The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-02-28

Tor savannah, Sunbury and st. Augustine
and returns. This trip he takes twelve
times in the year. On one of those trips
he fell sick, and employed a man to ride
for him, this man came into the office
drunk, he delivered about fifty loose let
tiers to Mr.. Thompson, the next day he re-
turned to the office and demanded the
letters as his own perquisite, saying that
it had been the former practice and that
he had been instructed to follow it. Thus
was Mackenfuss charg'd with an unwar-
rantable practise, but when he was ques-
tion'd on this matter he denied that he
had ever taken any money in this way.
The time schedule between Suffolk Va,
and Charles Town, S. c., was twenty-seV-
en- days the mail carrier averaging six
teen miles per day, the whole distance be-
ing 433 miles. Letters had to lie in post
offices sometimes for sixteen days. Now
a-days the fast mails make the trip from
st. Augustine to Suffolk in about twenty
four hours.
Inspector Finley advised that a weekly
mail should be established between Savan-
nah and Charles Town. ''Now," said he,
IF a weekly post were established, 1t
would be proper to advertise it in the Lon
don papers for some time, and in the car
DINA, Georgia and Florida coffee houses TO
make the publick and especially the Lon
don merchants trading to these parts ac-
uuainted with the despatch with which
Town to all parts southwark"
Postmaster Wilson tells us that as early
as July, 1775, the continental congress took
charge of the postal affairs OF the colo
MES, and Ben Franklin was made post
master general, but he seems TO have de-
voted his time and talents mostly to run
ming line of mail carriers from Fal-
mouth or Portland, Me, to Savannah, Ca,
including such cross mail lines as he DEEM
ed advisable. The rate of postage then
was one pennyweight and eight grains for
a letter going not more than sixty miles;
two pennyweights for less than one hun
dred miles, and so on in proportion. No
papers were allowed in the mails until
1892 and then the postage was put at one
cent for first hundred miles, and a cent
and a half for longer distances. Under
this rate a single sheet newspaper from
Boston to New York would be twenty
cents in our present currency.
Farmers ought to appreciate our pres
ent cheap postage, as Postmaster wallace
at Hammondsville, o. one of the Oldest IN
point of service since 1881, says he collect
ed on a letter coming four hundred miles
or more to a farmer, five dozen eggs, or
four pounds of butter, or two bushels oats,
etc. and that It would take good mich
COW to pay postage on thirty-two such let
ters.
Prior to 1S45, when the late Secretary
McCulloch was cashier of the Fort Wayne,
Ind, bank, the postage on many OF the
letters that came to the bank was over
one dollar, as each check or other enclos-
ure was counted as a separate letter and
postage charged therefor.
"The letter" says Postmaster General
Wilson, whose transmission cost the
Fort Wayne bank more than dollar in
the early forties, or the farmer in Ohio
two bushels of oats, will now travel
with greatly increased speed and safely
from Key West Fla, to Juneau, in Alaska,
or from any office in the United States
to any office in Mexico or Canada, for
cents. Five cents will carry it as fast
as steam cars and steamships can speed
to any place in the civilized world"
Few people realize the magnitude of the
free delivery system in cities like Savan-
nah-how 1t has grown since the war!
During President Lincoln's term the re-
ceipts. on an average, OF the whole pos
tai service were less than the immense
sum now paid to letter carriers under the
free delivery system.
But there is a patriotic side to this pic
ture which must not be lost sight of in
estimating the cost and benefits of the
! postal system. 1T is the opinion of POST
! master General Wilson that as the Amer
| lean postofiice bound the colonies together,
| years before they dreamed of any other
| bond of union, so the postal union of
| to-day binds all the enlightened coun-
| tries of all the continents in one great
| family.
Once in five years this postal union holds
a Universal Postal Congress, and this is
| the year 1t is to meet, and Washington
| is the place of its assembling. It is safe
| to assert that mans inventive genius will
| present to that congress thousands of in
ventions and improvements in postal work
| that were unthought of at the last meet
ing five years ago. One of these wonder
| full inventions is the electric oRncelling
w CT at
| the same time stamps the name of the
| office and date on the envelopes But this
is only one of many remarkable new de-
vices now facilitating fast mail service.
Sidney Herbert.
Rosemound Cottage Fla