Royal Mail,' in the chapter headed "Mail-Packets." The vessels were clearly not of a high order of excellence, for one report says: "We doe find that in blowing weather they take in soe much water that the men are constantly wet through, and can noe ways go below, being forced to keep the hatches shut to save the vessel from sinking." So perilous was the service, that there was a scale of pensions for wounds. The loss of an eye was £4, both eyes £12. Nor were the letters better protected than their carriers. "We are concerned," says one agent, "to tell you that we find the letters brought by the boat are so consumed by the ratts we cannot find out to whom they belong." All Government letters were carried free. Even within our memory very curious articles have been sent by the Foreign Office messengers, but we do not imagine such commodities as the following were ever franked: –
"Imprimis. 'Fifteen couple of hounds going to the King of the Romans with a free pass.'
"Item. 'Two maid servants going as laundresses to my lord ambassador.'
"Item. 'Doctor Chrichton, carrying with him a cow and divers necessaries.'
"Item. 'Two bales of stockings for the use of the ambassador.'"
In those days members signed large packets of covers at once, and sold them to their friends; and so little care was taken, that thousands of letters passed with forged signatures.
The changes from the post-riders to mail-coaches, and from mail-coaches to railways, are not more remarkable than the vast change made in our postal system by the introduction of the penny postage. Sir Rowland Hill has always been considered the originator of the penny postage; but in fact the idea had been started by Professor Babbage some years before, in his work on economy of machinery and manufactures, in which he demonstrated that if the cost of carriage could be reduced, the result would be a cheaper rate of postage, and a great increase in the number of letters. It was, however, Sir Rowland Hill who devoted his time to the completion of the scheme; and in 1837 he embodied it in the pamphlet entitled "Post-office Reform, its importance and practicability." This created a great sensation, more especially in the mercantile world. He proved that while the population was rapidly increasing, the Post-office revenue was diminishing, and this was chiefly owing to the high rate of postage, and the temptation which it held out for smuggling – whole bales of letters being sent from one town to another as ordinary goods. While in his able pamphlet the subject was exhausted, he maintained that the 76 millions of letters, the number which passed through the Post-office in 1839, was capable of a large increase; "that it should form a distinguished part in the great work of national education, and of becoming a benefaction and a blessing to mankind." He concluded with proposing – (1) a reduction in the rate to a penny a letter, weighing not more than half an ounce; (2) increased speed in the delivery of letters: (3) more frequent opportunities for the despatch of letters; (4) simplification in all the arrangements with the view to economy. After an examination by a Royal Commission, and a full investigation by a committee of the House of Commons, Mr Hill's plan was adopted by the Legislature in 1839, and came into operation in 1840, when the
