Besides the label stamps, the English post-office manufactures and sells stamped envelopes, which will at once enclose the letter and pay the postage. The price of the envelope is half a farthing, in addition to the 1d. for postage; that is, eight stamped envelopes are sold for 9d., or 24 for 2s. 3d.
Stamped half sheets of paper are also furnished by the post-office, a farthing being charged for the paper, besides the 1d. for postage. These are much used for printing circulars, for which they are very convenient. They are also bought by the poor to write brief letters on.
It is a common practice, in writing to another person on your own business, to enclose a postage stamp to prepay the letter in reply. Some persons, who have much correspondence, procure their own address printed in script on the back of stamped envelopes, and then send these enclosed to bring back the expected return. Persons doing a great deal of business with each other, through the post-office, keep each other's envelopes on hand. The child at school or the son in college, is furnished with his father's envelopes, stamped and directed.
The postage stamps are cancelled, by an obliterating stamp in the office where they are received, so that no postage stamp can ever be used a second time. Each post-office is furnished with a cancel stamp, and an ineffaceable ink for this purpose. There are five different forms of cancel stamps, one used for London letters, deliverable within the London District, one for letters mailed in London for places elsewhere, one for all other places in England and Wales, one for Scotland, and one for Ireland. Thus it is seen at a glance, from what section a letter comes. Sometimes the stamp denoting the place at which a letter is mailed, is not sufficiently plain. To meet this, and to serve some other conveniences, the cancel stamps have a blank in the centre, in which is inserted the number belonging to that office. Thus the shape tells the district, and the number the office from which each letter comes. The London stamp has a circular blank for letters that are mailed within the London circle, and deliverable also within it, and a diamond-shaped blank for letters going out of London.
The post-offices in each section are all numbered consecutively, and each office is permanently known in all other offices by its number as well as its name. Each office has its number engraved in the blank space of its cancel stamp, as in the first and last above, so that the place from which the letter comes is known at a glance.
The total number of Label Stamps issued in the year ending
| 1d. Stamps. | 2d. Stamps. | |
| 5th January, 1841, | 74,856,960 | 7,587,960 |
| 5th January, 1842, | 110,878,344 | 3,391,800 |
| 5th January, 1843, | 121,648,080 | 2,866,080 |
| ——— | ——— | |
| First three years, | 307,383,384 | 13,845,840 |
| 321,229,224 stamps, nominal value, | £1,396,146 |
| Expense of manufacture and distribution, | 42,763 |
| ——— | ——— |
| Net proceeds, | £1,353,382 |
| Average yearly, | 451,127 |
The present cost of Label Stamps is reported, July 16, 1846, thus:
| Paper for a million labels, | £5 11s. |
| Printing and gumming, | 25 -- |
| Salaries, proportion of, | 46 10s. |
| Contingencies, poundage, &c. | 46 10s. |
| ————— | ——— |
| Cost per million, | £79 -- |