The twenty-two miles between Preston and Lancaster are more remarkable for the excellence of the road than for the interest of the way. When you have achieved the pull-up past Gallows Hill—or what was once known by that name—where numbers of the rebels of 1715 expiated their error of judgment, and have come to where the tramways cease, the road becomes undulating, and is neighboured, first on one side and then on the other, by the railway and the Lancaster Canal. At Hollowforth what looks like an ancient gateway was built in 1853 from the stones of an old obelisk formerly standing in Preston market-place. The little river Wyre is twice crossed, at Brock’s Bridge and Garstang. At Myerscough, where the pull-up was formerly very trying for horses, the inscription may be read: To relieve the sufferings Of animals labouring in our service The steep ascent of this hill Was lowered At the expense of Mary and Margaret Cross of Myerscough, A.D. 1869. This deed of mercy appeals to every Passer-by, that he too show Mercy to The creatures God has put under his hand [Illustration: GARSTANG.] Garstang, that stands rather finely on the road, with its old “Royal Oak” inn and ancient market-cross, hinting, not remotely to those who care for these things, of better days, was in fact once a market-town. But Garstang has outlived its ancient importance. Time was when it owned a Mayor and Corporation, who proudly dated back to 1314. Even in 1680 it was sufficiently important to win a renewal of its ancient charter of incorporation, but it has long lost any relics of its old state. The interfering besoms of the Local Government Board swept away the Mayor and his subordinates in 1883, and presented Garstang instead with a nice new Town Trust. It all sounds very improving and wonderful, but the plain man suspects only the difference between Tweedledum and Tweedledee in all this; with, of course, the inevitable legal charges for making the wonderful change. In the days when Garstang did a large cattle trade, that singular seventeenth-century character, Richard Braithwaite, who styled himself “Drunken Barnaby,” came staggering through, with his usual skinful, on his way from Lancaster. Thence to Garstang, pray you hark it, Ent’ring there a great beast market; As I jogged along the street ’Twas my fortune for to meet A young heifer, who before her Took me up, and threw me o’er her.