n, Royston, and Jacob Brittain,
of Cambridge.

In October, 1786, at two o'clock in the morning, the first coach
carrying the mails came through Royston, and in the same month of the
same year the Royston Coach was "removed from the Old Crown to the Red
Lyon."

In 1788 we learn that "The Royston Post Coach, constructed on a most
approved principle for speed and pleasure in travelling goes from
Royston to London in six hours, admits of only four persons inside, and
sets out every morning from Mr. Watson's the Red Lion."

In 1793, W. Moul and Co. began with their Royston Coach.

Some of the old announcements of Coach routes indicate a spirit of
improvement which had set in even thus early, such as "The Cambridge
and Yarmouth Machine upon steel springs, with four able horses." It
was a common name to apply to public coaches during the last century to
call them "Machines," and when an improved Machine is announced with
steel springs one can imagine the former state of things! It was a
frequent practice, notwithstanding the apparent difficulty of
maintaining one's perch for a long weary journey and sleeping by the
road, for these old coaches to be overloaded at the top, and coachmen
fined for it. In his "Travels in England in 1782," Moritz, the old
German pastor, in his delightful pages, says on this point: {11}
"Persons to whom it is not convenient to pay a full price, instead of
the inside, sit on the top of the coach, without any seats or even a
rail. By what means passengers thus fasten themselves securely on the
roof of these vehicles, I know not."

Reference has been made to the condition of the roads, and the terrible
straits to which the old coaches and wagons of the last century were
sometimes put on this account. The system of "farming" the highways
was responsible for a great deal of this. An amusing instance occurred
in October, 1789. A part of one of the high roads out of London was
left in a totally neglected condition by the last lessee, excepting
that some men tried to let out the water from the ruts, and when they
could not do this, "these labourers employed themselves in scooping out
the batter," and the plea for its neglect was that it was taken, but
not yet entered upon by the person who had taken it to repair, it being
some weeks before his time of entrance commenced! What was its state
in November may be imagined. "When the ruts were so deep that the fore
wheels of the wagons would not tur