The following are noticeable indications of the existence of this mail :
On the ItUh of January, 16S9. the mail having just left the house of Colonel Lewis Morris, in this county, was seized by Leisler's order and returned to New- York and examined.'
The Earl of Bellaraont, writing May 25, 1(598, from New York, says : " the sure way of conveying letters to me is by the way of Boston, whence the post comes every week to this place."
Lord Cornbury, in a letter to the Lords of Trade June 30th, 1704, writes : " The post that goes through this place, goes Eastward as far as Boston, but Westward he goes no farther than Philadelphia and there is no other post upon all this continent." ^
In a letter describing the effects of Her Majesty's proclamation as to the rates of coin, Governor Cornbury writes as follows : " It was on Monday the 5th day of February, 1705, the day the Boston Post sets out from hence, several persons here sent away as much money by the Post as he could carry."
In 1704 we have from jMadam Knight's journal an account of her trip from Boston to New York herself, and the postman on horseback.*
In 1703 Lord Cornbury, sending home for approval several bills passed by the Assembly, speaks of one as " An Act of absolute necessity, for without it the Post to Boston and Philadelphia will be lost."*
1 X. Y. Col. MSS., vol. iii. p. r,S2. 3 N. Y. Col. JISS., vol. iv. p. 111.3.