Certainly if the pictures of the period are to be trusted for accuracy, soon after the overthrow of James II. by William of Orange there were horses in plenty of almost exactly this type to be seen in England. Also the harness that was worn by many of the Dutch horses shown in the pictures resembled the harness that was in use among followers of William III., more especially the parts we mean to indicate when we speak of a horse's trappings. Even the bridles greatly resembled one another in some instances. * * * * * Bearing directly upon the story of the horse in history are the descriptions that have been handed down to us of the almost frantic opposition that met the introduction of the stage coach soon after the middle of the seventeenth century. In some respects these descriptions recall vividly to mind the rabid antagonism some two centuries later to the introduction of the steam engine, not to speak of the objections that are still raised by a proportion of the community to the general adoption of automobilism. Prior to the introduction of the stage coach into England a four-wheeled carriage with a long, low body had been employed to convey the general public from one part of the country to another, and when the stage coach first arrived many of our wiseacres were quick to prophesy that the death-knell of the nation's greatness had in consequence been sounded! Perhaps one of the stoutest of the opponents of reform in this respect was a certain Mr Cressett, of Charterhouse, who in the year 1662 openly and in very straightforward language affirmed that the adoption of the stage coach must “entirely ruin the country,” and who in that year wrote a vigorous tract, in which he explained entirely to his satisfaction—also, apparently, to the satisfaction of his partisans—that the amount of harm the introduction of road coaching must inevitably cause to the community at large would be enormous. His remarks, too voluminous to reprint _in extenso_, contain in one place the observation that “by this rapid mode of travelling”—at the period in which he wrote it took approximately three days to get from London to Dover, even in fine weather—“gentlemen will come to London upon the slightest pretext, which but for these abominable coaches they would not do but upon urgent necessity.” Nor would the impending evil, in his opinion, end there, for, lashing himself gradually into a fury, he went on to maintain that “the gentlemen's wives” would come too, and that no sooner would they find themselves in London than they would “get fine clothes, go to plays and treats, and by these means get such a habit of idleness and love for pleasure that they would be uneasy ever after.” Poor Mr Cressett!