If one can imagine this kind of thing continuing for hour after hour, while one’s bones ached with the cramp, and one was stupefied with the noise and smell, one gains some idea of the delights of waggon travelling. We find an account of the roads actually in Hampshire, Jane Austen’s own county, in the correspondence of Lady Newdigate (_The Cheverels of Cheverel Manor_). In giving an account of going from Arbury (Warwick) to Stanstead near Portsmouth in 1795, she says: “The sisters were decidedly for going through Reading and Farnham, but Mr. Cotton, from consultation of maps and conversation with postillions, believed it would be full as good and pleasant and a much shorter road to go by Basingstoke and Alton. In the first of these places we found it 19 miles instead of 15, and were informed that instead of ten miles good turnpike to Alton there was not above three miles made, and the rest so cut as to be impassable for such a carriage as mine; in short that we had twelve miles across country road ... the consequence was that we had eight miles bad road out of 16, and was an hour in the dark. But the poneys performed wonders.” Lady Newdigate also gives the cost of this journey, which is interesting: “We paid 14d. per mile great part of the way for the chaisehorses, and 6d. all the way for the saddle horse; the whole, baits and sleepings included, comes to above £24 to this place.” On the way to Brighton, two years later, she says, “I never saw this road so rotted, so heavy, or so deep. It was with difficulty my poor poneys could drag us.” We have therefore a tolerable notion of the fatigues attendant on a journey in those days. Another drawback was, that if one wished to travel by coach instead of going post, one could not always be sure of a place unless booked beforehand. This kind of thing frequently happened— “I was called up early—to be ready for the coach, but judge my disappointment and chagrin, when on my approach I found it chock-full. I petitioned, reasoned, urged and entreated, but all to no effect. I could not make any impression on the obdurate souls, who, proud and sulky, kept easy and firm possession of their seats, and hardly deigned to answer, when I requested permission to squeeze in. I was hoisted on the coach box as the only alternative; but on the first movement of the vehicle, had it not been for the arm of the coachman, I should have been instantly under the wheels in the street. I was chucked into a basket as a place of more safety, though not of ease or comfort, where I suffered most severely from the jolting, particularly over the stones; it was most truly dreadful and made one suffer almost equal to sea sickness.” (Tate Wilkinson, _Memoirs_.) This basket was actually a basket slung on for the purpose of carrying luggage, though it was also used for passengers, and sometimes filled with people in spite of its discomfort, because seats here were charged at a low price.