I860.] EXTRACTS FROM CORRESPONDENCE. 339 



the place ; but if there be, it is a very humble one. He can say 

 that there is no post-office, but there is something which answers 

 all the purposes of a receiving-house, viz. a box fixed into the 

 churchyard wall, into which the correspondence of Horton is 

 deposited till the pedestrian postwoman comes at 6 p.m. to take 

 out the missives and transmit them to their respective destina- 

 tions. This novel scheme of Sir Rowland HilFs possesses one ad- 

 vantage over the usual letter-receiving houses in country places, 

 viz. that the postmaster or postmistress is no longer able to read 

 the letters of their neighbours, entrusted to them for conveyance, 

 but not for perusal. 



There is one disadvantage attending this recent invention, viz. 

 that the letter-writer and letter-sender cannot be supplied with 

 stamps in the village. 



The perverse ingenuity of the opponents of progress is both 

 amusing and instructive. When the penny-postage plan was 

 first established, it was pretended to be a grievance that the 

 sender had to provide himself or herself with a penny to pre- 

 pay his epistle, obstinately forgetting that the shopkeeper would 

 give him change. It was deemed an intolerable hardship when 

 this money prepayment was altered into payment by a penny 

 stamp ; and loud were the lamentations over the departure of 

 the good old times, when these new-fangled ways were in the 

 deep and distant future, and when a letter was received only once 

 a week, or seldomer, at the moderate charge of from fourpence 

 to eighteenpence, if the said letter were from any part of the Bri- 

 tish Isles. 



There were growlers and grumblers who muttered and maun- 

 dered about the substitution of hollow cylinders with a slit at 

 their apex, for the usual receiving-houses. But as the new system 

 prevented all prying into the letters of the receiver's neighbours, 

 this grievance was quickly forgotten. 



But your special correspondent has to deal with botany, rather 

 than with social improvement ; and as an apology to those who 

 may cavil because he has not stuck closely to his text, he enters 

 the above as a hint to the fraternity, when they visit Horton, to 

 take note-paper, etc., with them, and not to forget the postage- 

 stamps. 



The soil of Horton is a thick alluvial deposit on the gravel, in 

 some places from four to six feet in thickness, and it is quite, or 



