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318
The Royal Mail: Its Curiosities and Romance
·
James Wilson Hyde
302
In
the
earlier
history
of
the
post,
and
up
till
the
time
of
mail-coaches,
the
Post-office
was
very
generally
to
be
found
established
at
the
inn
of
the
place.
There
was
an
evident
convenience
in
this,
owing
to
the
innkeeper
being
the
postmaster
in
the
other
and
original
sense
of
the
provider
of
horses
to
ride
post,
when
it
was
common
to
send
on
expresses,
by
means
of
these
agents,
from
stage
to
stage.
But
the
innkeepers,
being
often
farmers
besides,
had
business
more
important
than
that
of
the
post
to
look
after,
and
consequently
the
work
was
delegated
to
others.
The
duty
of
receiving
and
despatching
the
mails
was
frequently
left
to
waiters
or
chambermaids,
with
the
undesirable
but
inevitable
result
that
the
work
was
badly
done.
Often
there
was
no
separate
place
set
apart
for
Post-office
business;
letters
were
sorted
in
the
bar
or
in
one
of
the
public
rooms,
where
any
one
could
see
them,
thereby
excluding
all
possibility
of
secrecy
in
dealing
with
the
correspondence.
Referring
to
the
middle
of
last
century,
a
surveyor
expressed
himself
to
the
effect
that
"the
head
ostler
was
often
the
postmaster's
prime
minister
in
matters
relating
to
the
mails."
The
interest
taken
by
Boniface
in
the
Post-office
does
not
seem
to
have
been
very
great;
for
an
English
surveyor,
writing
in
1792,
thus
expresses
himself:
"Persons
who
keep
horses
for
other
uses,
and
particularly
innkeepers,
may
assuredly
more
conveniently
and
at
less
expense
work
the
mails
than
those
who
keep
horses
for
that
business
only.
But,
on
the
other
hand,
it
may
be
observed
that
innkeepers,
so
far
from
paying
Government
service
the
compliment
of
employing
in
it
their
best
horses,
too
often
send
their
worst
with
the
mails;
and
as
to
their
riders,
they
are,
in
general,
the
dregs
of
the
stable-yard,
and
by
no
means
to
be
compared
to
those
employed
by
postmasters
in
private
stations."
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