The “New Exeter” Mail went at the moderate inclusive speed of 9 miles an hour, and reached Exeter, where it stopped altogether, 1 hour 38 minutes later than the “Quicksilver.” The fourth of this company went a circuitous route down the Bath Road to Bath, Bridgewater, and Taunton, and did not get into Exeter until 3.57 p.m. Halting ten minutes, it went on to Devonport, and stopped there at 10.5 that night. The tabulated form given on opposite page will clearly show how the West of England mails went in 1837. The starting of the “Quicksilver” and the other West-country mails was a recognised London sight. That of the “Telegraph” would have been also, only it left Piccadilly at 5.30 in the morning, when no one was about besides the unhappy passengers, except the stable-helpers. Chaplin, who horsed the “Quicksilver” and other Western mails from town, did not start them from the General Post Office, but from the Gloucester Coffee-House, Piccadilly. The mail-bags were brought from St. Martin’s-le-Grand in a mail-cart, and the City passengers in an omnibus. The mails set out from Piccadilly at 8.30 p.m. THE WEST OF ENGLAND MAILS, 1837. +-----+-----------------+-----------+----------+-----------+----------+ | | | |Devonport | | | | | |Old Exeter | (“Quick- | |Devonport | |Miles| Places. | Mail, | silver”) |New Exeter |Mail, by | | | | continued |Mail, con-| Mail. |Bath and | | | | to |tinued to | |Taunton. | | | | Falmouth. | Falmouth.| | | +-----+-----------------+-----------+----------+-----------+----------+ | |General Post | | | | | | | Office, | | | | | | |London dep.| 8.0 p.m. | 8.0 p.m.| 8.0 p.m. | 8.0 p.m.| | 12 |Hounslow arr.| | | | 9.12 ” | | 19 |Staines | | | 9.56 ” | | | 23 | Slough | | | | | | 29 | Maidenhead | | | |10.40 ” | | 58 | Newbury | | | | 1.53 a.m.| | 77 | Marlborough | | | | 3.43 ” | | 91 | Devizes | | | | 5.6 ” | | 109 | Bath | | | | 7.0 ” | | 149 | Bridgewater | | | |11.30 ” | | 160 | Taunton | | | |12.35 p.m.| | 180 | Cullumpton | | | | 2.42 ” | | 29 |Bagshot | |10.47 p.m.| | | | 67 |Andover | | 2.20 a.m.| 2.42 a.m. | | | 84 | Salisbury | 4.52 a.m. | | 4.27 ” | |