Lab
Library
Journal
Shop
Sign in
to keep
Share image
1
318
The Royal Mail: Its Curiosities and Romance
·
James Wilson Hyde
205
CHAPTER
XVII.
HOW
LETTERS
ARE
LOST.
In
dealing
with
the
vast
numbers
of
letters
and
other
post
articles
which
daily
flow
through
the
capacious
veins
of
the
British
Post-office,
the
officials
of
the
department
come
to
learn
many
strange
things
connected
with
the
wanderings
of
letters
from
their
proper
courses;
they
learn
much
in
regard
to
the
blunders
made
by
the
senders
of
letters
in
writing
their
addresses,
and
of
the
supreme
folly
frequently
shown
by
individuals
in
transmitting
valuables
in
carelessly-made-up
packets;
and
this
experience
not
only
has
the
effect
of
causing
complaints
made
by
the
public
to
be
sometimes
met
by
doubts
and
misgivings
on
the
part
of
the
Post-office,
but
is
of
great
use
in
tracing
home
the
blame
to
the
right
quarter,
which
is
found
to
be,
not
infrequently,
where
the
complainer
had
least
reason
to
suspect
it.
The
following
facts
will
probably
establish
what
is
here
advanced,
besides
proving
of
interest
to
the
reader.
It
is
quite
a
common
occurrence
for
letters--especially
letters
of
a
small
size--which
are
dropped
into
a
letter-box,
to
slip
inside
newspapers
or
book-packets,
and
to
be
carried,
not
only
out
of
their
proper
course,
but
to
places
abroad,
thus
getting
into
the
hands
of
the
wrong
persons.
Such
letters
are
returned
from
time
to
time
from
every
quarter
of
the
globe,
but
what
proportion
of
those
which
go
astray
are
duly
returned
it
is
impossible
to
say;
for
there
are
persons
who,
on
receiving
letters
in
this
way
not
intended
for
them,
proceed
to
open
the
envelopes
through
sheer
curiosity,
and
having
thus
violated
the
letters,
do
not
hesitate
to
destroy
them.
Others
again,
through
dishonest
motives,
open
letters
of
this
class
in
the
hope
of
gain.
But
there
are
others
who,
through
no
such
interest,
but
merely
from
the
want
of
a
neighbourly
spirit,
refuse
to
take
any
trouble
to
put
an
errant
letter
in
its
proper
course.
This
spirit
was
displayed
in
the
case
of
a
letter
which
had
been
misdelivered
by
the
postman
at
a
given
address
on
the
first
floor
of
a
tenement
(it
being
intended
for
a
person
occupying
the
ground
floor),
the
person
who
had
received
it
stating,
when
questioned,
that
he
had
torn
up
the
letter
because
he
would
not
be
troubled
to
send
it
downstairs!
Letters
are
sometimes,
too,
carried
away
to
wrong
addresses
by
sticking
to
the
backs
of
other
letters.
Marker
Marker
Fine marker
White-out
Fine white-out
Circle
Paint
Unmarker
Hand
Scalpel
Dice
Sieve
Purify
Undo
Redo
Start over
