We remarked above that it was by their roads especially that the Romans extended their power over all the world. We must notice now briefly the Roman post-system, the “cursus publicus,” whose coaches probably carried travelers from tavern to tavern like the modern mail-coaches. We must, however, curb the imagination of the reader with a reminder that practically only the state officials used this service. Not every country bumpkin could mount with market-basket on his arm, to make a jolly journey over hill and dale to the sound of the echoing horn. Still the Emperor or his prefect could issue tickets to private persons; and furthermore, these persons could, under certain circumstances, get a sort of Cook’s ticket, called “diploma tractoria,” which included board and lodging as well as transportation. If the journey lay through a lonely region, where there were no private taverns to provide shelter for the night, the traveler might put up at the state inn (“mansio”) which the province was obliged to maintain at public cost, with all the necessities and comforts to which respectable Roman travelers were accustomed. One can well understand how, as the empire disintegrated, the provincials were glad to throw off this hated compulsory tax for the support of the state inn. It was not till the time of Charlemagne that the institution was revived as a military-feudal service along the routes of the imperial army. Whether these Roman state inns displayed signs or not, we do not know. It is, however, very likely that they were distinguished by the sign of the Roman eagle, and so became the type of the later private eagle inns. Here let us remark that the post-coaches of our own day, which seem to us an institution dating from the Deluge, are a comparatively late invention. The first so-called “land-coach” in Germany was established between Ulm and Heidelberg in the year 1683. Through all the Middle Ages and the Renaissance period, we depended on mounted messengers, traveling cloister brothers, university students, and rare travelers to carry messages. In Württemberg, where we find to-day the most abundant reminders of the good old post-coach days, and consequently the finest old signs, bands of “noble post-boys” are found, including the distinguished names of Trotha and Hutten.