MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT IN GERMANY. 59 



might be made of it in the department, and we may be sure 

 that, if a good use is found for it, it will be put into appli- 

 cation without delay. The pneumatic-tube service of the 

 Berlin post-office, for the quick delivery of letters, etc., is 

 a great improvement upon our special delivery system. 

 The pneumatic lines radiate out over the city from a cen- 

 tral station, connecting various local stations at frequent 

 intervals, so that a message is delivered in almost any 

 part of the great city within half an hour. The postage 

 for the pneumatic service is 25 pfennige, or 6J cents. Tele- 

 grams are very extensively sent and delivered by means of 

 the pneumatic service. 



Now contrast the efficiency of the German post-office 

 with its widely comprehensive functions, with the condi- 

 tion of things in the United States, where, indeed, the 

 postoffice itself, pure and simple, is reasonably efficient, 

 considering our slipshod and barbarous civil-service sys- 

 tem, but where the public is at the mercy of two great and 

 greedy monopolies for the telegraph and telephone service, 

 which have become as essentially a part of public intercourse 

 as the carrying of the mails, and are just as properly a legit- 

 imate function of the government ; as Germany wisely rec- 

 ognizes. It must eventually be perceived in the United 

 States that the only remedy for the extortionate and in- 

 efficient telegraph-service to which the public is now sub- 

 ject is the government administration thereof, although 

 when Congress is " influenced" by the Western Union Com- 

 pany with free telegraphic passes, as Senator Ingalls un- 

 intentionally confessed a few months ago, it is probable 

 that only an overwhelming public pressure can effect the 

 change. The despotism of a plutocracy is becoming a se- 

 rious danger in the United States. 



A like increased efficiency of service has followed the 

 resumption of the control of the railways by the Prussian 



