Part 28

“FORBIDDEN ARTICLES.—The rule which forbids the transmission through the post of any article likely to injure the contents of the mail-bags or the person of any officer of the post-office is, of course, applicable to the pattern-post; and a packet containing any thing of the kind will be stopped and not sent to its destination.

“Articles such as the following have been occasionally posted as patterns, and have been detained as unfit for the post, viz.,—metal boxes, porcelain and china, fruit, vegetables, bunches of flowers, cuttings of plants, spurs, knives, scissors, needles, pins, pieces of machinery, watch-machinery, sharp-pointed instruments, samples of metals, samples of ore, samples in glass bottles, pieces of glass, acids of various kinds, curry-combs, copper and steel engraving-plates, and confectionery of various kinds.”

_WATCH YOUR LETTER-BOXES._

In many of our large post-offices postmasters have baskets placed inside for the reception of letters. These are invariably too small, and it not unfrequently occurs that the aperture through which letters pass gets choked up, the basket being full to its mouth. Any person could from the outside take a handful of letters without any one being aware of it. Honest men, however, making the discovery, notify the clerks of the situation of the letters, but not until it is very natural to suppose some letters may have been stolen. This will account in some measure for the mysterious disappearance of letters which have caused many an innocent person to be suspected and the business operations of an office justly censured. These baskets, instead of being wide and shallow, are deep and narrow. If properly constructed and arranged, there would be no necessity for clerks shouting out, “Swamp on the baskets.” This is very much like locking the stable-door after the horse has been stolen.

We would suggest, therefore, that when dropping a letter, newspaper, &c. into a letter-box, always to see that the packet falls into the basket or box, and does not stick in its passage.

_SUGGESTIONS TO THE PUBLIC, ETC._

The following sensible suggestions are taken from “The British Postal Guide:” let us advise our readers to pay some little attention to them:—

“To see that every letter, newspaper, or other packet sent by post is securely folded and sealed, and that, when postage-stamps are remitted, they are enclosed in paper sufficiently thick to prevent them from being seen or felt through the cover. It should be remembered that every such packet has to be several times handled, and that even when in the mail-bag it is exposed to pressure and friction. Unless, therefore, the article be light and pliant, it should be enclosed in strong paper, linen, parchment, or some other material which will not readily tear or break. The observance of this precaution is especially necessary whenever any fragile articles of value are forwarded by post. These should always be enclosed in a wooden or tin box. Owing to neglect of these precautions many postal packets burst open, causing much trouble to the department and risk to the owners, it being sometimes impossible to determine to what packet a particular article belongs.

“To fasten the covers of newspapers firmly, so as to prevent the contents from slipping out. When, for additional security, the address is written on the newspaper itself, such address (if the newspaper be franked by an impressed stamp) must in case of re-transmission be cut off; otherwise the newspaper will become subject to a postage of 2_d._ It is not sufficient that the old address be _obliterated_, as the rules forbid writing or marks of any kind in addition to the true address.

“In affixing stamps, to wet slightly the corner of the envelope and the gummed side of the stamp, and then gently to press the stamp till it is firmly fixed. The practice of dipping the stamp in water is objectionable, because, unless the stamp be immediately withdrawn, and care be taken by the use of blotting-paper or some other absorbent to remove any excess of moisture, the gum may be washed off, or the stamp may be rubbed off the letter. By the use of envelopes bearing an _embossed_ stamp (which can be purchased at any post-office), all risk of the stamp being detached may be avoided.

“Never to send money or any other article of value through the post, except either by means of a money-order or in a registered letter. Any person who sends money or jewelry in an unregistered letter not only runs a risk of losing his property, but exposes to temptation every one through whose hands his letter passes, and may be the means of ultimately bringing some clerk or letter-carrier to moral ruin. Every letter which contains money or other valuable article, even when registered, ought to be securely sealed.”

_FORBIDDEN ARTICLES._

“Postmasters are instructed not to receive any letter, &c. which there is good reason to believe contains any thing likely to injure the contents of the mail-bag or the person of any officer of the post-office. If such a packet be posted without the postmaster’s knowledge, or if at any time before its despatch he should discover any such packet, he is directed not to forward it, but to report the case, with the address of the packet, to the secretary. The following are examples of the articles referred to:—

“A glass bottle, or glass in any form; razors, scissors, needles, knives, forks, or other sharp instruments; leeches, game, fish, meat, fruit, or vegetables; bladders or other vessels containing liquids; gunpowder, lucifer matches, or any thing which is explosive or combustible.”

_LETTER-CARRIERS, THEIR COMPENSATION, ETC._

“Letter-carriers shall be employed as the postmaster-general shall direct, at a compensation not exceeding $800 a year, which may be increased to $1000 at offices where the income will allow, on proof of the carrier’s fidelity, diligence, and experience. Carriers must give bond. Deliveries shall be made as frequently as the public interest may require. No carrier’s fee or extra postage shall be charged on letters delivered or collected by carriers. Separate accounts must be kept of the expenses of the carrier-service and of the receipts from _local_ mail-matter; and all such expenses must be paid from the income of the office employing the carriers. Letter-carriers may be employed, under contract between postmaster and publishers, to deliver newspapers, periodicals, circulars, &c., but such contracts must be first approved by the postmaster-general; and the postmaster-general may also provide for delivery by such carriers of small packets, not exceeding four pounds each, at the rate of two cents for each four ounces.”

Attempts were made subsequent to the passage of this law (1862) to have the salaries increased to $1000, urged by the applicants in consequence of the high price of provisions. In 1864 they were coolly informed that there were plenty of people _outside_ ready to step _inside_ at the same salary. The post-office would present a strange appearance if this system was adopted, for the duties of the office are not learned in a day. Under former administrations it was the chief object of men in power to pay their employees living wages and reward honesty, sobriety, and attention to business by preferment. _It is not so now._

_ONE-CENT SYSTEM._

The law authorizing the free delivery of mail-letters and all other mail-matter by carriers took effect on the first day of July, 1863. We much question if the change has benefited the treasury of the department.

_THE DISTRIBUTION OF LETTERS IN EUROPE._

Although we have expressed a doubt in relation to this system with us, it may not apply to other countries. Here it is expected that the income of an office will sustain its own expenses, and hence every postmaster is anxious to make his report to the department favorably to this system. Carriers now receive a regular salary; before, they depended in a great measure on the one-cent system, which lessened the department’s expense for carriers’ pay more than one-third what it is now. The one cent was received from the recipients of letters and papers, which they paid freely, and not unfrequently made it two when they came to settle with the carriers. Merchants and others still consider the old plan the best, _having an idea that they are better served_.

AUSTRIA.—Brought to the door. In all larger places, without carrier’s fee; in smaller places (villages and farms), a fee of two kreutzers (one cent) is charged.

BELGIUM.—Brought to the door throughout the kingdom.

ENGLAND.—By carriers without fee.

FRANCE.—By carriers without fee (to the door) in both city and country. Poste restante exists for letters so addressed, and when the person’s address is not found.

HANSEATIC CITIES—BREMEN.—By letter-carriers to the door.

ITALY.—To the door by carriers without fee.

THE NETHERLANDS.—By carriers without fee.

PRUSSIA.—By carriers. In larger cities the fee will soon be abolished entirely; in the rural districts it is six pfennige (about one and a quarter cent) per letter.

SWITZERLAND.—By carriers without fee.

XIV.

Miscellaneous.

_THE ANDERSONVILLE POST-OFFICE._

The following touching lines, by George H. Hollister, Esq., of Litchfield, Connecticut, are descriptive of an incident in the _pen_ of the Union prisoners at Andersonville, Georgia. The war has elicited nothing more beautiful in description or of sadder interest:—

“No blanket round his wasted limbs, Under the rainy sky he slept, While, pointing his envenom’d shafts Around him Death, the archer, crept. He dream’d of hunger, and held out His hand to clutch a little bread, That a white angel with a torch, Among the living and the dead, Seem’d bearing, smiling as he went: The vision waked him, as he spied The post-boy follow’d by a crowd Of famish’d prisoners, who cried For letters—letters from their friends. Crawling upon his hands and knees, He hears his own name call’d, and, lo! A letter from his wife he sees!

“Gasping for breath, he shriek’d aloud, And, lost in nature’s blind eclipse, Faltering amid the suppliant crowd, Caught it and press’d it to his lips. A guard who follow’d, red and wroth, And flourishing a rusty brand, Reviled him with a taunting oath, And snatch’d the letter from his hand. ‘First pay the postage, whining wretch!’ Despair had made the prisoner brave: ‘Then give me back my money, sir! I am a captive,—not a slave. You took my money and my clothes; Take my life, too,—but let me know How Mary and the children are, And I will bless you ere I go.’

“The very moonlight through his hands, As he stood supplicating, shone, And his sharp features shaped themselves Into a prayer, and such a tone Of anguish there was in his cry For wife and children, that the guard— Thinking upon his own—pass’d by And left him swooning on the sward. Beyond the ‘dead-line’ fell his head: The eager sentry knew his mark, And with a crash the bullet sped Into his brain, and all was dark. But when they turn’d his livid cheek Up toward the light, the pale lips smiled, Kissing a picture fair and meek That held in either hand a child.”

_A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS._

“The Wheeling Intelligencer” (1865) gives the following “chapter of accidents”: it says,—

“We received a letter several days ago from a gentleman, enclosing an announcement of his marriage, and stating that he had also enclosed the sum of seventy-five cents to pay for it. The letter did not enclose the money; but the next day we got another letter from the same gentleman, stating that it had occurred to him, after he had mailed the first note, that he had not enclosed the money; ‘and I therefore,’ says the second epistle, ‘enclose to you the amount;’ but, instead of seventy-five cents, the letter only contained twenty-five. A day or two afterwards we received two more letters from the same person, each enclosing fifty cents. The first of the two letters stated that the writer, having discovered his mistake, enclosed fifty cents more to make up the amount. In the second letter the gentleman says, that ‘having learned that the mail containing my last letter was destroyed by fire, I enclose now another fifty cents.’ Our friend’s singular confusion is no doubt attributable to the fact which in his original note he requested us to announce.”

_A SCENE AT THE PHILADELPHIA POST-OFFICE._

DIDN’T LIKE THE IDEA.—A single female, apparently forty-five years of age, with a very scraggy neck and weazened features, made her appearance yesterday afternoon at the ladies’ window in the post-office.

“I want to get back a letter.”

“What for, madam?”

“Why, I dropped it in the box over yonder. I want to take it back again.”

“That’s against our rules, ma’am; I am not allowed to give back a letter unless I know all about it.”

“Well, then, there’ll be a fuss here, that’s all: I want my letter again.”

“I’ll call the chief clerk, then, ma’am. You can make the fuss with him, if you must have one.”

Mr. Booth was summoned. With his usual blandness he asked the lady how the letter was directed, and to whom. He obtained a prompt reply. He found that the lady had dropped the letter into the box under the general delivery-window. He produced it from the basket after a little search, and returned it to her. She appeared considerably pleased, brushed off the letter with her handkerchief, and at once dropped it into the basket under the ladies’ window, before which she was standing.

“Why, I thought you wanted to take out the letter!” said Mr. Booth, in some surprise. “Here you’ve mailed it again.”

“That’s all right now,” said the woman. “That’s what I wanted. I dropped the letter in the wrong place fust, among the men’s letters. I hate the men, so I do. I hain’t goin’ to have my letter mixed up with men’s letters, nohow.”

“You dislike the male sex then, madam?”

“I don’t hate you mail folk, as I know on, wuss than the rest on ’em.”

“I mean the men, madam; you dislike them?” said Mr. Booth, emphasizing the title of masculinity.

“Oh, the men! Of course I hate ’em. I wouldn’t trust one of ’em anigh me. They’re a deceivin’, lyin’”——

How the sentence would have been completed is more than we can say. At this moment somebody trod upon the tail of a vixenish-looking dog that followed the lady, and, as she rushed out, others took her place at the window. Mr. Booth feels flattered that, while hating the male sex in general, she doesn’t hate the mail folks in particular.

_THE POST COMES IN._

BY WILLIAM COWPER.

“Hark! ’tis the twanging horn o’er yonder bridge, That with its wearisome but needful length Bestrides the wintry flood; in which the moon Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright. He comes, the herald of a noisy world, With spatter’d boots, strapp’d waist, and frozen locks, News from all nations lumb’ring at his back. True to his charge, the close-pack’d load behind. Yet careless what he brings, his one concern Is to conduct it to the destined inn, And, having dropp’d the expected bag, pass on. He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch, Cold, and yet cheerful; messenger of grief Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some; To him indiff’rent whether grief or joy. Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks, Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet With tears, that trickled down the writer’s cheeks Fast as the periods from his fluent quill, Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains Or nymphs responsive, equally affect His horse and him, unconscious of them all.”

_Task_, Book IV.

_WATCH THE WASTE PAPER._

One of the postal regulations (sect. 217) is as follows:—

“The postmaster, or one of his assistants, in all cases, _immediately_ before the office is swept or otherwise cleared of rubbish, is to collect and examine the waste paper which has accumulated therein, in order to guard against the possibility of loss of letters or other mail-matter which may have fallen on the floor or have been intermingled with such waste paper during the transaction of business. The observance of this rule is strictly enjoined upon all postmasters, and its violation will constitute a grave offence. Postmasters should be careful to use, in mailing letters or packets, all wrapping-paper fit to be used again; and the sale of any such paper is strictly forbidden.”

A neglect of this section might lead to serious consequences, inasmuch as letters are continually falling from the tables and trays to the floor, and, unless looked after, would unquestionably find their way to the “waste-bags.”

The proprietor of a paper-mill informed us that one of the girls employed by him in separating the waste paper purchased from postmasters had found several letters, one of which contained $30 in Treasury notes, and another contained a note for $500 and an order to cancel stamp placed upon a note since it was signed, as stamps could not be obtained at the place where the note was signed.

The above letters had been thrown into the waste paper by some careless postmaster or clerks, and sold at two and a half cents per pound; and some other postmaster or clerks have been under suspicion of committing a depredation upon those letters; and had this girl been dishonest they might never have been able to convince the parties interested of their innocence.

This is inexcusable carelessness; and postmasters who read this article should see that they or their clerks are not caught in this way.

_SEALING-WAX._

Under no circumstances use sealing-wax for postal purposes. Wax should only be used for letters or documents when a person is anxious to _display his seal or coat of arms_, or where it may be required for a legal purpose, and only then when they are more effectually secured.

The practice of sealing letters passing more particularly through warm climates with wax is attended with much inconvenience, and frequently with serious injury, not only to the letters so sealed, but to the other letters in the mail, from the melting of the wax and adhesion of the letters to each other. The public are, therefore, recommended in all such cases to use either wafers or gum, and to advise their correspondents in the countries referred to to do the same.

English newspapers—indeed, nearly all European printed matter—come to us sealed with _bad wax_; and if many of them were not secured by thread, few would ever reach the parties to whom they are addressed.

_COMPLAINTS ABOUT MISTAKES._

When complaint is made of letters or newspapers lost, miscarried, or delayed, to furnish information as precise as possible regarding all the facts of the case, and to enclose whatever documents may throw light upon it. The day and hour at which the letter or newspaper was posted, as well as the office at which and the person by whom this was done, should always be stated, and, when possible, the cover or wrapper, in an entire state, should be sent, in order that the place of delay may be ascertained by an examination of the stamps. Cases frequently occur in which complaint is made against the post-office and redress expected, although little or no means of tracing the error and of guarding against a repetition of it is supplied by those who alone are able to do so.

_A LAW CASE._

In 1806 a case was tried in the District Court of Maryland, “United States _vs._ Barney,” which we deem essential to the nature of our work.

“WINCHESTER, J.—The indictment in this case, which charges the defendant with having wilfully obstructed the passage of the public mail at Susquehanna River, is founded on the act of Congress of March, 1799.

“The defendant sets up as a defence and justification of this obstruction of the mail that he had fed the horses employed in carrying the mail for a considerable time, and that a sum of money was due to him for food furnished at and before the time of their arrest and detention.

“On this state of the facts, two questions have been agitated:—

“1st, Whether the right of an innkeeper to detain a horse for his food extends to horses owned by individuals and employed in the transportation of the public mail. And,

“2d, Whether such right extends to horses belonging to the United States, employed in that service.

“The first question involves the consideration of principles of some extent, and to decide correctly on the second it may be necessary to state them generally.

“Lien is generally defined to be a tie, hold, or security upon goods or other things which a man has in his custody, till he is paid what is due to him. From this definition it is apparent that there can be no lien where the property is annihilated or the possession parted with voluntarily and without fraud. 2 _Vern._ 117; 1 _Atk._ 234.

“The claim of a lien otherwise well founded cannot be supported if there is—

“1st, A particular agreement made and relied on. _Sayer’s _ Rep. 224; 2 _R. A._ 92. Or,

“2d, Where the particular transaction shows that there was no intention that there should be a lien, but some _other security is looked to and relied upon_. 4 _Burr._ 2223.

“If, therefore, in this case the agreement between the defendant and the public agent actually was that he should be paid for feeding the public horses on as low terms as any other person on the road would supply them, he could not justify detaining the horses; for the particular agreement thus made, and under which the food was furnished, is the foundation of the remedy of the defendant, and it can be pursued in no other manner than upon that agreement. Or, if there was no particular agreement, this case is such that between the defendant and a private owner of horses and carriages employed in transporting the mail I incline to think it could not legally be presumed a lien was ever intended or contemplated. A carrier of the mail is bound not to delay its delivery, under severe penalties; and it can scarcely be supposed that he would expose himself to the penalty for such delay by leaving his horses subject to the arrest of every innkeeper on the road for their food, or that in such case the innkeeper could look to any other security than the personal credit of the owner of the horses for reimbursement. But the law on such a case could be only declared on facts admitted by the parties or found by the jury, and is not now before the court.

“3d, The great question in this case rests on a discrimination between the property of the government and individuals.”

After defining the constitutional rights of the government and its general power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excise, to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States, and quoting numerous authorities, the judge concludes with the following:—

“_A stolen horse found in the mail-stage._ The owner cannot seize him.

“The driver being in debt, or even committing an offence, can only be arrested in such way as does not obstruct the passage of the mail.

“These examples are as strong as any which are likely to occur; but even these are not excepted by the statute; and probably considerations of the extreme importance to the government and individuals of the regular transmission of public despatches and private communications may have excluded these exceptions. But whatever may have been the policy which led to the adoption of the law, which the court will not inquire into, it totally prohibits any obstruction to the passage of the mail. It is the duty of the court to expound and execute the law, and therefore I am of opinion and decide that the defendant is not justified.”

_POSTAGE-STAMPS._