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1
435
Her Majesty's Mails
·
William Lewins
340
Sykes
of
Huddersfield,
engaged
in
the
savings'
bank
of
that
town,
addressed
Mr.
Gladstone
on
the
deficiencies
of
the
existing
system.
Through
his
practical
acquaintance
with
the
old
plan
of
working,
he
was
able
to
demonstrate
that
increased
facilities
for
depositing
at
any
time,
and
almost
at
any
place,
were
great
desiderata
amongst
the
poorer
classes.
The
same
facilities
were
necessary
for
withdrawing
deposits.
Mr.
Sykes
proposed
that
a
bank
for
savings
should
be
opened
at
every
money-order
office
in
the
kingdom;
that
each
postmaster
should
be
authorized
to
receive
deposits;
and
that
all
the
offices
should
have
immediate
connexion
with
a
central
bank
in
London.
The
general
principle
of
this
scheme
was
at
once
seen
to
be
useful
and
practicable,
though,
again,
the
mode
of
working
was
evidently
unsatisfactory.
Mr.
Sykes,
for
instance,
proposed
that
all
payments
and
withdrawals
should
be
severally
effected
by
means
of
money-orders
to
be
drawn
for
each
separate
undertaking.
Any
one
at
all
acquainted
with
the
machinery
of
the
money-order
office
was
aware
that
this
would
of
necessity
be
a
slow
and
complex,
as
well
as
expensive
plan.
Mr.
Sykes's
idea
was,
that
no
deposit
should
be
less
in
amount
than
twenty
shillings.
This
arrangement,
again,
would
have
gone
far
to
negative
the
merits
of
the
whole
plan,
and
especially
to
interfere
with
its
usefulness
amongst
the
classes
which
the
measure
was
really
intended
to
benefit.
For
a
few
months
this
scheme,
like
those
preceding
it,
exhibited
signs
of
suspended
animation,
when
it
was
referred
to
the
practical
officers
of
the
revenue
department
of
the
Post-Office,
and
by
them
resolved
into
the
simple
and
comprehensive
measure
which
the
Chancellor
of
the
Exchequer
proposed
in
1861,
and
which
was
the
crowning
effort
of
the
legislative
session
of
that
year.
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