Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 1.djvu/73

 i. JAN-. 16, loo*.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

nineties, and was acquired by the Cardiff Free Library for, I believe, 3,366. ; but whether the MSS. were included or otherwise I cannot say. EVERARD HOME COLEMAN.

4 MEMOIRS OF A STOMACH ' (10 th S. i. 27). Halkett and Laing state that Sydney Whit- ing was the author of this book (1853) ; also that he wrote 'Affection, its Flowers and Fruit' (1848), and 'Helionde ; or, Adventures in the Sun '(1855). R. A. POTTS.

[MR. RALPH THOMAS refers to Boase's ' Modern English Biography,' s.v. Whiting.]

ENVELOPES (9 th S. xii. 245, 397, 434, 490). With all respect to CAPT. THORNE GEORGE, I fear that his statement as to the " envelopes dated 1856 which had been franked through the post by Lord Fortescue" and others needs some modification. Private franking was abolished in 1840, when the reformed postal system came in, though the practice of writing a name outside a letter the act which constituted the frank still survives, as do other habits whose original meaning is lost. Nowadays the outside signature de- notes the writer, not the franker of the mis- sive. CAPT. THORNE GEORGE'S later state- ment that "stamped covers" were used in Australia to prepay postage " previous to Rowland Hill's scheme ' must, I think, have been culled from one of those works of fiction which profess to tell the story of postal reform.

That letters before 1840 sometimes con- tained enclosures is true. To enclose was easy. The letters were written on large square sheets of paper, which were folded and made secure by sealing-wax or wafers. At every post-office was a " candling room," in which any letter that seemed thicker than usual was held up against a strong light to ascertain of how many separate pieces it con- sisted. It was to defeat temptation to dis- honesty caused by this scrutiny that the practice was adopted of cutting a bank-note in two before posting it, and keeping back the second half till receipt of the first had been acknowledged. A bank-note or other enclosure in a letter would have counted as two letters, and, if both were put into one envelope, as three. Thus, if this missive with its two enclosures were sent, say from London to Edinburgh, the charge would have been Is. d. X3 = 4s. plus a halfpenny, in those Protectionist days, for the privilege of crossing the Scottish border.

Unless the envelopes mentioned by Swift in 1726, by Lamb in 1825, and by Creevey's biographer prior to 1838, were employed to -cover "smuggled" letters or those conveyed

by hand, it is hard to understand their raison d'etre. It is this difficulty which bewilders one when reading the striking and seemingly exact evidence adduced by SIR HERBERT MAXWELL, CAPT. THORNE GEORGE, and MR. W. H. PEET as to the use of these covers before 1840. Can it be that the " little bags called envelopes," as my father described them, were, as CAPT. THORNE GEORGE says, "nothing but a revival"? Or must the mystery remain as insoluble as the identity of the Man in the Iron Mask ?

An interesting account may be found of the local penny posts invented by poor Dock- wra (whose plan in many ways resembled my father's) in that standard work on prepostal- reformation times Joyce's 'History of the Post Office.' ELEANOR C. SMYTH.

Harborne.

At the last reference it is stated that Edward IV. originated a practical post in 1481. I should like to know whether this statement, which I have met with before, rests upon any sufficient evidence. The same correspondent, following a well-known work of reference, says that Randolph was ap- pointed "Postmaster of England" in 1581. Randolph was appointed Master of the Posts in 1566, in succession to Sir John Mason, who was appointed in November, 1545, by letters patent. Mason's predecessor, Brian Tuke, was Master of the Posts in 1512, and perhaps earlier, and he seems to have been the first person who held the office in this country.

From about the beginning of the reign of Henry VIII. there were posts from London to Dover and to Berwick, and later in the century there was a post to Holyhead and to other places. But these were the king's post for the conveyance of letters on his affairs, or of persons travelling with his commission, or the commission of certain officers of the State. When ordinary private letters were first sent by post is a question more easily asked than answered. The Privy Council as late as January, 1583, laid down, inter alia, in a proclamation, " that no packets or letters shall be sufficient warrant or authority to constrain the posts to run with them in post, except they be directed on her Majesty's affairs." The letters of private persons were, no doubt, sent by post, but had to take their chance of being forwarded. Private letters were, as a rule, entrusted to the common carriers.

J. A. J. HOUSDEN.

The following citations would seem to indicate the use of the envelope, or its practical equivalent the " cover," for a period