The post office and its story an interesting account of the activities of a great government department

The Assistant Secretaries have included several men who were not only able administrators, but who were known outside the walls of the office. In another chapter I have spoken of Mr. Frank Ives Scudamore, C.B., who was one of the most remarkable men who ever served in the Post Office. Mr. Herbert Joyce, C.B., was an Assistant Secretary, and he wrote a History of the Post Office which is the standard work on the subject. Mr. F. E. Baines, C.B., was also an able administrator. He rendered valuable services during the period of the transfer of the telegraphs and in the organisation of the parcel post. He was an official with ideas, and he possessed what is rare in a permanent official, the quality of enthusiasm. He has published two books, Forty Years at the Post Office and On the Track of the Mail Coach, which are important contributions to the history of the Post Office. Mr. H. Buxton Forman, C.B., who was long associated with the foreign business of the Department, is known also as the editor and biographer of Keats, and as the author of several works dealing with the Keats and Shelley circles. The Comptroller and Accountant-General is the keeper of the purse at St. Martin's le Grand. He is practically the financial adviser of the Postmaster-General, and his Department keeps the accounts. Centralisation is the great feature of Post Office business, and in nothing is this more marked than in financial matters. The postmasters' accounts throughout the whole of the country pass through the office, and the money needed to carry on the work is advised to the postmasters by the Accountant-General's Department. The balance-sheet of the Post Office is a formidable document. Take, for instance, the year ending 31st March 1910. The receipts from all sources amounted to £23,625,710, while the expenditure was £19,845,746, and the net revenue was therefore £3,779,964. Bear in mind that these huge sums are made up for the most part of very small items and daily accounts, and you will have some idea of the work performed in the Accountant-General's Department. All salaries and pensions are also paid from this office. Mr. Herbert Samuel, the Postmaster-General, wittily described the work of this branch of the Service at a departmental dinner in 1911:—