This British and Foreign Company, not being able to satisfy the Admiralty that they had the means of performing the proposed Service, their tender was rejected. Upon which they addressed the Admiralty, and requested that the Contract might be postponed, alleging, that if a month more were given to them, they could provide sufficient vessels. Their request was granted; and, contrary to all previous practice, after the tender of the Peninsular Company had been given in, and the amount of it, in all probability, known to their competitors, the Contract was again advertised, and a month more given for receiving tenders. The British and Foreign Company again failed to show that they had any adequate means of performing the Service; and a private negotiation was then entered into by the Government, with the Peninsular Company, with a view to reduce the sum required by them. This sum was £30,000 per annum, being about £5,000 less than the estimated annual cost to the public of the sailing packets and steam packet previously employed in conveying the Mails. This sum was ultimately reduced to £29,600,[2] on which terms the Contract was concluded on the 22nd August, 1837, and may be considered to have formed the basis upon which one of the most extensive and successful steam enterprises yet known has been established. These facts, it is submitted, abundantly show, that so far from any favour being shown, in regard to this Contract, to the originators of this Company, they obtained it in the face of adverse circumstances, and solely because they had, by their own enterprise, placed themselves in a position to effect an important public improvement, combined with a reduction of the public expenditure. No. II. _Contract for an accelerated Conveyance of the India and other Mails between England and Malta, and Alexandria._ COMMENCED SEPTEMBER 1ST, 1840. The efficiency with which the Peninsular Mail Packet Service was performed elicited from the Admiralty repeated testimonials of approbation; and, proving as it did, that that description of service could be more advantageously conducted by private enterprise, under Contract, than by Government vessels and establishments, paved the way for the subsequent extension of Contract Mail communication which took place with the West Indies, North America and the East Indies, China, &c. Previous to the 1st of September, 1840, the arrangements for transmitting the India Mails to and from Egypt, to meet the East India Company’s steamers plying monthly between Bombay and Suez, were as follows:-- These Malls were forwarded, every fourth Saturday, by the Contract Mail steamers of the Peninsular Company to Gibraltar, and there transferred to an Admiralty steam packet, which carried them to Malta. They were there transferred to another Admiralty packet, which carried them to Alexandria. The homeward Mails were brought in a similar manner.