Note 199 — Chapter VII · CONCERNING SOME OF THE POPULAR MISCONCEPTIONS AND MISREPRESENTATIONS TO WHICH THE POST-OFFICE IS LIABLE.

As another example, take the United States, with Mr. Anthony Trollope for a judge on postal concerns. In his North America, vol. ii. p. 368, we read: "It is, I think, undoubtedly true that the amount of accommodation given by the Post-Office of the States is small, as compared with that afforded in some other countries, and that that accommodation is lessened by delays and uncertainty.... Here in England, it is the object of our Post-Office to carry the bulk of our letters at night, to deliver them as early as possible in the morning, and to collect them and take them away for despatch as late as may be in the day; so that the merchant may receive his letters before the beginning of his day's business, and despatch them after its close. In the States no such practice prevails. Letters arrive at any hour of the day miscellaneously, and were despatched at any hour. I found that the postmaster of one town could never tell me with certainty when letters would arrive at another. I ascertained, moreover, by painful experience that the whole of a mail would not always go forward by the first despatch. As regarded myself, this had reference chiefly to English letters and newspapers. 'Only a part of the mail has come,' the clerk would tell me. With us the owners of that part which did not come would consider themselves greatly aggrieved and make loud complaint. But, in the States, complaints made against official departments are held to be of little moment." We are further told that the "letters are subject to great delays by irregularities on railways. They have no travelling post-offices in the States, as with us. And, worst of all, there is no official delivery of letters." "The United States' Post-Office," says Mr. Trollope, "does not assume to itself the duty of taking letters to the houses of those for whom they are intended, but holds itself as having completed the work for which the original postage has been paid when it has brought them to the window of the post-office of the town to which they are addressed." The recognised official mode of delivery is from the office window, many inhabitants paying for private boxes at the post-office. If delivered, a further sum must be paid the bearer. Surely English people have reason to be content with their privileges, and in a certain degree to "rest and be thankful."