124 ON THE TRACK OF THE MAIL-COACH 



dead of the night was a wild and fearsome journey. Skirting 

 the shore of Mount's Bav, without as much as a broomstick 

 to shelter him from the fury of a south-east gale, the driver 

 met a branch cart on Marazion Green, and took over the corre- 

 spondence from the Helston and Lizard district. Crossing the 

 causewav, over the Havle district the roar of the breakers could 

 be distinctly heard, thundering against the ironbound coast. 

 Comior Downs brought him to the once prosperous mining 

 district of Camborne and Kedruth. The clatter of a thousand 

 stamps, pounding the ore, and the giant arms of the pumping 

 engines rising and faUing with every stroke of the piston, gave 

 the country a weird and unearthly aspect, and this was not 

 improved on his passing tln'ough Scorrier and Chacewater, 

 where, for many generations, human moles had been burrowing 

 for tin and copper, and had left the surface defaced with huge 

 piles of attle — monuments of an industr3" now, alas ! fallen into 

 decaj'. 



' One dark and stormy night, having done the work up short, 

 I was Hstening for the horn which the mail-cart driver always 

 blew to announce his approach. The horn was silent, but 

 presently I heard the clatter of the horses' hoofs, and the rumble 

 of the wheels as the cart drew up at the office door. After 

 waitmg some time and finding the driver did not bring in the 

 bags as usual, I went out, and there he was, helplessly in- 

 toxicated, leaning forward against the splashboard. I tried to 

 arouse him, but the case was hopeless ; so getting the key, I 

 examined the cart, and foimd he had no ixiail from any place 

 nearer Truro than Hayle. And here comes in what I venture to 

 think is an extraordinary instance of sagacitj^ and inteUigence on 

 the part of the horse. The driver had dropped off to sleep 

 shortly after leaving Hayle, and lay a helpless log for the rest of 

 the journey of nearly twenty miles. The horse had pulled up at 

 every turnpike, stopped the regulation time at each post-office 

 [where it was the practice of the Postmaster to leave the office 

 door unlocked, and hang the bags on a peg behind it, so that the 

 driver might help himself] , trotted into Truro, and pulled up at 

 my office to the minute.' 



There is not a more temperate, sober, and well- 



