Witherings lived in an age characterised by corruption, by Court intrigue and Court favouritism, when envy and uncharitableness struggled for place and power, and when those who failed to secure the royal smile were in imminent danger of going to the wall. He did not achieve his official career without attempts being made to oust him from his place. Many general allegations were made against him of irregularities committed in his office, but for the most part with an irritating absence of any definite charges; and in the opposite scale we have the fact that he was still Postmaster for Foreign Parts at the time of his death, in the year 1651. We have hitherto been dealing with the Postmastership for Foreign Parts; and having accompanied Witherings over a portion of his service, it will be convenient now to see what was going on in the inland posts. It will be remembered that Charles Lord Stanhope was the king's Postmaster at Home and in Foreign Parts, within the king's dominions. The duties of Stanhope were to appoint and supervise the deputy postmasters on the roads, to provide for the conveyance of letters to or from the king or the Court, and, generally, letters on State business; but there was no arrangement, recognised as a State service, for the conveyance of letters of the merchants or the public generally by the deputy postmasters under Stanhope. Although this was so, there is apt to be some misapprehension as to the means available at this time for the forwarding of letters of the public throughout the country. It might be supposed that no machinery to this end existed. There is, however, we think, every probability that while the postmasters were not officially authorised to convey letters from place to place, they did so, and reaped some benefit from the work. The postmasters throughout the country were constantly sending guides and horses between their several stages; the horses had to be brought back by the guides to their headquarters; and it would be surprising if the postmasters, when opportunity offered, did not undertake the carriage of letters for a fee. Further, in a State-paper office document, dated 1635, it is mentioned that the king's postmasters carried the subjects' letters, but up to that time had never reaped any benefit from it. The meaning of this must be, that the Chief Postmaster and his predecessors had never reaped any benefit; but it is not likely that the deputy postmasters, who did the work, would perform the service for nothing. When the carriage of letters was afterwards taken up as a State affair, we shall hear an outcry for arrears of wages due to the postmasters, who previously were apparently content to let that matter lie over, deriving their profits from the letting out of horses, and the fees from the carriage of private letters. But the carriers with their carts and pack horses also conveyed letters for the public, and though the travelling was slow, it extended to all parts. By consulting