754 



POSTS. 



armed man to guard them. It formed a part of 

 the proposed improvement that the times of de- 

 parture of the coaches Waring mails from places in 

 the country should be so regulated as to insure 

 their nearly simultaneous arrival in London at an 

 early hour of the morning, and that the whole 

 should quit the metropolis at the same hour in the 

 evening. The first mail coach upon Mr Palmer's 

 plan left London for Bristol, on the evening of the 

 '2nd of August. 1784. 



The difficulties which the projector had to en- 

 counter in carrying his proposed improvements into 

 effect might form an instructive chapter in the his- 

 tory of inventions. At the time the management 

 of the post-office attracted Mr Palmer's attention, 

 he was the manager of the theatres of Bath and 

 Bristol, and in the enjoyment of a considerable in- 

 come. The first circumstance that particularly 

 struck him was the great length of time consumed 

 in the transmission of a letter from London to 

 Bath, a distance of 110 miles. A letter posted in 

 London on Monday evening was seldom delivered 

 earlier than Wednesday afternoon, frequently much 

 later, whilst at the very same time coaches were leav- 

 ing London on Monday afternoon and reaching Bath 

 by breakfast time the following morning.* The post- 

 age of a letter was 6d., the carriage of a parcel 2s.. 

 yet Mr Palmer discovered that the tradesmen con- 

 tinually made parcels of their letters, the extra 

 speed being of more consequence than the extra 

 expense. From this individual specimen of the 

 existing arrangements, Mr Palmer carried his in- 

 quiries farther: he found that the post-office was 

 as irregular as it was slow; that its robbery was a 

 matter of continual occurrence ; that the grossest 

 mismanagement, and the most flagrant abuses, per- 

 vaded every department ; and, in short, that a 

 thorough reformation was required, both for the 

 sake of the public accommodation, and the govern- 

 ment revenue. He immediately devoted himself 

 to the consideration of the remedy, and presented 

 the first rude sketch of his plan to Mr Pitt, the 

 minister, in 1782, with an intimation that he was 

 willing to devote his entire time and attention to 

 the carrying it into operation ; that if he failed, 

 he should not expect a shilling for his services, but 

 that, if he succeeded, he expected 2J per cent, 

 upon the increase on the net revenue. His pro- 

 posal pleased the sagacious premier, who returned 

 it to him in order that it might be further devel- 

 oped, stating at the same time that the pecuniary 

 proposition was fair, and would not be objected to. 

 Early in 1783 the plan, prepared as desired, was 



* The slow rate of travelling here mentioned was by no 

 means peculiar to the Bath mail. The post of Monday night 

 from London reached Norwich, Worcester, or Birmingham, 

 only on Wednesday morning, and did not arrive at Exeter un- 

 til Thursday morning at nine o'clock. Dr Cleland, in his 

 " Statistical Account of Gla-iro-.v," tells us that before the in- 

 troduction of mail coaches into that part of the kingdom in 

 1788. the course of post from London to Glasgow was five days, 

 the letters being then carried round by Edinburgh. This writer 

 mentions a curious circumstance, which shows how slowly im- 

 provement was allowed to proceed in those days. Only five 

 London mails had usually arrived in Glasgow during the week, 

 it not being customary to receive or despatch letters at or from 

 Edinburgh on Sunday; but when the mail-coach conveyance 

 had been brought under Mr Palmer's improvements as far as 

 Carlisle, it occurred to the managers of the post-office that the 

 sixth mail for Glasgow, which the Sunday regulation of the 

 Edinburgh office prevented being passed through that medium, 

 mi^ht be conveyed by the mail-coach to Carlisle, and forwarded 

 thence to Glas'gow. By this means the sixth mail reached 

 igow m four days, while the conveyance of the other five 

 continued, for a year beyond this time, to occupy five davs. 

 It appears to have required the whole of that time in order to 

 iscover that the five mails, which required five days to reach 

 UlMgcnr by hdms.irgh, might, like the sixth, be carried by 

 Carlisle in four dava. 



again presented and about to be acted upon, when 

 j the administration was dissolved. The new min- 

 isters, however, took up the matter, but for the 

 time did no more than transmit the plan to the 

 post-office for the opinion of the authorities. In 

 the interim Mr Palmer travelled through the coun- 

 try to clear up fresh doubts that hud been expres- 

 sed, and from this period appears to have deter- 

 mined to pursue the affair at every personal risk, 

 satisfied that success was feasible, and that a mag- 

 nificent fortune would ultimately be his reward for 

 nil the difficulty, anxiety, and pecuniary danger be 

 had to undergo. In July following, the post-office 

 authorities furnished their opinions in the shape of 

 three volumes of objections! declaring generally 

 that the plan was impracticable, and would be pre- 

 judicial to revenue and to commerce. Some of the 

 objections offered show the extreme absurdities 

 into which selfishness or bigotry may lead men, 

 even upon matters with which above all others 

 they ought to be the best acquainted. One de- 

 clared that the coaches went too fast for the pro- 

 per transaction of the business of the post-office 

 in the different towns, whilst another could not 

 even see why the post-office should be the swiftest 

 conveyance in England. It was asserted that the 

 time for the transmittal of the mails from London, 

 namely, from midnight until two or three o'clock 

 in the morning, could not be altered without throw- 

 ing the whole correspondence of England into con- 

 fusion. As to the appointment of a guard, one 

 gentleman observed pleasantly as well as shrewdly, 

 that " he might be waited for at every ale house 

 he should pass by," whilst another could not 

 " think a guard to each mail would add to its 

 safety ;" but the climax of the argument was 

 reached by a third, who, evidently thinking there 

 was danger in too much security, lest the robbers 

 should grow outrageous at such unfair conduct, ob- 

 served, " that when desperate fellows had once 

 determined upon a mail robbery, the consequence 

 would be murder in case of resistance!" In con- 

 clusion, it was stated generally with respect to the 

 affairs of the post-office, " that the constant eye 

 that has long been kept toward their improvement 

 in all situations, and under all circumstances, has 

 made them now almost as perfect as they can be 

 without exhausting the revenue arising therefrom." 

 Seeing all this, we may excuse the merriment ap- 

 parently produced among these gentlemen at the 

 absurdity of Mr Palmer's idea, that the Bath mail 

 could be brought to London in sixteen or eighteen 

 hours. At all events, whether the plan was or 

 was not practicable, there was no denying the firm- 

 ness of its author. Instead of listening with hum- 

 ble conviction to the objections urged, he refuted 

 them all, and decided government in his favour. 

 Again delay was caused by a change of adminis- 

 tration, but it was Mr Pitt who came into power, 

 and who lost no time in visiting the post-office 

 with Mr Palmer to make the necessary arrange- 

 ments. Fresh objections were here presented to 

 the minister, the authorities were more than ever 

 convinced that the scheme was impracticable and 

 destructive. Nearly seven more anxious months 

 were spent by Mr Palmer in collecting information 

 to overcome these new obstacles : at last a meet- 

 ing took place, at which the postmasters-general 

 and their principal officers were confronted" with 

 Mr Palmer, who triumphantly answered all their 

 objections ; a trial was peremptorily ordered to be 

 made. On the 2nd of August, 178-1, the first mail 





