I need scarcely add that, should the expectations of my medical friends, of improved health from rest, be realised, and any occasion arise in which it may appear to your Lordships that my assistance or advice in further postal improvements may be of advantage, I shall feel honoured by being permitted to place them at your disposal.
I have, &c.,
Rowland Hill.
The Right Hon.
The Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty’s Treasury,
&c., &c., &c.
Memorandum.
A low and uniform rate of postage forms the most essential feature of my plan of postal reform, and I have no hesitation in stating that its conception originated wholly with myself. To guard against future error I ask permission to place on record a brief statement of facts.
The principle of uniformity of rate, now that it has been in successful operation for nearly a quarter of a century, appears, perhaps, simple and obvious; but so far from its having been, as it is sometimes supposed, the happy thought of a moment, it was the result of most laborious investigation on my part. Indeed, a slight consideration will show that its conception necessarily involved a previous discovery—viz., that the cost per letter of mere transit within the limits of the United Kingdom was practically inappreciable, or, at least, that it was not dependent mainly on distance; being, in fact, quite as much dependent on the number of letters contained in the particular mail as on the distance that mail was carried. Indeed, it was shown, from careful investigation, that the cost of mere conveyance, even for so great a distance as from London to Edinburgh, was only the thirty-sixth part of a penny per letter. From this and other facts, it followed that a uniform rate was more just than one varying according to distance. The convenience of uniformity was obvious.
I may add that when I first entered on the investigations preparatory to the construction of my plan, I myself had no conception of the practicability of a uniform rate, and that the discovery referred to above was as startling to myself as it proved when announced to the public at large.
A reference to my original pamphlet—a copy of which is, I presume, still in your Lordships’ possession—or to my evidence before the Select Committee of 1838, appointed to inquire into the practicability of my plans, will show the various steps by which I arrived at the conclusion that a uniform penny rate was at once just and practicable.
There is but one other person, so far as I am aware, to whom the suggestion of a uniform penny rate has, with even the slightest plausibility, ever been assigned—I refer to the late Mr. Wallace, formerly Member for Greenock, and Chairman of the Select Committee on Postage in 1838; but though Mr. Wallace frequently urged, among other useful reforms, a great reduction in the postal charges, I can say from personal knowledge that he had no idea whatever of a uniform rate until after the publication of my pamphlet. Indeed, this sufficiently appears from his speech in Parliament in July, 1836, the last occasion on which, before the publication of my pamphlet, he referred to the rates of postage. The following is an extract from “Hansard” (Vol. xxxv., 3rd series, p. 422):—