The Post-office to-day pays full half as much for the transportation of a ton of mail-bags from New York to Buffalo by railway, as it used to cost to send ordinary freight the same distance by boat and by wagon, in the days before the opening of the Erie Canal. Books, carpets, cutlery, hats and caps, boots and shoes, gloves and laces, are carried from Liverpool, via steamer to New Orleans and thence by railway to San Francisco, for $1.07 a hundred pounds. Our express companies carry all sorts of parcels, from the domicile in New York to the station, thence by rail a thousand miles to Chicago, and deliver at the domicile in that city, at a rate of $3.00 a hundred pounds, but the railways tax the Government 2.77 cents a pound, $2.77 a hundred, $55.50 a ton, for the transportation of its mail-bags for an average haul of not over 442 miles. -Report P. O. D., 1900.

For the first ten years after the railroads began to carry the mails there was a continual deficit in the revenues of the post-office, and it was only met by the increase of the business which followed the decrease of the postage and the wide grouping of rates, in 1845. The deficits in the business of the Post-office in recent years are easily accounted for by the burdensome taxes levied by our railway kings. These taxes remain, in most cases, at the same rate to-day as in 1878. In some instances the receipts from the Post-office probably more than pay the entire cost of the trains that carry the

But notwithstanding the failure of the people's representatives to compel the managers of our "post-roads" to give to the public reasonable postal transportation, and notwithstanding the waste of postal revenues in bounties given to such concerns as the Standard Oil Company's AngloAmerican Steamship Line, the extension of the sphere of the Post-office has gone steadily, though slowly, forward.

The Act of Congress of 1845 made the letter rate five cents a half ounce within distances of three hundred miles, and ten cents for longer distances.

In 1849, Congressman Palfrey, of Massachusetts, advocated the abolition of the franking privilege, a prepaid, uniform two-cent letter rate for all distances, and free city delivery. He believed that the two-cent rate would speedily send the letters up to 200,000,000 (the number of paying-letters had increased under the Act of 1845 from 24,267,552 in 1843, to 58,069,075 in 1849), and make all recourse to the general Treasury unnecessary. The expenses of the department would be somewhat increased, by such a multiplication of letters, But not materially. "It is the keeping up of the system that costs so much money, and not the amount of the business. The increased cost for transportation would be but trifling." The institution of free delivery would save to the city of New York alone $900 a day, or nearly a third of a million dollars a year. But Mr. Palfrey was far ahead of his time. The next step was not taken until 1851, when books

were first introduced into the mails and the rates on letters were made three cents a half ounce for distances within three thousand miles, and six cents for greater distances. In 1855, prepayment by stamps was made compulsory. It was not until 1863 that a uniform three-cent letter rate was adopted, and a system of free delivery was inaugurated in our large cities. It was only in 1873 that the franking privilege was abolished, to be revived in a modified form later.

The country waited for thirty-four years (until 1883), before it secured a Congress bold enough and far-sighted enough to complete the scheme of Mr. Palfrey and give to the people a uniform twocent letter rate. In 1885, the weight of letters was increased to one ounce.

The English Post-office, as organized by James I., in 1603, provided not only for the handling of the correspondence of his subjects, but also for the conveyance of their persons and property up to thirty pounds in weight, and this inland traveller's post was not abandoned until 1780, after an existence of 177 years. The Penny-Post, established by Wm. Docwra, in 1683, carried parcels up to one pound anywhere within a ten-mile circuit of London, and as late as 1711 this service extended to certain towns as far away as twenty miles from the metropolis.

The Act of Parliament, Ninth of Queen Anne, chapter 10, establishing a postal department in the American Colonies, made it the especial duty of

the Postmasters to furnish horses for the transportation of travellers at a rate of three pence a mile for a horse and four pence a mile for a guide, parcels up to eighty pounds to be carried on the guide's horse free of charge. f

We also note among the curious articles franked to foreign parts, by the old English packet service, the following:

"Fifteen hounds going to the King of the Romans with a free pass."

"Two maid-servants going as laundresses to my lord Ambassador Methuen."

"Dr. Crichton, carrying with him a cow and divers other accessories."

Previous to 1689, the Harwich Post-office packets running to Brill, in Holland, were entirely supported by the receipts from freight and from passengers, and in the year 1822 the Dublin-Holyhead line carried over 16,000 passengers. In 1827, the steam flotilla of the English postal department comprised nineteen vessels of an aggregate of 4000 tons burden, and it was only in 1830 that the regular over-sea mail service of England was turned over to private hands.

These facts are of great interest, as showing the original functions of the post-office, and as indicating its possibilities, but it is doubtful if the possibilities of this wonderful public service were ever thoroughly appreciated, and we know that for many years previous to 1860, both in England and in America, it was closely confined to the convey

ance of letters and newspapers. Up to that time the interests of the private common carrier seem nearly always to have prevailed against the interests of the public.

The Act of Queen Anne was partially revived by our National Government in 1861, when a few articles of merchandise, maps, photographic materials, scions, seeds, etc., were admitted to the mails in very small parcels.

In 1864, this list was somewhat extended, and finally, in 1879, it was made to cover almost anything that could be carried in a mail-bag without injury to the rest of the contents, the rate being one cent an ounce, in parcels up to four pounds. In 1885, it was further provided that publishers and news-agents might send their merchandise, paper-covered books, and newspapers, through the mails to their customers, anywhere in the United States, at one cent a pound, and in any quantity from a pound to a car-load; and to-day the conveyance of this kind of merchandise makes up two thirds of the business of the Post-office. The aggregate weight of second-class matter in 1895 was 312,000,000 pounds (156,000 tons), being an increase over 1894 of 13,000,000 pounds or 6,500 tons. It is said that a certain publisher in Maine has sent out through the mails 1600 tons of books in a single year, and a number of publishers, at some seasons of the year, ship two tons a day. The city of New York deposits in its Post-office 30,000 sacks of this merchandise every month. These