s but a year later
than the original stage-coach between Edinburgh and Glasgow. At that
time, in favorable weather, the coach between London and Edinburgh made
the trip in thirteen days. The London mail-coach in its palmiest days
could make this trip in forty-three hours and a half. As early as 1718
Jonathan Wardwell advertised that he would run a stage to Rhode Island.
In 1767 a stage-coach was run during the summer months between Boston
and Providence; in 1770 a stage-chaise started between Salem and Boston
and a post-chaise between Boston and Portsmouth the following year. As
early as 1732 some common-carrier lines had wagons which would carry a
few passengers. Let us hear the testimony of some travellers as to the
glorious pleasure of stage-coach travelling. Describing a trip between
Boston and New York towards the end of the last century President Quincy
of Harvard College said:--

"The carriages were old and the shackling and much of the harness
made of ropes. One pair of horses carried us eighteen miles. We
generally reached our resting-place for the night if no accident
intervened, at ten o'clock, and after a frugal supper went to bed,
with a notice that we should be called at three next morning, which
generally proved to be half-past two, and then, whether it snowed
or rained, the traveller must rise and make ready, by the help of a
horn-lantern and a farthing candle, and proceed on his way over bad
roads, sometimes getting out to help the coachman lift the coach
out of a quagmire or rut, and arrived in New York after a week's
hard travelling, wondering at the ease as well as the expedition
with which our journey was effected."

The _Columbia Centinel_ of April 24, 1793, advertised a new line of
"small genteel and easy stage-carriages" from Boston to New York with
four inside passengers, and smart horses. Many of the announcements of
the day have pictures of the coaches. They usually resemble market
wagons with round, canvas-covered tops, and the driver is seated outside
the body of the wagon with his feet on the foot-board. Trunks were
small, covered with deerskin or pigskin, studded with brass nails; and
each traveller took his trunk under his seat and feet.

The poet, Moore, gives in rhyme his testimony of Virginia roads in
1800:--

"Dear George, though every bone is aching
After the shaking
I've had this week over ruts and