The exemption of mail-coaches from payment of tolls, a relief provided for by the Act of 25th George III., was really a continuation of the old policy by which the postboys of an earlier age, riding horseback and carrying the mailbags athwart the saddle, had always passed toll-free. Even the light mail-cart partook of this advantage, to which there could then have been no real objection. It had been no great matter, one way or the other, with the Turnpike Trusts, for the posts were then infrequent and the revenue to be obtained quite a negligeable quantity; but the appearance of mail-coaches in considerable numbers, running constantly and carrying passengers, and yet contributing nothing towards the upkeep of the roads, soon became a very real grievance to those Trusts situated on the route of the mails, but in outlying parts of the kingdom, little travelled, and where towns were lacking and villages poor, few, and far between. Little wonder, then, that the various Turnpike Trusts in 1810 approached Parliament for a redress of these disabilities. They pointed out that not only was there a greater wear and tear of the roads now the mail-coaches were running, but that travellers, relying on the fancied security of the mails, had deserted the stages, which in many cases had been wholly run off the road. Pennant, writing in 1792, tells how two stages plying through the county of Flint, and yielding £40 in tolls yearly, had been unable to compete with the mail, and were thus withdrawn, to the consequent loss of the Trust concerned. It was calculated, so early as 1791, by one amateur actuary, that the total annual loss through mail exemptions was £90,000; but another put it at only £50,000 in 1810.