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Her Majesty's Mails
·
William Lewins
9
It
is
certainly
remarkable
that
neither
in
this
nor
in
any
other
recorded
instance
have
the
posts
in
ancient
times
developed
into
one
for
the
conveyance
of
private
correspondence.
It
is
certain
that
the
Greeks
and
Romans,
even
when
at
the
height
of
their
civilization,
had
no
regular
public
post.
There
are
some
traces
of
statores
and
stationes
under
the
Roman
Republic;
and
Augustus,
we
find,
instituted
posts
on
the
principal
trunk-roads,
for
the
use
of
the
Imperial
Government.
He
also
established
a
class
of
mounted
messengers,
called
tabellarii,
who
went
in
charge
of
the
despatches.
That
these
messengers
should
have
been
strictly
forbidden
to
convey
letters
for
private
persons,
or
that
no
provision
was
subsequently
made
for
that
purpose,
is
the
more
wonderful,
when
we
consider
the
high
character
of
the
nations
themselves,
and
the
fact,
often
pointed
out,
that
the
progress
of
civilization
has
always
been
intimately
and
essentially
connected
with,
and
dependent
upon,
facilities
for
intercommunication--keeping
pace,
in
fact,
with
the
means
which
nations
possessed
for
the
interchange
of
person
and
property,
and
with
them
of
thought
and
knowledge.
That
those
nations
to
which
we
are
so
greatly
indebted
for
so
much
that
exalts
the
intellect
and
adorns
life,
should
not
have
left
us
an
example
of
such
a
useful
and
(considering
the
vast
extent
of
their
respective
territories),
we
should
have
thought,
indispensable
institution
as
that
of
a
public
letter-post,
is
marvellous.
Marco
Polo,
the
famous
Venetian,
who
travelled
in
China
in
the
fourteenth
century,[3]
describes
the
government
post
as
similar
to
that
in
use
in
Persia
under
Cyrus.
The
posts
had
existed
in
China
from
the
earliest
times.
Every
twenty-five
miles
there
were
posts,
called
jambs,
where
the
imperial
envoy
was
received.
There
were
frequently
as
many
as
three
or
four
hundred
horses
in
waiting
at
one
of
these
places.
Polo
further
states
that
there
were
ten
thousand
stations
of
this
kind
in
China,
some
of
them
affording
sumptuous
accommodation
to
travellers.
Two
hundred
thousand
horses
are
said
to
have
been
engaged
in
the
service.
The
fact
affords
a
curious
commentary
on
the
progress
of
civilization
in
the
Celestial
Empire,
that,
though
this
gigantic
and
elaborate
establishment
has
been
in
existence
so
long
and
up
to
the
present
century,
it
is
only
within
the
last
few
years
that
provision
has
been
made
in
China
for
public
letter-posts.
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