The employment of vessels for the conveyance of mails seems to have passed through three several stages, each no doubt merging into the next, but each retaining, nevertheless, distinct features of its own. First, there was the stage when Government equipped and manned its own ships for the service; then there was an age of very heavy subsidies to shipping companies who could not undertake regularity of sailing without some such assistance; and now there is the third stage, when, through the great development of international trade and the consequent competition of rival shipowners, regularity of sailing is ensured apart from the post, and the Government is able to make better terms for the conveyance of the mails.
It is curious to take a glimpse of the conditions under which the early packets sailed, when they were often in danger of having to fight or fly. The instructions to the captains were to run while they could, fight when they could no longer run, and to throw the mails overboard when fighting would no longer avail. In 1693, such a ship as then performed the service was described as one of "eighty-five tons and fourteen guns, with powder, shot, and firearms, and all other munitions of war." A poor captain, whose ship the 'Grace Dogger' was lying in Dublin Bay awaiting thetide, fell into the hands of the enemy, a French privateer having seized his ship and stripped her of rigging, sails, spars, and yards, and of all the furniture "wherewith she had been provided for the due accommodation of passengers, leaving not so much as a spoone or a naile-hooke to hang anything on." The unfortunate ship in its denuded state was ransomed from its captors for fifty guineas. If we may judge from this case, the fighting of the packets does not seem always to have been satisfactory; and the Postmasters-General of the day, deeming discretion the better part of valour, set about building packets that should escape the enemy. They did build new vessels, but so low did they rest in the water that the Postmasters-General wrote of them thus: "Wee doe find that in blowing weather they take in soe much water that the men are constantly wet all through, and can noe ways goe below to change themselves, being obliged to keep the hatches shut to save the vessel from sinking, which is such a discouragement of the sailors, that it will be of the greatest difficulty to get any to endure such hardshipps in the winter weather." These flying ships not proving a success, the Postmasters-General then determined to build "boats of force to withstand the enemy," adopting the bull-dog policy as the only course open in the circumstances. It may be interesting to recall how these packets were manned. In May 1695 the crews of the packets between Harwich and Holland were placed on the following footing:—
These wages may not have been considered too liberal considering the risks the men ran; and as an encouragement to greater valour in dealing with the enemy, and as an additional means of recompense, the crew were allowed to take prizes if they fell in their way. They also "received pensions for wounds, according to a code drawn up with a nice discrimination of the relative value of different parts of the body, and with a most amusing profusion of the technical terms of anatomy. Thus, after a fierce engagement which took place in February 1705, we find that Edward James had a donation of £5 because a musket-shot had grazed on the tibia of his left leg; that Gabriel Treludra had £12 because a shot had divided his frontal muscles and fractured his skull; that Thomas Williams had the same sum because a Granada shell had stuck fast in his left foot; that John Cook, who received a shot in the hinder part of his head, whereby a large division of the scalp was made, had a donation of £6, 13s. 4d. for present relief, and a yearly pension of the same amount; and that Benjamin Lillycrop, who lost the fore-finger of his left hand, had £2 for present relief, and a yearly pension of the same amount." Some other classes of wounds were assessed for pensions as follows: "Each arm or leg amputated above the elbow or knee is £8 per annum; below the knee is 20 nobles. Loss of the sight of one eye is £4, of the pupil of the eye £5, of the sight of both eyes £12, of the pupils of both eyes £14; and according to these rules we consider also how much the hurts affect the body, and make the allowances accordingly."
But between different parts of the United Kingdom, not a century ago, it is remarkable how infrequent the communications sometimes were. Nowadays, there are three or four mails a-week between the mainland and Lerwick, in Shetland, whereas in 1802 the mails between these parts were carried only ten times a-year, the trips in December andJanuary being omitted owing to the stormy character of the weather. The contract provided that there should be used "a sufficiently strong-built packet," and the allowance granted for the service was £120 per annum. It may perhaps be worthy of notice that the amount of postage upon letters sent to Shetland in the year ended the 5th July 1802 was no more than £199, 19s. 1d. It was also stipulated, by the terms of the agreement, that the contractors should adopt a proper search of their own servants, lest they should privately convey letters to the injury of the revenue; and they were also required to take measures against passengers by the packet transgressing in the same way. On one occasion the good people in these northern islands, when memorialising for more frequent postal service, suggested that the packets would be of great use in spying out and reporting the presence of French privateers on the coast; but the Postmaster-General of the period took the sensible view that the less the packets saw of French privateers the better it would be for the packet service.
Difficulties are experienced even in the present day in communicating with some of the outlying islands of the north of Scotland, weeks and occasionally months passing without the boats carrying the mails being able to make the passage. The following is from a report made by the postmaster of Lerwick on the 27th March 1883, with reference to the interruption of the mail-service with Foula, an outlying island of the Shetland group:—
"A mail was made up on the 8th January, and several attempts made to reach the island, but unsuccessfully, until the 10th March. Fair Isle was in the same predicament as Foula, but the mail-boat was more unfortunate. A trip was effected to Fair Isle about the end of December, but none again until last week. About 9th March the boat left for Fair Isle, and nothing being heard of her for afortnight, fears were entertained for her safety. Fortunately the crew turned up on 23d March, but their boat had been wrecked at Fair Isle. During the twenty years I have been in the service, I have never been so put about arranging our mails and posts as since the New Year; we have had heavier gales, but I do not think any one remembers such a continuation of storms as from about the first week of January to end of February; indeed it could hardly be calledstorms, but rather one continued storm, with an occasional lull of a few hours. I cannot recall any time during the period having twenty-four hours' calm or even moderate weather. If it was a lull at night, it was on a gale in the morning; and if a lull in the morning, a gale came on before night. The great difficulty in working Foula and Fair Isle is the want of harbours; and often a passage might be made, but the men dare not venture on account of the landing at the islands." This statement gives a fair idea of the difficulties that have to be overcome in keeping up the circulation of letters with the distant fragments of our home country.
In the packet service deeds of devotion have been done in the way of duty, as has been the case on occasions in the land service. At a period probably about 1800, a Mr Ramage, an officer attached to the Dublin Post-office, being charged with a Government despatch, to be placed on board the packet in the Bay of Dublin, found, on arriving there, that the captain, contrary to orders, had put to sea. Mr Ramage, being unable to acquit himself of his duty in one way, undertook it in another; and hiring an open boat, he proceeded to Holyhead, and there safely landed the despatch. Another instance is related in connection with the shipwreck of the 'Violet' mail-packet sailing between Ostend and Dover; the particulars being given as follows in the Postmaster-General's report for 1856:—
"Mr Mortleman, the officer in immediate charge of the mail-bags, acted on the occasion with a presence of mind and forethought which reflect honour on his memory. On seeing that the vessel could not be saved, he must have removed the cases containing the mail-bags from the hold, and so have placed them that when the ship went down they might float; a proceeding which ultimately led to the recovery of all the bags, except one containing despatches, of which, from their nature, it was possible to obtain copies."
It has already been mentioned that at the close of the seventeenth century a mail-packet was a vessel of some 85 tons—a proud thing, no doubt, in the eyes of him who commanded her. The class of ship would seem to have remained very much the same during the next hundred years; for, in the last years of the eighteenth century, a mail-packet on the Falmouth Station, reckoned fit to proceed to any part of the world, was of only about 179 tons burthen. Her crew, from commander to cook, comprised only twenty-eight persons when she was on a war footing, and twenty-one on a peace footing; and her armament was six 4-pounder guns. The victualling was at the rate of tenpence per man per day; the whole annual charge for the packet when on the war establishment, including interest on cost of ship, wages, wear and tear of fittings, medicine, &c., being £2112, 6s. 8d.; while on the peace establishment, with diminished wear and tear, and reduced crew, the charge was estimated at £1681, 11s. 9d. The packets on the Harwich station, performing the service to and from the Continent, were much less in size, being of about 70 tons burthen.
During the wars with the French at this period the mail-packets were not infrequently captured by the enemy. From 1793 to 1795 alone four of these ships were thus lost—namely, the 'King George,' the 'Tankerville,' the'Prince William Henry,' and the 'Queen Charlotte.' The 'King George,' a Lisbon packet, homeward bound with the mails and a considerable quantity of money, was taken and carried into Brest. The 'Tankerville,' on her passage from Falmouth to Halifax, with the mails of November and December 1794, was captured by the privateer 'Lovely Lass,' a ship fitted out in an American port, and probably itself a prize, there having been some diplomatic correspondence with the United States shortly before on the subject of a captured vessel bearing that name. Before the 'Tankerville' fell into the hands of the enemy, the mails were thrown overboard, in accordance with the standing orders which have already been referred to. The officers and crew were carried on board the 'Lovely Lass,' and then the 'Tankerville' was sunk. Soon afterwards the captive crew were released by the commander of the privateer, and sent in a Spanish prize to Barbadoes.
But though the mail-packets were intended to rely for safety mainly upon their fine lines and spread of canvas, and were expected to show fight only in the last resort, we may be sure that, when the hour of battle came upon them, they were not taken without a struggle. Nor, indeed, did they always get the worst of the fray, as will be seen by the following account of a brilliant affair which took place in the West Indies, copied from the 'Annual Register' of 1794:—
"The 'Antelope' packet sailed from Port Royal, Jamaica, November 27, 1793. On the 1st of December, on the coast of Cuba, she fell in with two schooners, one of which, the 'Atalanta,' outsailed her consort; and after chasing the 'Antelope' for a considerable time, and exchanging many shots, at five o'clock in the ensuing morning, it being calm, rowed up, grappled with her on the starboard side, poured in a broadside, and made an attempt to board, which wasrepulsed with great slaughter. By this broadside, Mr Curtis, the master and commander of the 'Antelope,' the first mate, ship's steward, and a French gentleman, a passenger, fell. The command then devolved on the boatswain (for the second mate had died of the fever on the passage), who, with the few brave men left, assisted by the passengers, repelled many attempts to board. The boatswain, at last observing that the privateer had cut her grapplings, and was attempting to sheer off, ran aloft, and lashed her squaresail-yard to the 'Antelope's' fore-shrouds, and immediately pouring in a few volleys of small arms, which did great execution, the enemy called for quarter, which was instantly granted, although the French had the bloody flag hoisted during the whole contest. The prize was carried into Annotta Bay about eleven o'clock the next morning. The 'Antelope' sailed with 27 hands, but had lost four before the action by the fever, besides two then unfit for duty: so that, the surgeon being necessarily in the cockpit, they engaged with only 20 men, besides the passengers.
"The 'Atalanta' was fitted out at Charlestown, mounted eight 3-pounders, and carried 65 men, French, Americans, and Irish, of whom 49 were killed or wounded in the action; the 'Antelope' having only two killed and three wounded—one mortally.
"The House of Assembly at Jamaica, as a reward for this most gallant action, voted 500 guineas—200 to be paid to the master's widow, 100 to the first mate's, 100 to the boatswain, and 100 among the rest of the crew."
Another adventure of a mail-packet worthy of mention happened a few years later. The 'Lady Hobart,' an Atlantic packet of 200 tons burthen, left Halifax, Nova Scotia, for England in June 1803, and a few days after leaving port, fell in with a French schooner, called 'L'Aimable Julie,' laden with salt fish. Captain Fellowesof the packet took possession of the schooner, and put a prize crew in charge. A few days later, however, the 'Lady Hobart' ran into an iceberg; and there being no hope of saving the ship, the mails were lashed to pigs of ballast and thrown overboard. The crew and passengers took to the boats, and the 'Lady Hobart' shortly thereafter foundered. After suffering great hardships, the voyagers reached Newfoundland on the 4th July. The illustration is from a contemporary print.
'Lady Hobart,' Mail-Packet
'Lady Hobart,' Mail-Packet, 200 tons.
The duty of throwing the mails overboard, when serious danger was apprehended, appears sometimes to have beencarried out with undue haste; for we find an account in the 'Annual Register' of March 4, 1759, that the Dutch Mail of the 23d February had been thus disposed of through an unlucky mistake. The ship conveying it was of Dutch nationality, and, being boarded by a privateer, those in charge had hastily concluded that the visitor must be an enemy. When too late, they discovered their mistake, for the stranger proved to be a friendly English cruiser; and they thereafter reached Harwich with a budget of regrets in place of the mails.
The packet-boats sailing from the ports of Harwich and Dover, being habitually in the "silver streak," were subject to frequent interruptions from English privateers and men-of-war frequenting these waters; and to lessen the inconvenience thus arising, the packets at one time carried what was called a "postboy jack." An official record of 1792 thus describes the flag: "It is the Union-jack with the figure of a man riding post with a mail behind him, and blowing his horn." These flags were made of bunting, and cost £1, 2s. each.
Postboy jack
Postboy jack
Happily there has not for a long time been any need for using fighting ships to convey the mails of this country over the high seas; and this is a danger which it has not been needful to provide against in the packet service of the present generation.
Before leaving these mail-packets of former days, it is perhaps worth recording, that while needy passengers were sometimes carried on board at half the usual fares, and those in destitute circumstances for nothing at all, the poor Jews were kept outside the pale of the generous concession; and the Post-office thus joined the world's mob in the general harsh treatment of that unhappy race. This appears by an official order of 1774, and the hardship was only removed under an authority dated August 24, 1792. The Postmaster-General's minute on the subject is as follows:—"The Postmaster-General thinks that the last words of the order which proscribes all Jews, merely because they are Jews, is not consistent with the usual liberality of the office; but that the agent should be directed to give to them the same privileges that are given to all the rest of the world without any exception to them on account of their religion."
We will be pardoned one more quotation. It is a concession on the score of religion, made by the Postmaster-General in a minute, dated October 19, 1790. It runs thus:—"Let the Secretary write a civil letter to Mr Coke, that the Postmaster-General is very willing to relinquish, on the part of the King, the usual head money of 12 guineas for three persons at £4, 4s. each, whom Mr Coke represents to be sent to the West Indies for the purpose of instructing the negro slaves in the principles of the Christian religion."
While in the eighteenth century but trifling advancement would seem to have been made in naval matters, what acontrast is presented by the achievements of the last eighty years! As compared with the 'Etruria' and the 'Umbria' recent acquisitions of the Cunard Company, for the conveyance of the mails between Liverpool and New York, each of 8000 tons burthen and 12,500 horse-power, the pigmy vessels of the past almost sink into nothingness; and we cannot but acknowledge the rapidity with which such stupendous agencies have come under the control of man for the furtherance of his work in the world.
Steamship 'America'
Steamship 'America.'
A favourite American packet of our own era, for travellers crossing the Atlantic, was the 'America' of the National Steamship Company, which has since been purchased by the Italian Government for service as a fast cruiser. It is a ship of 6500 tons gross tonnage; and is a surprising contrast to the American packet of eighty years ago already described.
We would present a further contrast between the past and the present as regards the packet service. So late as 1829, and perhaps later still, the voyages out to the undermentioned places and home again were estimated to take the following number of days, viz.:—
There were then no regular packets to China, New South Wales, Sierra Leone, Cape Coast Castle, Goree, Senegal, St Helena, and many parts of South America; opportunity being taken to send ship letter-bags to these places as occasion offered by trading vessels.
Nowadays the transit of letters to the places first above-mentioned is estimated to occupy the following number of days:—
And the return mails would occupy a similar amount of time.
In nothing perhaps will the advantages now offered by the Post-office, in connection with the packet service, be more appreciated by the public than in the reduced rates of postage. The following table shows the initial rates for letters to several places abroad in 1829 and in 1884:—
If we were asked to point out a mail-packet of the present day as fulfilling all modern requirements in regard to the packet service, and showing a model of equipment in the vessels as well as order in their management, we would not hesitate to name the mail-steamers plying between Holyhead and Kingstown. It may not be generally known, but it is the case, that these vessels carry a Post-office on board, wherein sorters perform their ordinary duties, by which means much economy of time is effected in the arrangement of the correspondence. In stormy weather, when the packets are tumbling about amid the billows of the Channel, the process of sorting cannot be comfortably carried on, and the men have to make free use of their sea legs in steadying themselves, so as to secure fair aim at the pigeon-holes into which they sort the letters. But the departure of one of these ships from Kingstown is a sight to behold. Up to a short time before the hour of departure friends may be seen on the hurricane-deck chatting with the passengers; but no sooner is the whistle of the mail-train from Dublin heard than all strangers are warned off; in a few minutes the train comes down the jetty; the sailors in waiting seize the mail-bags and carry them on board; and the moment the last of the bags is thus disposed of, the moorings are all promptly cast off, and the signal given to go ahead: and with such an absence of bustle or excitement is all this done, that before the spectator can realise what has passed before his eyes, the ship is majestically sailing past the end of the pier, and is already on her way to England.
Outside the Post-office department it is probably not apprehended to what extent care is actually bestowed upon letters and packets—when, in course of transit through the post, their covers are damaged or addresses mutilated—in order to secure their further safe transmission; many envelopes and wrappers being of such flimsy material that, coming into contact with hard bundles of letters in the mail-bags, they run great risk of being thus injured. But the occasions on which exceptional pains are taken, and on a large scale, to carry out this work, are when mails from abroad have been saved in the case of shipwreck, and the contents are soaked with water. Then it is that patient work has to be done to get the letters, newspapers, &c., into a state for delivery, to preserve the addresses, and to get the articles dried. In certain instances the roof of the chief office in St Martin's-le-Grand has been used as a drying-green for shipwrecked newspapers, there being no sufficient space indoors to admit of their being spread out. The amount of patching, separating, and deciphering in such circumstances cannot well be conceived.
But perhaps the most curious difficulty arising out of a shipwrecked mail was that which took place in connection with the loss of the Union Steamship Company's packet'European' off Ushant, in December 1877. After this ship went down the mails were recovered, but not without serious damage, through saturation with sea-water. One of the registered letter-bags from Cape Town, on being opened in the chief office in London, was found to contain several large packets of diamonds, the addresses on which had been destroyed by the action of the water, and some 7 lbs. weight of loose diamonds, which had evidently formed the contents of a lot of covers lying as pulp at the bottom of the bag, and from which no accurate addresses could be obtained. Every possible endeavour was made to trace the persons to whom the unbroken packets were consigned, and with such success, that after some little delay they reached the hands of the rightful owners. To discover who were the persons having claims upon the loose diamonds, which could not be individually identified, was a more serious matter, involving much trouble and correspondence. At length this was ascertained; and as the only means of satisfying, or attempting to satisfy, the several claims, the diamonds were valued by an experienced broker, and sold for the general behoof, realising £19,000. This means of meeting the several claimants proved so satisfactory, that not a single complaint was forthcoming.
Correspondence.
The amount of work performed by the Post-office in the transmission of letters and other articles of correspondence within the space of a year, may be gathered from the following figures, taken from the Postmaster-General's annual report issued in 1883:—
These figures are, however, of little service in conveying to our minds any due conception of the amount of work which they represent. Nor, when the scene of the work is spread and distributed over the whole country, and the labour involved is shared in by a host of public servants, would any arrangement of figures put the matter intelligibly within our grasp. The quantity of paper used in this annual interchange of thought through the intermediary of the British Post-office, may perhaps be measured by thefollowing facts:—Supposing each letter to contain a single sheet of ordinary-sized note-paper; the post-cards taken at the size of inland post-cards; book-packets as containing on an average fifty leaves of novel-paper; and newspapers as being composed of three single leaves 18 inches by 24 inches,—the total area of paper used would be nearly 630 millions of square yards. This would be sufficient to pave a way hence to the moon, of a yard and a half in breadth; or it would give to that orb a girdle round its body 53 yards in width; or again, it would encircle our own globe by a band 14 yards in width. Another way to look at the magnitude of the Post-office work is as follows:—Suppose that letters, book-packets, newspapers, and post-cards are taken at their several ascertained averages as to weight, the total amount of the mails for a year passing through the British Post-office, exclusive of the weight of canvas bags and small stores of various kinds, would exceed 42,000 tons, which would be sufficient to provide full freight for a fleet of twenty-one ships carrying 2000 tons of cargo each. What a burthen of sorrows, joys, scandals, midnight studies, patient labours, business energy, and everything good or bad which proceeds from the human heart and brain, does not this represent! Yet, after all, what are the figures above given, when put in the balance with the facts of nature? The whole paper, according to the foregoing calculations, although it would gird our earth with a band 14 yards wide, could only be made to extend hence to the sun by being attenuated to the dimensions of a tape of slightly over one-eighth of an inch in width!
Bearing in mind the great quantity of correspondence conveyed by the post, as well as the hurry and bustle in which letters are often written, it is not astonishing that writers should sometimes make mistakes in addressing their letters; but it will perhaps create surprise that one year'sletters which could neither be delivered as addressed, nor returned to the senders through the Dead-letter Office, were over half a million in number! It is curious to note some remarks written by the Post-office solicitor in Edinburgh eighty years ago with respect to misdirected letters. He speaks of "the very gross inattention in puttingthe properaddresses upon letters—a cause which is more productive of trouble and expense to the Post-office than any other whatever. In fact, three out of four complaints respecting money and other letters may generally be traced to that source, and of which, from the proceedings of a few weeks past, I have ample evidence in my possession at this moment." Letters posted in covers altogether innocent of addresses, number 28,000 in the year; and the value in cash, bank-notes, cheques, &c., found in these derelict missives is usually about £8000. Letters sent off by post without covers, or from which flimsy covers become detached in transit, number about 15,000; while the loose stamps found in Post-offices attain the annual total of 68,000. The loose stamps are an evidence of the scrambling way in which letters are often got ready for the post, and probably more so of the earnest intentions of inexperienced persons, who, in preparing stamps for their letters, roll them on the tongue until every trace of adhesive matter is removed, with the result that so soon as the stamps become dry again they fall from the covers. Letters which cannot be delivered in consequence of errors in the addresses, or owing to persons removing without giving notice of the fact to the Post-office, are no less than 5,650,000, such being the number that reach the Dead-letter Office. But of these it is found possible to return to the writers about five millions, while the remainder fail to be returned owing to the absence of the writers' addresses from the letters. The otherarticles sent to the Dead-letter Office in a year are as follows, viz.:—
As regards the book-packets, it is well to know that a large part of the five millions is represented by circulars, which are classed as book-packets, and the addresses on which are not infrequently taken by advertisers from old directories or other unreliable sources.
There is one trifling item which it may be well to give, showing how the smallest things contribute to build up the great, as drops of water constitute the sea, and grains of sand the earth. Those tiny things called postage-stamps, which are light as feathers, and might be blown about by the slightest breeze, make up in the aggregate very considerable bulk and weight, as will be appreciated when it is mentioned that one year's issue for the United Kingdom amounts in weight to no less than one hundred and fourteen tons.
ST VALENTINE'S DAY.
"The day's at hand, the young, the gay,The lover's and the postman's day,The day when, for that only day,February turns to May,And pens delight in secret play,And few may hear what many say."—Leigh Hunt.
"The day's at hand, the young, the gay,The lover's and the postman's day,The day when, for that only day,February turns to May,And pens delight in secret play,And few may hear what many say."—Leigh Hunt.
The customs of St Valentine's day have no direct connection with the saint whose name has been borrowed to designate the festival of the 14th of February. It is only by a side-light that any connection between the saint and the custom can be traced.
In ancient Rome certain pagan feasts were held every year, commencing about the middle of February, in honour of Pan and Juno, on which occasions, amid other ceremonies, it was the custom for the names of young women to be placed in boxes, and to be drawn for by the men as chance might decide. Long after Christianity had been introduced into Rome, these feasts continued to be observed, the priests of the early Christian Church failing in their attempts to suppress or eradicate them. Adopting a policy which has served missionaries in other quarters of the globe, the priests, while unable at once to destroy the pagan superstitions with the obscene observances by which they were accompanied, endeavoured to lessen their vicious character, and to bring them more into harmony with their religion; and one step in this policy was the substitution of the names of the saints for those of young women previously used in the lotteries. Now it happened that the fourteenth day of February was the day set apart for the commemoration of the saint named Valentine; and as the feasts referred to commenced, as has been seen, in the middle of February, a connection would seem to have been set up between the lotteries of the pagan customs (carried down to the time when Valentines were drawn for) and the saint's festival, merely through a coincidence of days. That St Valentine should have been selected as the patron of the custom known to us nowadays, is too unlikely, knowing as we do from history something of his life and death. He was a priest who assisted the early Christians during the persecutions under Claudius II., and who suffered a cruel martyrdom about the year 270, being first beaten with clubs, and then beheaded.
The customs of St Valentine's Day have passed through many phases, each age having its own variation, but allhaving a bearing to one idea. The following is an account of the ceremony in our own country as observed by "Misson," a learned traveller of the early part of last century:—"On the eve of St Valentine's Day the young folks of England and Scotland, by a very ancient custom, celebrate a little festival. An equal number of maids and bachelors get together, each writes their true or some feigned name upon separate billets, which they roll up and draw by way of lots, the maids taking the men's billets, and the men's the maids'; so that each of the young men lights upon a girl that he calls his Valentine, and each of the girls upon a young man whom she calls hers. By this means each has two Valentines, but the man sticks faster to the Valentine that has fallen to him than to the Valentine to whom he has fallen. Fortune having thus divided the company into so many couples, the Valentines give balls and treats to their mistresses, wear their billets several days upon their bosoms or sleeves, and this little sport often ends in love." Pennant also, in writing of his tour in Scotland in 1769, refers to the observance of this custom in the north of Scotland in these words:—"The young people in February draw Valentines, and from them collect their future fortune in the nuptial state."
In later times the drawing of a lady's name for a Valentine was made the means of placing the drawer under the obligation to make a present to the lady. The celebrated Miss Stuart, who became the Duchess of Richmond, received from the Duke of York on one occasion a jewel worth £800, in discharge of this obligation; and Lord Mandeville, who was her Valentine at another time, presented her with a ring worth some £300.
The term Valentine is no longer used in its more general application to denote the lady to whom a present is sent onthe 14th of February, but the thing sent, which is usually a more or less artistic print or painting, surmounted by an image of Cupid, and to which are annexed some lines of loving import. Thirty years ago Valentines were generally inexpensive articles, printed upon paper with embossed margins. Their style gradually improved until hand-painted scenes upon satin grounds became common; and Valentines might be bought at any price from a halfpenny to five pounds. It should not be omitted to be noted that for many years Valentines have had their burlesques, in those ridiculous pictures which are generally sent anonymously on Valentine's Day, and which were often observed to be decked out in extraordinary guises, and having affixed to them such things as spoons, dolls, toy monkeys, red herrings, rats, mice, and the like. On one occasion a Valentine was seen in the post having a human finger attached to it.
But as every dog has its day, and each succeeding period of life its own interests and allurements, so have customs their appointed seasons, and ideas their set times of holding sway over the popular mind. The wigs and buckled shoes of our forefathers, the ringlets of our grandmothers, which in their day were things of fashion, have lapsed into the category of the curious, and have to us none other than an antiquarian interest. The Liberal in politics of to-day becomes the Conservative of to-morrow; and the custom of sending Valentines, at one time so common, that afforded so great pleasure not only to the young, but sometimes to those of riper years, has already had its death-knell sounded; and at the present rate of decline, it bids fair very soon to be relegated to the shades of the past.
The rage for sending Valentines probably had its culmination some ten years ago, since when it has steadily gone down; and now the festival is no longer observed byfashionable people, its lingering votaries being found only among the poorer classes.
The following facts show how far the Post-office was called upon to do themessenger'spart in delivering the love-missives of St Valentine when the business was in full swing. At the chief office in London on Valentine's Eve 1874, some 306 extra mail-bags, each 3 feet long by 2 feet wide, were required for the additional work thrown on the Post-office in connection with Valentines, and at every Post-office in the kingdom the staff was wont to regard St Valentine's Eve as the occasion of the year when its utmost energies were laid under requisition for the service of the public.
But the decay of the ancient custom of sending Valentines has probably not come about from within itself; it may rather be attributed to the progress made in what may be called the rival custom of sending cards of greeting and good wishes at Christmas-time. It would almost seem that two such customs, having their times of observance only a few weeks apart, cannot exist together; and it will probably be found that the new has been growing precisely as the old has been dying, the former being much the stronger, choking the latter. Valentines were sent by the young only—or for the most part, at any rate—while Christmas-cards are in favour with almost every age and condition of life. It follows, then, that a custom such as this, having developed great energy, and being patronised by all classes, must throw a larger mass of work upon the Post-office—the channel through which such things naturally flow—than Valentines did. And so it has been found. The pressure on the Post-office in the heyday of Valentines was small by comparison with that which is now experienced at Christmas. During the Christmas season of 1877, the number of letters, &c., which passed through the InlandBranch of the General Post-office in London, in excess of the ordinary correspondence, was estimated at 4,500,000, a large portion of which reached the chief office on Christmas morning; while in the Christmas week of 1882 the extra correspondence similarly dealt with was estimated at 14,000,000, including registered letters (presumably containing presents of value), of which there was a weight of no less than three tons. Everywhere similar pressure has been felt in the Post-offices, and it is by no means settled that we have yet reached the climax of this social but rampant custom.
In the London Metropolitan district there are employed 4030 postmen; and taking their daily amount of walking at 12 miles on the average—a very low estimate—this would represent an aggregate daily journeying on foot of 48,360 miles, or equal to twice the circumference of our globe.
Articles of many curious kinds have been observed passing through the post from time to time, some of them dangerous or prohibited articles, which, according to rule, are sent to the Returned-letter Office—the fact showing that the Post-office is not only called upon to perform its first duty of expeditiously conveying the correspondence intrusted to it, but is made the vehicle for the carriage of small articles of almost endless variety. Some of these are the following, many of them having been in a live state when posted—viz., beetles, blind-worms, bees, caterpillars, crayfish, crabs, dormice, goldfinches, frogs, horned frogs, gentles, kingfishers, leeches, moles, owls, rabbits, rats, squirrels, stoats, snails, snakes, silk-worms, sparrows, stag-beetles, tortoises, white mice; artificial teeth, artificial eyes, cartridges, china ornaments, Devonshire cream, eggs, geranium-cuttings, glazier's diamonds, gun-cotton, horseshoe nails, mince-pies, musical instruments, ointments,perfumery, pork-pies, revolvers, sausages, tobacco and cigars, &c., &c.
Occasionally the sending of live reptiles through the Post-office gives rise to interruption to the work, as has occurred when snakes have escaped from the packets in which they had been enclosed. The sorters, not knowing whether the creatures are venomous or not, are naturally chary in the matter of laying hold of them; and it may readily be conceived how the work would be interfered with in the limited space of a Travelling Post-office carriage containing half-a-dozen sorters, upon a considerable snake showing his activity among the correspondence, as has in reality happened.
On another occasion a packet containing a small snake and a lizard found its way to the Returned-letter Office. Upon examining it next day the lizard had disappeared, and from the appearance of the snake it was feared that it had made a meal of its companion. Another live snake which had escaped from a postal packet was discovered in the Holyhead and Kingstown Marine Post-office, and at the expiration of a fortnight, being still unclaimed, it was sent to the Dublin Zoological Gardens. In the Returned-letter Office in Liverpool, a small box upon being opened was found to contain eight living snakes; but we are not informed as to the manner in which they were got rid of.
The strike of the stokers employed by the Gas Companies of the metropolis in 1872 is remembered in the Post-office as an event which gave rise to a considerable amount of inconvenience and anxiety at the time. That the Post-office should be left in darkness was not a thing to be thought possible for a moment; for such a circumstance would almost have looked like the extinction of civilisation. On the afternoon of the 3d December in the year mentioned, intimation reached the chief office thatthe Gas Company could not guarantee a supply of gas for more than a few hours, in consequence of their workmen having struck work. The occasion was one demanding instant action in the way of providing other means of lighting, and accordingly an order was issued for a ton of candles. These were used at St Martin's-le-Grand and at the branch offices in the East Central district; while arrangements were made to provide lanterns and torches for the mail-cart drivers, and oil-lamps for lighting the Post-office yard. In the evening the sorting-offices presented the novel spectacle of being lighted up by 2000 candles; and this reign of tallow continued during the next three days. The total cost of this special lighting during the four days' strike was £58; but there was a saving of about 160,000 feet of gas, reducing the loss to something like £27.
When the past history of the Post-office is looked into, at a period which cannot yet be said to be very remote, it is both curious and instructive to observe the contrast which presents itself, as between the unpretending institution of those other days, and the great and ubiquitous machine which is now the indispensable medium for the conveyance of news to every corner of the empire. To imagine what our country would be without the Post-office as it now is, would be attempting something quite beyond our powers; and if such an institution did not exist, and an endeavour were made to construct one at once by the conceits and imaginings of men's minds, failure would be the inevitable result, for the British Post-office is the child of long experience and never-ending improvement, having a complexity and yet simplicity in its fabric, which nothing but many years of growth and studied application to its aims could have produced.
But it is not the purpose here to go into the history of its improvements, or of its changes. It is merely proposed to show how rapidly it has grown, and from what small beginnings.
The staff of the Edinburgh Post-office in 1708 wascomposed of no more than seven persons, described as follows:—
In 1736 the number of persons employed had increased to eleven, whose several official positions were as follows:—
Postmaster-General for Scotland.Accountant.Secretary to the Postmaster.Principal Clerk.Second Clerk.Clerk's Assistant.Apprehender of Private Letter-carriers.Clerk to the Irish Correspondents.Three Letter-carriers.
The apprehender of private letter-carriers, as the name implies, was an officer whose duty it was to take up persons who infringed the Post-office work of carrying letters for money.
The work continued steadily to grow, for in 1781 we find there were 23 persons employed, of whom 6 were letter-carriers; and in 1791 the numbers had increased to 31. In 1828 there were 82; in 1840, when the penny post was set on foot, there were 136; and in 1860, 244.
In 1884 the total number of persons employed in all branches of the Post-office service in Edinburgh was 939.
The Post-office of Glasgow, which claims to be the second city of the kingdom, shows a similar rapidity of growth, if not a greater; and this growth may be taken as an index of the expansion of the city itself, though theformer has to be referred to three several causes—namely, increase of population, spread of education, and development of trade.
In 1799 the staff of the Glasgow Post-office was as follows, viz.:—
So that the whole expense for staff was no more than £391, 10s. per annum, and this had been the recognised establishment for several years. But it appears from official records, that though the postmaster was nominally receiving £200 a-year, he had in 1796 given £10 each to the clerks out of his salary, and expended besides, on office-rent, coal, and candles, £30, 2s. 8d. Somewhat similar deductions were made in 1797 and 1798, and thus the postmaster's salary was then less than £150 a-year in reality. It is worthy of note here that letters were at that time delivered in Glasgow only twice a-day.
Some ten years earlier—that is, in 1789—the indoor staff consisted of the postmaster and one clerk, the former receiving £140 a-year, and the latter £30.
A penny post, for local letters in Glasgow, was started in the year 1800, when, as part and parcel of the scheme, three receiving-offices were opened in the city. The revenue derived from the letters so carried for the first year was under £100, showing that there cannot have been so many as eighty letters posted per day for local delivery. After a time the experiment was considered not to have been quite a success, for one of the receiving-offices was closed, and a clerk's pay reduced £10 a-year, in order to bring the expense down to the level of the revenue earned. In 1803matters improved, however, as in the first quarter of that year the revenue from penny letters was greater than the expense incurred.
At the present time, the staff of the Glasgow Post-office numbers 1267 persons, and the postmaster's salary is over a thousand pounds a-year.
To those who know Liverpool, with its expansive area, its vast shipping, its stir of commerce, and, in the present relation, its army of postmen, the following facts will exhibit a striking contrast between the past and the present. In 1792, when the population of that town stood at something like 60,000, the number of postmen employed was but three, whose wages were 7s. a-week each; but, to be quite correct, it should be added that one of the postmen, having heavier work than the others, was aided by his wife, and for this assistance the office allowed from £10 to £12 a-year. One of the postmen delivered the letters for the southern district, including Everton, St Ann's, Richmond, &c.; another served the northern portion, taking in part of the old dock, the dry dock, George's Dock, &c.; while the third disposed of the letters for the remaining portions of the town. The duties of these men seem to have been carried out with a good deal of deliberation. The postmen arranged the correspondence for distribution in the early morning, then they partook of breakfast, and set out upon their rounds about 9a.m., completing their work of delivery about the middle of the afternoon. And thus it would appear that Liverpool at that time had only one delivery per day.
Upon all letters delivered by two of the postmen—the two first mentioned—a halfpenny per letter over and above the postage was charged for delivery; in the other case the ordinary postage only was levied.
The reason for the additional charge was no doubt thisthat the postmaster was allowed by the Department only one postman, and that consequently the wages of the other men who were necessarily employed had to be met by the special tax referred to. The following minute of the Postmaster-General, dated 28th October 1792, while in some sense affording an explanation of the matter, shows that somewhat peculiar notions prevailed with regard to providing force where such was required. It runs as follows:—
"There are only two instances in the kingdom where more than one letter-carrier is allowed, viz., Portsmouth and Bath. I understand it has been held as a general rule not to allow more than one to any other place, however extensive and populous it may be; in the two exceptions to this rule the inhabitants had been accustomed to pay the deputies a gratuity for delivering the letters, but having refused to continue the payment, these postmasters felt their income considerably reduced, and I believe it was not till after much discussion the rule was broke through."
The minute continues as follows:—"Mr Palmer had some ideas respecting such a modification of the rates of postage as might induce the inhabitants of every place in the kingdom to paywith cheerfulnessan extra halfpenny or penny over and above the rates; this extra payment to be sanctioned by an Act of Parliament; and then the whole amount of the sums now paid for letter-carriers, being £1927, 8s. per year, would be saved to the Revenue." If this accurately represents Mr Palmer's ideas, Mr Palmer did not quite understand the British public.
At the same period to which we refer, there were only three letter-carriers in Manchester, four at Bristol, and three or four at Birmingham; but in each case only one was allowed by the Department, the others being employed as extras, and provided for, no doubt, by a special tax upon the letters delivered. This system of charging extra fordelivery would seem to have been open to abuse, for we find that in 1791 the Postmaster-General called for explanation of an exceptional charge at Eton, in a Minute as follows:—"Let the Comptroller-General inquire who serves, and by whose authority, the parts of the country circumjacent to the Eton delivery, as they charge no less a sum than 3d. for each letter, in addition to the postage, for all letters delivered at Upton, which is not above a mile from the College." And the Postmaster-General makes this very wise observation on the practice—"This enormous expense for letters must check and ruin all correspondence, and essentially hurt the revenue."
At the end of last century and beginning of this—and indeed it may be said throughout the whole term of the existence of the Post-office—humble petitions were always coming up from postmasters for increase of pay, and from these we know the position in which postmasters then were.
The postmaster of Aberdeen showed that in 1763, when the revenue of his office was £717, 19s. 4d., with something for cross post-letters, probably about £400, his salary had been £93, 15s.; while in 1793, with a revenue of over £2500, his whole salary was only £89, 15s., and out of this he had to pay office-rent and to provide assistance, fire, wax, candles, books, and cord.
At Arbroath, now an important town, the revenue was, in 1763, £76, 12s. 8d., and the postmaster's salary, £20. At this figure the salary remained till 1794, though the revenue had increased to £367, 13s. 5d.; but now the postmaster appealed for higher pay, and brought up his supports of office-rent, coal, candles, wax, &c., to strengthen his case.
In Dundee, in the year 1800, the postmaster's salary was £50, and the revenue £3165, 9s. 5d.
At Paisley, the postmaster's salary was fixed at £33 in 1790 and remained at that figure till 1800 when a petitionwas sent forward for what was called in official language an augmentation. In the memorial it is stated that the revenue for 1799 was £1997, 1s. 11d., and that the deductions for rent, coal, candles, wax, paper, pens, and ink, reduced the postmaster's salary to from £15 to £20 a-year!
To show how these towns have grown up into importance within a period of little more than the allotted span of man, and as exhibiting perhaps the yet more bounding expansion of the Post-office system, the following particulars are added, and may prove of interest:—
At Aberdeen, at the present time, the annual value of postage-stamps sold, which may be taken as a rough measure of the revenue from the carriage of correspondence alone, is little short of £30,000; the staff of all sorts employed numbers 191; and the postmaster's salary exceeds £600 a-year. Arbroath is less pretentious, being a smaller town; but the letter revenue is over £4000 a-year; the persons employed, 14; and the postmaster's salary nearly £200. Dundee shows a postage revenue of over £35,000; 193 persons are employed there; and the postmaster's salary is little short of £600. While at Paisley the revenue from stamps is nearly £10,000; the persons employed, 43; and the postmaster's salary, £300. Notwithstanding the vast decrease in the rates of postage, these figures show, in three of the cases mentioned, that the revenue from letters is now about twelve times what it was less than a century ago.
It will probably be found that one of the most mushroom-like towns of the country is Barrow-in-Furness, now a place of considerable commerce, and an extensive shipping port. The following measurements, according to the Post-office standard, may repay consideration. Prior to 1847 there was nothing but a foot-postman, who served the town by walking thither from Ulverston one day, and back to Ulverston the next. Later on, he made the double journey daily,and delivered the letters on his arrival at Barrow. In 1869 the town had grown to such dimensions that the office was raised to the rank of a head-office, and three postmen were required for delivery. Now, in 1884, thirteen postmen are the necessary delivering force for the town.
About the year 1800 the Post-office had not as yet carried its civilising influence into the districts of Balquhidder, Lochearnhead, Killin, and Tyndrum, there being no regular Post-offices within twenty, thirty, or forty miles of certain places in these districts. The people being desirous of having the Post-office in their borders, the following scheme was proposed to be carried out about the time mentioned:—
So that here a whole district of country was to be opened up to the beneficent operations of the Post at an annual cost of what would now be no more than sufficient to pay the wages of a single post-runner. It may be proper, however, to remark in this connection, that money then was of greater value than now; and since it has been shown that a messenger had formerly to travel as much as fourteen double miles for 2s., it is not surprising that Scotchmen, brought up in such a school, should like to cling to a sixpence when they can get it.
It were remiss to pass over London without remark,whose growth is a marvel, and whose Post-office has at least kept up in the running, if it has not outstripped, London itself. In 1796 the delivery of London extended from about Grosvenor Square and Mayfair in the west, to Shadwell, Mile End, and Blackwall in the east; and from Finsbury Square in the north, to the Borough and Rotherhithe in the south; and the number of postmen then employed for the general post-delivery was 126. London has since taken into its maternal embrace many places which were formerly quite separate from the metropolis, and nowadays the agglomeration is known, postally, as the Metropolitan district. In this district the number of men required to effect the delivery of letters in 1884 is no less than 4030. It may be mentioned that the general post-delivery above mentioned had reference to the delivery of ordinary letters coming from the country. Letters of the penny post—or local letters—and letters from foreign parts, were delivered by different sets of men, who all went over the same ground. In 1782 the number of men employed in these different branches of delivery work was as follows, viz.:—
It was not till many years later that all kinds of letters came to be delivered by one set of postmen, and that thus needless repetition of work was got rid of.
At the same period—namely, in 1782—the other officers of all kinds employed in the London Post-office numbered 157. At the present time the officers of all kinds (exclusive of postmen, who have been referred to separately) employed in the Metropolitan district are nearly 16,000 in number.