Page:A short history of social life in England.djvu/249

Rh by coach was no unmixed pleasure in these early days of the Restoration. Like other innovations, it was strongly opposed. "These coaches," wrote a contemporary, "are one of the greatest mischiefs that hath happened of late years to the kingdom, mischievous to the public, destructive to trade, and prejudicial to lands." Despite opposition the coaches increased both in number and in speed, till, attaining the breakneck speed of fifty miles a day, they were dignified by the name of "Flying Coaches." The roads were very bad, the ruts deep and dangerous; not infrequently the whole coach and its occupants was upset; the difficulties and discomforts were inconceivably great. But even these were as nothing compared to the very real danger which beset the travellers of the seventeenth century. To-day the mounted and masked highwayman is an unknown personage, except in romance; then, he was a genuine terror to the stoutest-hearted Englishman, for whom he lay in wait on every main road or lonely common in the country. The waste tracts which bordered the highways from London to the provinces were haunted by these robbers and thieves. Hounslow Heath, Finchley Common, Epping Forest, were famous for