delivery area—exclusive of 55,300 Clifton posted letters—221,000 letters are posted at the head office itself, and the total posted within a radius of a mile is 652,290, or more than three-fourths of the whole. In addition to the 888,000 letters posted weekly in Bristol city and Clifton, there are 108,000 letters posted in the suburban and rural districts. The posting every Sunday consists of 35,000 letters.
The greater extent to which the well-to-do classes in Bristol use the post than their less fortunate brethren may be gathered from the fact that the average yield of letters, newspapers, etc., per day per box in the Clifton district is 128 per cent. higher than in Redland and Cotham, and 179 per cent. higher than in Redcliffe; and in the Redland and Cotham district 22 per cent. higher than in Redcliffe.
The mails are chiefly conveyed between the head office and the principal railway station by horsed carts.
About 7,000,000 "forward" letters—that is, letters neither posted nor delivered locally, but passing through the Bristol Post Office—are dealt with annually.
The parcel post, started in 1883, has done well in Bristol. Nearly three-quarters of a million of parcels are posted in the district annually. The greater part of the parcel despatching duties is performed at a separate parcel office on the Temple Meads Railway Station premises. People often avail themselves of the parcel post for obtaining a regular weekly supply of produce. A joint of beef from Scotland, weighing just under eleven pounds, invariably reaches Bristol at the week end, and a package of butter from Dublin is observed every Friday in the Bristol parcel depôt on its way to Weston-super-Mare.
The London mail is, naturally, the most important mail which leaves Bristol. In the course of the day fifty-five mail bags are forwarded, containing about 20,000 letters; the trains used being those leaving at 3.10 a.m., 7.50 a.m., 9.35 a.m., 11.40 a.m., 12.13 p.m., 1.54 p.m., 3.0 p.m., 3.43 p.m., 4.45 p.m., 7.22 p.m., and 12.45 a.m. So numerous are the London and "London forward" letters in the evening, that three clerks are engaged from 5.0 p.m. to midnight in sorting them. In the opposite direction fifty mail bags are received from London daily, containing
about 30,000 letters. Birmingham comes next in the importance of exchange, thus: twelve mail bags go out daily, containing 5,500 letters, and ten bags come in, with 4,500 letters. The neighbouring city of Bath figures next, with ten outward mail bags daily, containing 4,200 letters, and ten inward bags, containing 2,700 letters. The same three cities also stand in the forefront in respect of the import and export of parcels, 870 parcels being received from London and 550 parcels sent thereto daily. Birmingham sends 190 parcels and takes a like number; whilst Bath sends 160 and takes in return 250 parcels daily.
The members of the permanent staff have fallen on better days than their predecessors of old times. They are granted holidays varying in periods according to rank, from the twelve working days allowed to the telegraph messengers to the month enjoyed by the superintending officers. Medical attendance is afforded gratuitously, and full pay is, as a rule, given during sick absence, and under special circumstances sick leave on full pay is allowed for six months, and a further six months on half-pay. After that time, if there
appears to be little or no chance of recovery, a pension or gratuity is given. The appointment of medical officer to the Post Office was in 1862 conferred upon Mr. F. Poole Lansdown, who has held the post ever since. For the last four years the average sick absence per year has been ten days for males and seventeen days for females per head; and during the last seven years the average mortality amongst the established officers of the Service has been two per annum.