I had then been exposed to that terrible weather for fifty hours. Next day I felt a good deal better, and started back for Gloucester, but had great difficulty in getting over the mountain. I had the honour of receiving a letter from the Postmaster-General complimenting me on my zeal and energy in getting the mail over the mountain. Even when there was no snow; the wind on the top of Plinlimmon was often almost more than we could contend with. Once, indeed, it was so strong that it blew the coach completely over against a rock; but we soon got that right again, and always afterwards took the precaution of opening both the doors and tying them back, so that the wind might pass through the coach.” [Illustration: STUCK FAST. _After C. Cooper Henderson_, 1843. ] On another occasion Nobbs and the mail escaped in a miraculous manner. The snow had been falling for many hours on Plinlimmon, and it was a fearful night. They safely passed the summit at Stedfa-gerrig, but, after going down for a mile, lost their way in a dense combined fog and snowstorm. A postboy was riding one of the leaders, but he took the coach over a precipice about sixty feet deep, and Nobbs and the coachman performed two somersaults in the involuntary descent. When they reached the bottom they blessed that same snowstorm which they had been regarding in quite another light, for the drifts made a soft and safe resting-place. There were only two passengers, who were, of course, riding inside on such a night. They were greatly cut by the breaking of the glass, and two horses were killed. But in two hours the coach was righted, and, having found an old Roman road in the hollow and harnessed the two remaining horses, they drove off, and actually succeeded in reaching Cheltenham in time to catch the up London mail. When the Cheltenham and Aberystwith Mail came off the road, in 1854, Nobbs was appointed travelling inspector to the Post Office on the Great Western Railway between Paddington and Exeter, and was shortly afterwards transferred to Paddington, where he remained for the rest of his official career, superintending the receipt and despatch of the mails until retired and pensioned off in 1891, under the Post Office regulations. He had thus performed fifty-five years’ service, and had seen the business of the Post Office grow from the one hundredweight of mail-matter in his charge on the Cheltenham and Aberystwith Mail at Christmas 1839, to the twenty tons despatched from Paddington on Christmas Eve 1889.