The Life of Sir Rowland Hill and the History of Penny Postage, Vol. 2 (of 2)Hill, Rowland, Sir
History
The Life of Sir Rowland Hill and the History of Penny Postage, Vol. 2 (of 2)
Hill, Rowland, Sir
Hill, Rowland, Sir, 1795-1879; Postal service -- Great Britain -- Rates
"What an impudent daring is this by creatures of mere circumstance
and pomp.
"God is defied, and the genuine execrating outcry of a Christian
nation is set at naught!
"It is to be hoped that our Queen will be solicited to cast such
men out from her councils and executive; _they_ are the men who
endanger the State; for, most assuredly as there is a God who
taketh vengeance, so will this realm be visited if the sins of it
should be so enormously added unto; and the Lord's people (who are
the saving salt of it) will be constrained to say. 'Even so, Lord,
so let Thine enemies perish.'
"Fellow Christians of every denomination! continue to pray for the
oppressed, they shall have a holy fortitude themselves to cast from
them the bands of the oppressor.
"6, Finsbury Pavement,
"Friday, 26th October, 1849."
As usual, in these exhortations to bold defiance, the printer's name
was cautiously suppressed.
While so much was doing to abuse the public mind, official reserve
prevented my taking the most direct means for its correction:--
"_Same day._--The Postmaster-General objects to my sending the
proposed information to the newspapers; he thinks it will be better
to wait and see what they say, contradicting it if necessary. I
cannot convince him of the practical impossibility of correcting an
erroneous impression when once adopted by the public."
After all that has been described, the reader will not be surprised at
the next passage from my Journal. I must first state, however, that
ere this the time for hesitation was past, the labour of preparation
concluded, and the day of actual trial come:--
"_October 28th.--Sunday._--Very ill--confined to my bed nearly
the whole day. I have no doubt my illness has been caused by the
anxieties of the last month."
Ill though I was, nevertheless I was eagerly desirous of information as
to the success of the first experiment, particularly as to whether the
force engaged had proved, as I expected, ample. I had ascertained the
previous day "that no more carriages, drivers, guards, &c., would be
employed in conveying the bags from and to the stations than heretofore
on a Sunday; the only difference will be that four-wheeled carriages
with two horses will be substituted for two-wheeled carriages with one
horse." Mr. Bokenham wrote up from the office that the work not having
been quite completed by ten o'clock, though twenty minutes more would
have sufficed, he had requested ten of the force to return in the
evening to finish; a necessity arising, however, from the fact that the
number of letters was 18,000 or 20,000 more than usual on the Sunday.
He added, that, "the men were all in excellent humour, and exerted
themselves to their utmost."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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