Contemporary with, but originating even earlier than, the stage-waggons were the pack-horses, which dated from a time when even the broad-wheeled wains would have sunk hopelessly in the mud of the best roads in the country. By pack-horse, at an earlier date than 1500, all goods, and even such heavy articles as building-stone, coals and timber, were carried, for the very eloquent reason that, before the passing of the first General Highway Act, in 1555, which was the first obligation upon the parishes to repair and maintain the roads, nothing had been done to keep them in repair for many centuries; and the parishes, with the best will in the world, could not at once retrieve them from their desperate condition. Wheeled traffic had been unknown until the early stage-waggons appeared, and those few who travelled otherwise than afoot or on their own horses were content to mount the pack-saddle of a patient and long-suffering pack-horse, themselves only a degree less long-suffering and patient. Then the etymology of the words “travel” and “journey” was abundantly justified; for it was sorrow and hard labour to leave one’s own fireside, and a day’s journey was--what the word “journey” implies--the passing from place to place within the hours of daylight. No one dared travel the roads when night had fallen, and it was not until the eighteenth century had dawned that coaches began to run by night as well as day. In far parts of the country and on the by-roads the pack-horse train lasted an incredible time. Wheeled conveyances of any kind were, generally speaking, impossible on any but the principal roads. The farmers and higglers who had occasion to transport heavier loads than it was possible for horses to carry, used a primitive kind of sledge, formed of tree-trunks, of which the light tapering ends formed the shafts and the heavy bodies of the trunks the runners. Thus the building materials were of old often carried or dragged, with much friction and waste of effort, to their destination. In Devon and Cornwall these truly savage makeshifts were called by the peculiarly descriptive name of “truckamucks.”