Benjamin Worthy Horne was thus only twenty-four years of age when the management of this business fell to him. He soon had need of all those fierce energies that were his, for, in addition to a watchful eye upon the doings of his rivals, he had the stress and turmoil of the rebuilding of the “Golden Cross” to contend with. To him, indeed, fell the singular experience of having that central place of business rebuilt twice in three years, and the second occasion on another site. When it was first rebuilt, in 1830, Trafalgar Square was not in existence, and the inn was re-erected on the old spot at the rear of Charles I.’s statue, exactly where the south-eastern one of Landseer’s four lions, guarding the Nelson Column, now looks across towards the Grand Hotel. But no sooner was the place rebuilt than the Metropolitan improvements in the meanwhile decided upon brought about the clearance of the site, and the present “Golden Cross” arose some distance away. At this time fifty-six coaches left that place daily, many of them bitterly competitive with those of other proprietors. Equally with his father, Benjamin Horne was an extremely keen business man, and eager to cut into any paying route. He had stables at Barnet and Finchley, to enable him to compete advantageously on the northern and north-western roads with Sherman, of the “Bull and Mouth,” and with others on those routes. As early as 1823, when the “Tally-Ho!” fast coach between London and Birmingham was first put on the road by Mrs. Ann Mountain, of the “Saracen’s Head,” Snow Hill, to do the 109 miles in 11 hours, the success of her enterprise had roused the jealousy of William Horne, who speedily started the “Independent Tally-Ho!”--setting out an hour and a quarter earlier, in order to intercept the bookings of the original conveyance. Numerous other “Tally-Ho’s!” were then established, and the racing between them on the London and Birmingham road grew fast and furious, much to the advantage of the slower coaches, whose bookings were wonderfully increased by timid passengers refusing to go any longer by these breakneck rivals. Benjamin Worthy Horne had at one time seven mails: the old Chester and Holyhead; the Cambridge Auxiliary; the Gloucester and Cheltenham; the Dover Foreign Mail; the Norwich, through Newmarket; the Milford Haven; and the Worcester and Oxford; in addition to the Hastings, a two-horsed affair, afterwards transferred to the “Bolt-in-Tun” office in Fleet Street.