The Express.
London, England, 1861-11-19 00:00:00

TO OUR READERS.

SPORTING INTELLIGENCE.

A late edition of the Express is published every
evening during the racing season, containing the
results of the day's ram.

Tee practice of issuing an Annual Report on the
Administrative Departments of the Government,
although one of recent introduction, is recommended
by manifold and obvious utility. Adopted at first and
primarily as a means of realising the responsibility
of the public service to public opinion, it has a
natural reflex action, and engages the good feeling
of the public towards bodies of men of whose
meritorious activity most of us were imperfectly
aware. And so far as it does this, it destroys pre-
judice, associates the departments with objects in
which we feel an interest, and thus facilitates
that willing co-operation of the community
with ofbcial persons by which the general
convenience is greatly promoted. Of none of the
departments is this so true as of the Poirt-office.
Its employs are never out of sight and hearing.
And while the sphere of other departments—es,

for simple, the Cuatoras—bs; been wisely
contracted and may even be destroyed, the organi-
zation of the Postoffice has been extended, and
its functions have been multiplied at a prodigious
rate in proportion with that progress of society
which it stimulates while it obeys. In respect of
this progress the annual reports of the Post-office
possess a certain social interest akin to that which
attends the reportsof the Committee of Council
on Education.

From the Seventh Annual Report of the roar
Nam-ma-Gen mut, just issued, we learn that we a»
making steady progress in reading and writing.
The number of letters delivered through the
Post-office in England in 1860 was 462 millions,
which is at the rate of 22 letters for every man,
woman, and child. In Ireland the number was
48 millions, being at the rate of eight to each per-
son ; and in Scotland 54 millions, being at the
relatively high rate of 17 to each person. Taking
the United Kingdom, the total number of letters
delivered was 564 millions, which is 19 millions
more than were delivered in the previous year.
This increase is at the rata of 31 per cent, for the
United Kingdom, and it is pleasing to observe
that Ireland participates iu it to the extent of S
per cent. The rate of increase for the United
Kingdom is, however, below the average of the
last live yeare,which was 41 per cent. In Liverpool
the proportion is as high as 27 letters to each
person ; in Birmingham and Manchester, 2s; in
Dublin, 34 ; in Edinburgh, 36 ; and in London,
43. The enormous development of postal com-
munication iu our great towns contributes power-
fully to enhance these figures. Thus, of the
19 millions of additional letters delivered
in 1860, 31 millions were London local letters.
The establishment and increase of district
posts in tho metropolis has supplied a mesas of

rapid communication that makes the Post-office
the medium of • class of correspondence winch
formerly found other channels. Thus, of the
31, millions of additional London local letters de-
livered last year, 2 millions were delivered in the
name district in which they were posted. The
whole number of letters now delivered in the same
district in which they are peaked is as high ea
11} millions. Nearly 71,000,000 newspapers
were delivered last year, and about 11,700,000
book packets. The increase in book packets was
700,000, being in a much greater proportion than
that of newspapers, which was 450,000. But of
the former increase, by far the greater part,
500,000, took place in London alone.

_ .
These results might have been larger had the
labours of the department not been invalidated by
the luches of the public. Nearly 2 millions of letters,
or one is 286 of the whole number, were returned
to the writers last year owing to failure in the
attempts to deliver them. Three out of four
of these failures were owing to the letters being
addressed insufficiently or incorrectly, and more
than 10,000 were posted without any address at
all. In connexion with this branch of the subject
may be mentioned the loose practice which some
persons adopt of addressing letters to persons with-
out adding the number of the house or even the
name of the street. Many persons will learn with
surprise, on the authority of Lord BTANLIT Of
ALOKILIT, that " more than 20,000 letters now
a arrive daily bearing ouly the name of an ad-
" dresses, with the simple addition of London,'"
a prat:nos which, besides retarding the sorting, not
unfrequently ceases delay in delivery.
For the distribution of this WWI of correspond-
ence over the United Kingdom we Ind that the
mails are conveyed every week-day over about
144,000 miles, viz., 39,047mileaby railway, 32,297
miles by mail coaches and mail carts, 69,994 miles
on foot, and 2,838 miles by packets and boats.
The total gives an increase of about 4,000 miles
over 1859, chiefly in railway conveyance. The
stud of officers in the British Isles is
25,192, of whom 11,428 are postmasters,
and 11,889 carriers and meessegers. The
gross revenue of the Post-ollee in 1860 was
3,267,6621. from postage, and 121,6931. from
concsimions on money orders. 1,066,9201. was
disbursed in salaries and pensions. The net re-
venue of the year was 1,102,47 W. being 31,41111.
less than that of the previous year, a diminution