326 ON THE TRACK OF THE MAIL-COACH 



the agency of one of its departments, to take at least 

 a step towards checking the movement — possibly 

 towards reversing its direction. The means are ready 

 to the hand in the parcel post, day mail conveyances, 

 and local telephonic exchanges. 



My conviction is that by a liberal use of these 

 powerful accessories of commerce and social life, 

 exercised through the agency of the Post-Office, the 

 aspect of the rural question may, in less than a 

 generation — perhaps in a decade — be wholly changed 

 for the better. The resources of the Post-Office are 

 practically inexhaustible ; those of the telephone — the 

 vital importance of an extended use of which has 

 been insisted on by many high authorities — are as yet 

 undreamt of. 



Naaman the Syrian hesitated to bathe in the river 

 Jordan because the proposed remedy appeared to him 

 to be too simple to be a true one. But sometimes, as 

 with Naaman, the simplest is the best, the most 

 effective, the only cure. 



The country is deserted for the town because wages 

 are better in the latter and life more cheerful than in 

 the former ; in other words, because in rural parts the 

 proportion of employers to the working classes is too 

 small, and labour there has, so to speak, become a 

 drug in the market. 



The person of private means, or the prosperous 

 townsman, shrinks, for the most part, from a purely 

 rural abode. He foresees, or has experienced, the 

 difficulty of supplying the needs of civilization. The 



