so marked, that the immense success of this branch establishment may be considered as entirely owing to the reduction of postage-rates. Had the penny-postage scheme done no more for the nation than assisted the people in the exercise of a timely prudence and frugality, stimulating them, as it can be proved, to self-denial and benevolence, it would have done much. But we are anticipating an important era. Soon after the passing of the Penny-postage Act, the commission on money-orders was reduced to threepence instead of sixpence, and sixpence for any amount above two pounds and under five pounds. In 1840, the number of money-order transactions had increased to thousands, in the place of hundreds under the old _régime_. The money passed through the office in the advent year of cheap postage amounted to nearly half a million sterling, the Post-Office commission on the sum exceeding 6,000_l._ The rate of increase, subsequently, may best be shown by taking a month's work ten years afterwards. Thus, during one month of 1850, twice as many orders were taken out and paid as were issued and paid during 1840, the particulars of which year were given above. The same rate of increase has continued up to the present moment. During the year 1862, the number of orders had, in round numbers, risen to more than seven and a half millions, or a money-value exceeding sixteen millions sterling, the commission on the whole amounting to more than one hundred and thirty-six thousand pounds.[70] By the statute of Queen Anne, letters might be brought from abroad by _private ships_ under certain distinctly-specified regulations. On the contrary, no law existed enabling the Postmaster-General to _send_ bags of letters by the same medium until 1799, when an Act was passed with this object. Masters of such ships refusing to take bags were subjected to heavy penalties.[71] The postage of letters so sent (on account of the slowness of transit in the majority of cases) was fixed at half the usual rates. This Act is the foundation of the ship-letter system, by means of which, besides the regular packet communication, letters are forwarded to all parts of the world. At the same period the Government rigorously adhered to the law as laid down with regard to letters _brought_ by private vessels. A case was tried in 1806 in the Court of King's Bench--"King _v._ Wilson"--in which the defendant--a merchant who had had letters brought from the Continent in a ship of his own, and pleaded that he had a right to do so--was cast in heavy damages, and told that "all and every such letters, as well as others," must pass through the Post-Office in the usual way.