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318
The Royal Mail: Its Curiosities and Romance
·
James Wilson Hyde
170
CHAPTER
XV.
POST-OFFICE
ROBBERIES.
If
records
are
not
now
forthcoming
of
all
the
robberies
which
have
been
committed
upon
the
Post-office
from
the
earliest
times,
we
may
be
assured
that
an
institution
such
as
it
is,
maintaining
agencies
all
over
the
country,
and
having
to
keep
up
communications
between
those
agencies,
would
be
exposed
at
all
times
and
at
all
points
to
the
risk
of
robbery,
whether
by
the
dashing
boldness
of
the
highwayman,
or
the
less
pretentious
doings
of
the
town
house-breaker.
To
us
who
live
in
an
age
when
the
public
roads
are
generally
safe
to
travellers,
it
is
difficult
to
realise
the
dangers
that
lurked
in
the
highways
at
no
more
remote
a
period
than
last
century;
nor
can
we
well
realise
a
state
of
things
under
which
mail-coaches
in
this
our
quiet
England
had
to
be
protected
by
guards
armed
to
the
teeth.
We
have
it
handed
down,
however,
as
a
historical
fact,
that
when,
in
1720,
Belsize
House,
Hampstead,
was
opened
as
a
place
of
public
resort,
the
programme
announcing
its
attractions
contained
the
following
item:--"And
for
the
security
of
its
guests,
there
are
twelve
stout
fellows
completely
armed,
to
patrol
betwixt
London
and
Belsize,
to
prevent
the
insults
of
highwaymen
or
footpads
which
may
infest
the
road."
Yet
that
statement
does
not
give
the
whole
truth,
for
the
road
between
these
two
places
became
so
much
more
dangerous,
that
after
a
time
"the
patrol
had
to
be
increased
from
twelve
to
thirty
stout
fellows
completely
armed,
independently
of
two
tall
grenadiers
who
mounted
guard
over
the
gate
of
the
mansion."
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