Note 53 — I THE RATE FOR LETTERS
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"Upon the next renewal of his Contract, which was in the Year 1741, the Postmasters-General, after largely expressing, as usual, their sense of the integrity of his conduct, and the services he had done to the Public, told him they judged it but reasonable to expect some addition to his rent of £6,000 a Year for the Bye, Way and Cross Road Letters, altho' he should still continue to support and increase the produce of the Country Letters for the Benefit of the King. To which, Mr. Allen answered, that their expectations of additional rent appeared very reasonable to him, and which he should have made in his own way (a way he was going to open to them) had they not themselves proposed it. That there are two ways of giving this additional Rent: the one was by paying a further some of money yearly, such as he could afford to his Majesty's use without any advance to public commerce, the other was by paying his Majesty, and immediately too, a much larger sum than he could in the first way pretend to advance, in causing a considerable increase of the produce of the London and Country Letters by means of extending and quickening the correspondence of London and several of the most considerable Trading Towns and Cities thro'out the Kingdom; a project that would be of infinite advantage to commerce. Which of these two ways the Postmasters-General would think fit to prefer, he left to themselves to consider; who on duly weighing all circumstances, did not in the least hesitate to prefer the latter method.
"Upon which Mr. Allen agreed to erect, at his own Expence, one every day cost from London to Bath, Bristol, and Glocester towards the West; and from London to Cambridge, Lynn, Norwich, and Yarmouth towards the East; and to all intermediate places in both quarters: and—that all the increase of the postage of Letters thus conveyed between London and the several places, East, and West of it above-mentioned, should, without any charge or deduction, be paid in directly for his Majesty's use, as well as all the increase of the Country Letters within that District, that is, such Letters as pass between one Country Town and another thro' London.
"All this was accordingly done and executed conformable to the terms of the contract."—Ibid., pp. 25-6.
Similar extensions were made at the renewals of the lease in 1748 and 1755.