“Where am I?” in full expectation of having floated to France or Spain; whereupon they answered, “at Wansford.”  “What!” he exclaimed in ecstacy, “Wansford in England!” and landing, drank the ale and gave a new name to the inn of this village between three counties.  The inn (which belongs to the Duke of Bedford) affords a sort of accommodation which the rapid travelling and short halts of railways have almost abolished.  But an easy rent, a large farm, and a trade in selling and hiring hunters, enables the landlord to provide as comfortably for his guests, as when, in old posting days, five dukes made the Haycock their night halt at one time.  On entering the well carpeted coffee-room, with its ample screen, blazing fire, and plentiful allowance of easy chairs, while a well appointed tempting dinner is rapidly and silently laid on the spotless table-cloth,—­the tired sportsman or traveller will be inclined to fancy that he is visitor to some wealthy squire rather than the guest of an innkeeper.  When we add that the bed-rooms match the sitting-rooms, that the charges are moderate, that the Pytchley, Earl Fitzwilliam’s, and the Duke of Rutland’s hounds (the Beevor), meet within an easy distance; that the county abounds in antiquities, show-houses like Burleigh, that pleasant woodland rides are within a circle of ten miles, that good pike-fishing is to be had nearly all the year round, while in retirement Wansford is complete; we have said enough to show that it is well worth the notice of a large class of travellers,—­from young couples on their first day’s journey, to old gentlemen travelling north and needing quiet and a bottle of old port.

The last station, Peterborough, presents an instance of a city without population, without manufactures, without trade, without a good inn, or even a copy of the Times, except at the railway station; a city which would have gone on slumbering to the present hour without a go-a-head principle of any kind, and which has nevertheless, by the accident of situation, had railway greatness thrust upon it in a most extraordinary manner.

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Peterborough is one of the centres from which radiate three lines to London, viz., by the Northampton route, on which we have travelled; by the direct line, through Herts, of the Great Northern; and by the Eastern Counties, with all its Norfolk communications.  From Peterborough also proceeds an arm of the Midland Counties, through Stamford, Oldham, and Melton Mowbray, and the best Leicestershire grass country, to Leicester or to Nottingham,—­while the Great Northern, dividing, embraces the whole of Lincolnshire and makes way to Hull, by the Humber ferries, on the one hand, and to York on the other.  There is, therefore, the best of consolation on being landed in this dull inhospitable city, that it is the easiest possible thing to leave it.