The Sun.
London, England, 1862-09-18 00:00:00

THE POST-OFFIC'.E.

The number of chargeable letters delivered from the
British offices in the last complete year before the reduction
of postage was taken at seventy-six millions. The number
in 1861 had risen to the stupendous amount of five hundred
and ninety-three millions, being nearly an eightfold multi •
plication of the former number. The imagination refuses
to grapple with figures so enormous ; probably, therefore,
the vast increase will be more clearly apprehended if I give
the following short table, which gives the proportion of
letters to population at the two extremes. In 1889 the
proportion stood thus : —ln England and Wales, four letters
per annum to each individual; in Ireland, one; ire Scot-
land, three, being an average of three to each porson in the
United Kingdom. In 1861 the average had grown in Eng-
land and Wales to twenty-four per head ; in Ireland, to
nine ; in Scotland, to nineteen ; being an average of twenty
per head for the United Kingdom, It will be felt that a
rise from three per head to twenty leads to inferences
bearing on the social state of the nation which would of
themselves furnish matter for a whole paper. The enor-
mous increase of correspondence may be placed in still
another light. The total weight of letters, exclusive of
newspapers find other matter, during the year 1849, was
seven hundred and fifty- eight tons. In 1861 it had risen
to four thousand three hundred tons. The increase of the
average daily mileage of the mails, whether carried by rail-
way coaches, horses, or on foot, is very striking. It is esti-
mated, although, in the absence cf records no very close
approximation to the truth can be reached, that in 1839 it
did not exceed fifty-four thousand miles per diem, whereas
in 1861 it had risen to one hundred and fifty-one thousand,
being six times the circumference of the globe; so that,
although the Post-office still falls short of the activity of
Puck, who could " put a girdle round the earth in forty
minutes," yet it
performs a
similar feat to his every four
hours of its existence. This increase would have been much
larger but for the circumstance that each trunk railway,
like the Great North-Western, for instance, draws to itself
an aggregation of mails which formerly left London by
several distinct routes. The staff of officers of all ranks and
both sexes constantly employed in the labours of the Post-
office was in 1839, by rough estimate, about 800. In 1861
it was, by exact enumeration, 25,473. In addition to this
force, many assistants are engaged a portion of their time.
Lot me now compare the gross and the net revenue of the
, department as it existed in 1838 and in 1861. The gross
revenue in 1838 was X 2,346,278; in 1861, upwards of three
millions and a half. Hence it appears that notwithstand-
ing the wonderful reduction whereby the public now ob-
tains far more of the article postage for the same price
then it did formerly, yet that its expenditure in postage ex-
ceeds by more than one-half the amount so spent under the
old exorbitant rates. Nor is the promise for the future less
brilliant than the experience of the past.
Correspondence
is still advancing by rapid strides.
One incident in this
vast accession cannot but give rise to sanguine expectations.
Whatever the vicissitudes in our harvests, whatever the
fluctuations of our commerce, whether we are in the en.
joy ment of peace er suffer the privations of war, each re-
volving year adds to the mass of our correspondence. Tho
tide of our letters, like that from the Politic to the Pro-
politic Sea, feels an ebb. Eighteen hundred and sixty-one,
though by no means a year of general affluence, added a
influx of twenty-nine millions—in addition even beyond
' the average of former years,—.FrmeB,ol-aszino,