exception indeed was made in the case of Hackney, Islington, Newington Butts, and Lambeth, which were then separate towns. There one penny carried only to the receiving office, and for delivery at a private house the charge was one penny more. Delivery in the street was not allowed. [9] Curiously enough, the Post Office Report for 1854 gives the year as 1683; but this is an error. [10] Here also the Post Office Report for 1854 is in error. It says that at first there was no limit to the weight of a packet. But it was not only in the matter of weight and frequency of delivery that the new undertaking was conceived in the most liberal spirit. Provided a letter or parcel was securely tied and sealed and its contents endorsed on the outside, the charge of one penny covered not only cost of conveyance but insurance as well, up to a limit of ten pounds. That is to say, subject to this limit, if a parcel or a letter or its contents were lost, Dockwra would, the conditions being observed, make the value good. There is yet another novelty which Dockwra introduced. As a check upon his messengers he supplied the seven sorting offices with stamps bearing their own initial letters and denoting the several hours of the day. With one of these stamps all letters and parcels were impressed as they passed through the post, and if in the busy parts of the capital they were not delivered within little more than an hour from the time denoted by the impression, the public were encouraged to complain. The following are specimens of the stamps which Dockwra used:-- [Illustration: Three stamps] This was the introduction of postmarks. In the first and last impressions Mor. 8 signifies of course 8 o'clock in the morning, and Af. 4, 4 o'clock in the afternoon. In the second or middle impression the initial letter L signifies Lyme Street, where the principal office of the penny post was held at Dockwra's private dwelling-house, formerly the dwelling-house of Sir Robert Abdy. The General Post Office, until lately in Bishopsgate Street, stood at this time in Lombard Street, where it occupied a site on part of which the branch office now stands. There the persons employed, all told, numbered 77. In the country and dependent on the chief office were 227 postmasters, viz. 182 in England and Scotland and 45 in Ireland. Twelve persons were also employed in the office in Dublin. Altogether and throughout the whole of the kingdom the General Post Office, in 1680, gave employment to 316 persons, a number very much less than that which Dockwra employed in London alone.