Horses were a primary method of delivering mail and messages for many years in different countries around the world. Riders on horseback could take small bundles quickly, while carts pulled by horses could take large amounts of mail very long distances.
Relay rider networks were a common feature of every ancient empire. They were primarily for the exclusive use of the government or military and carried no civil correspondence as a rule. Later,
post riders became popular when there was an obvious demand for the transportation of public correspondence. The
Hanseatic League had a regular mounted service as early adopters the year 1274 between the principal towns of the League as well as the fortified castles which protected the merchants in their commerce. On behalf of the far-flung
Habsburg dynasty of
The Holy Roman Empire,
Franz von Taxis set up a courier network that grew to cover all of Western Europe in the middle of the 16th century. Permanent post stations were built about a
day's journey apart.
Elizabethan England really started using post riders in earnest, being much more open to public use despite government restrictions. The
Pony Express was a fast mail service crossing the North American continent from the
Missouri River to the Pacific coast, operating from April 1860 to November 1861. Messages were carried on horseback relay across the prairies, plains, deserts, and mountains of the western United States. It briefly reduced the time for mail to travel between the
Atlantic and
Pacific coasts to around ten days before being replaced by the
First transcontinental railroad and the
telegraph. Regular mail delivery is now provided by horses in limited areas where other forms of transportation are not practical. For example, some towns in mountainous parts of
Sichuan and
Tibet, in China, are served by horse couriers. The village of
Supai, in the bottom of the
Grand Canyon of
Arizona, United States, is served by a regular mule train from the canyon's rim. ==Birds==