-foot wreath 

 at Auchterneed, ran into it, and stuck fast. 



The department had a very trying time in the 

 South of Scotland, the fall of snow being greater 

 than anyone living can recollect in that quarter. 

 The lines between Carlisle and Ayr and Glasgow 

 were kept open ; but the Stranraer line, which 

 branches from the Carlisle-Ayr line at Dumfries, 

 and runs for about seventy miles through a highly 

 picturesque, but in parts rather wild, country, as well 

 as the Portpatrick and Wigtownshire and AVhithorn 

 lines, were all hopelessly blocked. The mail-train, 

 with a sorting carriage attached, was snow-bound at 

 Creetown for two days and a night before it was 

 released, and the Post-Office sorters suffered a good 

 deal. 



The Larne steamer, on her way back from Ireland, 

 at the commencement of the storm had to anchor at 

 the mouth of Loch Pivan for a long time ; and after- 



