[96] Ibid.
[97] October, 1859, Art 9. See also Raikes' Diary, vol. iii.
[98] "Lord Lowther," so Mr. Hill was told, "was a steady friend to Post reform, and was well acquainted with the department." Without doubt the new Postmaster-General's feelings, however ridiculous, were consulted in this matter. Mr. Hill's anxiety for the general scheme, and for subsequent minor proposals, was quite natural. When refused the Treasury appointment, he asked to be taken into the Post-Office there to see his plans worked out. Lord Lowther, when he comes to speak on the proposal, somewhat indignantly asks the Treasury Lords if "the character and fortunes of the thousands employed in the Post-Office are to be placed at the mercy of an individual who confesses that he is 'not very familiar with the details of the methods now practised.'" "It is easy to imagine," continued Lord Lowther, "the damage the community might sustain from his tampering with a vast machine interwoven with all the details of Government and necessary to the daily habits and events of this great Empire!" The matter is not one of "detail," but of "principle;" if their Lordships want this or that carried into execution, they have only to say so, and Lord Lowther will see that it is done, "though it may be in opposition to my own opinion."
[99] We find that Birmingham, at which town Sir Rowland Hill spent some of the earlier years of his life, has been the first to move in the matter. At a meeting held March 3, a statue was voted to cost 2,000l. to be placed in the new public hall. A petition to the House of Commons was likewise adopted.
[100] This motion has twice been deferred, owing, it is said, to representations made by members of both sides of the House of Commons. A few days ago, an influential deputation from the House met the First Lord of the Treasury at his official residence, the members of which strongly urged, that in place of the deferred pension to Lady Hill, a Parliamentary Grant, sufficient though reasonable, be made to Sir Rowland Hill at once. It is considered certain that, when the House resumes after Easter, Lord Palmerston will propose a grant, most probably, of 30,000l.
[CHAPTER VIII.]
EARLY RESULTS OF THE PENNY-POSTAGE SCHEME.
There are, of course, two aspects in which to contemplate the measure of penny-post reform. The first relates to its social, moral, and commercial results; the second views it in its financial relationship. When the system had been in operation two years, it was found that the success of the scheme in its first aspect had far surpassed the most sanguine expectations ever formed of it by any of its advocates. As a financial measure, it cannot be said to have succeeded originally. In this latter respect it disappointed even Mr. Hill, who, though he never mentioned the date when the revenue derivable from the Post-Office would be recovered under the new system, was very emphatic in his assurances that the loss during the first year would not exceed 300,000l. Calculating upon a fourfold increase of letters, in his pamphlet[101] he estimated the net revenue, after deducting for franks and newspapers, in round numbers at 1,300,000l.; a sum only 300,000l. less than the revenue of 1837. We do not say that Mr. Hill originally calculated on recovering the absolute net revenue by the collection of postage; but any deficiency which might continue after the scheme was fairly tried, he expected to see supplied, eventually, by increased productiveness in other departments of the revenue, which would be benefited by the stimulus given to commerce by improved communication.[102] Before the Parliamentary Committee he was equally explicit:[103] when asked, if, on a fivefold increase, there would still be a deficiency on the net revenue, he answered in the affirmative, to the extent of, he should think, 300,000l. He again, however, stated his conviction that the deficit would be made up by the general improvement of trade and commerce in the country. It is true that events proved that the falling off in the gross revenue was considerably in excess of all the calculations which had been made: but even under this head, much may be said; and in considering the different results of penny postage, we expect to be able to point out that the scheme had intrinsic qualities in it, which, under proper treatment, must have made it in all respects a success. Mr. Hill met another Parliamentary Committee in 1842, when his recommendations—in their principal features, at any rate—had been acted upon for nearly two years. In the course of this further investigation—to the circumstances attending which we shall presently allude—much information relative to the carrying out of the measure, its successes, and failures, was elicited.
It was shown beyond all dispute, that the scheme had almost entirely prevented breaches of the law, and that if any illicit correspondence was carried on, it was simply and purely in matters where the question of speed was involved; that the evils, amounting to social prohibitions, so prevalent before the change, had been, for the most part, removed. Commercial transactions, relating even to very small amounts, were now managed through the post. Small orders were constantly transmitted; the business of the Money-order Office having increased almost twenty-fold—first, from the reduction of postage in 1840, and then from the reduction of the fees in November of the same year. These orders are generally acknowledged. Printers send their proofs without hesitation;[104] the commercial traveller writes regularly to his principal, and is enabled for the first time to advise his customers of his approach; private individuals and public institutions distribute widely their circulars and their accounts of proceedings to every part of the land. Better than any account that we might give of the reception of this boon by the country, and the social and commercial advantages which were immediately seen to follow from it, we may here give some account of the correspondence which flowed in upon Mr. Hill between 1840-1842, and which he read to the select committee appointed to try the merits of his scheme. Ten times the weight of evidence, and far more striking instances of the advantages of the penny-post scheme might now be adduced, but it must be remembered that we are here speaking merely of first results, and when the scheme had been but two years in operation. Numbers of tradesmen wrote to say how their business had increased within the two years. One large merchant now sent the whole of his invoices by post; another increased the number of his "prices current" by 10,000 per annum. Messrs. Pickford and Co. the carriers, despatched by post eight times the number of letters posted in 1839; whilst the letters, had they been liable to be charged as per single sheet, would have numbered 720,000 in 1842 from this one firm, against 30,000 letters in 1839. In this case we have an exemplification of the correctness of the argument upon which Mr. Hill built his scheme; for the increase of money actually paid for postage was at the rate of 33 per cent. Mr. Charles Knight, the London bookseller, said the penny postage stimulated every branch of his trade, and brought the country booksellers into almost daily communication with the London houses. Mr. Bagster, the publisher of a Polyglot Bible in twenty-four languages, stated to Mr. Hill that the revision which he was just giving to his work as it was passing through the press would, on the old system, have cost him 1,500l. in postage alone, and that the Bible could not have been printed but for the penny post. Secretaries of different benevolent and literary societies wrote to say how their machinery had been improved; conductors of educational establishments, how people were everywhere learning to write for the first time in order to enjoy the benefits of a free correspondence, and how night-classes for teaching writing to adults were springing up in all large towns for the same object. Mr. Stokes, the honorary secretary of the Parker Society—composed of the principal Church dignitaries and some intelligent laymen—which has done so much for ecclesiastical literature by reprinting the works of the early English reformers, stated that the Society could never have come into existence but for the penny postage. One of the principal advocates for the repeal of the Corn Laws subsequently gave it as his opinion, that their objects were achieved two years earlier than otherwise would have been the case, owing to the introduction of cheap postage. After a lapse of twenty years, many more useful societies might be mentioned of which the same could be said. An interesting letter from the late Professor Henslow, the then Rector of Hitcham in Suffolk, may be given, as it contains a pretty accurate estimate of the social advantages accruing to the masses. The professor had, consequent upon the change at the Post-Office, arranged a scheme of co-operation for advancing among the landed interest of the county the progress of agricultural science. After stating that the mere suggestion of such a thing had involved him in a correspondence which he could not have sustained if it had not been for the penny postage, he goes on to say: "To the importance of the penny postage to those who cultivate science, I can bear most unequivocal testimony, as I am continually receiving and transmitting a variety of specimens by post. Among them, you will laugh to hear that I have received three living carnivorous slugs, which arrived safely in a pill-box! That the penny postage is an important addition to the comforts of the poor labourer, I can also testify. From my residence in a neighbourhood where scarcely any labourers can read, much less write, I am often employed by them as an amanuensis, and have frequently heard them express their satisfaction at the facility they enjoy of now corresponding with distant relatives. The rising generation are learning to write, and a most material addition to the circulation of letters may soon be expected. Of the vast domestic comfort which the penny postage has added to homes like my own, I need say nothing more." Miss Harriet Martineau bore testimony to the social advantages of the measure in the neighbourhood where she resided. A celebrated writer of the period[105] gives it as his opinion, that "the penny-post scheme was a much wiser and more effective measure than the Prussian system of education" just then established. "By the reduction of the postage on letters," adds he, "the use and advantage of education has been brought home to the common man (for it no longer costs him a day's pay to communicate with his family). A state machinery of schoolmasters on the Prussian system would cost far more than the sacrifice of revenue by the reduction of postage. This measure will be the great historical distinction of the reign of Victoria. Every mother in the kingdom who has children earning their bread at a distance lays her head on the pillow at night with a feeling of gratitude for this blessing." Almost all now living, who shared the benefits of the scheme at this early date, could probably relate some anecdote which circumstances had brought to their knowledge as to the operation of penny postage on the poorer classes especially. Thus, the then Inspector of Prisons for Scotland, visiting the Shetland Islands in 1842, writes:[106] "The Zetlanders are delighted with cheap postage. The postmaster told me that the increase in the number of letters is astonishing.... Another gentleman who is well acquainted with the people told me, that although the desire of parents to keep their offspring at home is unusually strong in Zetland, yet that cheap postage has had the effect of reconciling families to the temporary absence of their members, and has thus opened to the islanders the labour-market of the mainland." An American writer,[107] in an admirable pamphlet on cheap postage, says: "The people of England expend now as much money as they did under the old system; but the advantage is, they get more service for their money, and it gives a spring to business, trade, science, literature, philanthropy, social affection, and all plans of public utility." Joseph Hume, writing to Mr. Bancroft, then American minister at the court of St. James's, 1848, says: "I am not aware of any reform, amongst the many which I have promoted during the past forty years, that has had, and will have, better results towards the improvement of the country socially, morally, and politically." And Mr. Hill himself, in addressing the Statistical Society in May, 1841,[108] made a statement which was neither an idle nor a vain boast, when he assured them that "the postman has now to make long rounds through humble districts where, heretofore, his knock was rarely heard."
We have yet the second, or financial, aspect of the measure to consider. In two years a tolerably correct idea might be formed as to the results of the scheme financially; but it would certainly not be fair to attempt any full estimate of such a thorough reform within a more circumscribed period. Not that this was not attempted. Colonel Maberly discovered, at the end of the first week, that Mr. Hill's plan had failed, at any rate, as a question of revenue. No doubt the wish was father to the thought. He not only thought so, however, but proceeded to take timely action and shield himself and his congeners against some probable future attack. In his own words, he charged "the officials to take care that no obstacle was thrown in the way of the scheme, so as to give a colour to the allegation"—which the prophetic colonel was only too sure would be made—"that its failure was owing to the unwillingness of the authorities to carry it fairly into execution."[109]