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318
The Royal Mail: Its Curiosities and Romance
·
James Wilson Hyde
161
Frauds
on
the
Public.
The
Post-office,
while
it
is
the
willing
handmaid
to
commerce,
the
vehicle
of
social
intercourse,
and
the
necessary
helper
in
almost
every
enterprise
and
occupation,
becomes
at
the
same
time
a
ready
means
for
the
unscrupulous
to
carry
on
a
wonderful
variety
of
frauds
on
the
public,
and
enables
a
whole
army
of
needy
and
designing
persons
to
live
upon
the
generous
impulses
of
society.
While
these
things
go
on,--and
Post-office
officials
know
they
go
on,--the
Department
is
helpless
to
prevent
them;
for
the
work
of
the
Post-office
is
carried
on
as
a
secret
business,
in
so
far
as
the
communications
intrusted
to
it
are
concerned,
and
the
contents
of
the
letters
conveyed
are
not
its
property
or
interest.
There
are
men
and
women
who
go
about
from
town
to
town
writing
begging
letters
to
well-to-do
persons,
appealing
for
help
under
all
sorts
of
pretences;
and
these
persons
are
as
well
known,
in
the
sense
of
being
customers
to
the
Department,
as
a
housekeeper
is
known
at
her
grocer's
shop.
There
are
other
persons,
again,
who
carry
on
long-firm
swindles
through
the
post,
obtaining
goods
which
are
never
to
be
paid
for;
and
as
soon
as
the
goods
are
received
at
one
place,
the
swindlers
move
on
to
another
place,
assume
new
names,
and
repeat
the
operation.
The
schemes
adopted
are
often
very
deeply
laid;
and
the
police,
when
once
set
upon
the
track,
have
hard
work
to
unravel
the
wily
plans.
But
tradespeople
are
not
infrequently
themselves
very
much
to
blame,
as
they
show
themselves
too
confiding,
and
too
ready
to
do
business
with
unknown
persons.
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