The public, however, found means of their own of remedying the evil, which, if not wholly legitimate, were under the circumstances to be regarded with some degree of leniency. Letter-smuggling was a not unnatural result of the high and disproportionate charges referred to, and was almost openly adopted to an extent that is hardly credible. Thus, many Manchester merchants--Mr Cobden amongst the number--stated before the Post-office Inquiry Committee appointed in 1838, their belief that four-fifths of the letters written in that town did not pass through the Post-office. A carrier in Scotland confessed to having carried sixty letters daily for a number of years, and knew of others who carried five hundred daily. A Glasgow publisher and bookseller said he sent and received fifty letters or circulars daily, and added that he was not caught until he had sent twenty thousand letters otherwise than through the post! There were also other methods of evading the postage rates at work. Letters were smuggled in newspapers, which in these days passed free within a stated period through the post, the postage being covered by the stamp-duty impressed on the papers. Invisible ink, too, was used for inditing messages on the newspapers themselves; while the use of certain pre-arranged codes on the covers of letters was likewise systematically adopted, the addressees, after turning the letters over and learning from the covers all they desired to know, declining to take in the letters on the ground that they could not afford to pay the postage. The system of 'franking' letters in the high-postage days led to an appalling abuse of that privilege, which belonged to peers and members of the House of Commons. It was no doubt originally allowed to enable members to correspond with their constituents; but under the circumstances it is perhaps not surprising that the plan soon became abused, and was ultimately used to cover all kinds of correspondence, not only members' but other people's as well. At one time, indeed, all sorts of curious packages passed free under the franking privilege, such as dogs, a cow, parcels of lace, bales of stockings, boxes of medicine, flitches of bacon, &c. Sometimes, indeed, franked covers were actually sold; and they have even been known to be given in lieu of wages to servants, who speedily converted them into ready money.