Fortunately, the biographical literature of our country is rich in records of the horsemen who, still relying upon their own exertions and those of their willing steeds, rode long distances and left the toiling stage leagues behind them at the close of each day’s journey. Ralph Thoresby, of Leeds, a pious and God-fearing antiquary who flourished at this time, gives us, on the other hand, the spectacle of one who generally rode horseback trying the coach by way of a change. He had occasion to visit London in February 1683, and as there was at that time no coach service between Leeds and London, he rode from Leeds to York to catch the stage, which seems to have kept the road in this particular winter. He rose at five one Saturday morning, and was at York by night, ready for the coach leaving for London on the Monday. Four years earlier he had scorned the coach, and did not now take it for sake of speed, for he commonly rode from Leeds to London in four days, and the York stage at this period of its career took six; so, including the two days expended in coming to York, he was clearly twice as long over the business. He looked forward to the coach journey with misgivings, “fearful of being confined to a coach for so many days with unsuitable persons and not one I know of.”
On other occasions, when he rode horseback, his diary is rich with picturesque incident. He finds the waters out on the road between Ware and Cheshunt, and waits until he and a party of other horsemen can be guided across by a safe way, and so avoid the pitiful fate of a poor higgler, who blundered into the raging torrent where the road should have been, and was swept away and drowned. He loses his way frequently on the high-road; shudders with apprehension when crossing Witham Common, near Stamford, “the place where Sir Ralph Wharton slew the highwayman”; and, with a companion, has a terrible fright at an inn at Topcliffe, where they miss their pistols for a while and suspect the innkeeper of sinister designs against them. Hence, at the safe conclusion of every journey, with humble and heartfelt thanks he inscribes: “God be thanked for his mercies to me and my poor family!”
In 1715, when John Gay wrote his entertaining poem, A Journey to Exeter, describing the adventures of a party of horsemen who rode down from London, things were, we may suppose, much better, for the travellers found amusement as well as toil on their way.
They took five days to ride to Exeter. The first night they slept at Hartley Row, 36 miles. The second day they left the modern route of the Exeter Road at Basingstoke, and, like some of the coaches about that time, struck out along the Winchester road as far as Popham Lane, where they branched off across the downs to Sutton and Stockbridge, at which town they halted the night, after a day’s journey of 30 miles. The third morning saw them making for Salisbury. Midway between Stockbridge and that city their road falls into the main road to Exeter. That night they were at Blandford. The fourth day took them to Axminster, and the fifth to Exeter:—
’Twas on the day when city dames repair
To take their weekly dose of Hyde Park air;
When forth we trot: no carts the road infest,
For still on Sundays country horses rest.
Thy gardens, Kensington, we leave unseen;
Through Hammersmith jog on to Turnham Green:
That Turnham Green which dainty pigeons fed,
But feeds no more, for Solomon is dead.
Three dusty miles reach Brentford’s tedious town,
For dirty streets and white-legg’d chickens known:
Thence o’er wide shrubby heaths and furrow’d lanes
We come, where Thames divides the meads of Staines.
We ferry’d o’er; for late the winter’s flood
Shook her frail bridge, and tore her piles of wood.
Prepar’d for war, now Bagshot Heath we cross,
Where broken gamesters oft repair their loss.
At Hartley Row the foaming bit we prest,
While the fat landlord welcom’d ev’ry guest.
Supper was ended, healths the glasses crown’d,
Our host extolled his wine at ev’ry round,
Relates the Justices’ late meeting there,
How many bottles drank, and what their cheer;
What lords had been his guests in days of yore,
And praised their wisdom much, their drinking more.
* * * * *
Let travellers the morning’s vigils keep:
The morning rose, but we lay fast asleep.
Twelve tedious miles we bore the sultry sun,
And Popham Lane was scarce in sight by one;
The straggling village harbour’d thieves of old,
’Twas here the stage-coach’d lass resigned her gold;
That gold which had in London purchas’d gowns,
And sent her home, a belle, to country towns.
But robbers haunt no more the neighbouring wood;
Here unnamed infants find their daily food;
For should the maiden mother nurse her son,
’Twould spoil her match, when her good name is gone.
Our jolly hostess nineteen children bore,
Nor fail’d her breast to suckle nineteen more.
Be just, ye prudes, wipe off the long arrear,
Be virgins still in towns, but mothers here.
Sutton we pass; and leave her spacious down,
And with the setting sun reach Stockbridge town.
O’er our parch’d tongues the rich metheglin glides,
And the red dainty trout our knife divides.
Sad melancholy ev’ry visage wears;
What! no election come in seven long years!
Of all our race of Mayors, shall Snow alone
Be by Sir Richard’s dedication known?
Our streets no more with tides of ale shall float,
Nor cobblers feast three years upon one vote.
* * * * *
Next morn, twelve miles led o’er th’ unbounded plain
Where the cloak’d shepherd guides his fleecy train.
No leafy bow’rs a noontide shelter lend,
Nor from the chilly dews at night defend;
With wondrous art he counts the straggling flock,
And by the sun informs you what’s o’clock.
How are our shepherds fall’n from ancient days!
No Amaryllis chants alternate lays;
From her no list’ning echoes learn to sing,
Nor with his reed the jocund valleys ring.
Here sheep the pasture hide, there harvests bend,
See Sarum’s steeple o’er yon hill ascend;
Our horses faintly trot beneath the heat,
And our keen stomachs know the hour to eat.
Who can forsake thy walls, and not admire
The proud cathedral and the lofty spire?
What sempstress has not proved thy scissors good?
From hence first came th’ intriguing riding-hood.
Amid three boarding-schools well stock’d with misses,
Shall three knight-errants starve for want of kisses?
O’er the green turf the miles slide swift away,
And Blandford ends the labours of the day.
* * * * *