WESTWARD HO ! 259 



As a matter of course, all the mail-coaches, what- 

 ever the particular point of departure for passengers, 

 called for the mails at the General Post-Office, oppo- 

 site the Nelson monument — a column on which the 

 figure of the hero, thirteen feet high, commands a 

 full view of the LiiTey from an altitude of a hundred 

 and twenty-five feet. The building itself, which was 

 erected from the designs of Francis Johnston, has, 

 like Smirke's structure in St. Martin's-le-Grand, ' a 

 fine hexastyle portico,' eighty feet broad ; but, unlike 

 the porch of the building in London, it projects over 

 the foot pavement. 



Including the mails, not fewer than fifty-seven 

 principal coaches worked out of Dublin in 1837. 

 Dawson Street and Upper Sackville Street were the 

 favourite, but by no means the exclusive, points of 

 departure. The Newry Lark, for instance, winged 

 its flight from Bolton Street at a quarter before nine 

 a.m., and even earlier astir than this cheerful bird was 

 the Wonder, which started at a quarter before six from 

 the Imperial Hotel, while the No Wonder for Armagh, 

 not to be outdone, went off at the same time, from 

 the same place. These were not staid mail-coaches, 

 which disdained such tricksy titles, but private 

 ventures. 



So long as Howth was a packet-station, coaches of 

 course ran at suitable hours swiftly along the admir- 

 able mail-road between Dublin and Howth Harbour. 

 There was once a wonderful escape on that road. 

 When, in 1815, the work of constructing the harbour 



