have been able to develop originality and make his own way in physics and mechanics.” [211] In writing of the discontents which occasionally troubled the postal peace during the mid-nineteenth century, it must be clearly understood that no allusion is intended to those of later times. In this story of an old reform the latest year at the Post Office is 1864; therefore, since this is a chronicle of “ancient history” only, comments on the troubles of modern days, which the chronicler does not profess to understand, shall be scrupulously avoided. [212] He never wasted his time in reading the attacks, even when some good-natured friend occasionally asked: “Have you seen what Blank has just written about you?” [213] “Life,” ii. 328. [214] Some of us enjoyed a capital view of the eclipse at Swindon in fine weather and pleasant company. Our friend, Mr W. H. Wills, who was also present, wrote an amusing account of the eclipse—appending to it, however, a pretty story which never happened—in _Household Words_. The eclipse was soon over, but the great astronomical treat of the year was, of course, Donati's unforgettable comet, “a thing of beauty,” though unfortunately not “a joy for ever,” which blazed magnificently in the northern hemisphere for some few weeks. [215] “Life,” ii. 334. [216] Here was another reformer from outside the Post Office. Yet one more was Sir Douglas Galton, who first proposed that the Post Office should take over the telegraphic system. His father-in-law, Mr Nicholson of Waverley Abbey, sent the then Captain Galton's paper on the subject to Rowland Hill in 1852. The communication being private, my father replied also privately, giving the project encouragement, and leaving Captain Galton to take the next step. He submitted his plan to the Board of Trade, whence it was referred to the Post Office. The Postmaster-General, Lord Hardwicke, did not view the scheme with favour, and it was dropped, to be resumed later within the Office itself. Had Captain Galton's proposals been resolutely taken up in 1852, the British taxpayers might have been spared the heavy burden laid upon them when, nearly twenty years later, the State purchase of the Telegraphs was effected “at a cost at once so superfluous and so enormous.” (“Life,” ii. 251, 252.) [217] “Life,” ii. 335. [218] “Report of the Select Committee on Postage (1843),” p. 41. Also “Life,” ii. 336.