On March 12th the first parliamentary return on the subject was obtained; when it appeared that the increase in the number of chargeable letters was somewhat less than two and a quarter-fold. Certainly I had expected more, and was obliged, in my disappointment, to fall back on my general confidence in the soundness of my views, deriving, however, some encouragement from finding that the average postage, instead of being only 1¼_d._, as I had calculated, proved to be nearly 1½_d._; a difference which, however trifling in appearance, would, when multiplied, as it already had to be, by a hundred and fifty millions, tell sensibly in the result. This, also, enabled me to correct my calculation as to the increase in the number of letters necessary to sustain the gross revenue; which I now reduced from five-fold to four and three-quarters-fold; a reduction fully justified eleven years later by the result.[296] A Treasury Minute of April 22nd appointed the 6th of the following month as the day when prepayment by stamps should begin; the alternative of prepayment in money being left for the present, so as to allow time for the public to fall quietly into the new practice. Mr. Baring, indeed, having but little faith in the expected preference of the public for stamps, offered to promote their use by making them the only means of prepayment; but, independently of my confidence in their acceptability, I preferred that the two modes, money and stamps, should contend for public favour on equal terms. A difficulty, however, arose here, for which I was quite unprepared, and which may still excite wonder. Objection was raised in the department to the sale of stamps at the three Chief Offices, viz., of London, Dublin, and Edinburgh. I can only suppose that official dignity was touched, the feeling excited being such as might arise on board a man-of-war at a proposal to intrude bales of merchandise on “Her Majesty’s Quarter-deck.” The issue of stamps, however, began, as appointed, on the 1st of May. Great, I had the satisfaction of hearing, was the bustle at the Stamp Office; the sale on this one day amounting to £2,500. It was clear, therefore, that this practice, so “inconvenient and foreign to the habits of Englishmen,” was at least to have trial. So far all was well; but now began a series of troubles, against which I had striven to provide, but necessarily through the instrumentality of others little interested in their prevention. Six days later, I received information that no stamps had been issued to any of the receiving-houses in London. On inquiring into the cause of this omission, I found that in the Treasury letter, giving instructions on the subject, the important word _not_ had been omitted, so that whereas the minute directed that the issue should not be delayed on account of certain preliminaries, the letter directed that it should.