The control of the packets by the Admiralty after 1837 failed to produce the results anticipated. The power of authorizing contracts for the conveyance of the mails by water was actually vested in the Lords of the Treasury upon consultation with the Postmaster-General, the Colonial Secretary, and the Lords of the Admiralty with reference to the postal, colonial, or nautical questions involved, but as a matter of fact these officials did not always work in harmony. The mails continued to be carried by private vessels or war vessels not under contract, by packets belonging to the Crown, and by vessels under contract. Before the use of steam vessels the Government was able as a rule to make contracts for a short period and at comparatively little cost. Between England and the neighbouring countries (Ireland, France, and Belgium), government steam packets were employed. For the longer voyages it was considered advisable to induce commercial companies to build steam vessels by offering large subsidies for long periods. In 1853, a Parliamentary Committee reported in condemnation of the further use of government-owned packets on account of their expense and also of the payments to the owners of contract vessels in excess of the actual cost of mail carriage. They pointed out, however, that exceptions might very well be made when for political or social reasons it seemed necessary to carry mails to places where commercial vessels did not go, or went very irregularly, or where high speed was desirable.[552] This report, in so far as it condemned the use of government-owned packets and the excessive subsidies paid to contractors, repeated the findings of an earlier committee published in 1849, which had in addition advised that the rule should be observed of calling for tenders in the most public way possible.[553] In 1852, the only service performed by the government packets was that between Dover, Calais, and Ostend. On the French service the night mails between Dover and Calais were conveyed by British packets and the day mails by French. Between Dover and Ostend there was a daily service, thrice a week by British, four times by Belgian packets. Of the six boats employed by the Admiralty, four were kept fully manned and two were spare steamers. The receipts did not equal the gross expenses.[554] Again in 1860, the year in which the control of the packets was transferred to the Post Office, we find a third Parliamentary committee repeating the recommendations of its predecessors so far as the subsidy question was concerned. Nothing was said about the government steamers, for in the meantime the principle of packet ownership had been abandoned.[555] [552] _Rep. Com._, 1860, xiv; _Acc. & P._, 1852-53, xcv, 1660, pp. 1-7. [553] _Rep. Com._, 1849, xii, p. iii. [554] _Acc. & P._, 1852-53, xcv, 1660, p. 37. [555] _Rep. Com._, 1860, xiv, p. 17; 23 Vict., c. 46; _Parl. Deb._, 3d ser., clxi, col. 830; cxciv, col. 1281; cxcvii, col. 1818.