Page:The Post Office of Fifty Years Ago.djvu/86

 If any doubt is entertained of the accuracy of this result it may be tested thus:—Suppose one thousand letters to be made up into a parcel and dispatched from London to Edinburgh by coach: at the estimate above given, the weight of the parcel would be about 16 lbs., and the charge for its carriage about 2s. 4½d.; a rate of charge which, upon a contract for nearly half a ton per day, will furnish an adequate remuneration to the coach-master.

It appears, then, that the cost of mere transit incurred upon a letter sent from London to Edinburgh, a distance of 400 miles, is not more than one thirty-sixth part of a penny. If therefore the proper charge (exclusive of tax) upon a letter received and delivered in London itself were two-pence, then the proper charge (exclusive of tax) upon a letter received in London, but delivered in Edinburgh, would be two-pence plus one-thirty-sixth part of a penny. Now, as the letters taken from London to Edinburgh are undoubtedly carried much more than an average distance, it follows, that when the charge for the receipt and delivery of the letter is determined, an