In the City, on the proposal of Mr Moffatt, afterwards Member for Southampton, the “Mercantile Committee” was formed. Its founder, whom Rowland Hill has described as “one of my most zealous, steady, and efficient supporters,” threw himself with great earnestness into the formation of this Committee, raising funds, and gathering together the able men, London merchants and others, who became its members. Its principal aim was to collect evidence in favour of the plan; and to its ceaseless energy much of the success of the movement was due. Mr Ashurst, father to a late Solicitor to the Post Office, was requested to become Solicitor to the Committee. He accepted the invitation, declined to receive remuneration for his services, and worked with unflagging industry.[86] Mr Bates, of the house of Baring Brothers, acted as Chairman; Mr Cole as Secretary. In addition to the above, and to Mr Moffatt, may be mentioned the names of Messrs William Ellis, James Pattison, L. P. Wilson, John Dillon,[87] John Travers, J. H. Gladstanes, and W. A. Wilkinson—all warm supporters of the plan from the beginning. Mr Cole excelled in the invention of pictorial devices of the sort which are far more likely to convert the average citizen to faith in a newly propounded reform than all the arguments, however able, that were ever spoken or written; and are therefore most valuable. He drew, for instance, a mail-coach with a large amount of postal matter piled, by artistic licence, on the roof instead of inside “the boot.” Six huge sacks contained between them 2,296 newspapers weighing 273 lbs.; a seventh sack, as large as any of its fellows, held 484 franked letters, and weighed 47 lbs.; while a moderate-sized parcel was filled with Stamp Office documents. They were all labelled “go free.” A bag of insignificant dimensions leant up against one of the sacks. It held 1,565 ordinary letters, weighed 34 lbs., and was marked “pay £93.” This tiny packet paid for all the rest! Cole was too sensible a man to make use of an illustration which, if untrue, could only have inspired ridicule. His figures were absolutely correct, and represented the actual proportions of the mail matter carried from London to Edinburgh on 2nd March 1838. His Brobdingnagian “single” and Lilliputian “double” letters, whose names are indicative of their relative size, were one evening handed round the House of Commons with telling effect. They were, of course, designed to satirise the old system practice of “taxing” letters according to number of enclosures. Both had passed through the post that day, the giant having been charged just half what was paid on the dwarf.