It was some time before the more opulent, who could afford to post to town in aristocratic style, became reconciled to railway travelling. In the opinion of many, it was only another illustration of the levelling tendencies of the age. It put an end to that gradation of rank in travelling which was one of the few things left by which the nobleman could be distinguished from the Manchester manufacturer and bagman. But to younger sons of noble families the convenience and cheapness of the railway did not fail to recommend itself. One of these, whose eldest brother had just succeeded to an earldom, said one day to a railway manager: “I like railways—they just suit young fellows like me with ‘nothing per annum paid quarterly.’ You know we can’t afford to post, and it used to be deuced annoying to me, as I was jogging along on the box-seat of the stage-coach, to see the little Earl go by drawn by his four posters, and just look up at me and give me a nod. But now, with railways, it’s different. It’s true, he may take a first-class ticket, while I can only afford a second-class one, but _we both go the same pace_.” For a time, however, many of the old families sent forward their servants and luggage by railroad, and condemned themselves to jog along the old highway in the accustomed family chariot, dragged by country post-horses. But the superior comfort of the railway shortly recommended itself to even the oldest families; posting went out of date; post-horses were with difficulty to be had along even the great high-roads; and nobles and servants, manufacturers and peasants, alike shared in the comfort, the convenience, and the despatch of railway travelling. The late Dr. Arnold, of Rugby, regarded the opening of the London and Birmingham line as another great step accomplished in the march of civilisation. “I rejoice to see it,” he said, as he stood on one of the bridges over the railway, and watched the train flashing along under him, and away through the distant hedgerows—“I rejoice to see it, and to think that feudality is gone for ever: it is so great a blessing to think that any one evil is really extinct.”