post was an organization for conveying the royal missives only; the private letter-writer was not thought of, perhaps because he hardly existed. Learned individuals, however, continued to exchange notes by uncertain means, and finally the University of Paris, perhaps as early as the eleventh century, established a post for carrying the students' letters to their families—doubtless narrating wonderful progress in study, with postscripts requesting cakes and pocket-money, like students' 'letters home' in more recent times. The service was a popular one, as the messengers were exempt from wine duty; but whether this exemption tended to foster speed and safe transmission is more than questionable.
As other Universities imitated Paris in the matter, Oxford, no doubt, maintained a special messenger service in very remote times. Otherwise the postal service in England was for centuries still very much what it was when the last Roman Legion crossed over to Calais—an establishment of royal couriers, forerunners of the modern 'King's Messengers.' So far back as 1250, as we find from the Royal Wardrobe Accounts, these couriers were paid. They must have worn the royal livery of scarlet, and have been familiar figures on the roads of the time. In 1481 Edward IV. was kept advised of events in Scotland by relays of horsemen, each of whom rode a stage of twenty miles.
But postal revenue came in those days from the Crown, not the people; and the Crown sometimes forgot to pay. In August, 1588, Thomas Cromwell wrote sharply to Sir Brian Tuke, 'Magister Nunciorum, Cursorum, sive Postarum,' complaining of 'great default in conveyance of letters,' and signifying the King's pleasure 'that posts be better appointed.' Sir Brian replied with a few eloquent facts:
'The King's Grace hath no moo ordinary posts, ne of many days hathe had, but between London and Calais. … For, Sir, ye knowe well, that, except the hackney horses between Gravesend and Dovour, there is no such usual conveyance in post for men in this
