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Produced by Adrian Mastronardi, Martin Pettit, The | |
Philatelic Digital Library Project at http://www.tpdlp.net | |
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at | |
http://www.pgdp.net | |
A Hundred Years by Post | |
A JUBILEE RETROSPECT | |
BY | |
J. WILSON HYDE | |
AUTHOR OF 'THE ROYAL MAIL: ITS CURIOSITIES AND ROMANCE' | |
[Illustration] | |
LONDON | |
SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON AND CO., LIM. | |
St. Dunstan's House | |
FETTER LANE, FLEET STREET, E.C. | |
1891 | |
[_All rights reserved_] | |
Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to Her Majesty, at the | |
Edinburgh University Press. | |
TO | |
THE RIGHT HONOURABLE | |
HENRY CECIL RAIKES, M.P. | |
HER MAJESTY'S POSTMASTER-GENERAL, | |
THE FOLLOWING PAGES ARE, | |
BY PERMISSION, | |
RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED. | |
PREFACE. | |
The following pages give some particulars of the changes that have taken | |
place in the Post Office service during the past hundred years; and the | |
matter may prove interesting, not only on account of the changes | |
themselves, but in respect of the influence which the growing usefulness | |
of the Postal Service must necessarily have upon almost every relation | |
of political, educational, social, and commercial life. More especially | |
may the subject be found attractive at the close of the present year, | |
when the country has been celebrating the Jubilee of the Penny Post. | |
EDINBURGH, | |
_December 1890._ | |
CONTENTS. | |
PAGE | |
_Frontispiece_--MAIL-COACH IN THUNDERSTORM. | |
PAST AND PRESENT CONTRASTED, 1 | |
LIBERTY OF SUBJECT AND PUBLIC OPINION, 5 | |
ABUSES OF POWER, 7 | |
SLOW DIFFUSION OF NEWS, 17 | |
_Illustration_--ANALYSIS OF LONDON TO EDINBURGH | |
MAIL OF 2D MARCH 1838, _facing_ 22 | |
STATE OF ROADS AND INSECURITY OF TRAVELLING, 27 | |
FOOT AND HORSE POSTS, 33 | |
_Illustration_--THE MAIL, 1803, _facing_ 40 | |
THE MAIL-COACH ERA, 40 | |
_Illustration_--THE MAIL, 1824, _facing_ 46 | |
_Illustration_--MODERN MAIL "APPARATUS" FOR | |
EXCHANGE OF MAILS, _facing_ 58 | |
_Illustration_--THE MAIL-COACH GUARD, _facing_ 74 | |
DEAR POSTAGE, 80 | |
_Diagrams_--ROUNDABOUT COMMUNICATIONS, 84, 85 | |
STREETS FIRST NUMBERED, 88 | |
POSTMASTERS AS NEWS COLLECTORS, 91 | |
_Illustration_--THE BELLMAN, _facing_ 92 | |
MAIL-PACKET SERVICE, 96 | |
_Illustration_--HOLYHEAD AND KINGSTOWN PACKET | |
"PRINCE ARTHUR," _facing_ 102 | |
PENNY POSTAGE, 111 | |
_Illustration_--HANDBILL USED IN PENNY POSTAGE | |
AGITATION, _facing_ 112 | |
VARIOUS BUSINESS OF THE POST OFFICE, 119 | |
STAFF OF THE POST OFFICE, 123 | |
_Illustration_--TONTINE READING-ROOMS | |
GLASGOW, _facing_ 126 | |
VALUE OF EARLY NEWS BY POST, 130 | |
DIFFUSION OF PARLIAMENTARY NEWS BY THE TELEGRAPH | |
AND PRESS, 136 | |
RESULTS OF RAPID COMMUNICATIONS, 139 | |
[Illustration: _Frontispiece._ MAIL-COACH IN THUNDERSTORM. | |
(_From a print, 1827._)] | |
A HUNDRED YEARS BY POST. | |
Were a former inhabitant of this country who had quitted the stage of | |
life towards the close of last century to reappear in our midst, he | |
could not fail to be struck with the wonderful changes which have taken | |
place in the aspect of things; in the methods of performing the tasks of | |
daily life; and in the character of our social system generally. Nor is | |
it too much to say that he would see himself surrounded by a world full | |
of enchantment, and that his senses of wonder and admiration would rival | |
the feelings excited in youthful minds under the spell of books like | |
Jules Verne's _Journey to the Moon_, or the ever-entertaining stories of | |
the _Arabian Nights_. It is true that he would find the operations of | |
nature going on as before. The dewdrop and the blade of grass, sunshine | |
and shower, the movements of the tides, and the revolutions of the | |
heavenly bodies; these would still appear to be the same. But almost | |
everything to which man had been wont to put his hand would appear to | |
bear the impress of some other hand; and a hundred avenues of thought | |
opening to his bewildered sense would consign his inward man to the | |
education of a second childhood. | |
So fruitful has been the nineteenth century in discovery and invention, | |
and so astounding the advancement made, that it is only by stopping in | |
our madding haste and looking back that we can realise how different the | |
present is from the past. Yet to our imaginary friend's astonished | |
perception, nothing, we venture to think, would come with greater force | |
than the contrast between the means available for keeping up | |
communications in his day and in our own. We are used to see trains | |
coursing on the iron way at a speed of fifty or sixty miles an hour; | |
steamships moving on every sea, defiant of tide and wind, at the rate of | |
fifteen or twenty miles an hour; and the electric telegraph | |
outstripping all else, and practically annihilating time and space. | |
But how different was the state of things at the close of the eighteenth | |
century! The only means then available for home communications--that is | |
for letters, etc.--were the Foot Messenger, the Horse Express, and the | |
Mail Coach; and for communication with places beyond the sea, | |
sailing-ships. | |
The condition of things as then existing, and as reflected upon society, | |
is thus summed up by Mackenzie in his _History of the Nineteenth | |
Century_: "Men had scarcely the means to go from home beyond such | |
trivial distance as they were able to accomplish on foot. Human society | |
was composed of a multitude of little communities, dwelling apart, | |
mutually ignorant, and therefore cherishing mutual antipathies." | |
And when persons did venture away from home, in the capacity of | |
travellers, the entertainment they received in the hostelries, even in | |
some of the larger towns, seems now rather remarkable. If anything | |
surprises the traveller of these latter days, in regard to hotel | |
accommodation, when business or pleasure takes him from the bosom of his | |
family, it is the sumptuous character of the palaces in all the | |
principal towns of all civilised countries wherein he may be received, | |
and where he may make his temporary abode. To persons used to such | |
comforts, the accommodation of the last century would excite surprise in | |
quite another direction. Here is a description of the inn accommodation | |
of Edinburgh, furnished by Captain Topham, who visited Edinburgh in | |
1774: "On my first arrival, my companion and self, after the fatigue of | |
a long day's journey, were landed at one of these stable-keepers (for | |
they have modesty enough to give themselves no higher denomination) in a | |
part of the town called the Pleasance; and, on entering the house, we | |
were conducted by a poor devil of a girl, without shoes or stockings, | |
and with only a single linsey-woolsey petticoat which just reached | |
half-way to her ankles, into a room where about twenty Scotch drovers | |
had been regaling themselves with whisky and potatoes. You may guess our | |
amazement when we were informed that this was the best inn in the | |
metropolis--that we could have no beds unless we had an inclination to | |
sleep together, and in the same room with the company which a | |
stage-coach had that moment discharged." | |
Before proceeding further, let us look at some of the circumstances | |
which were characteristic of the period with which we are dealing. | |
Liberty of the subject and public opinion are inseparably wedded | |
together, and this seems inevitable in every country whose government | |
partakes largely of the representative system. For in such States, | |
unlike the conditions which obtain under despotic governments, the laws | |
are formulated and amended in accordance with the views held for the | |
time being by _the people_, the Government merely acting as the agency | |
through which the people's will is declared. And this being so, what is | |
called the Liberty of the subject must be that limited and circumscribed | |
freedom allowed by the people collectively, as expressed in the term | |
"public opinion," to the individual man. In despotic States the | |
circumstances are necessarily different, and such States may be excluded | |
from the present consideration. | |
Wherever there is wanting a quick and universal exchange of thought | |
there can be no sound public opinion. Where hindrances are placed upon | |
the free exchange of views, either by heavy duties on newspapers, by | |
dear postage, or by slow communications, public opinion must be a plant | |
of low vitality and slow growth. Consequently, in the age preceding that | |
of steam, so far as applied to locomotion, and to the telegraph, which | |
age extended well into the present century, there was no rapid exchange | |
of thought; new ideas were of slow propagation; there was little of that | |
intellectual friction so productive of intellectual light among the | |
masses. In these circumstances it is not surprising to read of things | |
existing within the last hundred years which to-day could have no place | |
in our national existence. Lord Cockburn, in the _Memorials of his | |
Time_, gives the following instance. "I knew a case, several years | |
after 1800," says he, "where the seat-holders of a town church applied | |
to Government, which was the patron, for the promotion of the second | |
clergyman, who had been giving great satisfaction for many years, and | |
now, on the death of the first minister, it was wished that he should | |
get the vacant place. The answer, written by a Member of the Cabinet, | |
was that the single fact of the people having interfered so far as to | |
express a wish was conclusive against what they desired; and another | |
appointment was instantly made." Going back a little more than a hundred | |
years, the following are specimens of the abuses then in full vigour. | |
They are referred to in Trevelyan's _Early History of Charles James | |
Fox_, the period in question being about 1750-60: "One nobleman had | |
eight thousand a year in sinecures, and the colonelcies of three | |
regiments. Another, an Auditor of the Exchequer, inside which he never | |
looked, had L8000 in years of peace, and L20,000 in years of war. A | |
third, with nothing to recommend him except his outward graces, bowed | |
and whispered himself into four great employments, from which thirteen | |
to fourteen hundred British guineas flowed month by month into the lap | |
of his Parisian mistress."... "George Selwyn, who returned two members, | |
and had something to say in the election of a third, was at one and the | |
same time Surveyor-General of Crown Lands, which he never surveyed, | |
Registrar in Chancery at Barbadoes, which he never visited, and Surveyor | |
of the Meltings and Clerk of the Irons in the Mint, where he showed | |
himself once a week in order to eat a dinner which he ordered, but for | |
which the nation paid." | |
The shameful waste of the public money in the shape of hereditary | |
pensions was still in vigour within the period we are dealing with; one | |
small party in the State "calling the tune," and the great mass of the | |
people, practically unrepresented, being left "to pay the piper." During | |
the reign of George III., who occupied the throne from 1760 to 1820, the | |
following hereditary pensions were granted:--To Trustees for the use of | |
William Penn, and his heirs and descendants for ever, in consideration | |
of his meritorious services and family losses from the American war | |
L4000. To Lord Rodney, and every the heirs-male to whom the title of | |
Lord Rodney shall descend, L2000. To Earl Morley and John Campbell, | |
Esq., and their heirs and assignees for ever, upon trust for the | |
representatives of Jeffrey Earl Amherst, L3000. To Viscount Exmouth and | |
the heirs-male to whom the title shall descend L2000. To Earl Nelson and | |
the heirs-male to whom the title of Earl Nelson shall descend, with | |
power of settling jointures out of the annuity, at no time exceeding | |
L3000 a year, L5000. In addition to this pension of L5000, Parliament | |
also granted to trustees on behalf of Earl Nelson a sum of L90,000 for | |
the purchase of an estate and mansion-house to be settled and entailed | |
to the same persons as the annuity of L5000. | |
Within the Post Office too very strange things happened in connection | |
with money paid to certain persons supposed to be in its service. Here | |
is a case, in the form of a remonstrance, referring to the period close | |
upon the end of last century, which explains itself. "Mr. Bushe observes | |
that the Government wished to reward his father, Gervas Parker Bushe | |
(who was one of the Commissioners), for his services, and particularly | |
for having increased the revenue L20,000 per annum; but that he | |
preferred a place for his son to any emolument for himself, in | |
consequence of which he was appointed Resident Surveyor. He expressed | |
his astonishment to find in the Patent (which he never looked into | |
before) that it is there mentioned 'during good behaviour,' and not for | |
life, upon which condition alone his father would have accepted it. He | |
adds that it was given to him as totally and absolutely a sinecure, and | |
that his appointment took place at so early a period of life that it | |
would be impossible for him to do any duty." | |
Again, the following evidence was given before a Commission on oath in | |
1791, by Mr. Johnson, a letter-carrier in London: "He receives at | |
present a salary as a letter-carrier of 14s. per week, making L36, 19s. | |
per annum; he likewise receives certain perquisites, arising from such | |
pence as are collected in the evening by letters delivered to him after | |
the Receiving Houses are shut, amounting in 1784 to L38, 11s., also from | |
acknowledgments from the public for sending letters by another | |
letter-carrier not immediately within his walk, amounting in the same | |
year to L5. He likewise receives in Christmas boxes L20,--the above | |
sums, making together L100, was the whole of his receipts of every kind | |
whatever by virtue of his office in 1784 (312 candles and a limited | |
allowance of stationery excepted), out of which he pays a person for | |
executing his duty as a letter-carrier, at the rate of 8s. a week, being | |
L20, 16s. per annum, and retains the remainder for his own use | |
entirely." | |
In a report made by a Commission which inquired into the state of the | |
Post Office in 1788, the following statement appears respecting abuses | |
existing in the department; and in reflecting upon that period the Post | |
Office servants of to-day might almost entertain feelings of regret that | |
they did not live in the happy days of feasts, coals, and candles. Here | |
is the statement of the Commissioners: "The custom of giving certain | |
annual feasts to the officers and clerks of this office (London) at the | |
public expense ought to be abolished; as also what is called the feast | |
and drink money; and, as the Inland Office now shuts at an early hour, | |
the allowances of lodging money to some of the officers, and of | |
apartments to others, ought to be discontinued." But of all allowances, | |
those of coals and candles are the most enormous; for, besides those | |
consumed in the official apartments, there are allowed to sundry | |
officers for their private use in town or country above three hundred | |
chaldrons of coals, and twenty thousand pounds of candles, which several | |
of them commute with the tradesmen for money or other articles; the | |
amount of the sums paid for these two articles in the year 1784 was | |
L4418, 4s. 1d. | |
In the year 1792 a payment was being made of L26 a year to a Mrs. | |
Collier, who was servant to the Bye and Cross Road Office in the London | |
Post Office; but she did not do the work herself. She employed a servant | |
to whom she paid L6, putting L20 into her own pocket. | |
What a splendid field this would have been for the Comptroller and | |
Auditor General, and for questioners in the Houses of Parliament! | |
An abuse that had its origin no doubt in the fact that the nation was | |
not represented at large,[1] but by Members of Parliament who were | |
returned by a very limited class, and who could not understand or | |
reflect the views of the masses, was that of the franking privilege. | |
The privilege of franking letters enjoyed by Members of Parliament was a | |
sad burden upon the Revenue of the Post Office, and it continued in | |
vigour down to the establishment of the Penny Post. Some idea of the | |
magnitude of this arrangement, which would now be called a gross abuse, | |
will be gathered from the state of things existing in the first quarter | |
of the present century. Looking at the regulations of 1823, we find that | |
each Member of Parliament was permitted to receive as many as fifteen | |
and to send as many as ten letters in each day, such letters not | |
exceeding one ounce in weight. At the then rates of postage this was a | |
most handsome privilege. In the year 1827 the Peers enjoying this extent | |
of free postage numbered over four hundred, and the Commons over six | |
hundred and fifty. In addition to these, certain Members of the | |
Government and other high officials had the privilege of sending free | |
any number of letters without restriction as to weight. These persons | |
were, in 1828, nearly a hundred in number. | |
How the privilege was turned to commercial account is explained in | |
Mackenzie's, _Reminiscences of Glasgow_. Referring to the Ship Bank of | |
that city, which had its existence in the first quarter of our century, | |
and to one of the partners, Mr. John Buchanan of Ardoch, who was also | |
Member of Parliament for Dumbartonshire, the author makes the following | |
statement: "From his position as Member of Parliament, he enjoyed the | |
privilege of franking the letters of the bank to the extent of fourteen | |
per diem. This was a great boon; it saved the bank some hundreds of | |
pounds per annum for postages. It was, moreover, regarded as a mighty | |
honour." | |
Great abuses were perpetrated even upon the abuse itself. Franks were | |
given away freely to other persons for their use, they were even sold, | |
and, moreover, they were forged. Senex, in his notes on _Glasgow Past | |
and Present_, describes how this was managed in Ireland. "I remember," | |
says he, "about sixty years ago, an old Irish lady told me that she | |
seldom paid any postage for letters, and that her correspondence never | |
cost her friends anything. I inquired how she managed that. 'Oh,' said | |
she, 'I just wrote "Free, J. Suttie," in the corner of the cover of the | |
letter, and then, sure, nothing more was charged for it.' I said, 'Were | |
you not afraid of being hanged for forgery?' 'Oh, dear me, no,' she | |
replied; 'nobody ever heard of a lady being hanged in Ireland, and | |
troth, I just did what everybody else did.'" But the spirit of inquiry | |
was beginning to assert itself in the first half of the century, and the | |
franking privilege disappeared with the dawn of cheap postage. | |
Public opinion had as yet no active existence throughout our | |
Commonwealth, nor had the light spread so as to show up all the abuses. | |
And how true is Buckle's observation in his _History of Civilisation_ | |
that all recent legislation is the undoing of bad laws made in the | |
interest of certain classes. How could there be an active public opinion | |
in the conditions of the times? Everybody was shut off from everybody | |
else. Hear further what Mackenzie says in his _History of the Nineteenth | |
Century_, referring to the end of last century: "The seclusion resulting | |
from the absence of roads rendered it necessary that every little | |
community, in some measure every family, should produce all that it | |
required to consume. The peasant raised his own food; he grew his own | |
flax or wool; his wife or daughter spun it; and a neighbour wove it | |
into cloth. He learned to extract dyes from plants which grew near his | |
cottage. He required to be independent of the external world from which | |
he was effectively shut out. Commerce was impossible until men could | |
find the means of transferring commodities from the place where they | |
were produced to the place where there were people willing to make use | |
of them." So much for the difficulty of exchanging ordinary produce. The | |
exchange of thought suffered in a like fashion. | |
In the first half of the present century severe restrictions were placed | |
upon the spread of news, not only by the heavy postage for letter | |
correspondence, but by the equally heavy newspaper tax. Referring to | |
this latter hindrance to the spread of light Mackenzie says: "The | |
newspaper is the natural enemy of despotic government, and was treated | |
as such in England. Down to 1765 the duty imposed was only one penny, | |
but as newspapers grew in influence the restraining tax was increased | |
from time to time, until in 1815 it reached the maximum of fourpence." | |
At this figure the tax seems to have continued many years, for under the | |
year 1836 Mackenzie refers to it as such, and remarks, "that this | |
rendered the newspaper a very occasional luxury to the working man; that | |
the annual circulation of newspapers in the United Kingdom was no more | |
than thirty-six million copies, and that these had only three hundred | |
thousand readers." | |
At the present time the combined annual circulation of a couple of the | |
leading newspapers in Scotland would equal the entire newspaper | |
circulation of the kingdom little more than fifty years ago. In the year | |
1799, which is less than a hundred years ago, the _Edinburgh Evening | |
Courant_ and the _Glasgow Courier_, two very small newspapers, were sold | |
at sixpence a copy, each bearing a Government stamp of the value of | |
threehalf-pence. Is it surprising, under these conditions, that few | |
newspapers should circulate, and that news should travel slowly | |
throughout the country? | |
But the growth of newspapers to their present magnificent proportions is | |
a thing of quite recent times, for even so lately as 1857 the | |
_Scotsman_, then sold unstamped for a penny, weighed only about | |
three-quarters of an ounce, while to-day the same paper, which continues | |
to be sold for a penny, weighs fully four and a half ounces. And other | |
newspapers throughout the country have no doubt swelled their columns to | |
a somewhat similar degree. | |
A very good instance of the small amount of personal travelling indulged | |
in by the people a century ago is given by Cleland in his _Annals of | |
Glasgow_. Writing in the year 1816, he says: "It has been calculated | |
that, previous to the erection of steamboats, not more than fifty | |
persons passed and repassed from Glasgow to Greenock in one day, whereas | |
it is now supposed that there are from four to five hundred passes and | |
repasses in the same period." In the present day a single steamboat | |
sailing from the Broomielaw, Glasgow, will often carry far more | |
passengers to Greenock, or beyond Greenock, than the whole passengers | |
travelling between the towns named in one day in 1816. For example, the | |
tourist steamer _Columba_ is certificated to carry some 1800 passengers. | |
In 1792 the principal mails to and from London were carried by | |
mail-coaches, which were then running between the Metropolis and some | |
score of the chief towns in the country at the speed of seven or eight | |
miles an hour; and so far as direct mails were concerned the towns in | |
question kept up relations with London under the conditions of speed | |
just described. But the cross post service--that is, the service between | |
places not lying in the main routes out of London--was not yet | |
developed, and these cross post towns were beyond the reach of anything | |
like early information of what was going on, not, let us say, in the | |
world at large, but in their own country. The people in these towns had | |
to patiently await the laggard arrival of news from the greater centres | |
of activity; and when it did arrive it probably came to hand in a very | |
imperfect form, or so late as to be useless for any purpose of combined | |
action or criticism. | |
Dr. James Russell, in his _Reminiscences of Yarrow_, describes how tardy | |
and uncertain the mail service by post was in the early years of the | |
present century; and what he says is a severe contrast to the service of | |
the present time, which provides for the delivery of letters, generally | |
daily, in every hamlet in the country. Dr. Russell writes:-- | |
"Since I remember (unless there was a chance hand on a Wednesday) our | |
letters reached us only once a week, along with our bread and butcher | |
meat, by the weekly carrier, Robbie Hogg. His arrival used to be a great | |
event, the letter-bag being turned out, and a rummage made for our own. | |
Afterwards the Moffat carriers gave more frequent opportunities of | |
getting letters; but they were apt to carry them on to Moffat and bring | |
them back the following week." | |
Another instance of the slow communications is given in a letter written | |
from Brodick Castle, Arran, by Lord Archibald Campbell, on the 25th | |
September 1820. | |
The letter was addressed to a correspondent in Glasgow, and proceeds | |
thus: "Your letter of the 18th did not reach me till this morning, as, | |
in consequence of the rough state of the weather, there has been no | |
postal communication with this island for several days." The time | |
consumed in getting this letter forward from Glasgow to Brodick was | |
exactly a week, and when so much time was required in the case of an | |
island lying in the Firth of Clyde, what time would be necessary to make | |
communication with the Outer Hebrides? | |
Even between considerable towns, as representing important centres in | |
the country, the amount of correspondence by letter was small. Thus the | |
mail from Inverness to Edinburgh of the 5th October 1808 contained no | |
more than 30 letters. The total postage on these was L2, 9s. 6d., the | |
charges ranging from 11d. to 14s. 8d. per letter. At the present time | |
the letters from Inverness to Edinburgh are probably nearly a thousand a | |
day; but this is no fair comparison, because many letters that would | |
formerly pass through Edinburgh now reach their destinations in direct | |
bags--London itself being an instance. | |
[Illustration: ANALYSIS OF THE LONDON TO EDINBURGH MAIL OF THE 2D MARCH | |
1838. (_After a print lent by Lady Cole from the collection of the late | |
Sir Henry Cole, K.C.B._)] | |
But coming down to a much later date, and looking at what was going on | |
between London and Edinburgh, the capital towns of Great Britain, what | |
do we find? An analysis of the London to Edinburgh mail of the 2d March | |
1838 gives the following figures; and let it not be forgotten that in | |
these days the Edinburgh mail contained the correspondence for a large | |
part of Scotland:-- | |
2296 Newspapers, weighing 273 lbs., and going free. | |
484 Franked Letters, weighing 47 lbs., and going free. | |
Parcels of stamps going free. | |
1555 Letters, weighing 34 lbs., and bearing postage to the value of L93. | |
These figures represent the exchange of thought between the two capitals | |
fifty years ago. These were truly the days of darkness, when abuses were | |
kept out of sight and were rampant. | |
Down to much later times the bonds of privilege remained untied. In the | |
Civil Service itself what changes have taken place! The doors have been | |
thrown open to competition and to capacity and worth, and probably they | |
will never be closed again. The author of these lines had an experience | |
in 1867--not very long ago--which may be worthy of note. He had been | |
then several years in the Post Office service, and desired to obtain a | |
nomination to compete for a higher position--a clerkship in the | |
Secretary's office. He took the usual step through the good offices of a | |
Member of Parliament, and the following rebuff emanated from | |
headquarters. It shall be its own monument, and may form a shot in the | |
historical web of our time:-- | |
"I wrote to ---- (the Postmaster-General) about the Mr. J. W. Hyde, who | |
desires to be permitted to compete for a clerkship in the London Post | |
Office, described as a cousin of ----. | |
"(The Postmaster-General) has to-day replied that nominations to the | |
Secretary's office are not now given except to candidates who are | |
actually gentlemen, that is, sons of officers, clergymen, or the like. | |
If I cannot satisfy (the Postmaster-General) on this point, I fear Mr. | |
Hyde's candidature will go to the wall."[2] | |
Now one of the chief obstacles in the way of rapid communication in our | |
own country was the very unsatisfactory state of the roads. Down to the | |
time of the introduction of mail-coaches, just about a hundred years | |
ago, the roads were in a deplorable state, and travellers have left upon | |
record some rather strong language on the subject. It was only about | |
that time that road-making came to be understood; but the obvious need | |
for smooth roads to increase the speed of the mail gave an impetus to | |
the subject, and by degrees matters were greatly improved. It is not our | |
purpose to pursue the inquiry as to roads, though the subject might be | |
attractive, and we must be content with the general assertion as to | |
their condition. | |
But not only were the roads bad, but they were unsafe. Travellers could | |
hardly trust themselves to go about unarmed, and even the mail-coaches, | |
in which (besides the driver and guard) some passengers generally | |
journeyed, had to carry weapons of defence placed in the hands of the | |
guard. Many instances of highway robbery by highwaymen who made a | |
profession of robbery might be given; but one or two cases may repay | |
their perusal. On the 4th March 1793 the Under-Sheriff of Northampton | |
was robbed at eight o'clock in the evening near Holloway turnpike by two | |
highwaymen, who carried off a trunk containing the Sheriff's commission | |
for opening the assizes at Northampton. | |
In the Autobiography of Mary Hewitt the following encounter is recorded, | |
referring to the period between 1758-96: "Catherine (Martin), wife of a | |
purser in the navy, and conspicuous for her beauty and impulsive, | |
violent temper, having quarrelled with her excellent sister, Dorothea | |
Fryer, at whose house in Staffordshire she was staying, suddenly set off | |
to London on a visit to her great-uncle, the Rev. John Plymley, prebend | |
of the Collegiate Church at Wolverhampton, and Chaplain of Morden | |
College, Blackheath. She journeyed by the ordinary conveyance, the | |
Gee-Ho, a large stage-waggon drawn by a team of six horses, and which, | |
driven merely by day, took a week from Wolverhampton to the Cock and | |
Bell, Smithfield. | |
"Arrived in London, Catherine proceeded on foot to Blackheath. There, | |
night having come on, and losing her way, she was suddenly accosted by a | |
horseman with, 'Now, my pretty girl, where are you going?' Pleased by | |
his gallant address, she begged him to direct her to Morden College. He | |
assured her that she was fortunate in having met with him instead of one | |
of his company, and inducing her to mount before him, rode across the | |
heath to the pile of buildings which had been erected by Sir Christopher | |
Wren for decayed merchants, the recipients of Sir John Morden's bounty. | |
Assisting her to alight, he rang the bell, then remounted his steed and | |
galloped away, but not before the alarmed official, who had answered | |
the summons, had exclaimed, 'Heavens! Dick Turpin on Black Bess!' My | |
mother always said 'Dick Turpin.' Another version in the family runs | |
'Captain Smith.'" | |
The _Annual Register_ of the 3d October 1792 records the following case | |
of highway robbery:-- | |
"The daily messenger, despatched from the Secretary of State's office | |
with letters to His Majesty at Windsor, was stopped near Langley Broom | |
by three footpads, who took from him the box containing the despatches, | |
and his money, etc. The same men afterwards robbed a gentleman in a | |
postchaise of a hundred guineas, a gold watch, etc. Some light dragoons, | |
who received information of the robberies, went in pursuit of the | |
thieves, but were not successful. They found, however, a quantity of the | |
papers scattered about the heath." | |
We will quote one more instance, as showing the frequency of these | |
robberies on the road. It is mentioned in the _Annual Register_ of the | |
28th March 1793. | |
"Martin (the mail robber), condemned at Exeter Assizes, was executed on | |
Haldown, near the spot where the robbery was committed. He had been well | |
educated, and had visited most European countries. At the end of the | |
year 1791 he was at Paris, and continued there till the end of August | |
1792. He said he was very active in the bloody affair of the 10th | |
August, at the Palace of the Tuilleries, when the Swiss Guards were | |
slaughtered, and Louis XVI. and his family fled to the National Assembly | |
for shelter. He said he did not enter with this bloody contest as a | |
volunteer, but, happening to be in that part of the city of Paris, he | |
was hurried on by the mob to take part in that sanguinary business. Not | |
speaking good French, he said he was suspected to be a Swiss, and on | |
that account, finding his life often in danger, he left Paris, and, | |
embarking for England at Havre de Grace, arrived at Weymouth in | |
September last, and then came to Exeter. He said that being in great | |
distress in October he committed the mail robbery." | |
A rather good anecdote is told of an encounter between a poor tailor | |
and one of these knights of the road. The tailor, on being overtaken by | |
the highwayman, was at once called upon to stand and deliver, the | |
salutation being accompanied by the presentation of two pistols at the | |
pedestrian's head. "I'll do that with pleasure," was the meek reply; and | |
forthwith the poor victim transferred to the outstretched hands of the | |
robber all the money he possessed. This done, the tailor proceeded to | |
ask a favour. "My friends would laugh at me," said he, "were I to go | |
home and tell them I was robbed with as much patience as a lamb. Suppose | |
you fire your two bull-dogs right through the crown of my hat; it will | |
look something like a show of resistance." Taken with the fancy, the | |
robber good-naturedly complied with the request; but hardly had the | |
smoke from the weapons cleared away, when the tailor pulled out a rusty | |
old horse pistol, and in turn politely requested the highwayman to shell | |
out everything of value about him--his pistols not excepted. So the | |
highwayman had the worst of the meeting on that occasion. The incident | |
will perhaps help to dispel the sad reproach of the craft, that a tailor | |
is but the ninth part of a man. | |
It should not be forgotten that these perils of the road had their | |
effect in preventing intercourse between different parts of the country. | |
In such outlying districts as were blessed with postal communication a | |
hundred years ago, the service was kept up by foot messengers, who often | |
travelled long distances in the performance of their duty. Thus in 1799 | |
a post-runner travelled from Inverness to Loch Carron--a distance across | |
country, as the crow flies, of about fifty miles--making the journey | |
once a week, for which he was paid 5s. Another messenger at the same | |
period made the journey from Inverness to Dunvegan in Skye--a much | |
greater distance--also once a week, and for this service he received 7s. | |
6d. The rate at which the messengers travelled seems not to have been | |
very great, if we may judge from the performances of the post from | |
Dumbarton to Inveraray. In the year 1805 the Surveyor of the district | |
thus describes it: "I have sometimes observed these mails at leaving | |
Dumbarton about three stones or 48 lbs. weight, and they are generally | |
above two stones. During the course of last winter horses were obliged | |
to be occasionally employed; and it is often the case that a strong | |
highlander, with so great a weight upon him, cannot travel more than two | |
miles an hour, which greatly <DW44>s the general correspondence of this | |
extensive district of country." | |
These humble servants of the post office, travelling over considerable | |
tracts of country, would naturally become the means of conveying local | |
gossip from stage to stage, and of spreading hearsay news as they went | |
along. In this way, and as being the bearers of welcome letters, they | |
were no doubt as gladly received at the doors of our forefathers as are | |
the postmen at our own doors to-day. Indeed, complaint was made of the | |
delays that took place on the route, probably from this very cause. Here | |
is an instance referring to the year 1800. "I found," wrote the | |
Surveyor, "that it had been the general practice for the post from | |
Bonaw to Appin to lodge regularly all night at or near the house of | |
Ardchattan, and did not cross Shien till the following morning, losing | |
twelve hours to the Appin, Strontian, and Fort-William districts of | |
country; and I consider it an improvement of itself to remove such | |
private lodgings or accommodations out of the way of posts, which, as I | |
have been informed, is sometimes done for the sake of perusing | |
newspapers as well as answering or writing letters." | |
Exposed to the buffetings of the tempest, to the rigours of wintry | |
weather, and considering the rough unkept roads of the time, it is easy | |
to imagine how seductive would be the fireside of the country house; and | |
bearing in mind the desire on the part of the inmates to learn the | |
latest news, it is not surprising that the poor post-runner occasionally | |
departed from the strict line of duty. | |
But immediately prior to the introduction of mail-coaches, and for a | |
long time before that, the mails over the longer distances were | |
conveyed on horseback, the riders being known as "post-boys." These were | |
sometimes boys of fourteen or sixteen years of age, and sometimes old | |
men. Mr. Palmer, at whose instance mail-coaches were first put upon the | |
road, writing in 1783, thus describes the post-boy service. The picture | |
is not a very creditable one to the Post Office. "The post at present," | |
says he, "instead of being the swiftest, is almost the slowest | |
conveyance in the country; and though, from the great improvement in our | |
roads, other carriers have proportionably mended their speed, the post | |
is as slow as ever. It is likewise very unsafe. The mails are generally | |
intrusted to some idle boy without character, and mounted on a worn-out | |
hack, and who, so far from being able to defend himself or escape from a | |
robber, is much more likely to be in league with him." There is perhaps | |
room for suspicion that Mr. Palmer was painting the post-boy service as | |
black as possible, for he was then advocating another method of | |
conveying the mails; but he was not alone in his adverse criticism. An | |
official in Scotland thus described the service in 1799: "It is | |
impossible to obtain any other contractors to ride the mails at 3d. out, | |
or 1 1/2d. per mile each way. On this account we are so much distressed | |
with mail riders that we have often to submit to the mails being | |
conveyed by mules and such species of horses as are a disgrace to any | |
service." This is evidence from within the Post Office itself. While | |
young boys were suited for the work in some respects, they were | |
thoughtless and unpunctual; yet when older men were employed they | |
frequently got into liquor, and thus endangered the mails. The records | |
of the service are full of the troubles arising from the conduct of | |
these servants. The public were doubtless much to blame for this. For | |
the post-boys were, as we may suppose, ever welcome at the house and | |
ball, where refreshment, in the shape of strong drink, would be offered | |
to them, and they thus fell into trouble through a too common instance | |
of mistaken kindness. | |
In the year 1763 the mail leaving London on Tuesday night (in the | |
winter season) was not in the hands of the people of Edinburgh until the | |
afternoon of Sunday. This does not betoken a very rapid rate of | |
progression; but it appears that in many cases the post-boy's speed did | |
not rise above three or four miles an hour. The Post Office took severe | |
measures with these messengers, through parliamentary powers granted; | |
and even the public were called upon to keep an eye upon their | |
behaviour, and to report any misconduct to the authorities. | |
Mention has already been made of the unsafety of the roads for ordinary | |
travellers; but the roads were in no way safer for the post-boys. In | |
1798 a post-boy carrying certain Selby mails was robbed near that place, | |
being threatened with his life, and the mail-pouch which he then carried | |
was recovered under very strange circumstances in 1876. | |
But to come nearer home. On the early morning of the 1st of August 1802 | |
the mail from Glasgow for Edinburgh was robbed by two men at a place | |
near Linlithgow, when a sum of L1300 or L1400 was stolen. The robbers | |
had previously been soldiers. They hurried into Edinburgh with their | |
booty, got drunk, were discovered, and, when subsequently tried, were | |
sentenced to be executed. The law was severe in those days; and the Post | |
Office has the distinction of having obtained judgment against a robber | |
who was the last criminal hung in chains in Scotland. According to | |
Rogers, in his _Social Life of Scotland_, this was one Leal, who, in | |
1773, was found guilty of robbing the mail near Elgin. A curious fact | |
came out in connection with the trial of this man Leal, showing what may | |
be termed the momentum of evil. It happened that some time previously | |
Leal and a companion had been to see the execution of a man for robbing | |
the mail, and, on returning, they had to pass through a dark and narrow | |
part of the road. At this point Leal observed to his companion that the | |
situation was one well suited for a robbery. And it was here that he | |
afterwards carried the suggestion then made into effect. | |
When such robberies took place the post-boys sometimes came off without | |
serious mishap, but at other times they were badly injured. On Wednesday | |
the 23d October 1816, a post-boy near Exeter was assaulted (as the | |
report says) in "a most desperate and inhuman manner," when his skull | |
was fractured, and he shortly afterwards died. | |
The post-boys were exposed to all the inclemency of the weather both by | |
day and night. Sometimes they were overtaken by snow-storms, when they | |
would have to struggle on for their lives. Sometimes, after riding a | |
stage in severe frost, they would have to be lifted from their saddles | |
benumbed with cold and unable to dismount. At other times accidents of a | |
different kind happened to them, and, as has been shown, they sometimes | |
lost their lives. | |
Mail-coaches were first put upon the road on the 8th of August 1784. The | |
term of about sixty years, during which they were the means of conveying | |
the principal mails throughout the country, must ever seem to us a | |
period of romantic interest. There is something stirring even in the | |
picture of a mail-coach bounding along at the heels of four well-bred | |
horses; and we know by experience how exhilarating it is to be carried | |
along the highway at a rapid rate in a well-appointed coach. | |
[Illustration: THE MAIL, 1803. (_From a contemporary print._)] | |
We cannot well separate the service given to the Post Office by | |
mail-coaches from the passengers who made use of that means of | |
conveyance, and we may linger a little to endeavour to realise what a | |
journey was like from accounts left us by travellers. The charm of day | |
travelling could no doubt be conjured up even now by any one who would | |
take time to reflect upon the subject. But other phases of the matter | |
could hardly be so dealt with. | |
De Quincey, in his _Confessions of an English Opium Eater_, gives a | |
pleasing description of the easy motion and soothing influence of a | |
well-equipped mail-coach running upon an even and kindly road. The | |
period he refers to was about 1803, and the coach was that carrying the | |
Bristol mail--which enjoyed unusual advantages owing to the superior | |
character of the road, and an extra allowance for expenses subscribed by | |
the Bristol merchants. He thus describes his feelings: "It was past | |
eight o'clock when I reached the Gloucester Coffee-House, and, the | |
Bristol mail being on the point of going off, I mounted on the outside. | |
The fine fluent motion of the mail soon laid me asleep. It is somewhat | |
remarkable that the first easy or refreshing sleep which I had enjoyed | |
for some months was on the outside of a mail-coach.... | |
"For the first four or five miles from London I annoyed my | |
fellow-passenger on the roof by occasionally falling against him when | |
the coach gave a lurch to his side; and, indeed, if the road had been | |
less smooth and level than it is I should have fallen off from weakness. | |
Of this annoyance he complained heavily, as, perhaps, in the same | |
circumstances, most people would.... When I next woke for a minute from | |
the noise and lights of Hounslow (for in spite of my wishes and efforts | |
I had fallen asleep again within two minutes from the time I had spoken | |
to him), I found that he had put his arm round me to protect me from | |
falling off; and for the rest of my journey he behaved to me with the | |
gentleness of a woman, so that, at length, I almost lay in his arms.... | |
So genial and refreshing was my sleep that the next time, after leaving | |
Hounslow, that I fully awoke was upon the pulling up of the mail | |
(possibly at a post-office), and, on inquiry, I found that we had | |
reached Maidenhead--six or seven miles, I think, ahead of Salthill. Here | |
I alighted, and for the half-minute that the mail stopped I was | |
entreated by my friendly companion (who, from the transient glimpse I | |
had had of him in Piccadilly, seemed to me to be a gentleman's butler, | |
or person of that rank) to go to bed without delay." | |
Night journeys might be very well, in a way, during the balmy days of | |
summer, when light airs and sweet exhalations from flower and leaf gave | |
pleasing features to the scenes, but in the cold nights of winter, in | |
lashing rain, in storms of wind and snow, the unfortunate passengers | |
and the guard and coachman must have had terrible times of it. It is | |
said of the guards and coachmen that they had sometimes, when passing | |
over the Fells, to be strapped to their seats, in order to keep their | |
places against the fierce assaults of the mountain blast. | |
The winter experience of travelling by mail-coach in one of its phases | |
is thus described by a writer in connection with a severe snow-storm | |
which occurred in March 1827: "The night mail from Edinburgh to Glasgow | |
left Edinburgh in the afternoon, but was stopped before reaching | |
Kirkliston. The guard with the mail-bags set forward on horseback, and | |
the driver rode back to Edinburgh with a view, it was understood, to get | |
fresh horses. The passengers, four in number, entreated him to use all | |
diligence, and meanwhile were compelled to wait in the coach, which had | |
stuck at a very solitary part of the road. There they remained through a | |
dark and stormy night, with a broken pane of glass, through which the | |
wind blew bitterly cold. It was nine o'clock next morning when the | |
driver came, bringing with him another man and a pair of horses. Having | |
taken away some articles, he jestingly asked the passengers what they | |
meant to do, and was leaving them to shift for themselves, but was | |
persuaded at length to aid one who was faint, and unable to struggle | |
through the snow. He was allowed to mount behind one of the riders; the | |
other passengers were left to extricate themselves as best they could." | |
[Illustration: THE MAIL, 1824. (_From a contemporary print._)] | |
Many instances might be given of the stoppage of the coaches on account | |
of snow, and of the efforts made by the guards to push on the mails. In | |
1836 a memorable snow-storm took place which disorganised the service, | |
and the occasion is one on which the guards and coachmen distinguished | |
themselves. The strain thrown upon the horses in a like situation is | |
well described by Cowper, if we change one word in his lines, which are | |
as follows:-- | |
"The _coach_ goes heavily, impeded sore | |
By congregated loads adhering close | |
To the clogg'd wheels; and in its sluggish pace | |
Noiseless appears a moving hill of snow. | |
The toiling steeds expand the nostril wide, | |
While every breath, by respiration strong | |
Forced downward, is consolidated soon | |
Upon their jutting chests." | |
A melancholy result followed upon a worthy endeavour to carry the mails | |
through the snow on the 1st February 1831. The Dumfries coach had | |
reached Moffat, where it became snowed up. The driver and guard procured | |
saddle-horses, and proceeded; but they had not gone far when they found | |
the roads impracticable for horses, and these were sent back to Moffat. | |
The two men then continued on foot; but they did not get beyond a few | |
miles on the road when they succumbed, and some days afterwards their | |
dead bodies were found on the high ground near the "Deil's Beef-Tub," | |
the bags being found attached to a post at the roadside, and not far | |
from where the men fell. They perished in a noble attempt to perform | |
their humble duties. The incident recalls the lines of Thomson:-- | |
"And down he sinks | |
Beneath the shelter of the shapeless drift, | |
Thinking o'er all the bitterness of death, | |
Mix'd with the tender anguish nature shoots | |
Through the wrung bosom of the dying man. | |
His wife, his children, and his friends unseen. | |
On every nerve | |
The deadly winter seizes; shuts up sense; | |
And o'er his inmost vitals creeping cold | |
Lays him along the snows, a stiffened corse, | |
Stretched out, and bleaching in the northern blast." | |
We have little conception of the labour that had to be expended, during | |
periods of snow, in the endeavour to keep the roads open. In places the | |
snow would be found lying thirty or forty feet deep, and the road | |
trustees were obliged to spend large sums of money in clearing it away. | |
Hundreds of the military were called out in certain places to assist, | |
and snow-ploughs were set to work in order to force a passage. | |
The inconvenience to the country caused by such interruptions is well | |
described in the _Annual Register_ of the 15th February 1795: "My letter | |
of two days ago is still here; for, though I have made an effort twice, | |
I have been obliged to return, not having reached half the first stage. | |
Two mails are due from London, three from Glasgow, and four from | |
Edinburgh. Neither the last guard that went hence for Glasgow on | |
Thursday, nor he that went on Wednesday, have since been heard of; this | |
country was never so completely blocked up in the memory of the oldest | |
person, or that they ever heard of. I understand the road is ten feet | |
deep with snow from this to Hamilton. I have had it cut through once, | |
but this third fall makes an attempt impossible. Heaven only knows when | |
the road will be open, nothing but a thaw can do it--it is now an | |
intense frost." | |
But the guards and coachmen were put upon their mettle on other | |
occasions than when snow made further progress impossible. | |
The following incident, showing the courage and devotion to duty of a | |
mail guard and coachman, is related by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, Bart., in | |
his account of the floods which devastated the province of Moray in | |
August 1829. Referring to the state of things in the town of Banff, Sir | |
Thomas proceeds: "The mail-coach had found it impracticable to proceed | |
south in the morning by its usual route, and had gone round by the | |
Bridge of Alva. It was therefore supposed that the mail for Inverness, | |
which reaches Banff in the afternoon, would take the same road. But what | |
was the astonishment of the assembled population when the coach | |
appeared, within a few minutes of the usual time, at the further end of | |
the Bridge of Banff. The people who were standing there urged both the | |
guard and coachman not to attempt to pass where their danger was so | |
certain. On hearing this the passengers left the coach; but the guard | |
and coachman, scouting the idea of danger in the very streets of Banff, | |
disregarded the advice they received, and drove straight along the | |
bridge. As they turned the corner of the butcher-market, signals were | |
made, and loud cries were uttered from the nearest houses to warn them | |
of the danger of advancing; yet still they kept urging the horses | |
onwards. But no sooner had they reached the place where the wall had | |
burst, than coach and horses were at once borne away together by the | |
raging current, and the vehicle was dashed violently against the corner | |
of Gillan's Inn. The whole four horses immediately disappeared, but | |
rose and plunged again, and dashed and struggled hard for their lives. | |
Loud were the shrieks of those who witnessed this spectacle. A boat came | |
almost instantaneously to the spot, but as the rowers pushed up to try | |
to disengage the horses, the poor animals, as they alternately reached | |
the surface, made desperate exertions to get into the boat, so that | |
extreme caution was necessary in approaching them. They did succeed in | |
liberating one of them, which immediately swam along the streets, amidst | |
the cheering of the population; but the other three sank to rise no | |
more. By this time the coach, with the coachman and guard, had been | |
thrown on the pavement, where the depth of water was less; and there the | |
guard was seen clinging to the top, and the coachman hanging by his | |
hands to a lamp-post, with his toes occasionally touching the box. In | |
this perilous state they remained till another boat came and relieved | |
them, when the guard and the mails were landed in safety. Great | |
indignation was displayed against the obstinacy which had produced this | |
accident. But much is to be said in defence of the servants of the Royal | |
Mail, who are expected to persevere in their endeavours to forward the | |
public post in defiance of risk, though in this case their zeal was | |
unfortunately proved to have been mistaken."[3] | |
Although, as already stated, robberies were frequent from the | |
mail-coaches, and the guard carried formidable weapons of defence, it | |
does not appear that the coaches were often openly attacked. At any rate | |
there do not seem to be many records of such incidents referring to the | |
later days of the mail-coach service. | |
An old guard, now retired, but still or quite recently living in | |
Carlisle, relates that only on one occasion did he require to draw his | |
arms for actual defence. This happened at a hamlet called Chance Inn, in | |
the county of Forfar, where the coach had stopped as usual. Both the | |
inside and outside places were occupied by passengers, and no additional | |
travellers could be taken. A number of sailors, however, who were | |
proceeding to join their ship at a seaport, wished to get upon the | |
coach; and though they were told that they could not travel by this | |
means, they plainly showed by their looks and demeanour that they were | |
determined to do so. One of them was overheard to say that, when the | |
proper moment arrived, they would make short work of the guard, who, as | |
it happened, was a youngish man. The passengers too were alarmed at the | |
appearances, and appealed to the guard to keep a sharp eye upon the | |
sailors. Under these conditions the guard directed the coachman, the | |
moment the word was given, to put the horses to a gallop, so as to leave | |
the seamen behind and avoid attack. The start was signalled as arranged, | |
the guard sprang into his place and faced round to the sailors, one of | |
whom was now in the act of preparing to throw a huge stone at his head | |
with both hands. Instantly the guard drew one of his pistols and covered | |
the ringleader, who thereupon dropped on his knees imploring pardon, | |
while his companions, previously so aggressive, scampered off in all | |
directions like a set of scared rabbits. | |
The apparatus by which in the present day bags of letters are dropped | |
from and taken up by the travelling post-office while the trains are | |
running at high speed had its prototype in the days of the mail-coaches. | |
In the one case as in the other the object was to get rid of stoppages, | |
and so to save time. In the coaching days the apparatus was of a most | |
primitive kind, consisting of a pointed stick rather less than four feet | |
long, whose sharpened end was put in behind the string around the neck | |
of the mail-bag, and on the end of the stick the bag was held up to be | |
clutched by the mail guard as the coach went hurriedly by. We are | |
indebted to the sub-postmaster of Liberton, a village a few miles out of | |
Edinburgh, for a description of the arrangement. He describes how the | |
guards, some fifty years ago, would playfully deal with the youngsters | |
who worked the "apparatus," by not only seizing the bag but also the | |
stick, and causing the young people to run long distances after the | |
coach in order to recover it. The fun was all very well, says the | |
sub-postmaster, in the genial nights of summer; "but when the cold | |
nights of winter came round, it was our turn to play a trick upon the | |
guard, when both he and the driver were numbed with cold and fast | |
asleep, and the four horses going at full speed. It was not easy to | |
arouse the guard to take the bag; and just fancy the rare gift of | |
Christian charity that caused us youngsters to run and roar after the | |
fast-running mail-coach to get quit of the bag. It used to be a weary | |
business waiting the mail-coach coming along from the south when the | |
roads were stormed up with snow or otherwise delayed. It required some | |
tact to hold up the bag, as the glare of the lamps prevented us from | |
seeing the guard as he came up with his red coat and blowing a long tin | |
horn." | |
Some curious notions were prevalent of the effect of travelling by | |
mail-coach--the rate being about eight or ten miles an hour. Lord | |
Campbell was frequently warned against the danger of journeying this | |
way, and instances were cited to him of passengers dying of apoplexy | |
induced by the rapidity with which the vehicles travelled. In 1791 | |
the Postmaster-General gave directions that the public should be warned | |
against sending any cash by post, partly, as he stated, "from the | |
prejudice it does to the coin by the friction it occasions from the | |
great expedition with which it is conveyed." After all, speed is merely | |
a relative thing. | |
[Illustration: MODERN MAIL "APPARATUS" FOR EXCHANGE OF MAIL-BAGS: | |
SETTING THE POUCH--EARLY MORNING.] | |
Although, as previously stated, open attacks were not often made upon | |
the coaches, robberies of the bags conveyed by them were quite | |
common--chiefly at night--and we may assume that they were made possible | |
through the carelessness of the guards. It would be a long story to go | |
fully into this matter. Let a couple of instances suffice. On the last | |
day of February 1810, in the evening, a mail-coach at Barnet was robbed | |
of sixteen bags for provincial towns by the wrenching off the lock while | |
the horses were changing. And on the 19th November of the same year | |
seven bags for London were stolen from the coach at Bedford about nine | |
o'clock in the evening. | |
The authorities had a good deal of trouble with the mail guards and | |
coachmen, and the records of the period are full of warnings against | |
their irregularities. Now they are admonished for stopping at ale-houses | |
to drink; now the guards are threatened for sleeping upon duty. Then | |
they are cautioned against conveying fish, poultry, etc., on their own | |
account. A guard is fined L5 for suffering a man to ride on the roof of | |
the coach; a driver is fined L5 for losing time; another driver, for | |
intoxication and impertinence to passengers, is fined L10 and costs. The | |
guards are entreated to be attentive to their arms, to see that they are | |
clean, well loaded, and hung handy; they are forbidden to blow their | |
horns when passing through the streets during the hours of divine | |
service on Sundays; they are enjoined to keep a watch upon French | |
prisoners of war attempting to break their parole; and to sum up, an | |
Inspector despairingly writes that "half his time is employed in | |
receiving and answering letters of complaint from passengers respecting | |
the improper conduct and impertinent language of guards." A story is | |
told of a passenger who, being drenched inside a coach by water coming | |
through an opening in the roof, complained of the fact to the guard, but | |
the only answer he got was, "Ay, mony a ane has complained o' that | |
hole," and the guard quietly passed on to other duties. | |
Railway travellers are familiar with an official at the principal | |
through stations whose duty it seems to be to ring a bell and loudly | |
call out "Take your seats!" the moment hungry passengers enter the | |
refreshment-rooms. How far his zeal engenders dyspepsia and heart | |
disease it is impossible to say. | |
In the mail-coach days similar pressure was put upon passengers; for | |
every effort was made to hurry forward the mails. In a family letter | |
written by Mendelssohn in 1829, he describes a mail-coach journey from | |
Glasgow to Liverpool. Among other things he mentions that the changing | |
of horses was done in about forty seconds. This was not the language of | |
mere hyperbole, for where the stoppage was one for the purpose of | |
changing horses only the official time allowed was one minute. | |
It is perhaps a pity that we have not fuller records of the scenes | |
enacted at the stopping-places; they would doubtless afford us some | |
amusement. There is the old story of the knowing passenger who, | |
unobserved, placed all the silver spoons in the coffee-pot in order to | |
cool the coffee and delay the coach, while the other passengers, already | |
in their places, were being searched. | |
There is another story which may be worth repeating. A hungry passenger | |
had just commenced to taste the quality of a stewed fowl when he was | |
peremptorily ordered by the guard to take his place. Unwilling to lose | |
either his meal or his passage, he hastily rolled the fowl in his | |
handkerchief, and mounted the coach. But the landlord, unused to such | |
liberties, was soon after him with the ravished dish. The coach was | |
already on the move, and the only revenge left to the landlord was to | |
call out jeeringly to the passenger, "Won't you have the gravy, sir?" | |
The other passengers had a laugh at the expense of their companion; but | |
we know that a hungry man is a tenacious man, and a man with a full | |
stomach can afford to laugh. At any rate the proverb says, "Who laughs | |
last laughs best." | |
The differences arising between passengers and the landlords at the | |
stopping-places were sometimes, however, of a much more prosaic and | |
solemn character. Charles Lamb has given us such a scene. "I was | |
travelling," he says, "in a stage-coach with three male Quakers, | |
buttoned up in the straitest nonconformity of their sect. We stopped to | |
bait at Andover, where a meal, partly tea apparatus, partly supper, was | |
set before us. My friends confined themselves to the tea-table. I in my | |
way took supper. When the landlady brought in the bill, the eldest of my | |
companions discovered that she had charged for both meals. This was | |
resisted. Mine hostess was very clamorous and positive. Some mild | |
arguments were used on the part of the Quakers, for which the heated | |
mind of the good lady seemed by no means a fit recipient. The guard | |
came in with his usual peremptory notice. The Quakers pulled out their | |
money and formally tendered it--so much for tea--I, in humble situation, | |
tendering mine, for the supper which I had taken. She would not relax in | |
her demand. So they all three quietly put up their silver, as did | |
myself, and marched out of the room, the eldest and gravest going first, | |
with myself closing up the rear, who thought I could not do better than | |
follow the example of such grave and warrantable personages. We got in. | |
The steps went up. The coach drove off. The murmurs of mine hostess, not | |
very indistinctly or ambiguously pronounced, became after a time | |
inaudible, and now my conscience, which the whimsical scene had for a | |
while suspended, beginning to give some twitches, I waited, in the hope | |
that some justification would be offered by these serious persons for | |
the seeming injustice of their conduct. To my surprise, not a syllable | |
was dropped on the subject. They sat as mute as at a meeting. At length | |
the eldest of them broke silence by inquiring of his next neighbour, | |
'Hast thee heard how indigos go at the India House?' and the question | |
operated as a soporific on my moral feelings as far as Exeter." | |
A Frenchman was once a traveller by mail-coach, who, although he knew | |
the English language fairly well, was not familiar with the finer shades | |
of meaning attached to set expressions when applied in particular | |
situations. An Englishman, who was his companion inside the coach, had | |
occasion to direct his attention to some object in the passing | |
landscape, and requested him to "look out." This the Frenchman promptly | |
did, putting his head and shoulders out of the window, and the view | |
obtained proved highly pleasing to the stranger. A stage further on in | |
the journey, when the coach was approaching a narrow part of the road | |
bordered and overhung by dense foliage, the driver, as was his custom, | |
called out to the company, "Look out!" to which the Frenchman again | |
quickly responded by thrusting head and shoulders out of the window; | |
but this time with the result that his hat was brushed off, and his face | |
badly scratched from contact with the neighbouring branches. This | |
curious contradiction in the use of the very same words enraged the | |
Frenchman, who said hard things of our language; for he had discovered | |
that when told to "look out" he was to look out, and that again when | |
told to "look out" he was to be careful not to look out. | |
Mackenzie graphically describes the part mail-coaches took in the | |
distribution of news over the country in the early years of the century. | |
Referring to the news of the battle of Waterloo, he says: "By day and | |
night these coaches rolled along at their pace of seven or eight miles | |
an hour. At all cross roads messengers were waiting to get a newspaper | |
or a word of tidings from the guard. In every little town, as the hour | |
approached for the arrival of the mail, the citizens hovered about their | |
streets waiting restlessly for the expected news. In due time the coach | |
rattled into the market-place, hung with branches, the now familiar | |
token that a great battle had been fought and a victory won. Eager | |
groups gathered. The guard, as he handed out his mail-bags, told of the | |
decisive victory which had crowned and completed our efforts. And then | |
the coachman cracked his whip, the guard's horn gave forth once more its | |
notes of triumph, and the coach rolled away, bearing the thrilling news | |
into other districts." | |
The writer of the interesting work called _Glasgow, Past and Present_, | |
gives the following realistic account of the arrival of the London mail | |
in Glasgow in war-time:-- | |
"During the time of the French war it was quite exhilarating to observe | |
the arrival of the London mail-coach in Glasgow, when carrying the first | |
intelligence of a great victory, like the battle of the Nile, or the | |
battle of Waterloo. The mail-coach horses were then decorated with | |
laurels, and a red flag floated on the roof of the coach. The guard, | |
dressed in his best scarlet coat and gold ornamented hat, came galloping | |
at a thundering pace along the stones of the Gallowgate, sounding his | |
bugle amidst the echoings of the streets; and when he arrived at the | |
foot of Nelson Street he discharged his blunderbuss in the air. On these | |
occasions a general run was made to the Tontine Coffee-room to hear the | |
great news, and long before the newspapers were delivered the public | |
were advertised by the guard of the particulars of the great victory, | |
which fled from mouth to mouth like wildfire." | |
The mail-guards, and also the coachmen, were a race of men by | |
themselves, modelled and fashioned by the circumstances of their | |
employment--in fact, receiving character, like all other sets of people, | |
from their peculiar environment. There are now very few of them | |
remaining, and these very old men. These officers of the Post Office | |
mixed with all sorts of people, learned a great deal from the | |
passengers, and were full of romance and anecdote. We remember one guard | |
whose conversation and accounts of funny things were so continuous that | |
his hearers were kept in a constant state of ecstasy whenever he was | |
set agoing. His fund of story seemed inexhaustible, and we can imagine | |
how hilariously would pass away the hours on the outside of a mail-coach | |
with such a companion. The guard of whom we are speaking was a north | |
countryman, possessed of a stalwart frame and iron constitution, a man | |
with whom a highwayman would rather avoid getting into grips. He used to | |
tell of an occasion on which the driver, being drunk, fell from his box, | |
and the horses bolted. He himself was seated in his place at the rear of | |
the coach. The state of things was serious. He however scrambled over | |
the top of the coach, let himself down between the wheelers, stole along | |
the pole of the coach, recovered the reins, and saved the mail from | |
wreck and the passengers from impending death. For this he received a | |
special letter of thanks from the Postmaster-General. | |
It was the custom of this guard, as no doubt of others of his class, to | |
take charge of parcels of value for conveyance between places on his | |
road. On one occasion he had charge of a parcel of L1500 in bank notes, | |
which was in course of transmission to a bank at headquarters. It | |
happened that the driver had been indulging rather freely, and at one of | |
the stopping-places the coachman started off with the coach leaving the | |
guard behind. The latter did not discover this till the coach was out of | |
sight, and realising the responsibility he was under in respect of the | |
money, which for safety he had placed in a holster below one of his | |
pistols, he was in a great fright. There was nothing for it but to start | |
on foot and endeavour to overtake the coach; but this he did not succeed | |
in doing till he had run a whole stage, at the end of which the | |
perspiration was oozing through his scarlet coat. At the completion of | |
the journey he sponged himself all over with whisky, and did not then | |
feel any ill effects from the great strain he had placed himself under, | |
though later in life he believed his heart had suffered damage from the | |
exertions of that memorable day. | |
Before leaving this branch of our subject it may be well to note that | |
while the mail guards received but nominal pay--ten and sixpence a | |
week--they earned considerable sums in gratuities from passengers, and | |
for executing small commissions for the public. In certain cases as much | |
as L300 a year was thus received; and the heavy fines that were | |
inflicted upon them were therefore not so severe as might at first sight | |
seem. Unhappily these men were given to take drink, if not wisely, at | |
any rate too often. The weaknesses of the mail guard are very cleverly | |
portrayed in some verses on the _Mail-Coach Guard_, quoted in Larwood | |
and Hotten's work on the _History of Signboards_; and while these | |
frailties are the burden of the song, it will be observed how cleverly | |
the names of inns or alehouses are introduced into the song:-- | |
"At each inn on the road I a welcome could find; | |
At the Fleece I'd my skin full of ale; | |
The Two Jolly Brewers were just to my mind; | |
At the Dolphin I drank like a whale. | |
Tom Tun at the Hogshead sold pretty good stuff; | |
They'd capital flip at the Boar; | |
And when at the Angel I'd tippled enough, | |
I went to the Devil for more. | |
Then I'd always a sweetheart so snug at the Car; | |
At the Rose I'd a lily so white; | |
Few planets could equal sweet Nan at the Star; | |
No eyes ever twinkled so bright. | |
I've had many a hug at the sign of the Bear; | |
In the Sun courted morning and noon; | |
And when night put an end to my happiness there, | |
I'd a sweet little girl in the Moon. | |
To sweethearts and ale I at length bid adieu, | |
Of wedlock to set up the Sign; | |
Hand-in-Hand the Good-Woman I look for in you, | |
And the Horns I hope ne'er will be mine. | |
Once guard to the mail, I'm now guard to the fair, | |
But though my commission's laid down, | |
Yet while the King's Arms I'm permitted to bear, | |
Like a Lion I'll fight for the Crown." | |
A good loyal subject to the last. | |
One of the changes that time and circumstances have brought into the | |
postal service is this, that the country post-offices have passed out of | |
the hands of innkeepers, and into those of more desirable persons. In | |
former times, and down to the period of the mail-coaches, the | |
post-offices in many of the provincial towns were established at the inn | |
of the place. In those days the conveyance of the mails being to a large | |
extent by horse, it was convenient to have the office established where | |
the relays of horses were maintained; and the term "postmaster" then | |
applied in a double sense--to the person intrusted with the receipt and | |
despatch of letters, and with the providing of horses to convey the | |
mails. The two duties are now no longer combined, and the word | |
"postmaster" has consequently become applicable to two totally different | |
classes of persons. The innkeepers were not very assiduous in matters | |
pertaining to the post, and the duty of receiving and despatching | |
letters, being frequently left to waiters and chambermaids, was very | |
badly done. Often there was no separate room provided for the | |
transaction of post-office business, and visitors at the inn and others | |
had opportunities for scrutinising the correspondence that ought not to | |
have existed. The postmaster was assisted by his ostler, as chief | |
adviser in the postal work, which, however, was neglected; the worst | |
horses, instead of the best, were hired out for the mails; and for | |
riders the service was graced with the dregs of the stable-yard. At the | |
same time the innkeepers were alive to their own interests, for they | |
sometimes attracted travellers to their houses by granting them franks | |
for the free transmission of their letters. The salaries of the | |
postmasters were not cast in a liberal mould, and what they did receive | |
was subject to the charge of providing candles, wax, string, etc., | |
necessary for making up the mails. | |
[Illustration: THE MAIL-COACH GUARD.] | |
The following are examples of the salaries of postmasters about a | |
hundred years ago:-- | |
Paisley, 1790 to 1800, L33 | |
Dundee, 1800, 50 | |
Arbroath, 1763 to 1794, 20 | |
Aberdeen, 1763 to 1793, about 90 | |
Glasgow, 1789 140 | |
and Clerk 30 | |
Constant appeals reached headquarters for "an augmentation," which was | |
the term then applied to an increase of salary, and in the circumstances | |
it is not surprising that the post-office work was indifferently done. | |
Attendance had to be given to the public during the day, and when the | |
mail passed through a town in the dead hours of night some one had to be | |
up to despatch or receive the mail. Sometimes the postmaster, when awoke | |
by the post-boy's horn, would get up and drop the mail-bag by a hook | |
and line from his bedroom window. An instance of such a proceeding is | |
given by Williams in his history of Watford, where the destinies of the | |
post were at the time presided over by a postmistress. "In response," | |
says he, "to the thundering knock of the conductor, the old lady left | |
her couch, and thrusting her head, covered with a wide-bordered | |
night-cap, out of the bedroom window, let down the mail-bag by a string, | |
and quickly returned to her bed again." Coming thus nightly to the open | |
window must have been a risky duty as regards health for a postmistress. | |
A hundred years ago the chief post-office in London was situated in | |
Lombard Street. The scene, if we may judge by a print of the period, | |
would appear to have been one of quietude and waiting for something to | |
turn up. In 1829 the General Post Office was transferred to St. Martin's | |
le Grand, and the departure of the evening mails (when mail-coaches were | |
in full swing) became one of the sights of London. | |
Living in an age of cheap postage as we do, we look back upon the rates | |
charged a century ago with something akin to amazement. In the following | |
table will be seen some of the inland and foreign postage charges which | |
were current in the period from 1797 to 1815:-- | |
-------------------------------------------------------------- | |
| | | | | | | |
| | Single| Double | Treble | 1 oz. | | |
| ENGLAND, 1797. | Letter| Letter | Letter | | | |
| | | | | | | |
|Distance not exceeding in +-------+--------+--------+-------+ | |
|Miles-- | s. d.| s. d. | s. d. | s. d. | | |
| | | | | | | |
|15, | 0 3 | 0 6 | 0 9 | 1 0 | | |
|15 to 30, | 0 4 | 0 8 | 1 0 | 1 4 | | |
|30 " 60, | 0 5 | 0 10 | 1 3 | 1 8 | | |
|60 " 100, | 0 6 | 1 0 | 1 6 | 2 0 | | |
|100 " 150, | 0 7 | 1 2 | 1 9 | 2 4 | | |
|150 and upwards, | 0 8 | 1 4 | 2 0 | 2 8 | | |
| | | | | | | |
|For Scotland these rates | | | | | | |
|were increased by | 0 1 | 0 2 | 0 3 | 0 4 | | |
| | | | | | | |
| FOREIGN. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
|From any part in Great | | | | | | |
|Britain to any part in-- | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
|Portugal, | 1 0 | 2 0 | 3 0 | 4 0 | | |
|British Dominions in } | | | | | | |
|America, } | 1 0 | 2 0 | 3 0 | 4 0 | | |
| | | | | | | |
| 1806. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
|From any part in Great | | | | | | |
|Britain to-- | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
|Gibraltar, | 1 9 | 3 6 | 5 3 | 7 0 | | |
|Malta, | 2 1 | 4 2 6 3 | 8 4 | | |
-------------------------------------------------------------- | |
--------------------------------------------------------- | |
| | | | | | | |
| 1808. |Single |Double |Treble | 1 oz. | | |
| |Letter.|Letter.|Letter.| | | |
|From any part in Great | | | | | | |
| Britain to-- +-------+-------+-------+-------+ | |
| | s. d.| s. d.| s. d.| s. d.| | |
| Madeira, | 1 6 | 3 0 | 4 6 | 6 0 | | |
| South America, } | | | | | | |
| Portuguese } | 2 5 | 4 10 | 7 3 | 9 8 | | |
| Possessions, } | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
| 1815. | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
|From any part in Great | | | | | | |
| Britain to-- | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
| Cape of Good Hope,}| | | | | | |
| Mauritius, }| 3 6 | 7 0 | 10 6 | 14 0 | | |
| East Indies, }| | | | | | |
| | | | | | | |
--------------------------------------------------------- | |
Over and above these foreign rates, the full inland postage in England | |
and Scotland, according to the distance the letters had to be conveyed | |
to the port of despatch, was levied. | |
Many persons remember how old-fashioned letters were made up--a single | |
sheet of paper folded first at the top and bottom, then one side slipped | |
inside the folds of the other, then a wafer or seal applied, and the | |
address written on the back. That was a _single_ letter. If a cheque, | |
bank-bill, or other document were enclosed, the letter became a double | |
letter. Two enclosures made the letter a treble letter. The officers of | |
the Post Office examined the letters in the interest of the Revenue, the | |
letters being submitted to the test of a strong light, and the officers, | |
peeping in at the end, used the feather end of a quill to separate the | |
folds of the letter for better inspection. Envelopes were not then used. | |
These high rates of postage gave rise to frequent attempts to defraud | |
the Revenue, and many plans were adopted to circumvent the Post Office | |
in this matter. Sometimes a series of words in the print of a newspaper | |
were pricked with a pin, and thus conveyed a message to the person for | |
whom the newspaper was intended. Sometimes milk was used as an invisible | |
ink upon a newspaper, the receiver reading the message sent by holding | |
the paper to the fire. At other times soldiers took the letters of their | |
friends, and sent them under franks written by their officers. Letters | |
were conveyed by public carriers, against the statute, sometimes tied up | |
in brown paper, to disguise them as parcels. The carriers seem to have | |
been conspicuous offenders, for one of them was convicted at Warwick in | |
1794, when penalties amounting to L1500 were incurred, though only L10 | |
and costs were actually exacted. The Post Office maintained a staff of | |
men called "Apprehenders of Letter Carriers," whose business it was to | |
hunt down persons illegally carrying letters. | |
Nor must we omit to mention how far short of perfection were the means | |
afforded for cross-post communication between one town and another. | |
While along the main lines of road radiating from London there might be | |
a fairly good service according to the ideas of the times, the | |
cross-country connections were bad and inadequate. Here are one or two | |
instances:-- | |
In 1792 there was no direct post between Thrapstone and Wellingborough, | |
though they lay only nine miles apart. Letters could circulate between | |
these towns by way of Stilton, Newark, Nottingham, and Northampton, | |
performing a circuit of 148 miles, or they could be sent by way of | |
London, 74 up and 68 1/2 down,--in which latter case they reached their | |
destination one day sooner than by the northern route. | |
[Illustrations: Diagrams--ROUNDABOUT COMMUNICATIONS] | |
Again, from Ipswich to Bury St. Edmunds, two important towns of about | |
11,000 and 7000 inhabitants respectively, and distant from each other | |
only twenty-two miles, there was no direct post. Letters had to be | |
forwarded either through Norwich and Newmarket, or by way of London, the | |
distance to be covered in the one case being 105 miles, and in the other | |
143 1/2 miles. According to a time-table of the period, a letter posted at | |
Ipswich for Bury St. Edmunds on Monday would be despatched to Norwich at | |
5.30 A.M. on Tuesday. Reaching this place six hours thereafter, it would | |
be forwarded thence at 4 P.M. to Newmarket, where it was due at 11 P.M. | |
At Newmarket it would lie all night and the greater part of next day, | |
and would only arrive at Bury at 5.40 P.M. on Wednesday. Thus three days | |
were consumed in the journey of a letter from Ipswich to Bury by the | |
nearest postal route, and nothing was to be gained by adopting the | |
alternative route _via_ London. | |
In 1781 the postal staff in Edinburgh was composed of twenty-three | |
persons, of whom six were letter-carriers. The indoor staff of the | |
Glasgow Post Office in 1789 consisted of the postmaster and one clerk, | |
and as ten years later there were only four postmen employed, the | |
outdoor force in 1789 was probably only four men. | |
Liverpool, in the year 1792, when its population stood at something like | |
60,000, had only three postmen, whose wages were 7s. a week each. One of | |
the men, however, was assisted by his wife, and for this service the | |
Post Office allowed her from L10 to L12 a year. Their duties seem to | |
have been carried out in an easy-going, deliberate fashion. The men | |
arranged the letters for distribution in the early morning, then they | |
partook of breakfast, and started on their rounds about 9 A.M., | |
completing their delivery about the middle of the afternoon. It would | |
thus seem that a hundred years ago there was but one delivery daily in | |
Liverpool. | |
During the same period there were only three letter-carriers employed at | |
Manchester, four at Bristol, and three or four at Birmingham. In our own | |
times the number of postmen serving these large towns may be counted by | |
the hundreds, or, I might almost say, thousands. | |
The delivery of letters in former times was necessarily a slow affair, | |
for two reasons, namely:--that prepayment was not compulsory, and the | |
senders of letters thoughtfully left the receivers to pay for them, when | |
the postmen would often be kept waiting for the money. And secondly, | |
streets were not named and numbered systematically as they now are, and | |
concise addresses were impossible. | |
It is no doubt the case that order and method in laying out the streets | |
and in regulating generally the buildings of towns are things of quite | |
modern growth. In old-fashioned towns we find the streets running at all | |
angles to one another, and describing all sorts of curves, without any | |
regard whatever to general harmony. And will it be believed that the | |
numbering of the houses in streets is comparatively a modern | |
arrangement! Walter Thornbury tells us in his _Haunted London_ that | |
"names were first put on doors in 1760 (some years before the street | |
signs were removed). In 1764 houses were first numbered, the numbering | |
commencing in New Burleigh Street, and Lincoln's-Inn-Fields being the | |
second place numbered." While in our own time the addresses of letters | |
are generally brief and direct, it is not to be wondered at that, under | |
the conditions above stated, the superscriptions were often such as now | |
seem to us curious. Here is one given in a printed notice issued at | |
Edinburgh in 1714:-- | |
"The Stamp office at Edinburgh | |
in Mr. William Law, Jeweller, | |
his hands, off the Parliament close, | |
down the market stairs, opposite | |
to the Excise office." | |
Here is another old-fashioned address, in which one must admit the | |
spirit of filial regard with which it is inspired:-- | |
"These for his honoured Mother, | |
Mrs. Hester Stryp, widow, | |
dwelling in Petticoat Lane, over | |
against the Five Inkhorns, | |
without Bishopgate, | |
in London." | |
Yet one more specimen, referring to the year 1702:-- | |
"For | |
Mr. Archibald Dunbarr | |
of Thunderstoune, to be | |
left at Capt. Dunbar's | |
writing chamber at the | |
Iron Revell, third storie | |
below the cross, north end | |
of the close at Edinburgh." | |
Under the circumstances of the time it was necessary thus to define at | |
length where letters should be delivered; and the same circumstances | |
were no doubt the _raison-d'etre_ of the corps of caddies in Edinburgh, | |
whose business it was to execute commissions of all sorts, and in whom | |
the paramount qualification was to know everybody in the town, and where | |
everybody lived. | |
All this is changed in our degenerate days, and it is now possible for | |
any one to find any other person with the simple key of street and | |
number. | |
The irregular way in which towns grew up in former times is brought out | |
in an anecdote about Kilmarnock. Early in the present century the | |
streets of that town were narrow, winding, and intricate. An English | |
commercial traveller, having completed some business there, mounted his | |
horse, and set out for another town. He was making for the outskirts of | |
Kilmarnock, and reflecting upon its apparent size and importance, when | |
he suddenly found himself back at the cross. In the surprise of the | |
moment he was heard to exclaim that surely his "sable eminence" must | |
have had a hand in the building of it, for it was a town very easily got | |
into, but there was no getting out of it. | |
A duty that the changed circumstances of the times now renders | |
unnecessary was formerly imposed upon postmasters, of which there is | |
hardly a recollection remaining among the officials carrying on the work | |
of the post to-day. The duty is mentioned in an order of May 1824, to | |
the following effect: "An old instruction was renewed in 1812, that all | |
postmasters should transmit to me (the Secretary), for the information | |
of His Majesty's Postmaster-General, an immediate account of all | |
remarkable occurrences within their districts, that the same may be | |
communicated, if necessary, to His Majesty's principal Secretaries of | |
State. This has not been invariably attended to, and I am commanded by | |
His Lordship to say, that henceforward it will be expected of every | |
Deputy." This gathering of news from all quarters is now adequately | |
provided for by the _Daily Press_, and no incident of any importance | |
occurs which is not immediately distributed through that channel, or | |
flashed by the telegraph, to every corner of the kingdom. | |
A custom, which would now be looked upon as a curiosity, and the origin | |
of which would have to be sought for in the remote past, was in | |
operation in the larger towns of the kingdom until about the year 1859. | |
The custom was that of ringing the town for letters to be despatched; | |
certain of the postmen being authorised to go over apportioned | |
districts, after the ordinary collections of letters from the receiving | |
offices had been made, to gather in late letters for the mail. Until the | |
year above mentioned the arrangement was thus carried out in Dublin. The | |
letter-box at the chief office, and those at the receiving offices, | |
closed two hours before the despatch of the night mail. Half an hour | |
after this closing eleven postmen started to scour the town, collecting | |
on their way letters and newspapers. Each man carried a locked leather | |
wallet, into which, through an opening, letters and other articles were | |
placed, the postmen receiving a fee of a penny on every letter, and a | |
halfpenny on every newspaper. This was a personal fee to the men over | |
and above the ordinary postage. To warn the public of the postman's | |
approach each man carried a large bell, which he rang vigorously as he | |
went his rounds. These men, besides taking up letters for the public, | |
called also at the receiving offices for any letters left for them upon | |
which the special fee had been paid, and the "ringers" had to reach the | |
chief office one hour before the despatch of the night mail. This custom | |
seems to have yielded considerable emolument to the men concerned, for | |
when it was abolished compensation was given for the loss of fees, the | |
annual payments ranging from L10 8s., to L36 8s. Increased posting | |
facilities, and the infusion of greater activity into the performance of | |
post-office work, were no doubt the things which "rang the parting | |
knell" of these useful servants of the period. | |
[Illustration: THE BELLMAN COLLECTING LETTERS FOR DESPATCH.] | |
The slow and infrequent conveyance of mails by the ordinary post in | |
former times gave rise to the necessity for "Expresses." By this term is | |
meant the despatch of a single letter by man and horse, to be passed on | |
from stage to stage without delay to its destination. In an official | |
instruction of 1824 the speed to be observed was thus described: "It is | |
expected that all Expresses shall be conveyed at the rate of seven | |
miles, at least, within the hour." The charge made was 11d. per mile, | |
arising as follows, viz.:--7 1/2d. per mile for the horse, 2d. per mile for | |
the rider, and 1 1/2d. per mile for the post-horse duty. The postmaster who | |
despatched the Express, and the postmaster who received it for delivery, | |
were each entitled to 2s. 6d. for their trouble. | |
It will perhaps be convenient to look at the packet service apart from | |
the land service, though progress is as remarkable in the one as in the | |
other. During the wars of the latter half of the last century, the | |
packets, small as they were, were armed packets. But we almost smile in | |
recording the armaments carried. Here is an account of the arms of the | |
_Roebuck_ packet as inventoried in 1791:-- | |
2 Carriage guns. | |
4 Muskets and bayonets. | |
4 Brass Blunderbusses. | |
4 Cutlasses. | |
4 Pair of Pistols. | |
3 old Cartouch-boxes. | |
In our own estuaries and seas the packets were not free from | |
molestation, and were in danger of being taken. In 1779 the Carron | |
Company were running vessels from the Forth to London, and the following | |
notice was issued by them as an inducement to persons travelling between | |
these places:-- | |
"The Carron vessels are fitted out in the most complete manner for | |
defence, at a very considerable expense, and are well provided with | |
small arms. All mariners, recruiting parties, soldiers upon furlow, and | |
all other steerage passengers who have been accustomed to the use of | |
firearms, and who will engage to assist in defending themselves, will be | |
accommodated with their passage to and from London upon satisfying the | |
masters for their provisions, which in no instance shall exceed 10s. 6d. | |
sterling." This was the year in which Paul Jones visited the Firth of | |
Forth, and was spreading terror all round the coasts. The following was | |
the service of the packets in the year 1780. Five packets were employed | |
between Dover and Ostend and Calais, the despatches being made on | |
Wednesdays and Saturdays. Between Harwich and Holland three were | |
employed, the sailings in this case also taking place on Wednesdays and | |
Saturdays. For New York and the West India Service twelve packets were | |
engaged, sailing from Falmouth on the first Wednesday of every month. | |
Four packets performed the duty between Falmouth and Lisbon, sailing | |
every Saturday; and five packets kept up the Irish communication, | |
sailing daily between Holyhead and Dublin. In the year 1798, a mail | |
service seems to have been kept up by packets sailing from Yarmouth to | |
Cuxhaven, at the mouth of the Elbe, respecting which the following | |
particulars may be interesting. They are taken from an old letter-book. | |
"The passage-money to the office is 12s. 6d. for whole passengers, and | |
6s. 6d. for half passengers, either to or from England; 6d. of which is | |
to be paid to the Captain for small beer, which both the whole and half | |
passengers are to be informed of their being entitled to when they | |
embark. | |
"1s. 6d. is allowed as a perquisite on each whole passenger, 1s. of | |
which to the agent at Cuxhaven for every whole passenger embarking for | |
England, and the other 6d. to the agent at Yarmouth; and in like manner | |
1s. to the agent at Yarmouth on every whole passenger embarking for the | |
Continent, and 6d. to the agent at Cuxhaven; but no fee whatever is to | |
be taken on half passengers, so that 10s. 6d. must be accounted for to | |
the Revenue on each whole passenger, and 6s. on each half passenger." | |
Half passengers were servants, young children, or persons in low | |
circumstances. | |
While touching upon passage-money, it may be noted that in 1811 the fare | |
from Weymouth to Jersey or Guernsey, for cabin passengers, was, to the | |
captain, 15s. 6d. and to the office 10s. 6d.--or L1, 6s. in all. | |
The mail packets performing the service between England and Ireland in | |
the first quarter of the present century were not much to boast of. | |
According to a survey taken at Holyhead in July 1821, the vessels | |
employed to carry the mails between that port and Dublin were of very | |
small tonnage, as will be seen by the following table:-- | |
Uxbridge, 93 tons. | |
Pelham, 98 " | |
Duke of Montrose, 98 " | |
Chichester, 102 " | |
Union, 104 " | |
Countess of Liverpool, 114 " | |
The valuation of these crafts, including rigging, furniture, and | |
fitting, ranged from L1600 to L2400. | |
The failures or delays in making the passage across the Channel are thus | |
described by Cleland in his _Annals of Glasgow_: "It frequently | |
happens," says he, "that the mail packet is windbound at the mouth of | |
the Liffey for several days together"; and we have seen it stated in a | |
newspaper article that the packets crossing to Ireland by the | |
Portpatrick route were sometimes delayed a couple of weeks by contrary | |
winds. | |
A few years previously an attempt had been made to introduce | |
steam-packets for the Holyhead and Dublin service; but this improved | |
service was not at that time adopted. Referring to the year 1816, | |
Cleland writes: "The success of steamboats on the Clyde induced some | |
gentlemen in Dublin to order two vessels to be made to ply as packets in | |
the Channel between Dublin and Holyhead, with a view of ultimately | |
carrying the mail. The dimensions are as follows:--viz., keel 65 feet, | |
beam 18 feet, with 9 feet draught of water--have engines of 20 | |
horse-power, and are named the 'Britannia' and 'Hibernia.'" These were | |
the modest ideas then held as to the power of steam to develop and | |
expedite the packet service. In the period from 1850-60, when steam had | |
been adopted upon the Holyhead and Dublin route, one of the first | |
contract vessels was the _Prince Arthur_, having a gross tonnage of 400, | |
and whose speed was thirteen or fourteen knots an hour. The latest | |
addition to this line of packets is the _Ireland_ a magnificent ship of | |
2095 tons gross, and of 7000 horse-power. Its rate of speed is | |
twenty-two knots an hour. | |
As regards the American packet service perhaps greater strides than | |
these even have been achieved. Prior to 1840 the vessels carrying the | |
mails across the Atlantic were derisively called "coffin brigs," whose | |
tonnage was probably about 400. At any rate, as will be seen later on, a | |
packet in which Harriet Martineau crossed the Atlantic in 1836 was one | |
of only 417 tons. On the 4th July 1840, a company, which is now the | |
Cunard Company, started a contract service for the mails to America, the | |
steamers employed having a tonnage burden of 1154 and indicated | |
horse-power of 740. Their average speed was 8 1/2 knots. In 1853 the | |
packets had attained to greater proportions and higher speed, the | |
average length of passage from Liverpool to New York being twelve days | |
one hour fourteen minutes. As years rolled on competition and the | |
exigencies of the times called for still more rapid transit, and at | |
the present day the several companies performing the American Mail | |
Service have afloat palatial ships of 7000 to 10,000 tons, bringing | |
America within a week's touch of Great Britain. | |
[Illustration: HOLYHEAD AND KINGSTOWN MAIL PACKET "PRINCE ARTHUR"--400 | |
TONS--PERIOD 1850-60. | |
(_From a painting, the property of the City of Dublin Steam Packet | |
Company._)] | |
Going back a little more than a hundred years, it is of interest to see | |
how irregular were the communications to and from foreign ports by mail | |
packet. Benjamin Franklin, writing of the period 1757, mentions the | |
following circumstances connected with a voyage he made from New York to | |
Europe in that year. The packets were at the disposition of General Lord | |
Loudon, then in charge of the army in America; and Franklin had to | |
travel from Philadelphia to New York to join the packet, Lord Loudon | |
having preceded him to the port of despatch. The General told Franklin | |
confidentially, that though it had been given out that the packet would | |
sail on Saturday next, still it would not sail till Monday. He was, | |
however, advised not to delay longer. "By some accidental hindrance at a | |
ferry," writes Franklin, "it was Monday noon before I arrived, and I | |
was much afraid she might have sailed, as the wind was fair; but I was | |
soon made easy by the information that she was still in the harbour, and | |
would not leave till the next day. One would imagine that I was now on | |
the very point of departing for Europe. I thought so; but I was not then | |
so well acquainted with his Lordship's character, of which indecision | |
was one of the strongest features. It was about the beginning of April | |
that I came to New York, and it was near the end of June before we | |
sailed. There were then two of the packet-boats which had long been in | |
port, but were detained for the General's letters, which were always to | |
be ready _to-morrow_. Another packet arrived; she, too, was detained; | |
and, before we sailed, a fourth was expected. Ours was the first to be | |
despatched, as having been there longest. Passengers were engaged in | |
all, and some extremely impatient to be gone, and the merchants uneasy | |
about their letters, and the orders they had given for insurance (it | |
being war-time) for fall goods; but their anxiety availed nothing; his | |
Lordship's letters were not ready; and yet, whoever waited on him found | |
him always at his desk, pen in hand, and concluded he must needs write | |
abundantly." | |
Apart from the manifest inconvenience of postal service conducted in the | |
way described, one cannot wonder that the affairs of the American | |
Colonies should get into a bad way when conducted under a policy of so | |
manifest vacillation and indecision. | |
But the irregular transmission of mails between America and Europe was | |
not a thing referring merely to the year 1757, for Franklin, writing | |
from Passy, near Paris, in the year 1782, again dwells upon the | |
uncertainty of the communication. "We are far from the sea-ports," he | |
says, "and not well informed, and often misinformed, about the sailing | |
of the vessels. Frequently we are told they are to sail in a week or | |
two, and often they lie in the ports for months after with our letters | |
on board, either waiting for convoy or for other reasons. The | |
post-office here is an unsafe conveyance; many of the letters we receive | |
by it have evidently been opened, and doubtless the same happens to | |
those we send; and, at this time particularly, there is so violent a | |
curiosity in all kinds of people to know something relating to the | |
negotiations, and whether peace may be expected, or a continuance of the | |
war, that there are few private hands or travellers that we can trust | |
with carrying our despatches to the sea-coast; and I imagine that they | |
may sometimes be opened and destroyed, because they cannot be well | |
sealed." | |
Harriet Martineau gives an insight into the way in which mails were | |
treated on board American packets in the year 1836, which may be held to | |
be almost in recent times; yet the treatment is such that a | |
Postmaster-General of to-day would be roused to indignation at the | |
outrage perpetrated upon them. She thus writes: "I could not leave such | |
a sight, even for the amusement of hauling over the letter-bags. Mr. | |
Ely put on his spectacles; Mrs. Ely drew a chair; others lay along on | |
deck to examine the superscriptions of the letters from Irish emigrants | |
to their friends. It is wonderful how some of these epistles reach their | |
destinations; the following, for instance, begun at the top left-hand | |
corner, and elaborately prolonged to the bottom right one:--Mrs. A. B. | |
ile of Man douglas wits sped England. The letter-bags are opened for the | |
purpose of sorting out those which are for delivery in port from the | |
rest. A fine day is always chosen, generally towards the end of the | |
voyage, when amusements become scarce and the passengers are growing | |
weary. It is pleasant to sit on the rail and see the passengers gather | |
round the heap of letters, and to hear the shouts of merriment when any | |
exceedingly original superscription comes under notice." Such liberties | |
with the mails in the present day would excite consternation in the | |
headquarters of the Post Office Department. Nor is this all. Miss | |
Martineau makes the further remark--"The two Miss O'Briens appeared | |
to-day on deck, speaking to nobody, sitting on the same seats, with | |
their feet _on the same letter-bag_, reading two volumes of the same | |
book, and dressed alike," etc. The mail-bags turned into footstools, | |
forsooth! It is interesting to note the size of the packet in which this | |
lady crossed the Atlantic. It was the _Orpheus_, Captain Bursley, a | |
vessel of 417 tons. In looking back on these times, and knowing what | |
dreadful storms our huge steamers encounter between Europe and America, | |
we cannot but admire the courage which must have inspired men and women | |
to embark for distant ports in crafts so frail.[4] It is well also to | |
note that the transit from New York occupied the period from the 1st to | |
the 26th August, the better part of four weeks. | |
Reference has been made to the fact that a century ago the little | |
packets, to which the mails and passengers were consigned, were built | |
for fighting purposes. It was no uncommon thing for them to fall into | |
the hands of an enemy; but they did not always succumb without doing | |
battle, and sometimes they had the honours of the day. In 1793 the | |
_Antelope_ packet fought a privateer off the coast of Cuba and captured | |
it, after 49 of the 65 men the privateer carried had been killed or | |
disabled. The _Antelope_ had only two killed and three wounded--one | |
mortally. In 1803 the _Lady Hobart_, a vessel of 200 tons, sailing from | |
Nova Scotia for England, fell in with and captured a French schooner; | |
but the _Lady Hobart_ a few days later ran into an iceberg, receiving | |
such damage that she shortly thereafter foundered. The mails were loaded | |
with iron and thrown overboard, and the crew and passengers, taking to | |
the boats, made for Newfoundland, which they reached after enduring | |
great hardships. | |
The introduction of the uniform Penny Postage, under the scheme with | |
which Sir Rowland Hill's name is so intimately associated, and the | |
Jubilee of which occurs in the present year, marks an important epoch in | |
the review which is now under consideration. To enter into a history of | |
the Penny Postage agitation would be beyond the scope of these pages. | |
Like all great schemes, the idea propounded was fought against inch by | |
inch, and the battle, so far as the objectors are concerned, remains a | |
memorial of the incapacity of a great portion of mankind to think out | |
any scheme on its merits. Whatever is new is sure to be opposed, | |
apparently on no other ground than that of novelty, and in this bearing | |
men are often not unlike some of the lower creatures in the scale of | |
animated nature, that start and fly from things which they have not seen | |
before, though they may have no more substance than that of a shadow. | |
However this may be, the Penny Postage measure has produced stupendous | |
results. In 1839, the year before the reduction of postage, the letters | |
passing through the post in the United Kingdom were 82,500,000. In 1840, | |
under the Penny Postage Scheme, the number immediately rose to nearly | |
169,000,000. That is to say, the letters were doubled in number. Ten | |
years later the number rose to 347,000,000, and in last year (1889) | |
the total number of letters passing through the Post Office in this | |
country was 1,558,000,000. In addition to the letters, however, the | |
following articles passed through the post last year--Book Packets and | |
Circulars, 412,000,000; Newspapers 152,000,000; Post Cards 201,000,000. | |
* * * * * | |
_Form of Petition used in agitation for the Uniform Penny Postage._ | |
UNIFORM PENNY POSTAGE. | |
(FORM OF A PETITION.) | |
TO THE HONOURABLE THE LORDS SPIRITUAL AND TEMPORAL [_or_, THE COMMONS, | |
_as the case may be_] IN PARLIAMENT ASSEMBLED:-- | |
The humble Petition of the Undersigned [_to be filled up with the name | |
of Place, Corporation, &c._] | |
SHEWETH, | |
That your Petitioners earnestly desire an Uniform Penny Post, payable in | |
advance, as proposed by Rowland Hill, and recommended by the Report of | |
the Select Committee of the House of Commons. | |
That your Petitioners intreat your Honourable House to give speedy | |
effect to this Report. And your Petitioners will ever pray. | |
* * * | |
MOTHERS AND FATHERS that wish to hear from their absent children! | |
FRIENDS who are parted, that wish to write to each other! | |
EMIGRANTS that do not forget their native homes! | |
FARMERS that wish to know the best Markets! | |
MERCHANTS AND TRADESMEN that wish to receive Orders and Money quickly | |
and cheaply! | |
MECHANICS AND LABOURERS that wish to learn where good work and high | |
wages are to be had! _support_ the Report of the House of Commons with | |
your Petitions for an UNIFORM PENNY POST. Let every City and Town and | |
Village, every Corporation, every Religious Society and Congregation, | |
petition, and let every one in the kingdom sign a Petition with his name | |
or his mark. | |
THIS IS NO QUESTION OF PARTY POLITICS. | |
Lord Ashburton, a Conservative, and one of the richest Noblemen in the | |
country, spoke these impressive words before the House of Commons | |
Committee--"Postage is one of the worst of our Taxes; it is, in fact, | |
taxing the conversation of people who live at a distance from each | |
other. The communication of letters by persons living at a distance is | |
the same as a communication by word of mouth between persons living in | |
the same town." | |
"Sixpence," says Mr. Brewin, "is the third of a poor man's income; if a | |
gentleman, who had 1,000_l._ a year, or 3_l._ a day, had to pay | |
one-third of his daily income, a sovereign, for a letter, how often | |
would he write letters of friendship! Let a gentleman put that to | |
himself, and then he will be able to see how the poor man cannot be able | |
to pay Sixpence for his Letter." | |
* * * | |
READER! | |
If you can get any Signatures to a Petition, make two Copies of the | |
above on two half sheets of paper; get them signed as numerously as | |
possible; fold each up separately; put a slip of paper around, leaving | |
the ends open; direct one to a Member of the House of Lords, the other | |
to a Member of the House of Commons, LONDON, and put them into the Post | |
Office. | |
* * * | |
_Reproduced from a handbill in the collection of the late Sir Henry | |
Cole, K.C.B. By permission of Lady Cole._ | |
* * * * * | |
Should any reader desire to inform himself with some degree of fulness | |
of the stages through which the Penny Postage agitation passed, he | |
cannot do better than peruse Sir Henry Cole's _Fifty Years of Public | |
Work_. | |
The Postmaster-General, speaking at the Jubilee Meeting at the London | |
Guildhall, on the 16th May last, thus contrasted the work of 1839 with | |
that of 1889: "Although I would not to-night weary an assemblage like | |
this with tedious and tiresome figures, it may be at least permitted to | |
me to remind you that, whereas in the year immediately preceding the | |
establishment of the Penny Postage the number of letters delivered in | |
the United Kingdom amounted to[5] 76,000,000, the number of letters | |
delivered in this country last year was nearly 1,600,000,000--twenty | |
times the number of letters which passed through the post fifty years | |
ago. To these letters must be added the 652,000,000 of post-cards and | |
other communications by the halfpenny post, and the enormous number of | |
newspapers, which bring the total number of communications passing | |
through the post to considerably above two billions. I venture to say | |
that this is the most stupendous result of any administrative change | |
which the world has witnessed. If you estimate the effect of that upon | |
our daily life; if you pause for a moment to consider how trade and | |
business have been facilitated and developed; how family relations have | |
been maintained and kept together; if you for a moment allow your mind | |
to dwell upon the change which is implied in that great fact to which I | |
have called attention, I think you will see that the establishment of | |
the penny post has done more to change--and change for the better--the | |
face of Old England than almost any other political or social project | |
which has received the sanction of Legislature within our history." | |
Among the Penny Postage literature issued in the year 1840 there are | |
several songs. One of these was published at Leith, and is given below. | |
It is entitled "Hurrah for the Postman, the great Roland Hill." The | |
leaflet is remarkable for this, that it is headed by a picture of | |
postmen rushing through the streets delivering letters on roller skates. | |
It is generally believed that roller skates are quite a modern | |
invention, and in the absence of proof to the contrary it may be fair to | |
assume that the author of the song anticipated the inventor in this mode | |
of progression. So there really seems to be nothing new under the sun! | |
HURRAH FOR THE POSTMAN, THE GREAT ROLAND HILL.[6] | |
"Come, send round the liquor, and fill to the brim | |
A bumper to Railroads, the Press, Gas, and Steam; | |
To rags, bags, and nutgalls, ink, paper, and quill, | |
The Post, and the Postman, the gude Roland Hill! | |
By steam we noo travel mair quick than the eagle, | |
A sixty mile trip for the price o' a sang! | |
A prin it has powntit--th' Atlantic surmountit, | |
We'll compass the globe in a fortnight or lang. | |
The gas bleezes brightly, you witness it nightly, | |
Our ancestors lived unca lang in the dark; | |
Their wisdom was folly, their sense melancholy | |
When compared wi' sic wonderfu' modern wark. | |
Neist o' rags, bags, and size then, let no one despise them, | |
Without them whar wad a' our paper come frae? | |
The dark flood o' ink too, I'm given to think too, | |
Could as ill be wanted at this time o' day. | |
The Quill is a queer thing, a cheap and a dear thing, | |
A weak-lookin' object, but gude kens how strang, | |
Sometimes it is ceevil, sometimes it's the deevil. | |
Tak tent when you touch it, you haudna it wrang. | |
The Press I'll next mention, a noble invention, | |
The great mental cook with resources so vast; | |
It spreads on bright pages the knowledge o' ages, | |
And tells to the future the things of the past. | |
Hech, sirs! but its awfu' (but ne'er mind it's lawfu') | |
To saddle the Postman wi' sic meikle bags; | |
Wi' epistles and sonnets, love billets and groan-ets, | |
Ye'll tear the poor Postie to shivers and rags. | |
Noo Jock sends to Jenny, it costs but ae penny, | |
A screed that has near broke the Dictionar's back, | |
Fu' o' dove-in and dear-in, and _thoughts_ on the shearin'!! | |
Nae need noo o' whisp'rin' ayont a wheat stack. | |
Auld drivers were lazy, their mail-coaches crazy, | |
At ilk public-house they stopt for a gill; | |
But noo at the gallop, cheap mail-bags maun wallop. | |
Hurrah for our Postman, the great Roland Hill. | |
"Then send round the liquor," etc. | |
The advantages resulting from a rapid and cheap carriage of letters must | |
readily occur to any ordinary mind; but perhaps the following would | |
hardly suggest itself as one of those advantages. Dean Alford thus | |
wrote about the usefulness of post-cards, introduced on the 1st October | |
1870: "You will also find a new era in postage begun. The halfpenny | |
cards have become a great institution. Some of us make large use of them | |
to write short Latin epistles on, and are brushing up our Cicero and | |
Pliny for that purpose." | |
Unlike some of the branches of post-office work, other than the | |
distribution of news, either by letter or newspaper, the money order | |
system dates from long before the introduction of penny postage--namely | |
from the year 1792. | |
It was set on foot by some of the post-office clerks on their own | |
account; but it was not till 1838 that it became a recognised business | |
of the Department. Owing to high rates of commission, and to high | |
postage, little business was done in the earlier years. In 1839 less | |
than 190,000 orders were issued of the value of L313,000, while last | |
year the total number of transactions within the United Kingdom was | |
9,228,183, representing a sum of nearly L23,000,000 sterling. | |
In the year 1861 the Post Office entered upon the business of banking by | |
the establishment of the Post Office Savings Banks. At the present time | |
there are upwards of 9000 offices within the kingdom at which Post | |
Office Savings Bank business is transacted. The number of persons having | |
accounts with these banks is now 4,220,927, and the annual deposits | |
represent a gross sum of over L19,000,000. | |
In order of time the next additional business taken up by the Department | |
was that of the telegraphs. Before 1870 the telegraph work for the | |
public was carried on by several commercial companies and by the railway | |
companies; but in that year this business became a monopoly, like the | |
transmission of letters, in the hands of the Post Office. The work of | |
taking over these various telegraphs, and, consolidating them into a | |
harmonious whole, was one of gigantic proportions, requiring indomitable | |
courage and unwearying energy, as well as consummate ability; and when | |
the history of this enterprise comes to be written, it will perhaps be | |
found that the undertaking, in magnitude and importance, comes in no | |
measure short of the Penny Postage scheme of Sir Rowland Hill. | |
In the first year of the control of the telegraphs by the Post Office | |
the number of messages sent was nearly 9,472,000, excluding 700,000 | |
press messages. At that time the minimum charge was 1s. per message. In | |
1885 the minimum was reduced to 6d., and under this rate the number of | |
messages rose last year to 62,368,000. | |
The most recent addition of importance to the varied work of the Post | |
Office is that of the Parcel Post. This business was started in 1883. In | |
the first year of its operation the number of inland parcels transmitted | |
was upwards of 22,900,000. Last year the number, including a proportion | |
of foreign and colonial parcels, rose to 39,500,000, earning a gross | |
postage of over L878,547. The uniform rates in respect of distance, the | |
vast number of offices where parcels are received and delivered, and the | |
extensive machinery at the command of the Post Office for the work, | |
render this business one of extreme accommodation to the public. Not | |
only is the Parcel Post taken advantage of for the transmission of | |
ordinary business or domestic parcels, but it is made the channel for | |
the exchange of all manner of out-of-the-way articles. The following are | |
some instances of the latter class observed at Edinburgh: Scotch oatmeal | |
going to Paris, Naples, and Berlin; bagpipes for the Lower Congo, and | |
for native regiments in the Punjaub; Scotch haggis for Ontario, Canada, | |
and for Caebar, India; smoked haddocks for Rome; the great puzzle "Pigs | |
in Clover" for Bavaria, and for Wellington, New Zealand, and so on. At | |
home, too, curious arrangements come under notice. A family, for | |
example, in London find it to their advantage to have a roast of beef | |
sent to them by parcel post twice a week from a town in Fife. And a | |
gentleman of property, having his permanent residence in Devonshire, | |
finds it convenient, when enjoying the shooting season in the far | |
north-west of Scotland, to have his vegetables forwarded by parcel post | |
from his home garden in Devonshire to his shooting lodge in Scotland. | |
The postage on these latter consignments sometimes amounts to about | |
fifteen shillings a day, a couple of post-office parcel hampers being | |
required for their conveyance. | |
And we should not omit to mention here the number of persons employed in | |
the Post by whom this vast amount of most diverse business is carried on | |
for the nation. Of head and sub-postmasters and letter receivers, each | |
of whom has a post-office under his care, there are 17,770. The other | |
established offices of the Post Office number over 40,500, and there | |
are, besides, persons employed in unestablished positions to the number | |
of over 50,000. Thus there is a great army of no less than 108,000 | |
persons serving the public in the various domains of the postal service. | |
A century ago, and indeed down to a period only fifty years ago, the | |
world, looked at from the present vantage-ground, must appear to have | |
been in a dull, lethargic state, with hardly any pulse and a low | |
circulation. As for nerve system it had none. The changes which the Post | |
Office has wrought in the world, but more particularly in our own | |
country, are only to be fully perceived and appreciated by the | |
thoughtful. Now the heart of the nation throbs strongly at the centre, | |
while the current of activity flows quickly and freely to the remotest | |
corners of the state. The telegraph provides a nervous system unknown | |
before. By its means every portion of the country is placed in immediate | |
contact with every other part; the thrill of joy and the moan of | |
desolation are no longer things of locality; they are shared fully and | |
immediately by the whole; and the interest of brotherhood, extending to | |
parts of the country which, under other conditions, must have remained | |
unknown and uncared for, makes us realise that all men are but members | |
of one and the same family. | |
The freedom and independence now enjoyed by the individual, as a result | |
of the vast influence exercised by society through the rapid exchange of | |
thought, is certainly a thing of which the people of our own country | |
may well be proud. Right can now assert itself in a way which was | |
entirely beyond the reach of our predecessors of a hundred years ago; | |
and wrong receives summary judgment at the hands of a whole people. Yet | |
there is a growing danger that this great liberty of the individual may | |
become, in one direction, a spurious liberty, and that the elements of | |
physical force, exerting themselves under the aegis of uncurbed freedom, | |
may enter into conspiracy against intellect, individual effort, and | |
thrift in such a way as to produce a tyranny worse than that existing in | |
the most despotic states. | |
The introduction of the telegraph, and the greater facilities afforded | |
by the press for the general distribution of news, have greatly changed | |
the nature of commercial speculation. Formerly, when news came from | |
abroad at wide intervals, it was of the utmost consequence to obtain | |
early command of prices and information as to movements in the markets, | |
and whoever gained the news first had the first place in the race. | |
Nowadays the telegraph, and the newspapers by the help of the | |
telegraph, give all an equal start, and the whole world knows at once | |
what is going on in every capital of the globe. The thirst for the first | |
possession of news in commercial life is happily described in _Glasgow | |
Past and Present_, wherein the author gives an account of a practice | |
prevailing in the Tontine Reading Rooms at the end of last century. | |
"Immediately on receiving the bag of papers from the post-office," says | |
the writer, "the waiter locked himself up in the bar, and after he had | |
sorted the different papers and had made them up in a heap, he unlocked | |
the door of the bar, and making a sudden rush into the middle of the | |
room, he then tossed up the whole lot of newspapers as high as the | |
ceiling of the room. Now came the grand rush and scramble of the | |
subscribers, every one darting forward to lay hold of a falling | |
newspaper. Sometimes a lucky fellow got hold of five or six newspapers | |
and ran off with them to a corner, in order to select his favourite | |
paper; but he was always hotly pursued by some half-dozen of the | |
disappointed scramblers, who, without ceremony, pulled from his hands | |
the first paper they could lay hold of, regardless of its being torn in | |
the contest. On these occasions I have often seen a heap of gentlemen | |
sprawling on the floor of the room and riding upon one another's backs | |
like a parcel of boys. It happened, however, unfortunately, that a | |
gentleman in one of these scrambles got two of his teeth knocked out of | |
his head, and this ultimately brought about a change in the manner of | |
delivering the newspapers." | |
[Illustration: THE TONTINE READING-ROOMS, GLASGOW--ARRIVAL OF THE | |
MAIL--PERIOD: END OF LAST CENTURY. (_After an old print._)] | |
Another instance of the anxiety for early news is exhibited in a | |
practice which prevailed in Glasgow about fifty years ago. The Glasgow | |
merchants were deeply interested in shipping and other news coming from | |
Liverpool. The mail at that period arrived in Glasgow some time in the | |
afternoon during business hours. A letter containing quotations from | |
Liverpool for the Royal Exchange was due in the mail daily. This letter | |
was enclosed in a conspicuously bright red cover, and it was the | |
business of the post-office clerk, immediately he opened the Liverpool | |
bag, to seize this letter and hand it to a messenger from the Royal | |
Exchange who was in attendance at the Post Office to receive it. This | |
messenger hastened to the Exchange, rang a bell to announce the arrival | |
of the news, and forthwith the contents of the letter were posted up in | |
the Exchange. The merchants who had offices within sound of the bell | |
were then seen hurrying to the Exchange buildings, to be cheered or | |
depressed as the case might be by the information which the mail had | |
brought them. | |
A clever instance of how the possession of early news could be turned to | |
profitable account in the younger days of the century is recorded of Mr. | |
John Rennie, a nephew of his namesake the great engineer, and an | |
extensive dealer in corn and cattle. His headquarters at the time were | |
at East Linton, near Dunbar. "At one period of his career Mr. Rennie | |
habitually visited London either for business or pleasure, or both | |
combined. One day, when present at the grain market, in Mark Lane, | |
sudden war news arrived, in consequence of which the price of wheat | |
immediately bounded up 20s., 25s., and even 30s. per quarter. At once he | |
saw his opportunity and left for Scotland by the next mail. He knew, of | |
course, that the mail carried the startling war news to Edinburgh, but | |
he trusted to his wit to outdo it by reaching the northern capital | |
first. As the coach passed the farm of Skateraw, some distance east of | |
Dunbar, it was met by the farmer, old Harry Lee, on horseback. Rennie, | |
who was an outside passenger, no sooner recognised Lee than he sprang | |
from his seat on the coach to the ground. Coming up to Lee, Rennie | |
hurriedly whispered something to him, and induced him to lend his horse | |
to carry Rennie on to East Linton. Rennie, who was an astonishingly | |
active man, vaulted into the saddle, and immediately rode off at full | |
gallop westwards. The day was a Wednesday, and, as it was already 11 | |
o'clock forenoon, he knew that he had no time to lose; but he was not | |
the stamp of man to allow the grass to grow under his feet on such an | |
important occasion. Ere he reached Dunbar the mail was many hundred | |
yards behind. At his own place at East Linton he drew up, mounted his | |
favourite horse "Silvertail," which for speed and endurance had no rival | |
in the county, and again proceeded at the gallop. When he reached the | |
Grassmarket, Edinburgh--a full hour before the mail,--the grain-selling | |
was just starting, and before the alarming war news had got time to | |
spread Rennie had every peck of wheat in the market bought up. He must | |
have coined an enormous profit by this smart transaction; but to him it | |
seemed to matter nothing at all. He was one of the most careless of the | |
harum-scarum sons of Adam, and if he made money easily, so in a like | |
manner did he let it slip his grip." | |
The two following instances of the expedients to which merchants | |
resorted, before the introduction of the telegraph, in cases of urgency, | |
and when the letter post would not serve them, are given by the author | |
of _Glasgow Past and Present_, to whose work reference has already been | |
made:-- | |
"During the French War the premiums of insurance upon running ships | |
(ships sailing without convoy) were very high, in consequence of which | |
several of our Glasgow ship-owners who possessed quick-sailing vessels | |
were in the practice of allowing the expected time of arrival of their | |
ships closely to approach before they effected insurance upon them, thus | |
taking the chance of a quick passage being made, and if the ships | |
arrived safe the insurance was saved. | |
"Mr. Archibald Campbell, about this time an extensive Glasgow merchant, | |
had allowed one of his ships to remain uninsured till within a short | |
period of her expected arrival; at last, getting alarmed, he attempted | |
to effect insurance in Glasgow, but found the premium demanded so high | |
that he resolved to get his ship and cargo insured in London. | |
Accordingly, he wrote a letter to his broker in London, instructing him | |
to get the requisite insurance made on the best terms possible, but, at | |
all events, to get the said insurance effected. This letter was | |
despatched through the post-office in the ordinary manner, the mail at | |
that time leaving Glasgow at two o'clock p.m. At seven o'clock the same | |
night Mr. Campbell received an express from Greenock announcing the safe | |
arrival of his ship. Mr. Campbell, on receiving this intelligence, | |
instantly despatched his head clerk in pursuit of the mail, directing | |
him to proceed by postchaises-and-four with the utmost speed until he | |
overtook it, and then to get into it; or, if he could not overtake it, | |
he was directed to proceed to London, and to deliver a letter to the | |
broker countermanding the instructions about insurance. The clerk, | |
notwithstanding of extra payment to the postilions, and every exertion | |
to accelerate his journey, was unable to overtake the mail; but he | |
arrived in London on the third morning shortly after the mail, and | |
immediately proceeded to the residence of the broker, whom he found | |
preparing to take his breakfast, and before delivery of the London | |
letters. The order for insurance written for was then countermanded, and | |
the clerk had the pleasure of taking a comfortable breakfast with the | |
broker. The expenses of this express amounted to L100; but it was said | |
that the premium of insurance, if it had been effected, would have | |
amounted to L1500, so that Mr. Campbell was reported to have saved L1400 | |
by his promptitude." | |
"At the period in question a rise had taken place in the cotton-market, | |
and there was a general expectancy among the cotton-dealers that there | |
would be a continued and steady advance of prices in every description | |
of cotton. Acting upon this belief Messrs. James Finlay & Co. had sent | |
out orders by post to their agent in India to make extensive purchases | |
of cotton on their account, to be shipped by the first vessels for | |
England. It so happened, however, shortly after these orders had been | |
despatched, that cotton fell in price, and a still greater fall was | |
expected to take place. Under these circumstances Messrs. Finlay & Co. | |
despatched an overland express to India countermanding their orders to | |
purchase cotton. This was the first, and, I believe, the only overland | |
express despatched from Glasgow to India by a private party on | |
commercial purposes." | |
One of the greatest achievements of our own time, yet too often | |
overlooked, is the marvellously rapid diffusion of parliamentary news | |
throughout the country. Important debates are frequently protracted in | |
the House of Commons into the early hours of the morning. The speeches | |
are instantly reported by the shorthand writers in the gallery, who dog | |
the lips of the speakers and commit their every word to paper. Thus | |
seized in the fleet lines of stenography, the words and phrases are then | |
transcribed into long-hand. Relays of messengers carry the copy to the | |
telegraph office, where the words are punched in the form of a | |
mysterious language on slips of paper like tape, which are run through | |
the Wheatstone telegraph transmitter, the electric current carrying the | |
news to distant stations at the rate of several hundred words a minute. | |
At these stations the receiving-machine pours out at an equal rate, | |
another tape, bearing a record in a different character, from which | |
relays of clerks, attending the oracle, convert the weighty sayings | |
again into ordinary language. The news thus received is carried | |
forthwith by a succession of messengers to the newspaper office; the | |
compositors set the matter up in type; it is reviewed and edited by the | |
men appointed to the duty; the columns are stereotyped, and in that form | |
are placed in the printing-machines. The machines are set in motion at | |
astonishing speed, turning out the newspapers cut and folded and ready | |
for the reader. A staff is in attendance to place under cover the copies | |
of subscribers for despatch by the early mails. These are carried to the | |
post-office, and so transmitted to their destinations. Taking Edinburgh | |
as a point for special consideration, all that has been stated applies | |
to this city. For the first despatches to the north, the _Scotsman_ and | |
_Leader_ newspapers are conveyed to certain trains as early as 4 A.M.; | |
and by the breakfast-hour, or early in the forenoon, the parliamentary | |
debates of the previous night are being discussed over the greater part | |
of Scotland. And all this hurry and intellectual activity is going on | |
while the nation at large is wrapped in sleep, and probably not one | |
person in a hundred ever thinks or concerns himself to know how it is | |
done. | |
The frequency and rapidity of communication between different parts of | |
the world seems to have brought the whole globe into a very small focus, | |
for obscure places, which would be unknown, one would think, beyond | |
their own immediate neighbourhoods, are frequently well within the | |
cognisance of persons living in far-distant quarters. An instance of | |
this is given by the postmaster of Epworth, a village near to Doncaster. | |
"We have," says the postmaster, "an odd place in this parish known as | |
Nineveh Farm. Some years ago a letter was received here which had been | |
posted somewhere in the United States of America, and was addressed | |
merely | |
Mr. ---- | |
NINEVEH. | |
I have always regarded its delivery to the proper person as little less | |
than a miracle, but it happened." | |
It is impossible to say how far the influence of this great revolution | |
in the mail service on land and sea may extend. That the change has | |
been, on the whole, to the advantage of mankind goes without saying. One | |
contrast is here given, and the reader can draw his own conclusions in | |
other directions. The peace of 1782, which followed the American War of | |
Independence, was only arrived at after negotiations extending over more | |
than two years. Prussia and Austria were at war in 1866. The campaign | |
occupied seven days; and from the declaration of war to the formal | |
conclusion of peace only seven weeks elapsed. Is it to be doubted that | |
the difference in the two cases was, in large measure, due to the fact | |
that news travelled slowly in the one case and fast in the other? | |
We may look back on the past with very mixed feelings,--dreaming of the | |
easy-going methods of our forefathers, which gave them leisure for study | |
and reflection, or esteeming their age as an age of lethargy, of | |
lumbering and slumbering. | |
We are proud of our own era, as one full of life and activity, full of | |
hurry and bustle, and as existing under the spell of high electrical | |
tension. But too many of us know to our cost that this present whirl of | |
daily life has one most serious drawback, summed up in the commonplace, | |
but not the less true, saying,-- | |
"It's the pace that kills." | |
Yet one more thought remains. Will the pace be kept up in the next | |
hundred years? There is no reason to suppose it will not, and the world | |
is hardly likely to go to sleep. Our successors who live a hundred years | |
hence will doubtless learn much that man has not yet dreamt of. Time | |
will produce many changes and reveal deep secrets; but as to what these | |
shall be, let him prophesy who knows. | |
FOOTNOTES: | |
[1] See Note A in Appendix. | |
[2] See Note D in Appendix. | |
[3] See Note B in Appendix. | |
[4] See Note C in Appendix. | |
[5] Exclusive of franked letters. | |
[6] From the collection of the late Sir Henry Cole in the Edinburgh | |
International Exhibition, 1890. | |
APPENDIX. | |
A. | |
As to the representation in Parliament, the freeholders in the whole of | |
the Counties of Scotland, who had the power of returning the County | |
Members, were, in 1823, for example, just under three thousand in | |
number. These were mostly gentlemen of position living on their estates, | |
with a sprinkling of professional men; the former being, from their want | |
of business training, ill suited, one would suppose, for conducting the | |
business of a nation. The Town Councils were self-elective--hotbeds of | |
corruption; and the members of these Town Councils were intrusted with | |
the power of returning the Members for the boroughs. The people at large | |
were not directly represented, if in strictness represented at all. | |
B. | |
Francis, afterwards Lord Jeffrey, in a letter of the 20th September | |
1799, describes the discomfort of a journey by mail from Perth to | |
Edinburgh, when the coach had broken down, and he was carried forward by | |
the guard by special conveyance. His graphic description is as | |
follows:--"I was roused carefully half an hour before four yesterday | |
morning, and passed two delightful hours in the kitchen waiting for the | |
mail. There was an enormous fire, and a whole household of smoke. The | |
waiter was snoring with great vehemency upon one of the dressers, and | |
the deep regular intonation had a very solemn effect, I can assure you, | |
in the obscurity of that Tartarean region, and the melancholy silence of | |
the morning. An innumerable number of rats were trottin and gibberin in | |
one end of the place, and the rain clattered freshly on the windows. The | |
dawn heavily in clouds brought on the day, but not, alas! the mail; and | |
it was long past five when the guard came galloping into the yard, upon | |
a smoking horse, with all the wet bags lumbering beside him (like | |
Scylla's water-dogs), roaring out that the coach was broken down | |
somewhere near Dundee, and commanding another steed to be got ready for | |
his transportation. The noise he made brought out the other two sleepy | |
wretches that had been waiting like myself for places, and we at length | |
persuaded the heroic champion to order a postchaise instead of a horse, | |
into which we crammed ourselves all four, with a whole mountain of | |
leather bags that clung about our legs like the entrails of a fat cow | |
all the rest of the journey. At Kinross, as the morning was very fine, | |
we prevailed with the guard to go on the outside to dry himself, and got | |
on to the ferry about eleven, after encountering various perils and | |
vexations, in the loss of horse-shoes and wheel-pins, and in a great gap | |
in the road, over which we had to lead the horses, and haul the carriage | |
separately. At this place we supplicated our agitator for leave to eat a | |
little breakfast; but he would not stop an instant, and we were obliged | |
to snatch up a roll or two apiece and gnaw the dry crusts during our | |
passage to keep soul and body together. We got in soon after one, and I | |
have spent my time in eating, drinking, sleeping, and other recreations, | |
down to the present hour." | |
On going north from Edinburgh, on the same tour apparently, Jeffrey had | |
previous experience of the difficulties of travel, as described in a | |
letter from Montrose, date 26th August 1799. | |
"We stopped," says he, "for two days at Perth, hoping for places in the | |
mail, and then set forward on foot in despair. We have trudged it now | |
for fifty miles, and came here this morning very weary, sweaty, and | |
filthy. Our baggage, which was to have left Perth the same day that we | |
did, has not yet made its appearance, and we have received the | |
comfortable information that it is often a week before there is room in | |
the mail to bring such a parcel forward." | |
Writing from Kendal, in 1841, Jeffrey refers to a journey he made fifty | |
years before--that is, about 1791--when he slept a night in the town. | |
His description of the circumstances is as follows:-- | |
"And an admirable dinner we have had in the Ancient King's Arms, with | |
great oaken staircases, uneven floors, and very thin oak panels, | |
plaster-filled outer walls, but capital new furniture, and the brightest | |
glass, linen, spoons, and china you ever saw. It is the same house in | |
which I once slept about fifty years ago, with the whole company of an | |
ancient stage-coach, which bedded its passengers on the way from | |
Edinburgh to London, and called them up by the waiter at six o'clock in | |
the morning to go five slow stages, and then have an hour to breakfast | |
and wash. It is the only vestige I remember of those old ways, and I | |
have not slept in the house since." | |
C. | |
The discomfort of a long voyage in a vessel of this class is well set | |
forth in the correspondence of Jeffrey. In 1813 he crossed to New York | |
in search of a wife; and in describing the miseries of the situation on | |
board, he gives a long list of his woes, the last being followed by this | |
declaration: "I think I shall make a covenant with myself, that if I get | |
back safe to my own place from this expedition, I shall never willingly | |
go out of sight of land again in my life." | |
D. | |
A notable instance of an attempt to shut the door in the face of an able | |
man is recorded in the Life of Sir James Simpson, who has made all the | |
world his debtors through the discovery and application of chloroform | |
for surgical operations. Plain Dr. Simpson was a candidate for a | |
professorship in the University of Edinburgh, and had his supporters for | |
the honour; but there was among the men with whom rested the selection a | |
considerable party opposed to him, whose ground of opposition was that, | |
on account of his parents being merely tradespeople, Dr. Simpson would | |
be unable to maintain the dignity of the chair. To their eternal | |
discredit, the persons referred to did not look to the quality and ring | |
of the "gowd," but were guided by the superficial "guinea stamp." The | |
spread of public opinion is gradually putting such distinctions, which | |
have their root and being in privilege and selfishness, out of court. | |
* * * * * | |
Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to Her Majesty, at the | |
Edinburgh University Press. | |
End of Project Gutenberg's A Hundred Years by Post, by J. Wilson Hyde | |
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