Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1898-01-20
LETTERS STOPPED IN TIME.
People Saved by Postmasters From the
Result of Easty Action.

People Saved by Postmasters From the
Result of Hasty Action.
'sThe tears were streaming from her
eyes like SPRAY from the Yerkes foun-
tain,' said clerk in the inquiry di-
vision of the postofice, laughing at the
memory of the stout, forid woman who
rushed in one hot afternoon with the
plaintive vail Stop my letter. Give
me my letter to the old countryP
"That letter. the man went on,
twas dropped somewhere within the
city limits and was mixed in with some
2,O00, 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 rubber ball out of a tennis
racket, snatch up that particular epis-
tie and come running back breathless
and hand it to her Now, the facts are
that the government does not permit
| the stopping of a letter that has left the
writer's hands unless it is important
| that it should be done. 1t makes an
enormous amount of extra work. Here
| is a blank that must be filled out, stat
| ing the box 10 which the letter was
| dropped, the time, the address and the
reason why the request for the recovery
! is made. That reason sometimes dis
closes some very interesting and roman
tic 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,
l IL tNTo o,, bod
| some troubles, an wrote to my fader
| for moneys to go home, but my man
an me have made up, an l would not
have that letter go for t'ousand dol
lar. We got that letter for her.
"There was another, a 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, Ills. There
were some SIS opera tickets in it that she
wanted to use that night. She had had
| letter written to her family, and,
| thinking there might be a postscript to
| add, had not sealed it. She bought her
seats to 'Tannhauser' and left the win
| dow with her purse, her letter and her
tickets in her hand. The open envelope
was so inviting place for the tickets
| that she thought she would carry them
there, but just as soon as she saw let
ter 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.
"Young women who have 'reconsid-
cred a proposal or who regret hasty
note, like the men, blushingly confde
their troubles to us. and we have pre-
vented more than one broken heart.
Sometimes the letters have left ou1
hands and we have to telegraph to catch
them, which is done at the person ex-
pense. We have more than once cabled
to Berlin and St. Petersburg to head of
billet doux or some request from an
impatient and petulant son for check.
A scion of noble German house came
in here to implore US to prevent the de
livery of demand for money, written,
fancy, in tone that, in the light Of
recent remittances, would endanger his
inheritance There is some mighty in.
teresting reading among the blanks re-
questing letters stopped, all OF which
are sent on to Washington. ''-ChicagC
| Inter Ocean