Relations such as these of course rendered it very difficult for the agent to perform the duties of his position at all effectually, and, as a matter of fact, he did not so perform them. Abuses of every kind crept into the Falmouth service. The captains were subjected to gross extortions by the agent, who in turn relaxed discipline in any way they might desire. If, for instance, it occurred to any commander, that by sailing with a few men short of his complement, he could save their victualling allowances and so increase his own profits; the agent, whose duty it was to muster the men immediately before sailing, would either neglect the muster altogether, or else make it, and be careful not to see the shore-boat which, immediately afterwards, took off three or four of the men who had answered to their names. If the captain wished to stay ashore, whilst his Packet went to sea, the agent would accept and forward to London a certificate that he was ill, without asking any questions either as to the nature of the illness or the qualifications of the person appointed to command the ship, who was not infrequently a common seaman. If the captain had received from some Bristol merchant a larger consignment of goods to be sold on commission at Lisbon or Barbados than his vessel ought to carry, the agent would still certify that she was in trim when she left Falmouth harbour, and had nothing on board which could impede her sailing. In fact, there were a hundred ways in which the agent could oblige those captains who dealt largely with him; and without attempting to go more deeply into the events of the last century, it may fairly be doubted, in the light of the scandals discovered in its closing years, whether misconduct far grosser than any here indicated was not practised by the commanders and tolerated by the agent.
This is a matter which will be dealt with more fully in succeeding chapters. Enough has been said to show that the state of affairs at Falmouth was unsatisfactory to the last degree; and while it may very probably be that a considerable number of individuals acted with scrupulous fidelity to their trust, there is no doubt whatever that very many betrayed it systematically.
Of course, a strong administration from headquarters would have changed all this. But the General Post-Office itself was by no means exempt from the taint which had fastened on Falmouth. There was scarcely a single official, from the secretary down to the door-keepers, who did not own shares in the Packets, and each one of them was for ever trying to secure advantages for the particular vessel in which he was interested. The ancient system of paying the clerks merely nominal salaries, and leaving in their hands privileges and perquisites out of which they were expected to make their chief, if not their sole, remuneration, produced its natural effect in causing every officer to judge upon departmental matters in the light of his own pecuniary advantage; and, in short, it can only be said that when the outcry in Parliament, which has been mentioned already, made itself heard, it was high time for some change to occur.
In truth, the end of an age of corruption was approaching. In all departments of Government a purer atmosphere was spreading. The Post-Office was no worse than other public offices. It was what the spirit of the times had made it, and it did but partake of the vices which were characteristic of the age. The old, bad system was everywhere breaking down, crushing individuals beneath it, as such rotten growths will when they fall at length. At Falmouth, a certain agent went too far. The unsavoury story need not be probed. Even at the time, as would appear, the facts were not fully disclosed; for it no sooner became plain that a searching inquiry into the agent’s conduct would be made, than the miserable man shut himself up in his office and blew his brains out.
That tragic occurrence marked, or coincided with, a turning point in the history of the Packet Service. On one side lies corrupt and slovenly administration, with its natural sequel of scandals and disorder. On the other can be traced the commencement of earnest endeavours for reform, the springing up of patient and honest striving after an ideal; and as the course of events in the Packet Service is followed from this moment through the forty years or so which intervened before the control passed from the hands of the Post-Office, the effect of these endeavours becomes continually more manifest, till they culminate at last in something resembling absolute success.
This is the story told in the ensuing pages. It is taken up from the year 1793, because that year, the first of the great struggle for mastery on which no Englishman can look back without pride, serves well to mark the commencement of the new order of things. Moreover, much more is to be known about the Packet Service from 1793 onwards than can be gleaned concerning the earlier period. The departmental records are fairly complete thenceforward; some account, at least, of every sea fight is preserved; and among piles of brown and dusty papers, from some of which the ink is fading fast, there has lain untouched for ninety years, not only the story of a piece of administrative work, as difficult and as useful to this country as any that has ever been carried through by patient effort, but also a whole series of naval actions, of which the Post-Office was once proud, and of which Cornishmen are proud still, though they have forgotten the details of most.
CHAPTER III.
A FIRMER RULE.
At the beginning of the year 1793, then, while the relations of this country with France were quickly growing desperate, the two statesmen who, according to the custom of the time, jointly filled the office of Postmaster General, were engaged in endeavouring to set their Department in order, and to reduce the expenses of administration, as the House of Commons Committee had directed.
The difficulty of any interference in a system which had grown up through a whole century was obviously very great. Malpractices which four generations of officers at Falmouth had learned to regard as their natural privileges would not be given up at the first word of rebuke from headquarters. The profits of smuggling would not be dropped without a struggle. Laxity of discipline, remissness, carelessness of the credit of the Department—these were faults which, where they existed, could be cured only by a firm rule and in course of years. One decision had, however, been taken, and was already being carried out, from which important results proceeded, and which upon the whole effected much good.
Throughout the whole existence of the Falmouth Packets up to this time it had scarcely been questioned that on the long Atlantic voyages the safety of the mails was directly proportionate to the heaviness of the armament. The West India merchants were perpetually forcing this point on the Postmaster General, and whenever a mail for Barbados or Jamaica was lost, the General Post-Office was beset with an indignant throng of merchants, loudly demanding that more and more guns should be assigned to every Packet which had to run the gauntlet of the West India Islands.