As early as the year 1811 a trial was made of a drag, or break, apparently a good deal resembling the breaks now so generally applied to wheels. In that year a drag, as it was then called, was introduced by a Mr. Simpson to the Post-office authorities, and was tried on the Brighton and Worcester mails; but the advantages claimed for it by the patentee were not borne out in practice. The advantages claimed were that in case of the reins or pole breaking, or horses running away, the drag could be at once applied by the guard without leaving his seat, as it was put in action by a lever or shaft affixed to the body of the coach, and worked by hand. It does not appear, however, to have possessed sufficient attractions for it to be brought into general use, as nothing more is heard of it. In the year 1811 I don't suppose there was much to be feared from horses running away! Before quite taking leave of science I will venture to touch upon a subject which, if not exactly science, is nearly related to it. At any rate, it can only be solved, if at all, through the medium of science. I can fancy I hear some votary of science exclaim with some indignation, "What is this doughty question which is to puzzle science?" To this I can only answer that if science has or can solve it satisfactorily, I humbly beg its pardon for doubting its powers. Well, the subject I am raising is expressed by the word _Traction_. Traction, I mean, as connected with pace. What is the difference in power required to move a given load at ten miles an hour and at five miles an hour? I have somewhere seen it argued as if it was the same, and that therefore the horses must suffer greatly over the latter part of a stage, supposing that their powers were less and the weight to be drawn remained the same. Of course, the weight does in one sense continue the same, but every coachman who has had any experience in driving will have observed how much longer time it requires to pull up a coach going at a high speed than one at a slow pace; which of itself proves that after the coach is once set in motion and has acquired a fast pace, the exertion required to keep it going is considerably reduced. Without for a moment forgetting the cardinal truth that "it is the pace which kills," it is quite apparent that the disease and the remedy, to some extent at least, travel together. Another fact which can be attested by all old stage coachmen, and which goes strongly to prove how much reduced the draught is by pace, is that four light horses can get a load up a steep pitch at a gallop which they would be quite incapable of surmounting at a walk.