twenty years previous to Rowland Hill's reforms by a stationary | £144,000, and that which had nothing to do with distance was revenue. The following table will show the gross receipts, the charges of collection and management, and the net revenue (omitting fractions of a pound) of the post office of Great Britain. We give the figures for the year 1808 for the purpose of comparison.

Before passing to the reform of 1839 we have to revert to that important feature in postal history-the interference with correspondence for judicial or political purposes. We have Govern. already seen (1) that this assumption had no parliamental mentary sanction until the enactment of the 9th of Interference with Corre Queen Anne; (2) that the enactment differed from the spondence. royal proclamations in directing a special warrant for each opening or detention of correspondence. It is a significant gloss on the statute to find that for nearly a century (namely, until 1798 inclusive) it was not the practice to record such warrants regularly in any official book. Of the use to which the power was applied the state trials afford some remarkable instances. At the trial of Bishop Atterbury, for example, in 1723 certain letters were offered in evidence which a clerk of the post office deposed on oath "to be true copies of the originals, which were stopped at the post office and copied, and sent forward as directed." Hereupon Atterbury asked this witness" if he had any express warrant under the hand of one of the principal secretaries of state for opening the said letters." But the lords shelved his objection on the grounds of public inexpediency. Twenty-nine peers recorded their protest against this decision. But the practice thus sanctioned appears to have been pushed to such lengths as to elicit in April 1735 a strong protest and censure from the House of Commons. A committee of inquiry was appointed, and after receiving its report the house resolved that it was "an high infringement of the privileges of the . Commons of Great Britain in Parliament that letters of any member should be opened or delayed without a warrant of a principal secretary of state."

£282,000. Applying to these figures the estimated number of letters and newspapers (126,000,000) passing through the office, there resulted a probable average cost of 1% of a penny for each, of which was cost of transit and cost of receipt, delivery, &c. Taking into account, however, the greater weight of newspapers and franked letters as compared with chargeable letters, the apparent average cost of transit became, by this estimate, but about 18, or less than of a penny.

A detailed estimate of the cost of conveying a letter from London to Edinburgh, founded upon the average weight of the Edinburgh mail, gave a still lower proportion, since it reduced the apparent cost of transit, on the average, to the thirty-sixth part of one penny. Hill inferred that, if the charge for postage were to be made proportionate to the whole expense incurred in the receipt, transit and delivery of the letter, and in the collection of its postage, it must be made uniformly the same from every post-town to every other post-town in the United Kingdom, unless it could be shown how we are to collect so small a sum as the thirty-sixth part of a penny. And, inasmuch as it would take a ninefold weight to make the expense of transit amount to one farthing, he further inferred that, taxation apart, the charge ought to be precisely the same for every packet of moderate weight, without reference to the number of its enclosures.

At this period the rate of postage actually imposed (beyond the limits of the London district office) varied from 4d. to 1s. 8d. for a single letter, which was interpreted to mean a single piece of paper not exceeding an ounce in weight; a second piece of paper or any other enclosure, however small, constituted the packet a double letter. A single sheet of paper, if it at all exceeded an ounce in weight, was charged with fourfold postage. The average charge on inland general post letters was nearly 9d. for each. It was proposed that the charge for primary distribution-that is to say, the postage on all letters received in a post-town, and delivered in the same or in any other post-town in the British Isles- should be at the uniform rate of one penny for each half-ounce-all letters and other papers, whether single or multiple, forming one packet, and not weighing more than half an ounce, being charged one penny, and heavier packets, to any convenient limit, being charged an additional penny for each additional half-ounce. It was further proposed that stamped covers should be sold to the public at such a price as to include the postage, which would thus be collected in advance. By the public generally, and pre-eminently by the trading public, the plan was received with favour. By the functionaries of the post office it was denounced as ruinous and visionary. In 1838 petitions poured into the House of Commons. A select committee was appointed, which reported as follows:

Parlia

mentary Action.

Sir Rowland Hill's Reforms (1836-1842). Rowland Hill's pamphlet (Post Office Reform) of 1837 took for its starting-point the fact that, whereas the postal revenue showed for the past twenty years a positive though slight diminution, it ought to have showed an increase of £507,700 a year in order to have simply kept pace with the growth of population, and an increase of nearly four times that amount in "The principal points which appear to your committee to have order to have kept pace with the growth of the analogous though been established in evidence are the following: (1) the exceedfar less exorbitant duties imposed on stage-coaches. The stage-ingly slow advance and occasionally retrograde movement of the coach duties had produced, in 1815, £217,671; in 1835 they produced £498,497. In 1837 there did not exist any precise account of the number of letters transmitted through the general post office. Hill, however, was able to prepare a sufficiently approximate estimate from the data of the London district post, and from the sums collected for postage. He thus calculated the number of chargeable letters at about 88,600,000, that of franked letters at 7,400,000, and that of newspapers at 30,000,000, giving a gross total of about 126,000,000. At this period the total cost of management and distribution was £696,569. In the finance accounts of the year (1837) deductions are made from the gross revenue for letters "refused, missent, redirected," and the like, which amount to about £122,000. An analysis of the component parts of this expenditure assigned £426,517 to cost of primary distribution and £270,052 to cost of secondary distribution and miscellaneous charges. A further analysis of the primary distribution expenditure gave £282,308 as the probable outgoings for receipt and delivery, and £144.209 as the probablement of additional deliveries, and more frequent despatches of outgoings for transit. In other words, the expenditure which hinged upon the distance the letters had to be conveyed was

Report of Secret Committee on the Post Office (1844), p. 9.
Lords' Journals, xxii. 183-186; State Trials, xvi. 540 seq.

post office revenue during the... last twenty years; (2) the fact of the charge of postage exceeding the cost in a manifold proportion; (3) the fact of postage being evaded most extensively by all classes of society, and of correspondence being suppressed, more especially among the middle and working classes of the people, and this in consequence, as all the witnesses, including many of the post office authorities, think, of the excessively high scale of taxation; (4) the fact of very injurious effects resulting from this state of things to the commerce and industry of the country, and to the social habits and moral condition of the people; (5) the fact, as far as conclusions can be drawn from very imperfect data, that whenever on former occasions large reductions in the rates have been made, these reductions have been followed in short periods of time by an extension of correspondence proportionate to the contraction of the rates; (6) and, as matters of inference from fact and of opinion-(i.) that the only remedies for the evils above stated are a reduction of the rates, and the establish

letters; (ii.) that owing to the rapid extension of railroads there is an urgent and daily increasing necessity for making such changes; (iii.) that any moderate reduction in the rates would Post Office Reform, 27 seq.

occasion loss to the revenue, without in any material degree | diminishing the present amount of letters irregularly conveyed, or giving rise to the growth of new correspondence; (iv.) that the principle of a low uniform rate is just in itself, and, when combined with prepayment and collection by means of a stamp, would be exceedingly convenient and highly satisfactory to the public."

Nature of
Reforms.

A bill to enable the treasury to establish uniform penny postage was carried in the House of Commons by a majority of 100, and became law on the 17th of August 1839. A temporary office was created to enable Rowland Hill to superintend the working out of his plan. The first step taken was to reduce, on the 5th of December 1839, the London district postage to id. and the general inland postage to 4d. the half-ounce (existing lower rates being continued). On the 10th of January 1840 the uniform penny rate came into operation throughout the United Kingdom-the scale of weight advancing from id. for each of the first two half-ounces, by gradations of 2d. for each additional ounce, or fraction of an ounce, up to 16 oz. The postage was to be prepaid, and if not to be charged at double rates. Parliamentary franking was abolished. Postage stamps were introduced in May following. The facilities of despatch were soon afterwards increased by the establishment of day mails.

office after Sir Brian Tuke. Under him the legislation of 1839 was carried out in 1840 and 1841. In September 1841 he was succeeded by Viscount Lowther.

In the summer of 1844 the statement that the letters of Mazzini, then a political refugee, long resident in England, had been systematically opened, and their contents Opening and communicated to foreign governments, by Sir James Detention of Graham, secretary of state for the home department, Letters. aroused much indignation. The arrest of the brothers Bandiera, largely in consequence of information derived from their correspondence with Mazzini, and their subsequent execution at Cosenza made a thorough investigation into the circumstances a public necessity. The consequent parliamentary inquiry of August 1844, after retracing the earlier events connected with the exercise of the discretional power of inspection which parliament had vested in the secretaries of state in 1710, elicited the fact that in 1806 Lord Spencer, then secretary for the home department, introduced for the first time the practice of recording in an official book all warrants issued for the detention and opening of letters, and also the additional fact that from 1822 onwards the warrants themselves had been preserved. The whole number of such warrants issued from 1806 to the middle of 1844 inclusive was stated to be 323, of which no less than 53 had been issued in the years 1841-1844 inclusive, a number exceeding that of any previous period of like extent.

But on the important point of simplification in the internal economy of the post office, with the object of reducing its cost without diminishing its working power, little was done. The The committee of 1844 proceeded to report that " the warrants plan had to work in the face of rooted mistrust on the part of issued during the present century may be divided into two classes the workers. Its author was (for a term of two years, afterwards-1st, those issued in furtherance of criminal justice . . . ; 2nd, prolonged to three) the officer, not of the post office, but of the treasury. He could only recommend measures the most indispensable through the chancellor of the exchequer. It happened, too, that the scheme had to be tried at a period of severe commercial depression. Nevertheless, the results actually attained in the first two years were briefly these: (1) the Results. chargeable letters delivered in the United Kingdom, exclusive of that part of the government correspondence which theretofore passed free, had already increased from the rate of about 75,000,000 a year to that of 196,500,000; (2) the London district post letters had increased from about 13,000,000 to 23,000,000, or nearly in the ratio of the reduction of the rates; (3) the illicit conveyance of letters was substantially suppressed; (4) the gross revenue, exclusive of repayments, yielded about a million and a half per annum, which was about 63% of the amount of the gross revenue in 1839. These results at so early a stage, and in the face of so many obstructions. vindicated the new system.

Seven years later (1849) the 196,500,000 letters delivered throughout the United Kingdom in 1842 had increased to nearly 329,000,000. In addition, the following administrative improvements had been effected: (1) the time for posting letters at the London receiving-houses extended; (2) the limitation of weight abolished; (3) an additional daily despatch to London from the neighbouring (as yet independent) villages; (4) the postal arrangements of 120 of the largest cities and great towns revised; (5) unlimited writing on inland newspapers authorized on payment of an additional penny; (6) a summary process established for recovery of postage from the senders of unpaid letters when refused; (7) a book-post established; (8) registration reduced from one shilling to sixpence; (9) a third mail daily put on the railway (without additional charge) from the towns of the north-western district to London, and day mails extended within a radius of 20 m. round the metropolis; (10) a service of parliamentary returns, for private bills, provided for; (11) measures taken, against many obstacles, for the complete consolidation of the two heretofore distinct corps of letter-carriers-an improvement (on the whole) of detail, which led to other improvements thereafter.1

Later History (1842-1905).

When Sir R. Hill initiated his reform the postmaster-general was the earl of Lichfield, the thirty-first in succession to that Hill, History of Penny Postage (1880), appendix A (Life, &c., ii. 438). Part of the strenuousness of the opposition to this measure. arose, it must be owned, from the " high-handedness" which in Sir R. Hill's character somewhat marred very noble faculties. The change worked much harm to some humble but hardworking and meritorious functionaries.

those issued for the purpose of discovering the designs of persons
known or suspected to be engaged in proceedings dangerous to
the State, or (as in Mazzini's case) deeply involving British
interests, and carried on in the United Kingdom or in British
possessions beyond the scas.... Warrants of the second descrip-
tion originate with the home office. The principal secretary of
state, of his own discretion, determines when to issue them, and
gives instructions accordingly to the under-secretary, whose
office is then purely ministerial. The mode of preparing them,
and keeping record of them in a private book, is the same as in
the case of criminal warrants. There is no record kept of the
grounds on which they are issued, except so far as correspondence
preserved at the home office may lead to infer them."
... The
letters which have been detained and opened are, unless retained
by special order, as sometimes happens in criminal cases, closed
and resealed, without affixing any mark to indicate that they
have been so detained and opened, and are forwarded by post
according to their respective superscriptions."

Almost forty years later a like question was again raised in the House of Commons (March 1882) by some Irish members, in relation to an alleged examination of correspondence at Dublin for political reasons.

Sir William Harcourt on that occasion spoke thus: "This power is with the secretary of state in England. . ... In Ireland it belongs to the Irish government. . . . It is a power which is given for purposes of state, and the very essence of the power is that no account [of its exercise] can be rendered. To render an account would be to defcat the very object for which the power was granted. If the minister is not fit to exercise the power so entrusted, upon the responsibility cast upon him, he is not fit to occupy the post of secretary of state." The House of Commons accepted this explanation; and in view of many grave incidents, both in Ireland and in America, it would be hard to justify any other conclusion.

The increase in the number of postal deliveries and in that of the receiving-houses and branch-offices, together Increase in with the numerous improvements introduced into Postal the working economy of the post office, when Business, Rowland Hill at length obtained the means of fully carrying out his reforms by his appointment as secretary, Ricordi dei fratelli Bandiera e dei loro compagni di martirio in Cosenza, p. 47 (Paris, 1844).

1839-1857

Report from the Secret Committee on the Post Office (1844), p. 11.
Ibid., pp. 14-17.

Hansard, Debates, vol. cclxvii. cols. 294-296 (session of 1832).

On the 12th of February 1892 letter cards bearing an imprinted penny stamp, and made to be fastened against inspection, were issued to the public at a charge Letter and of Post Cards. IS. for IO cards. The charge was reduced almost at once to 9d. for 8 cards. Similar cards have long been in use on the continent of Europe, but they do not enjoy much popularity in Great Britain either with the post office, which finds them inconvenient to handle in sorting and stamping, or with the public. The number issued annually is about 10 millions, not counting those of private

manufacturers.

The following table gives the number of post cards:

Year.

the purpose of detecting letters, &c., sent by the halfpenny post. permission to enclose book packets in unsealed envelopes. ComThe book post received a great impetus in 1892 (May 28) by the plaint is, however, made that such envelopes form a dangerous trap for small letters, which are liable to slip inside the flaps of open envelopes. But as the rate of postage for articles weighing over 2 oz. is now the same for letters and for book packets, articles over that weight derive no advantage from being sent in open covers.

Sample Post-The sample or pattern post, which was confined to bona-fide trade patterns and samples on the 1st of October 1870, striction was difficult to enforce and irritating to the public, and the was then assimilated to the book post (3d. for 2 oz.); but the re sample post was abolished on the 5th of October 1871, when the rates of letter postage were lowered. It was re-established on the Ist of October 1887 (1d. for 4 oz. or under, and d. for each succeeding 2 oz.); but when the Jubilee letter rates were introduced (June 22, 1897) it lost its raison d'être, and ceased to exist for inland purposes.

Estimated Number of Post Cards delivered in the United Kingdom,
and the Increase per cent. per Annum.

1872.
1875
1881-1882 114,251,500 10.4
1884-1885 134,100,000 4.3
1889-1890 184,400,000 8.4
1893-1894 209,100,000 1.4
1894-1895 271,600,000 29.9
dec.
1895-1896 268,300,000 .1.2

Inc. per cent.

per annum.

9,206,300 6.7 14,651,400 9.3 18,400,000 5.5 22,900,000 5.0

Ireland.

United
Kingdom.

4,000,000
76,000,000
4,540,900 5.5 87,116,300
10.7
6,426,100 6.9 135,329,000 IO.I
7,900,000 3.1 160,400,000 4.4
9,800,000 5.4 217,100,000 7.8
27,400,000 2.2 12,000,000
6.2 248,500,000 1.6
28,700,000 4.7 12,500,000 4.2 312,800,000 25.9

inc. 1900-1901 359,400,000 4.9 1905-1906 676,500,000 9.6

*Private cards with adhesive stamps first allowed in this year.

Newspapers.-The table on next page shows the estimated number of newspapers delivered in the United Kingdom, and the increase per cent. per annum.

The carriage of newspapers by the post office does not show the same elasticity as other post office business. This is due largely to the improved system of distribution adopted by newspaper managers and especially to the extension of the halfpenny press. The practice of posting a newspaper after reading it, under a co-operative arrangement, has The practically ceased to exist. carriage of newspapers by post

Post cards were first introduced in Austria on the 1st of October | is conducted by the post office at a loss. 1869, and were first issued in Great Britain on the 1st of October

the halfpenny post is unremunerative. Representations are, It has been frequently stated on behalf of the post office that however, made from time to time in favour of lower Halfpenny postage for literature of all kinds. It may therefore Post be of interest to mention that the postmaster-. Finance. general of the United States has, in successive annual reports, deplored the effect on the post office service of the cheap rates for second-class matter." The cost of carriage over the postmaster-general states that the low rates of postage so large a territory is heavier than in the United Kingdom; but "involve a sheer wanton waste of $20,000,000 or upwards a year." Facilities like the extension of free delivery are stifled, and the efficiency of the whole service cramped by the loss thus sustained. In the United Kingdom the rules respecting the halfpenny post were greatly simplified and brought into effect on the 1st of October 1906. The halfpenny post can be used only England and Wales.

1870. Only one kind of card was employed, and this was sold
for one halfpenny; but on the complaints of the stationers, a charge
of d. per dozen for the material of the card was made in 1872, and
permission was given for private persons to have their own cards
stamped at Somerset House. In 1875 a stouter card was put on
sale, and the charges were raised to 7d. per dozen for thin cards
and 8d. per dozen for stout cards. In 1889 the charges were
reduced, and they are now sold at 10 for 5d. and 11 for 6d.
respectively. On the 1st of September 1894, private post cards
with an adhesive halfpenny stamp were allowed to pass by post,
and the result has been greatly to diminish the number of cards
purchased through the post office. It is estimated that 232 out
of the 400 millions of cards delivered in 1899-1900 were private
cards. The sizes of the official cards were again altered in January
1895 and November 1899. The regulations forbidding anything
but the address to be written on the address side of a post card
were made less stringent on the 1st of February 1897; and in 1898
unpaid post cards, which were previously charged as unpaid letters,
were allowed to be delivered on payment of double the post card
rate. These various changes, espe
cially the use of the private card and
the popularity of illustrated post
cards, have contributed to the rapid
increase in the number of post cards
sent by post. Reply post cards were
first issued on the 1st of October
1893. Their use has not been exten-
sive. Only about 1 million are
issued yearly.

Book Packets and Samples.-The table at foot of page shows the estimated number of book packets, circulars and samples delivered in the United Kingdom, and the increase per cent. per annum. The rate of d. for 2 oz. for the book post has remained unaltered since the 1st of October 1870. Changes have been made in the regulations defining the articles which may be sent by book post, and prescribing the mode of packing them so as to admit of easy examination for

Year.

Number.

1872

13,000,000 15.2 15,723.700

1875
1881-1882 228,999.400 12.3 27,875,000 15.0
1884-1885 269,400,000 8.1 34,500,000 10.0
1889-1890 378,200,000 7.5 42,100,000
1894-1895 522,500,000 6.7 60,800,000
dec.

1898-1899' 590,900,000

Inc. per cent.

per annum.

11,000,000

9.548,000

75,100,000

114,000,000 158,666,600 11.7 14,104,300 16.9 271,038,700 12-8 16,500,000 18-9 320,400,000 8.8 3.7 21,600,000 9.6 441,900,000 7.3 8.2 31,300,000 10.2 614,600,000 7.0 dec. dec. dec. 2.3 35,500,000 5.3 701,500,000 3.5 inc. inc. inc. 3.7 35.300,000 8.6 732,400,000

4.2

3.6
inc.
1900-1901 619,300,000 4.0 77,800,000

Book packets over 2 oz. transferred to the letter post as a result of the Jubilee changes.

Ireland.

109,000,000 121,049,400 3.4 15,477,300 2.4 16,660,100 4.7 140,789,100 5.2 16,900,000 0.9 16,100,000 0.5 143,700,000 0.7 16,700,000 0.6 16,000,000 159,300,000 4.9 dec. dec. dec. 17,300,000 2.3 17,000,000 2.3 151,800,000 7.9 163,400,000 6.0 167,800,000 2.7

.inc. inc. 1899-1900 125,000,000 5.9 19.300,000 7.8 19,100,000 4.9 1900-1901 127,800,000 2.2 19,300,000 20,700,000 8.4