Page:The Post Office of India and its story.djvu/118

94 me before H.B.M.'s Vice-Consul and the small European Community at the Linga Club, and they all, while sympathizing with me in my perplexity, enjoyed a hearty laugh over the recital.

On the 31st March, 1918, there were over 19,410 post offices and 49,749 letter boxes in India to serve a population of 319 million people in an area of 1,622,000 square miles. This gives a post office to about every 16,000 persons, or to each 83 square miles of country, which seems a very poor service by comparison with Western countries, but, when one considers that the literate population of India is only 18,500,000, the service is good and the prospect of future development with the increase of education is enormous.

It must not be supposed, however, that the Post Office confines its energies to the literate population. It is largely used by people who can neither read nor write, and this is made possible by the existence of professional letter-writers, who are to be found in every town and village in the country. For a pice (farthing) they will write an address, and for two pice they will write a short letter or a postcard or fill up a money order, though slightly higher fees are charged if the letter is very long.

In rural tracts where it is not worth while to maintain a post office, the people are served by a letter-box or by a village postman who makes periodical visits and acts as a travelling post office. It is a wonderful achievement of the Department that there is scarcely a village in India which does not lie within the beat of a village postman. The competition between villages to obtain post offices is often very keen, and a Postmaster-General