Note 35 — Chapter IV

We think we shall he able to show clearly in a work on the Post Offices of England and France, preparing for publication early next year, that the penny postal system only began to be profitable to the nation about the time that Mr. Page wrote his report, notwithstanding that the statements of net revenue given in Post Office reports would make it appear to be otherwise. Until 1860, the charges for mail packets and contract mail steamers were borne on the Naval, and not on the Post Office Estimates, and the Postal Department debited itself specifically, for several years, with a charge for packets of about £4,500 a year! Last year, the total amount voted for our Ocean Postal Services and Packet Establishments was £821,163, of which £90,601 were for water conveyance of mails between different parts of the United Kingdom. Eight-ninths of it (£79,900) were for the mail service between Holyhead and Kingston. The vessels employed in this service are the finest and fastest afloat; they usually perform 63 statute miles in three hours and forty minutes, or at the rate of 17 miles an hour. The passages have, on some few occasions, been performed in three hours and twenty-five minutes, or over 18 miles an hour.