Gulf Coast breeze. [volume] (Crawfordville, Fla.) 1897-19??, 1897-12-10
LETTERS STOPPED IN TIME.
People Who Are Saved by tho Postmaster
From the Result of Hasty Action.

From the Result or Hasty Action.
"The tears were streaming from her
eyes like spray from the Yerkes foun-
tain" said clerk in the inquiry divi-
sion of the postoffice, laughing at tho
memory Of the stout, horid woman who
rushed in one hot afternoon with tho
plaintive wall, stop my letter; give mo
my letter to the old country
"That letter." the man went on,
"was dropped somewhere within the
city limits, and was mixed in with
some ., 200, 900 other letters, yet she
wanted us to get it for her quick
seemed to think that L would bounce
out of my chair like o rubber ball out
of tennis racquet, snatch up that
particular epistle, and come running
back breathless and hand it to her.
Now, the facts are that the govern
ment does not permit the stopping of
q letter that has left the writer's hands
unless it is important thatit should be
done. 1t makes an enormous amount
OF extra work. There is blank that
must be filed out, stating the box in
which the letter was dropped, the
time, the address and the reason why
the request for the recovery is made.
That reason sometimes discloses some
very interesting and romantic facts,
but, of course, most of the letters are
stopped for the business houses about
town. When we asked the red-faced
Niobe what her reason was, she boo
hooed, "Me an my man had some
troubles, n wrote to my fader for
moneys to go home, but my man and
me have made up and would not have
that letter go for tousand dollar.
We got that letter for her.
"rhere was another, young
woman, who rushed in here during the
opera season, and when she had caught
little breath she said she wanted
letter she had addressed to Peoria,
Ill.-there were some IS opera tickets
in it tn 1t she wanted TO use that night.
She had had letter written to her
family, and, thinking there might be
postscript to add, had not sealed it.
She bought her seats to 'Tannhauser'
and left the window with her purse,
her letter aud her tickets in her hand.
The open envelope was so inviting a
place for the tickets that she thought
she would carry them there, but just
as soon as she saw letter-box it was
like red rag to a bull. She sealed
the envelope and posted it, tickets
and all, and it was hours before she
remembered what she had done, and
then came down to us for help. We
got her tickets, too.
"Yonng women who have recon
sidered' proposal or who regret q
hasty note, like the men, blushingly
confde their troubles to us, and we
have prevented more than one broken
heart.
Sometimes the letters have left our
hands and we have to telegraph to
catch them, which is done at the per-
sons expense. We have more than
once cabled to Berlin and st. Peters
burg to head off billet-douk or some
request from an impatient and petu-
liant son for O check. A scion Of
noble German house came in here to
implore us to prevent the delivery Of
demand for money, written, ] fancy,
in tone that. in the light Of recent
remittances, would endanger his in
heritance. There is some mighty in
teresting reading among the blanks
requesting letters stopped, oil Of which
are sent on to Washington. Chicago
Inter Ocean.