[Click anywhere on map for high resolution image.] [Illustration: SKETCH MAP OF THE HOLYHEAD ROAD, SHOWING ALSO THE ROMAN WATLING STREET FROM DOVER AND THE ROMAN STATIONS ON THE WAY. HOLYHEAD ROAD ━━━━━━━━ WATLING STREET ──────── TELFORD’S NEW ROAD THROUGH ANGLESEY ╸╸╸╸╸╸╸╸ ] [Illustration: THE HOLYHEAD ROAD.] I “Peace hath its victories, no less renowned than war;” and there is nothing more remarkable than the engineering triumphs that land the Irish Member of Parliament, fresh from the Division Lobby at Westminster, at North Wall, Dublin, spouting treason, in nine hours and a quarter, or bring the Irish peasant, with the reek of the peat-smoke still in his clothes, and the mud of his native bogs not yet dried on his boots, to Euston in the same space of time. But a hundred years ago, when the peaceful labours of the engineer had not begun to annihilate space and time, and the Union of Great Britain and Ireland had only just been effected, no such ready transit was possible, and our great-grandfathers reckoned their journeys between the two capitals in days instead of hours. The Holyhead Road, known to our fathers and ourselves, was not in existence; and Liverpool (and even Parkgate, near Chester) was as often the point of embarkation for Ireland as Holyhead. The journey from London to Dublin was then of uncertain length, determined by such fluctuating conditions as the season of the year, the condition of the roads, and the winds of St. George’s Channel—sometimes smooth, but more often stormy. What the road was, and what it became, shall be the business of these pages to relate. * * * * *