Her Majesty's Mails: An Historical and Descriptive Account of the British Post-OfficeLewins, William
History
Her Majesty's Mails: An Historical and Descriptive Account of the British Post-Office
Lewins, William
Postal service -- Great Britain
But to return. While some of the officers are attending in this way to
the wants of the country, others are serving the interests of the town.
A hundred or two gentlemen, bankers and manufacturers, pay an extra
guinea yearly in order to secure certain special privileges at the
Post-Office. These privileges consist, in brief, of having their letters
arranged in private boxes, each labelled with their names, and delivered
from these boxes by one of the clerks as soon as the office is opened,
or the moment the letter-carriers emerge from it to enter upon any of
the daily deliveries of letters. Of course these letters must be
prepared previously.
The office is open to the public for money-orders and for the
transaction of the business of the new savings' banks at nine o'clock,
and continues open on every day, except Saturdays, until six, on which
day two hours longer are allowed. It is not necessary to describe the
arrangements in these branches, seeing that the public are familiar from
daily experience with them. It will suffice to say that separate clerks
are usually delegated to these duties in our large towns, and are
answerable to the postmaster for the correctness of their accounts. The
same clerk attends to the sale of postage-stamps, keeping an account
with the postmaster of the quantity _sold_, and also of the stamps
_bought_ from the public under the recent arrangement. In larger towns
where one clerk is specially retained for these duties, he is known as
the "window clerk," as it devolves upon him to answer all applications
and inquiries.
Throughout the day, the quietness of the post-office proper is broken in
upon and varied by the arrival of some small mail. On one of these
occasions, namely, on the receipt of the day-mail from London, the
operations of the morning are gone over again on a small scale, and for
a short time the office presents an appearance of some of its early
bustle. Letters are delivered in the town, but those arriving for the
country places remain at the office till the next morning.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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