The press is a great user both of the postal and telegraphic department.
In the postal department the representatives can call for letters at any
hour, provided their letters are enclosed in a distinctive-coloured
envelope, such as bright red or orange. Of course this privilege has to
be paid for. In the telegraph department the press can obtain their
'private wires' after six in the evening, as the wires are no longer
required for commercial purposes. The plan adopted in sending the same
message to every provincial town which has a daily journal is the
following: all along the route the operators are advised of the fact,
and whilst the message is only actually delivered at its final
destination, the words are caught as they pass each town by means of the
'sounder.' By this ingenious arrangement, dozens of towns are placed in
direct communication with the central office whence the message is
despatched. To carry on our telegraphic arrangements three miles of
shelves are needed, on which are deposited forty thousand batteries.
THE POST-OFFICE ON WHEELS.
The particular portion of the 'Post-office on Wheels' which we purpose
describing is the Special Mail which leaves London from Euston Station
daily. We have selected this mail, not only because all the duties
appertaining to the Travelling Post-office are performed therein, but
also because it is the most important mail in the United Kingdom,
probably in the whole world. In the Special Mail, the post-office
vehicles are forty-two feet in length, and one of thirty-two feet. There
is a gangway communication between all the carriages, so that the
officers on duty can pass from one to another throughout the entire
length without going outside. All the carriages are lighted with gas.
The pair-horse vans which convey the London bags for provincial towns
come dashing into the station in rapid succession, and as there are only
fifteen minutes before the train starts, no time is to be lost. The bags
are quickly removed from the vans, the name of each being called out in
the process, thus enabling an officer who stands near to tick them off
on a printed list with which he is provided. They are then stowed away
in the respective carriages in appointed places.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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