"'The last conveyance of which I had charge,' said he, 'was the old "Accommodation." She was not a road wagon, but a van driven by five horses, three leaders abreast, and reaching London in sixteen hours. We used to start from the "Globe Inn," Oyster Street, Portsmouth, and finished the journey to London at the "New Inn," Old Change, or at the "Castle and Falcon," Aldersgate Street. Yes, I took to the road pretty early. I was only about sixteen or seventeen years of age when I took charge of the London mail for my father. Father used to ride to Moushill and back (that's seventy-two miles) every night for fifty years. He drove the night "Nelson" for thirty-two years. That was a coach with a yellow body, and about 1822 its name was altered to that of the "Star of Brunswick." It ran from the "Fountain" and the "Blue Posts," Portsmouth, to the "Spread Eagle," in Gracechurch Street. Its pace was about eight miles per hour, including changes. We only changed once between Portsmouth and Godalming, and that was at Petersfield, but the stages were terribly long, and we afterwards used to get another team at Liphook. The night coaches to London used to do the distance in about twelve hours, and the day coaches did it in nine hours; but the mails were ten hours on the road. The mail-coaches carried four inside and three out, with a "dickey" seat for the guard, who never forgot to take his sword-case and blunderbuss, though in my time we never had any trouble with highwaymen, and I never heard much about them stopping coaches in this neighbourhood. Of course every now and then a sailor would tumble off and break a leg, a head, or an arm, but that was only what you might expect. There were plenty of poachers and smugglers about, but no highwaymen. We did not have key bugles, as the books often say; the horn served our turn. William Balchin, who was guard with me as well as with father, was a good hand with his horn. I was guard for twelve months to the night "Rocket," which ran to the "Belle Sauvage," then kept by Mr. Nelson. It was established for the benefit of the people of Portsea, and only ran for six or seven years. The day "Rocket" was much older, and got a good share of the Isle of Wight traffic. Both these "Rockets" were white-bodied coaches. Francis Falconer, who died at Petersfield about 1874, drove the day "Rocket" all the time it ran. Robert Nicholls was the only coachman that I ever knew to save money. He was a post-boy with me, and when he died he left a nice little fortune to each of his four daughters.