The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1900-08-12
SORTING LETTERS At SEA
WORK IN THE SEA POST SERVICE
EXPLAINED BY ONE WHO
KNOWS 1T
LIKE THE FAREERs WIVES
While the Work Is Never Done,
Still Post in Ocean Steam
ship Mall Service Much
Sought.

Imagine working twelve hours every
| day Tipping letters into cases of pigeon
holes at the rate of 1910 an hour, with
| the unstable deck Of a rolling steamship
for a floor, and keeping this UP six and
seven days at a stretch. That's what the
sixteen mail clerks comprising the United
States sea post service do for a living
month in and month out, says the New
! York Herald.
Moreover, they have to work in what Is
practically an elevator shaft, three stories
| high and about fifteen feet square. Ven
tilation is supplied by blowers way down
in the hold of the ship, which force the air
up and out of the portfolios the third
story, or attic floor, Of the floating post
office. Electric lights CLEAN night and
day in every nook and corner of this ele-
Vator shaft, for 1t is hard enough to deci-
! pher many Of the addresses on the for
| eign mail even in the light of years of ex-
perience and a luminous Imagination,
much less in dismal cabin tween decks
The sea post service, now in its tenth
year. has proved such an advantage in
expe diting the foreign mails that the past
! ONCE department Is contemplating the
establishment of floating postohices on
two more Atlantic steamship lines AL
ready five neutrality-suspicious., four
North German Lloyd and three American
| liners are equipped with postal facilities
| and the Cunarders and White Star ships
are expected to be the next to carry ex-
pert sorters and address readers In the
winter season the American and North
German Lloyd liners carry two mail clerks
! apiece The men eat at the first cabin
table or in the officers mess. but room on
transatlantic liner is so much needed
TOT high priced passenger and freight
traffic that the allowance for the sea pos
tai employees is rather grudgingly allotted.
Uusually they are given small room
| below the berth deck. lighted and venti-
! lated by couple of portfolios. with low
| ceilings and narrow berths In this 'at-
TIC or sky parlor, as the clerks call 1t,
the separation racks are placed. These
resemble Broodingnaglan pigeon cotes.
hach compartment is labeled New
York Boston, Ohio" Japan" etc.
when the vessel is bound thither, and
Hamburg, Berlin" London" Nor
Way-Sweden," Russia" etc, when bound
/ 1or Europe. On one side Of the room Is q
separation table," on which registered
PACKAGES are sorted, pair of small scales
!or weighing them and stamps for mark
! ing supplementary mail.
One deck below, reached bv a narro,v
companion way, are the newsnaner
RACKS, great iron gridirons with hIq
yawning canvas sacks suspended henea+b
INTO these pouches the third and fourth
cidss mail matter is thrown with marvel
Gus precision and rapidity. On the huh
head wall railroad man "a nIaoo1 IN n
! GUIDE the sorter If he IS a blf uncer+ot1
thrown - 10 De
trap door in the floor leads TO rbe eel
,ar OF the floating postoffice, one dack
nosttaa mere the bags of mail are first de-
P Fo! "hen the ship leaves port. AS
last as dozen or so are emptied nv ar
men at the separation table and djs+-th
Ecu III tHe cases another bunch is hauIed
up Ihus hour after hour. In fair u,eo+t
er ana FOUL In summer and winter tba
men VINO earn their bread and butter b,,
t taoiiltating the exchange OF news NJ
~ LES 90 matters and messages of love
ol other expressions Of the human enoo
ton toll and toll and toll. emo
~heH the Kaiser Friedrich. which
Sai,d last Thursday, was in port M
burke, one Of the original half doz-
Gu postal clerks assigned to the sea post
esi wee at lts inception in 1891. told some
thing about the work he and his COL
leagues do He said: I'VE are like
the farmers wives. Our work Is never
done Stfll, the position of clerk In the
ocean steamship mail service. or az ~
IS usually called, in the sea post Is much
sousht aIter by employees of the postal
~ fhA
service we have few days each month
IN Europe to travel, to see sights. or for
| quiet rest The government maintains
| the sea post to assist the New Yorl,
postofflce and to facilitate the dispatcb
OF mails transported on the fast Ameri-
| can North German Lloyd and Hamburg
| American ships. Here thew are onened
and distributed, and as only a small nor
! uon goes to the general postofice q
steamer may bring In between 500 and eo6
pags or mail at any time, and no extra
heIp be required in the postofice to
promptly and properly dispatch both
| this and the regular domestic postal mat
ter. ''
Directly from the ship on It's arrival
| at quarantine a bag Is sent to each sta-
| ton or the New York postoffice contain
Ing the proper mail for all the states
| and larger cities is assorted and deIIv-
cred in the quickest and most practical
manner-both letters and papers.
| separation is made Of California, Texas
and New York state mail, and registered
matter is dealt with
The sea post constitutes an interna-
! tfonal exchange and distributing postof-
nee On the German ships, where the
German government sends a post secre-
| tafr and a schaffner, mails going to the
| Fatherland are treated the same as
those on the way to America, Hamburg
city being separated on the Hamburg
American liners. The German and Amer
lean clerks cooperate in the work, and
each man is accountable to his own gov
eminent for the completion In distribu-
ton Of mails going to that country to
which the clerk belongs. Technically
the American clerk is In charge going
to Germany and the post secretair is
responsible going the other way, in COM
pliance with international law, but this
does not interfere with the responsible
ity for the completion of the work
ON the American line ships practi-
cally the same service Is maintained by
two Americans on each ship, but no dis
tributing is done going East Under the
terms of the subsidy which the American
line receives one man must be carried
The work has so grown that extra com
pensation is allowed for another mans