92 ON THE TRACK OF THE MAIL-COACH 



is that we disembarked in the Roads, and landed by 

 boat. The day of the Calais-Douvres was yet to 

 come. Indeed, I do not think that the larger vessels 

 have ever been put on the night mail-service. 



Somewhere in the sixties — I cannot now remember 

 the exact vear — the contractors for the Dover and 

 Calais mail-packet service made a great advance; 

 they built a number of small but swift paddle-wheel 

 steamers, the Breeze, Ware, Samphire, and Maid of 

 Kent, of from 133 to 161 tons, and all of a hundred 

 and sixty horse-power. 



These seem mere cockle-shells wherewith to en- 

 counter a storm in the Straits of Dover ; yet, after 

 nearly thirty years oi good work, they are still run- 

 ning, and, what is more, make the night mail passage 

 to or from Calais — the shortest navigable distance 

 bemg 22^ miles — usually in about an hour and three- 

 quarters. The Samphire indeed, on February 14, 

 1895, accomplished the voyage in less than an hour 

 and a half, and the Maid of Kent, having lately come 

 out of dock, I dare say does as well. But this is far 

 from approaching the unsurpassed performance of the 

 Calais-Douvres on the day service, when, on June 14, 

 1889, she crossed in an hour and two minutes. 



For many years the night mail-service, under the 

 contract of March, 1878, cost no more than from 

 eight to ten thousand pounds a year. But the price 

 since then has gone vigorously up. Under a new con- 

 tract of January 15, 1894, the London, Chatham, and 

 Dover Railway Company, for conveying the night 



