Foreign Steamship Subsidies. £ Germany pays 417,525 France 1,187,271 Russia 364,756 Austria 318,988 Hungary 80,755 Italy pays 320,000 Sweden 20,591 Norway 28,252 Denmark 29,669 Japan 745,607 (!)
United States: Besides large payments for mails, £1,000,000 a year is proposed to encourage shipbuilding, and, after 1907, £1,600,000.
The Postal Union.
It was a Swiss, I believe, who was first struck with the absurdity of taxing letters at every frontier, like cigars or potato-spirit How he reasoned I know not; but he must have perceived that correspondence benefits receivers at least as much as senders; that the post is the driving-wheel of trade; that nothing promotes international understandings like epistolary facilities; and that thought is essentially too subtle and inappreciable a thing to be weighed in scales. The result of his exertions was the establishment of the Postal Union in 1870. It was agreed, at a conference of postal representatives, that one primary charge should suffice to forward a letter, printed paper, or sample, throughout the territories of the States signing the convention, and that this charge should be 2½d. for a letter of ½oz. in weight. The congress has reassembled at fixed intervals, and sanctioned various changes, but has hitherto steadily maintained this high letter-postage of 2½d. It was provided that any two States, contiguous, or communicating by water, might fix a lower rate between themselves by forming a Restricted Union'; and, accordingly, Canada and the United States began to exchange mails at their respective inland rates—1½d. for Canada, Id. for the United States; and the Americans made a similar arrangement with Mexico, while, in Europe, Germany
