Interest and amusement, however, were not unmingled with feelings of a very different kind. It scarcely need be said that the operation in question requires very careful management both in the train and at the station. Even with such management an element of danger remains, increasing in proportion to the speed of the train and weight of the bags. In fact, as the use of the bag-apparatus extended, some slight accidents occurred. In my anxiety I induced the Postmaster-General to call for a report from Sir William Cubitt on the subject; and this being delayed through Sir William's indisposition, I took upon myself, (the Postmaster-General just then being absent), to issue instructions restricting, and in some cases suspending, their use. This difficulty, I may however state, was ultimately overcome by an improvement, devised by my son, in the bag-exchanging apparatus. I may be allowed to add that Sir William Cubitt, who had himself failed to devise means for surmounting the difficulty, candidly and kindly expressed a very high opinion of my son's expedient. RECTIFICATION OF ACCOUNTS. The reader will remember[111] how long and how ineffectually I once strove to obtain the rectification of accounts relative to the true amount of the postal revenue. In 1852, however, I succeeded in demonstrating to Lord Hardwicke that if the Post Office were charged, on the one hand, with a fair share of the packet service, and received credit, on the other hand, for the stamp duty on newspapers,[112] the net revenue would be found, not, as was then maintained by some persons, nothing at all, but, as set forth in the ordinary accounts of the department, more than a million per annum. A year later Lord Canning, then Postmaster-General, giving me the draft Report of the Packet Commission which he had prepared as chairman, with a request that I would look it over, I found that he had adopted my views, though he expressed doubts as to the agreement of his colleagues.[113] I may mention here that ten years later I prepared an elaborate memorandum as to the means of ascertaining the true net revenue of the Post Office. This paper, in which the incidence of the packet service expense, as well as other questions relative to the subject, is duly treated of, will be found in the Appendix (I). PACKET SERVICE. _Lord Canning's Commission._ Of the able Report of the Commission, already mentioned, commonly called Lord Canning's Commission, the following are some of the leading points. It will be observed that the question relative to the just incidence of the charge for mail-packets is not directly dealt with, though there is enough to show that the feeling of the Commission accorded with my view.