The failures or delays in making the passage across the Channel are thus described by Cleland in his Annals of Glasgow: "It frequently happens," says he, "that the mail packet is windbound at the mouth of the Liffey for several days together"; and we have seen it stated in a newspaper article that the packets crossing to Ireland by the Portpatrick route were sometimes delayed a couple of weeks by contrary winds.
A few years previously an attempt had been made to introduce steam-packets for the Holyhead and Dublin service; but this improved service was not at that time adopted. Referring to the year 1816, Cleland writes: "The success of steamboats on the Clyde induced some gentlemen in Dublin to order two vessels to be made to ply as packets in the Channel between Dublin and Holyhead, with a view of ultimately carrying the mail. The dimensions are as follows:—viz., keel 65 feet, beam 18 feet, with 9 feet draught of water—have engines of 20 horse-power, and are named the 'Britannia' and 'Hibernia.'" These were the modest ideas then held as to the power of steam to develop and expedite the packet service. In the period from 1850-60, when steam had been adopted upon the Holyhead and Dublin route, one of the first contract vessels was the Prince Arthur, having a gross tonnage of 400, and whose speed was thirteen or fourteen knots an hour. The latest addition to this line of packets is the Ireland a magnificent ship of 2095 tons gross, and of 7000 horse-power. Its rate of speed is twenty-two knots an hour.
As regards the American packet service perhaps greater strides than these even have been achieved. Prior to 1840 the vessels carrying the mails across the Atlantic were derisively called "coffin brigs," whose tonnage was probably about 400. At any rate, as will be seen later on, a packet in which Harriet Martineau crossed the Atlantic in 1836 was one of only 417 tons. On the 4th July 1840, a company, which is now the Cunard Company, started a contract service for the mails to America, the steamers employed having a tonnage burden of 1154 and indicated horse-power of 740. Their average speed was 8½ knots. In 1853 the packets had attained to greater proportions and higher speed, the average length of passage from Liverpool to New York being twelve days one hour fourteen minutes. As years rolled on competition and the exigencies of the times called for still more rapid transit, and at the present day the several companies performing the American Mail Service have afloat palatial ships of 7000 to 10,000 tons, bringing America within a week's touch of Great Britain.
HOLYHEAD AND KINGSTOWN MAIL PACKET "PRINCE ARTHUR"—400 TONS—PERIOD 1850-60.
(From a painting, the property of the City of Dublin Steam Packet Company.)
Going back a little more than a hundred years, it is of interest to see how irregular were the communications to and from foreign ports by mail packet. Benjamin Franklin, writing of the period 1757, mentions the following circumstances connected with a voyage he made from New York to Europe in that year. The packets were at the disposition of General Lord Loudon, then in charge of the army in America; and Franklin had to travel from Philadelphia to New York to join the packet, Lord Loudon having preceded him to the port of despatch. The General told Franklin confidentially, that though it had been given out that the packet would sail on Saturday next, still it would not sail till Monday. He was, however, advised not to delay longer. "By some accidental hindrance at a ferry," writes Franklin, "it was Monday noon before I arrived, and I was much afraid she might have sailed, as the wind was fair; but I was soon made easy by the information that she was still in the harbour, and would not leave till the next day. One would imagine that I was now on the very point of departing for Europe. I thought so; but I was not then so well acquainted with his Lordship's character, of which indecision was one of the strongest features. It was about the beginning of April that I came to New York, and it was near the end of June before we sailed. There were then two of the packet-boats which had long been in port, but were detained for the General's letters, which were always to be ready to-morrow. Another packet arrived; she, too, was detained; and, before we sailed, a fourth was expected. Ours was the first to be despatched, as having been there longest. Passengers were engaged in all, and some extremely impatient to be gone, and the merchants uneasy about their letters, and the orders they had given for insurance (it being war-time) for fall goods; but their anxiety availed nothing; his Lordship's letters were not ready; and yet, whoever waited on him found him always at his desk, pen in hand, and concluded he must needs write abundantly."
Apart from the manifest inconvenience of postal service conducted in the way described, one cannot wonder that the affairs of the American Colonies should get into a bad way when conducted under a policy of so manifest vacillation and indecision.
But the irregular transmission of mails between America and Europe was not a thing referring merely to the year 1757, for Franklin, writing from Passy, near Paris, in the year 1782, again dwells upon the uncertainty of the communication. "We are far from the sea-ports," he says, "and not well informed, and often misinformed, about the sailing of the vessels. Frequently we are told they are to sail in a week or two, and often they lie in the ports for months after with our letters on board, either waiting for convoy or for other reasons. The post-office here is an unsafe conveyance; many of the letters we receive by it have evidently been opened, and doubtless the same happens to those we send; and, at this time particularly, there is so violent a curiosity in all kinds of people to know something relating to the negotiations, and whether peace may be expected, or a continuance of the war, that there are few private hands or travellers that we can trust with carrying our despatches to the sea-coast; and I imagine that they may sometimes be opened and destroyed, because they cannot be well sealed."
Harriet Martineau gives an insight into the way in which mails were treated on board American packets in the year 1836, which may be held to be almost in recent times; yet the treatment is such that a Postmaster-General of to-day would be roused to indignation at the outrage perpetrated upon them. She thus writes: "I could not leave such a sight, even for the amusement of hauling over the letter-bags. Mr. Ely put on his spectacles; Mrs. Ely drew a chair; others lay along on deck to examine the superscriptions of the letters from Irish emigrants to their friends. It is wonderful how some of these epistles reach their destinations; the following, for instance, begun at the top left-hand corner, and elaborately prolonged to the bottom right one:—Mrs. A. B. ile of Man douglas wits sped England. The letter-bags are opened for the purpose of sorting out those which are for delivery in port from the rest. A fine day is always chosen, generally towards the end of the voyage, when amusements become scarce and the passengers are growing weary. It is pleasant to sit on the rail and see the passengers gather round the heap of letters, and to hear the shouts of merriment when any exceedingly original superscription comes under notice." Such liberties with the mails in the present day would excite consternation in the headquarters of the Post Office Department. Nor is this all. Miss Martineau makes the further remark—"The two Miss O'Briens appeared to-day on deck, speaking to nobody, sitting on the same seats, with their feet on the same letter-bag, reading two volumes of the same book, and dressed alike," etc. The mail-bags turned into footstools, forsooth! It is interesting to note the size of the packet in which this lady crossed the Atlantic. It was the Orpheus, Captain Bursley, a vessel of 417 tons. In looking back on these times, and knowing what dreadful storms our huge steamers encounter between Europe and America, we cannot but admire the courage which must have inspired men and women to embark for distant ports in crafts so frail.[4] It is well also to note that the transit from New York occupied the period from the 1st to the 26th August, the better part of four weeks.