| Louth | 148 | Bell and Crown, | 15 56 | 9 0 | | | | Holborn | | | | Norwich, by | 118 | Belle Sauvage | 13 5 | 9 0 | | Newmarket | | | | | | Stroud | 105 | Swan with Two Necks | 11 47 | 9 0 | | Wells | 133 | Bell and Crown | 14 43 | 9 0 | | Falmouth | 271 | Bull and Mouth | 31 55 | 8 4 | | Dover | 73 | Golden Cross | 8 57 | 8 1¼ | | Hastings | 67 | Bolt-in-Tun, Fleet | 8 15 | 8 0 | | | | Street | | | | Portsmouth | 73 | White Horse | 9 10 | 7 7-5/7| | Brighton | 55 | Blossoms Inn | 7 20 | 7 4 | +--------------------+------+---------------------+-------+----------+ With the exception of the Brighton, Portsmouth, Dover and Hastings, they were all splendidly-appointed four-horse coaches; but those four places being only at short distances, speed was unnecessary, and they were only provided with pair-horse mails. Had a speed similar to that maintained on most other mails been kept up, letters and passengers would have reached the coast in the middle of the night. The so-called “Yarmouth Mail” was, we are told by those who travelled on it, an ordinary stage-coach, carrying the usual four inside and twelve outside, chartered by the Post Office to carry the mail-bags; but the old print, engraved here, does not bear out that contention. The _arrival_ of the mails in London was an early morning affair. First of all came the Leeds, at five minutes past four, followed at an interval of over an hour--5.15--by the Glasgow, and then, at 5.39, by the Edinburgh. All arrived by 7 o’clock. There was then, as now, no Sunday delivery of letters in London, and Saturday nights were, by consequence, saturnalias for the up-mails. Although the clock might have been set with accuracy by their passing at any other time, their coming into London on Sundays was a happy-go-lucky, chance affair. The coachmen would arrange to meet on the Saturday nights at such junctions of the different routes as Andover, Hounslow, Puckeridge, and Hockliffe, and so in company have what they very descriptively termed a “roaring time.” [Illustration: THE YARMOUTH MAIL, AT THE “COACH AND HORSES,” ILFORD. _After J. Pollard._ ] In 1836 the fastest mail ran on a provincial route. This was the short 28-miles service between Liverpool and Preston, maintained at 10 miles 5 furlongs an hour. The slowest was the 19-miles Canterbury and Deal, at 6 miles an hour, including stops for changing. The average speed of all the mails was as low as 8 miles 7 furlongs an hour.