messenger beyond the limits of the free delivery, at
sixpence per double mile. To make arrangements,
on the plan of those prevailing in
Belgium and Switzerland, for the registration and
redirection of telegrams, and for the delivery of
copies. To give facilities for the transmission
of money orders by telegraph, on payment of
the charge for the message, and of a
commission which shall not be less than two
ordinary commissions, and under certain restrictions
as to the amount to be remitted by any one
person.

That these proposals offer enormous advantages
to the public, as they appear on paper, is
at once evident. The remaining question is, can
they be carried out? The proposers answer at
once in the affirmative, adding that there is
nothing novel in the scheme thus described, and
that each one of its parts has been tried successfully.
The amalgamation of the telegraphic and
postal administration has been tried with perfect
success in Belgium and in Switzerland, and also
in the British colonies of Victoria and New
South Wales. The proposed distribution of the
system is analogous to that which prevails in
France. Uniformity of charge, irrespective of
distance, and with a lower tariff than that which
is recommended in the first instance for the
United Kingdom, has been tried with the best
results in Belgium and in Switzerland. The
institution of places of deposit for messages, in
addition to the offices of transmission, and the
gratuitous grant of postal facilities under
certain conditions to the senders of telegraphic
messages, is borrowed from Belgium. Telegraph
stamps are in use in Belgium and in France.
The exclusion of the addresses from the number
of words to be paid for, is borrowed from
Victoria and New South Wales. A telegraphic
money-order office has for some years existed in
Switzerland and in Prussia. The result is, not
merely that the business is more cheaply
conducted, but that greater advantages are given
to the public on the Continent, than in the
United Kingdom. Not only are the telegraph
offices more numerous in proportion to the
population, but they are brought closer to the
population, and carried more freely into the
little towns and sparsely populated districts.
After making due deduction for those cases in
which a place is served by two or three
telegraph companies, where the service of one
company would suffice, it appears that in the
United Kingdom there is one telegraph office
to every eighteen thousand persons: whilst in
France there is one to every fourteen thousand
persons, in Belgium one to every twelve thousand
persons, and in Switzerland one to every
seven thousand persons.

There are many other advantages. Under
the arrangements proposed, the senders and
the addressees of telegraphic messages would
respectively be nearer than they now are
to the despatching and receiving telegraphic
offices: so that the difficulty of sending a
message would be reduced, while the rapidity of
its transmission would be increased. The
proportion of addressees resident within the limits
of the receiving telegraphic offices, would be
greater than it is at present; and consequently
the extra charge for the conveyance of a
message beyond those limits would be imposed less
frequently then than now. The period during
which telegraphic offices are open daily for
transmission of messages, would in many cases be
considerably extended. But perhaps the greatest
boon of all, especially for persons resident in
the rural districts, would be the combination
of postal and telegraphic facilities—at present
impossible, but a leading feature of the new
scheme. The telegraphic offices under the control
of the Post-office would be much closer to the
bulk of the population than the existing
telegraphic offices; but the residents in rural districts
would still in many cases be at a considerable
though a diminished distance from the nearest
telegraphic office. If these residents in rural
districts were desirous of transmitting their
messages to the nearest telegraphic office with
the greatest possible speed, they might either
despatch them by their own messenger or
procure an official messenger, by payment of an
extra charge, at the nearest deposit office. But
if they were not very much pressed for time,
and were content to accept service by letter-
carrier, in lieu of service by special messenger,
they might, by posting their messages in the
nearest pillar-box or deposit office, ensure their
transmission, free of extra charge, to the nearest
telegraphic office at the usual time of clearing
that pillar-box or deposit office. Thus, for
instance; residents in Lampeter desiring to
send telegrams to London through Carmarthen
(which, though twenty-four miles distant from
them, is their nearest telegraphic station),
would know that if they wrote their messages
on stamped paper and deposited them at the
Lampeter post-office by 1.15 P.M., the messages
would go forward at that hour free of extra
charge, and would reach Carmarthen for
immediate despatch by telegraph at 4.25 P.M. Thus,
also; messages might be posted at Fort
Augustus up to 11.40 P.M. for transmission over a
distance of thirty-five miles to Inverness, the
nearest telegraph office, where they would
arrive for immediate despatch by telegraph, at
9.20 A.M.

It will be obvious to all who study these
illustrations, that in an immense number of
cases a service partly postal and partly
telegraphic would meet all the requirements of the
senders, while it would be much cheaper (the
whole cost being covered by the charge for the
telegram) than a service partly by special
messenger and partly by telegraph. And it will be
equally obvious that this partly postal and partly
telegraphic service would in a vast number of
cases serve as well for the reply to the message
as for the message itself. For the transmission
of a letter and the reply thereto between
Lampeter and London, forty-four hours are required;
but for the transmission of a message and the
reply thereto between the same places, on the
partly postal and partly telegraphic system, only