Page:The Post Office of Fifty Years Ago.djvu/23

 income—that is to say, a sovereign—for a letter, how often would he write letters of friendship?"

Extravagant and almost prohibitive as were the postal charges in 1837, the service rendered by the Post Office in return was ludicrous for its slowness and inefficiency.

There was only one dispatch of mails from the country into London daily (the mail-coaches arriving at St. Martin's-le-Grand at about 6.30a.m.), and there was only one dispatch from London in return;—this left at 8p.m. All letters passing through London, as, for instance, those from Brighton to Birmingham, were detained, all day long, at St. Martin's-le-Grand, and when Sunday (blank-post day) intervened, the delay was of course far greater.

Between towns near to each other on opposite sides of London, this delay and infrequency of communication rendered the Post Office almost useless. Thus a letter posted in Uxbridge on Friday evening, after the office had closed, would not be delivered at Gravesend—a distance of little more than 40 miles—till Tuesday morning, and for this service the minimum postage was sixpence.

Even if blank-post day did not intervene, and a letter was posted at Uxbridge on Monday morning, it would not be delivered at Gravesend till Wednesday; and if the reply were immediately written and posted,