The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-02-18
AT THE STAMP WINDOW
THE CURIOUS QUESTIONS ASKED BY
PEOPLE ABOUT POSTAGE.
Women Frequently Doubt Correctness
of the Information They Re-
ceive-AIimony in Stamps.
W ashington Star.

Washington Star.
THE talk about viewing the country and
studying human nature from the window of
a railroad car doesn't approach results OBJ
tanned from viewing the public and study
ing human nature from the window of a
large postoffice," said an employe of the
Washington city postofice this morning, as
he exchanged condolences with a Star re-
porter in the corridors OF the granite build
ing with the clock tower.
Not long ago a lady hurried up to the
window, and 1 could see from the g~ratified
expression on her face that she was dead
sure she would soon make another woman
feel unhappy. only in this case the other
woman happened TO be a man.
"'Oh, say, Mr.. Clerk, she cried. eagerly,
can feather beds be sent through the
mails?'
"'Well, we don't encourage the practice,
miss 1 answered, frowning to save a smile.
""Therel she exclaimed, ~triumphantly, to
a companion in a raglan who had, in the
meantime, come up, Charlie will have to
pay me the box of candy. You see,' she ex-
planned to me, "a gentleman friend bet me
a box of candy against a box of cigars that
he could send a feather bed through the
lIidliS, anu Il = uiin LS COulOn - diAu -
1 have won. oh, I'm so glad. Charlie is so
smart
He can send a feather bed if he makes
it small enough, and it doesn't weigh over
four pounds, miss l resumed, 'or any 9TH
er article which is mailable, provided he
does not register it, as size cuts no ice so
long as it is TO be delivered in the United
States, but if it is TO go to foreign shores,
then both size and weight are very i'm
portant. If he brings the bed down, miss,
we will send X for him if properly packed
and the postage is prepaid. You have lost
your bet
Well. he won't she answered, mad
clear through, and / won't pay ii, either,
and the looks those two women gave me
were as inky as jet as they swished out of
the building. 1t would have been a good
joke on her If her beau had had a little
feather bed made up and mailed TO her.
THE LADIES ARE APT TO DOUBT.
1.-THE questions which are fired into us
would make the face of an eight-day clock
look troubled to find ready and satisfactory
answers. Men, as a rule, accept our state
ments, but women are inclined to doubt
and form conclusions of their own. The
men at the inquiry windows in the big rail-
road stations have the same experience,
but that is what we and they are paid for.
Two ladies came in one day, and one
asked If she could send her pet canary up
to Philadelphia in it's cage. L said she could
if she first killed the canary. took the body
to a taxidermist's had il thoroughly dried
ana prepared, replaced Ii in the cage, and
even included a small box of bird seed TO
assuage its hunger en- route, provided the
whole paraphernalia did not weigh over
four pounds, but that anything alive had
TO be shipped by express.
why she said, very Indignantly, my
landlady told me at breakfast that L could
send the canary. The idea.'
She meant after the cat had killed it
and IL was s~tuTed-just like you were
stuffed. said her companion with a smile.
But the other one didn't crack a break in
the bloom on her fair cheek.
II have had well-dressed. and evidently
well-educated, people ask me the rate OF
postage to. some foreign country, say. Rus
STA, and when told that the United States
scent postage stamp will carry a half
ounce letter to practically all countries In
the world, big or little, near or far. from
England TO the Niger coast protectorate,
Afghanistan, Abyssinia, the Pitcairn