Her Majesty's Mails

In the first year of penny postage, notwithstanding all the confident prophecies to the contrary from those who might have been supposed to have had means of judging, the net proceeds of the Post-Office were between four and five hundred thousand pounds, whilst the number of letters actually sent was tripled. Against a million and a half yearly revenue of the previous year, there certainly appeared an enormous deficit; but till all other arguments were exhausted, it ought not to have been considered either evidence or proof of the failure of cheap postage. In the first instance, the Post-Office authorities said the scheme would not pay its expenses: a year sufficed to prove their mistake. It was then said that the revenue sacrificed would never be recovered, and accidental circumstances, of which we shall presently speak, favoured for a time this view: the argument, however, was based on erroneous views, as subsequent events have sufficiently shown. Bad as things appeared, there were, nevertheless, many significant signs at the end of two years that the gross revenue under the old would soon be reached under the new system, and even prospects that the past net revenue might still be recoverable. Both these anticipations have now been entirely realized. With a tenfold--nay, in many cases, a hundredfold--gain to different classes of the community--with the Post-Office supplying more situations by thousands than under the ancien régime, the old gross revenue was passed in 1850-1, and the net revenue was reached last year. Moreover, every complaint under this head has long since been silenced. Many considerations went to hinder the early growth of the revenue; and it is to some of these considerations that we must now turn for a moment.