Page:The life and letters of Sir John Henniker Heaton bt. (IA lifelettersofsi00port).pdf/244

 present railway system too—by which you are shot through the world like so many tons of coal, no one caring whether you come or whether you do not, except that there may be a certain weight of food cooked for you to eat—will not bear thinking of, and now, when the telegraph system had practically destroyed the peace and quiet of life, there are to be telephones to complete the charter of human rights.

To me it's all maddening, and will cause my immediate retirement to my Scotch mountains, to which, thank goodness, there is no legal access at present.

P.S.—Still malgré tout I must support you.—A. B.

When H. H. entered Parliament in 1886, he drew up a list of sixty reforms for the Postmaster-General—most of which were adopted; when he left Parliament in 1910, he drew up another list of sixty-two reforms—one for every year of his life.

By 1891, H. H. had already been instrumental in obtaining:

1. A saving of £107,000 a year, or a total saving of £1,070,000, on the cost of conveying mails to India and the East during the next ten years.

2. A saving of £40,000 a year on the De la Rue Post Office stationery contract.

3. A saving of at least £25,000 a year on the Sample Parcel Post. Formerly tens of thousands of samples were sent from London to Belgium, to be posted back to England, and Belgium kept every farthing of the postage.

4. A saving of at least £30,000 a year in the carriage of mails to India, China, and Australia, overland from Calais to Brindisi. When H. H. commenced the