It was an expensive as well as a pleasant method of travelling, costing as it did at least a shilling a mile, and, in times when forage was dear, one shilling and threepence. The usual rates were chaise, nine-pence a mile, pair of post-horses, sixpence; four horses and chaise, supposing you desired to travel speedily—say at twelve miles an hour—one-and-ninepence. But these costs and charges did not frank the traveller through. The post-boy’s tip was as inevitable as night and morning. Likewise there were the “gates” to pay every now and again. One shudders to contemplate the total cost of posting from London to Edinburgh, even with only the ordinary equipment of two horses. There were thirty post-stages between the two capitals, according to the books published for the use of travellers a hundred years ago. Those books were very necessary to any one who did not desire to be charged for perhaps a mile more on each stage than it really measured, which was one of those artful postmasters’ little ways. Here is a list of these stages with the measurements, to which travellers drew the attention of those postmasters who commonly endeavoured to overcharge:— Miles Furlongs Miles Furlongs Barnet 11 0 York 9 3 Hatfield 8 4 Easingwold 13 3 Stevenage 11 7 Thirsk 10 3 Biggleswade 13 5 Northallerton 9 0 Buckden 15 7 Darlington 16 0 Stilton 13 7 Durham 18 2 Stamford 14 2 Newcastle 14 4 Witham Common 11 2 Morpeth 14 6 Grantham 9 5 Alnwick 18 6 Newark 14 3 Belford 14 5 Tuxford 13 2 Berwick 15 3 Barnby Moor 10 4 Press Inn 11 5 Doncaster 12 0 Dunbar 14 3 Ferrybridge 15 2 Haddington 11 0 Tadcaster 12 7 Edinburgh 16 0