There were in coaching days no fewer than eight inns and posting-houses of different degrees in Meriden. There are now but two inns: the “Bull’s Head,” formerly a farmhouse, and the “Queen’s Head,” already mentioned. Among the vanished signs are the “Nag’s Head,” “Malt Shovel,” “Crown,” and “Swan” (now a butcher’s shop). The magnificent inn spoken of by Pennant was the old “Bull’s Head”; whence the licence was transferred to the smaller house, now so named, at the time when coaching ceased to be. The old house is seen on the right hand, a very large, white-plastered building of good architectural character, now secluded from the road by a wall and iron palisade, standing where the drive up to the inn was formerly placed. One of the entrances to and exits from the house in coaching and posting times was by the first-floor window, above where the portico, a later addition, is seen. The “Bull’s Head” was an exclusive and aristocratic house, and preferred the top-sawyers, who posted in their own “chariots,” to those who travelled in hired chaises; while for the mere passengers by mail or stage-coach it had, at the best, but a contemptuous tolerance. And, indeed, it must have been a lordly place, and, with its surrounding gardens, stables, and picturesque turreted clock-tower, more like a private mansion than a place of public resort. There is still in the turret a dilapidated set of chimes that can, with care and patience, be induced to hammer out a few scattered notes of a tune alleged to be that of “God Save the King,” or Queen, as the case may be. XLVI Meriden is one of the many reputed “centres of England.” Measure a straight line from the North Foreland to Holyhead, and another from the Lizard to the mouth of the Humber, and their intersection will be at Meriden. With an irregularly shaped country like England, this is a somewhat empirical method, and the other reputed centres are evidently obtained by measuring from various places dictated by individual taste and fancy. The very hub of the country is held to be the ancient cross standing upon the village green—shattered now, and bound together by iron bands. A modern legend that it was originally placed here to mark the centre has grown up, and by consequence it is sketched and photographed times without number throughout the year. The “Forest of Arden Archers,” or the “Woodmen of Arden,” as they sometimes style themselves, an ancient guild revived in 1785, and holding meetings at Forest Hall, near by, remind the forgetful traveller that, like Touchstone, he is in Arden, or, at any rate, on the outskirts of it, in passing through Meriden. Henley-in-Arden lies to the left, served by a station, bald of any poetic or romantic suggestion in the title of “Henley Junction.” [Illustration: MERIDEN CROSS.]