Читать книгу Her Majesty's Mails - William Lewins - Страница 11

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[26] There were many exceptions, of course. Numbers of innkeepers were also the postmasters of the period. Taylor, the water-poet, travelling from London into Scotland in the early part of the century, has described one of these men, in his Penniless Pilgrimage, as a model Boniface.

[27] "The Grand Concern of England explained in several Proposals to Parliament."—Harl. MSS. 1673.

[28] Chamberlayne's Present History of Great Britain. 1673.

[29] Private coaches were started in London at the time when the stage- or hackney-coaches were introduced, and Mr. Pepys secured one of the first. Mightily proud was he of it, as any reader of his Diary will have learnt to his great amusement.

[30] There are few traces in this country, at any time, of public letter-writers. This is somewhat remarkable, inasmuch as then, and still in some of the southern states of Europe, the profession of public letter-writer has long been an institution. In England it has never flourished. Some years ago there might have been seen at Wapping, Shadwell, and other localities in London where sailors resorted, announcements in small shop-windows to the effect that letters were written there "to all parts of the world." In one shop a placard was exhibited intimating that a "large assortment of letters on all sorts of subjects" were kept on hand. There were never many, and now very few, traces of the custom.

[31] Chambers' Domestic Annals.

[32] Lord Macaulay. Vol. i. p. 388.

[33] No less interesting are the particulars of one year's postal revenue and expenditure, extracted from the old account-books of the department, by the present Receiver and Accountant-General of the Post-Office. The date given is within a year or two of that referred to in the text, viz. 1686-7. The net produce of the year was a little over 76,000l., and the following is a few of the most important and most suggestive items:—

	£	s.	d.
Product of foreign mails for the year	17,805	1	7
The King's Majesty paid for his foreign letters	178	18	4
Product of Harwich packet-boats	950	5	4
The Inland window money amounted to	870	4	2
The letter-receivers' money	313	19	8
The letter-carriers' money	30,497	10	0
The Postmaster's money	37,819	8	11
Officers were fined to the extent of	13	0	0
The profits of the Irish Office were	2,419	14	0
The profits of the Penny-Post	800	0	0

The Scotch Office appears not only not to have brought in any profits, but we find an item of absolute loss on the exchange of money with Edinburgh to the extent of 210l. 10s. 10d.

Amongst the more interesting items of expenditure we notice that—

	£	s.	d.
The six clerks in the Foreign Office and about twenty clerks belonging to other departments received per annum	60	0	0
The salary of the Postmaster-General was	1,500	0	0
Two officers had 200l. per annum, a third had 150l., and a fourth had 100l.—all four, doubtless, heads of departments	450	0	0
There were eight letter-receivers in London, viz. at Gray's Inn, at Temple Bar, at King Street, at Westminster, in Holborn, in Covent Garden, in Pall Mall, and in the Strand two offices, whose yearly salaries amounted in all to	110	6	8
The yearly salaries of the whole body of letter-carriers	1,338	15	0
The salaries of the deputy-postmasters	5,639	6	0

The entire total expenditure was 13,509l. 6s. 8d. "Thus we find," adds Mr. Scudamore, "that while the 'whole net produce' of the establishment for a year was not equal to the sum which we derive from the commission on money-orders in a year (Mr. Scudamore is writing of 1854), or to the present 'net produce' of the single town of Liverpool, so also, the whole expenditure of the whole establishment for a year was but a little larger than the sum which we now pay once a month for salaries to the clerks of the London Office alone." If we subtract the total expenditure from the "whole net produce," as it is called, we get a sum exceeding 62,000l. as the entire net receipts of the Post-Office for the year 1686-7.