to
the Bristol Channel again, consists of ground within the City and County
of Bristol, and the Counties of Gloucestershire and Somersetshire. The
border of Wiltshire is touched near Dyrham and Badminton, and the
district is separated from Monmouthshire by the estuary of the River
Severn.

[Illustration: HORTON THATCHED POST OFFICE AT THE FOOT OF COTSWALD
HILLS.]

Post Offices showing signs of great antiquity are scarcely in existence
now, for at the present day the wide district thus described in the
preceding paragraph contains within its boundaries only one post office
established under the primitive but comfortable and picturesque
thatched roof. This is the Horton Post Office. The picture of this post
office is from an excellent photograph taken by Miss Begbie, a daughter
of the Rector of Horton. The village lies at the foot of the Cotswolds,
and near this spot, in quiet retreat, William Tyndale translated the New
Testament. The Duke of Beaufort's hounds meet from time to time in the
Horton Post Office yard. This rustic place was originally the village
ale house, yclept "The Horse Shoe." It is now devoted to the more useful
purpose of the sale of stamps and the posting and distribution of
letters, under the able and energetic superintendence of Mrs. Slade.

Such Postal Sub-Districts as Horton, far remote from their principal
centre, were classified under Parliamentary legislation. Thus the fifth
Clause posts of early in the 19th Century took their name from the Act
41, Geo. 3, Ch. 7, Clause 5, under which they were established. Special
post marks were in use for such posts. In the case of the Bristol
district there was only one 5th Clause post, namely, at Thornbury, which
was established in 1825, and under its regulations one penny was
charged for the delivery of each letter at Thornbury. The post was a
horse post from and to Bristol, and the Contractor delivered and
collected bags at Almondsbury and Fylton, which were both "penny posts."
The main object of the fifth Clause post was to join up small towns with
the larger post towns and so it was that Thornbury became thus linked on
to Bristol. On the other hand, Bristol had 63 penny posts, including
Almondsbury and Fylton, which were denoted by numbers 1 to 63, Clifton
being No. 1.

Of the 52 "Fifth Clause Posts" existing in 1839 Bristol had only the one
which joined Bristol and Thornbury.

Owing to there being no settled port of departure or arrival for vess