of provincial Post Offices at the time the Bristol specimen was by no means an unfavourable one. At that time there were only about 20,000 letters, etc., delivered in a week.
The Bristol Chamber of Commerce took no notice of the Post Office for nearly twenty years (1835-1855), but in the latter year it did so, for its records of the annual meeting of 31st January, 1855, with John Salmon, President, in the chair, shew the following, viz.:—
"The Post Office questions of salaries, internal arrangements, and local inquiry, are still in the same position as they were six months ago, except that, after repeated further applications to the Postmaster-General, your Committee extracted, on the 10th December last, a renewed promise from his lordship that 'no time should be lost in making the enquiry at the Bristol Post Office.' As the inefficiency of the public service arises from the unjust treatment of the employés and defective internal arrangements of the local office, your Committee cannot desist, notwithstanding the tedious and disagreeable nature of the task which they have undertaken, from insisting on these repeated promises being redeemed."
Then, under the same presidency, at the next half-yearly meeting in the same year, it was stated that "Subsequent to the date of the last report, your Committee discovered that the Postmaster-General had caused a private local enquiry to be made with respect to the classification and salaries of the officers of the Bristol Post Office."
There was this further remonstrance:—
".... It would have been more satisfactory to your Committee if the Postmaster-General had fulfilled his promise to the deputation who waited upon him on the 30th of January, 1854, to hold a local enquiry at which they should be present, as there were several other matters connected with the internal arrangements of the Bristol Post Office (particularly the money order department, which is still very defective) with respect to which they were desirous of making some suggestions."
Then followed a copy of the report made to the Postmaster-General by Mr. Tilley, who conducted the enquiry, also a statement of the proposed Establishment.
At the Chamber's next annual meeting on 30th January, 1856, with James Hassell, the president,