BY SEVERN, TAFF, AND TO IVY 159 



service, she had walked with the letters an estimated 

 distance of seventy-four thousand miles. 



But whether Nanny trudged four times or five the 

 equivalent of the earth's circumference, she accom- 

 plished a noble walk before the end. "When it came, 

 I have not been able to find out, but the last glimpse 

 I catch is of this active soul marching down the 

 street at Neath, carrying forty or fifty pounds' weight 

 of coal on her head, and walking as smartly and erect 

 as ever, as though her burden of fourscore years and 

 ten was but a sweet-smelling posy. 



As regards the performances of my feminine col- 

 leagues, I think, on the whole, that Mary Jackson, 

 lately postwoman at Bilston, carries off the palm for 

 pedestrianism, health, and endurance. From 1819 

 until 1870, Mary, like Percival, never missed a day's 

 work except on four Sundays, when delivery was 

 experimentally suspended. I suppose a quarter of a 

 million of miles must be the tale of Mary Jackson's 

 walks to Ettingshall and Prince's End with the post. 

 Weather made no difference ; sickness never came 

 near her ; holidays she had none. 



Mary's only comment on those who sought to 

 relieve her of her Sunday's trudge was, I grieve to 

 relate, that they were ' a pack of fools !' She w^as a 

 thrifty soul, and charitably disposed, bequeathing at 

 her death a good round sum of money to the Wolver- 

 hampton Hospital. 



At Newport (Mon.) I used to see, when inspecting 

 the telegraphs, the old Westgate Hotel : not the fine 



