Sweet company! Next time, I do protest, Sir,

I’d walk to Dublin, ere I’d ride to Chester!

YARD OF THE “BULL AND MOUTH,” ST. MARTIN’S-LE-GRAND.       From an old Print.

This engine of torture was, however, well patronised.

The first stage-coach to ply between London and Holyhead was the conveyance promoted chiefly by that enterprising Shrewsbury innkeeper, Robert Lawrence. It started in 1780, and went through Coventry, Castle Bromwich, Birmingham, Walsall, Wolverhampton, Shrewsbury, Llangollen, Corwen, and Conway, thus keeping pretty closely to the course taken by the modern Holyhead Road. It lay the first night at Castle Bromwich, the second at Oswestry, and the third (if God permitted) at Holyhead. Five years later (in the summer of 1785) the first mail-coach to Chester and Holyhead was established, going by Northampton, Welford, Lutterworth, Hinckley, Atherstone, Tamworth, Lichfield, Wolseley Bridge, Stafford, Eccleshall, Woore, Nantwich, Tarporley, Chester, and St. Asaph. This, the only mail route to Holyhead until 1808, measured 278 miles 7 furlongs, and was the longest of all ways. Other roads for many years led by Oxford and Stratford-on-Avon, and were used by some of the smartest coaches to the end of the coaching age; but the shortest route, the great “Parliamentary” road to Holyhead, measures 260½ miles. In 1808 the London, Birmingham, and Shrewsbury Mail, through Oxford, was extended to Holyhead, going by Llangollen, Corwen, and Capel Curig. It ran thus until 1817, when it was transferred to the direct Coventry route. The Holyhead Road had then begun to be reformed, and the direct Mail took precedence over the old “Holyhead and Chester Mail,” still going by its old course.

The “New Holyhead Mail,” as it was officially named, then started from the “Swan with Two Necks,” in Lad Lane, every evening at 7.30, and took 38 hours about the business. In 1826, the year when the Menai Bridge was opened, the time was cut down to 32¾ hours, and in 1830 to 29 hours 17 minutes, the mail arriving at Holyhead at 1.17 on the second morning after it had left London. In 1836 and the last two years of its existence, the journey was performed in 26 hours 55 minutes; the arrival timed for 10.55 p.m.

Here is the time-bill for that last and best achievement:—

Miles.
London dep.8.0P.M.
15South Mimms arr.9.40„
25Redbourne „10.44„
45Little Brickhill „12.32A.M.
52¼Stony Stratford „1.26„
60¼Towcester „2.12„
72½Daventry „3.25„
80¼Dunchurch „4.11„
91¼Coventry „5.18„
100Stonebridge „6.8„
109¼Birmingham{arr.7.8„
dep.7.43„
117¼Wednesbury arr.8.28„
122¼Wolverhampton „9.1„
137½Shiffnal „10.14„
141½Haygate „10.59„
152Shrewsbury{arr.11.59„
dep.12.4P.M.
160½Nesscliff arr.12.53„
170Oswestry „1.46„
182½Llangollen „2.58„
192½Corwen{arr.3.55„
dep.4.0„
198¼Tynant arr.5.1„
205¾Cernioge „5.39„
220Capel Curig „7.2„
228Tyn-y-Maes „7.46„
234Bangor{arr.8.20„
dep.8.25„
237Menai Bridge arr.8.43„
247½Mona Inn „9.43„
260½Holyhead „10.55„

The man who made that achievement possible was Thomas Telford. Long before his aid was sought, the question of improving the communications between the two countries had become a burning one. The Irish members, meeting no longer on St. Stephen’s Green, had a grievance in the circumstance of their journeys to the Imperial Parliament at Westminster being both tedious and hazardous, and this question of road-reform was the first raised by them. The Government, in reply, appointed a Commission; Rennie, the foremost engineer of his day, was called in to advise upon the harbours of Holyhead and Howth, and Telford in 1810 to plan the road improvements.