THE OLD COACHING ROADS. 47 



Edinburgh and Glasgow. With the cross-roads it 

 was even worse, as in many instances where mail- 

 coaches had been applied for, and the Post Office 

 authorities had consented to put them on, they were 

 obliged to wait until the roads were ready to receive 

 them. The accelerated speed in travelling may be 

 attributed mainly to the great road engineers, Telford 

 and McAdam, as, from the condition in which we learn 

 that the roads used to be, with ruts up to the axle- 

 trees of the carriages, anything like speed was out of 

 the question altogether. Telford had the management 

 of the Holyhead Eoad to Shrewsbury, and was also 

 extensively employed on other roads by the Eoad 

 Commissioners. That his assistance was wanted on the 

 Holyhead Eoad is evinced by the circumstance that 

 when a new mail-coach was put on the road in 1808, 

 twenty-two townships were indicted by the Post 

 Office authorities for having their roads in a dangerous 

 and unfinished state. 



That the London and Holyhead Eoad, however, was 

 not neglected, may be gathered from the fact that at 

 different times more than six or seven Acts of 

 Parliament relating to it were passed for the purpose 

 of authorizing alterations for shortening the distance, 

 improving the gradients, and raising the necessary 

 funds for executing the works by loans. The last 

 Act was obtained so late as the year 1831 for the 



