mill at West Falmouth, Mass.[1]]

[Footnote 1: In many parts of the country where there was no water
power, as Cape Cod, Long Island, Nantucket, etc., flour was ground at
windmills. The windmill shown in the picture was built in 1787, and is
still in use.]

If you had lived in 1791 and started, say, from Boston, to go to
Philadelphia to see the President and the great city where independence
had been declared, you would very likely have begun by making your will,
and bidding good-by to your friends. You would then have gone down to
the office of the proprietor of the stagecoach, and secured a seat to
New York. As the coach left but twice a week, you would have waited
till the day came and would then have presented yourself, at three
o'clock in the morning, at the tavern whence the coach started.

The stagecoach was little better than a huge covered box mounted on
springs. It had neither glass windows, nor door, nor steps, nor closed
sides. The roof was upheld by ten posts which rose from the body of the
vehicle, and the body was commonly breast high. From the top were hung
curtains of leather, to be rolled up when the day was fine, and let down
and buttoned when it was rainy and cold. Within were four seats. Without
was the baggage. Fourteen pounds of luggage were allowed to be carried
free by each passenger. But if your portmanteau or your
brass-nail-studded hair trunk weighed more, you would have paid for it
at the rate per mile that you paid for yourself. Under no circumstances,
however, would you be permitted to take on the journey more than 150
pounds. When the baggage had all been weighed and strapped on the coach,
when the horses had been attached, and the waybill, containing the names
of the passengers, made out, the passengers would clamber to their seats
through the front of the stage and sit down with their faces toward the
driver's seat.

One pair of horses usually dragged the coach eighteen miles, when a
fresh pair would be attached, and if all went well, you would be put
down about ten at night at some wayside inn or tavern after a journey of
forty miles. Cramped and weary, you would eat a frugal supper and hurry
off to bed with a notice from the landlord to be ready to start at three
the next morning. Then, no matter if it rained or snowed, you would be
forced to make ready by the dim light of a horn lantern, unknown now,
for another ride of eighteen hours.

If no mishaps occurred, if the coach was n