wanting in one particular. He had no sense of proportion. A trivial
point hardly deserving of a moment's consideration he would elaborate as
carefully as a measure involving large and important issues; and a
clerical error or a slight indiscretion he would visit as severely as
misconduct of the gravest character. Nor must we omit to mention a habit
in which he indulged to an extent that has probably never been
surpassed. This was a habit of annotating. Nothing came officially
before him, whether a letter or a report or a book, without being
covered in the margin and every available space with notes and queries;
and, to add to the distraction which this mode of criticism seldom fails
to cause, they were in so small and crabbed a hand as to be always
difficult, and sometimes even with the aid of a magnifying-glass
impossible, to decipher.
There was only one person that had the slightest influence with
Walsingham. This was Daniel Braithwaite, who, holding nominally the
situation of clerk to the postmasters-general, was really their private
secretary. Braithwaite was a Fellow of the Royal Society. Of consummate
tact and judgment, and endowed with a peculiar sweetness of disposition,
he contrived during difficult times to tone down asperities and to
accommodate many a dissension which promised to become acute. Passing
through his hands a harsh admonition was turned into a gentle reproof,
and an imperious command into a courteous message. But under this
softness of manner and a deference of language so profound that even
Walsingham quizzed him on the number of "Lordships" he would introduce
into a single letter, there lay concealed a solidity of character which
few would have suspected. Honest Braithwaite he was called, and well he
deserved the epithet. By a simple inquiry, a request for information or
the expression of a doubt, he would nip some wild project in the bud,
and, where occasion required, he would not hesitate to speak his mind
freely. A young man, Stokes by name, who had been appointed to assist
Braithwaite, had miscopied a date in one of Walsingham's numerous
drafts, or rather, feeling sure that the date as it stood was wrong, had
altered it to what he believed to be the right one. Walsingham, who was
absent from London at the time, wrote back that Stokes was to be
suspended. Braithwaite's sense of justice was shocked, and he refused to
carry the order into effect. "If a mistake in copying," he wrote,
"deserves so severe a punishment as suspension, what am I not to fear
for disobedience, and yet I really cannot execute the task your Lordship
has imposed upon me. For God's sake, my dear lord," he proceeded, "let
me most earnestly entreat you to mitigate the severity of this sentence,
and, if a reprimand at the Board is not sufficient, give poor Stokes a
holiday and impose the fine for a substitute upon me. At any rate," he
added, "pray leave the case to be decided at a Board or refer it to Mr.
Todd." Walsingham did refer the case to Todd, but not before he had
sternly demanded of his refractory henchman whether he had never read
Beccaria on Crimes and Punishments. "No," replied Braithwaite, "I have
not read Beccaria on Crimes and Punishments; but Beccaria, say what he
may, will never convince me that it can be right to punish a mistake as
though it were a crime." Honest Braithwaite! He prevailed in the end,
and stood in Walsingham's confidence even higher than before.
At a Board meeting on the 20th of July 1787, less than a fortnight after
taking up his appointment, Walsingham in the presence of the captains
who were ashore, and who had been summoned to London for the occasion,
gave notice of his intention to reduce the packet establishment at
Falmouth. That establishment consisted of twenty-one boats of 200 tons
each, and manned by thirty men. It was proposed that for the future
there should be twenty boats of 150 tons each, and with a complement of
eighteen men. These boats would cost about L3000 apiece to build, and
would not be the property of the Government. The Government would simply
hire them, giving as the price of hire L1350 a year, which was to cover
everything, wages and victualling included. The owners would also have
the passage money, estimated at L150, for each boat. Large as this
reduction was, the Treasury desired that it should be carried further,
that only the boats to America should be of as much as 150 tons, and
that those for the West Indies and for Lisbon should be of 100. The
captains, who had not relished the proposed reduction even to 150 tons,
were half-amused and half-indignant. Why, they asked, should the boats
for America be the largest? Were hurricanes unknown in the West Indies?
And could not the Bay of Biscay boast of tremendous seas? Boats of 100
tons would be positively dangerous. No passenger would go by them; nor
would any merchant trust them with bullion, from the freight of which
the Post Office derived a considerable income.
The postmasters-general had also on their side the result of experience.
In 1745, when the packet service to the West Indies, which had ceased in
1711, was re-established, boats of 100 tons had been tried and had
proved to be altogether insufficient. Moreover, it was in the highest
degree important, as a means of checking smuggling, that the boats
should not be restricted to one route. The intention was that they
should be interchangeable, so that their port of destination should be
uncertain; and to this end the tonnage of one should be the tonnage of
all. The Treasury appear to have remained unmoved by these
representations. At all events no decision was received; and Walsingham,
after waiting for what he no doubt considered an unreasonable time, took
silence for assent and proceeded to carry his recommendations into
effect.
The economical results which had been looked for were not immediately
realised. The boats hitherto in use may not perhaps have been built with
the view of facilitating smuggling; and yet, crowded as they were
between decks with cupboards, they could hardly have been better adapted
to the purpose. In the new boats no receptacles were to be allowed in
which clandestine goods could be concealed; the holds were to be only
large enough to contain the stores and provisions for the voyage; the
seamen were no longer to remain unrestricted as to the size and number
of their boxes; and in other respects stringent regulations were laid
down to prevent illicit traffic. Finding what they called their ventures
stopped, the crews of the packets refused to go to sea without an
increase of pay all round. These ventures, they contended, had been
recognised from time immemorial and went in place of so much wages. How
else would it have been possible for them, many of them men with wives
and families, to subsist on a pittance of 23s. a month? The Post Office
was forced to yield to the demand; and as the immediate result of his
first essay in the cause of economy, Walsingham had the mortification of
seeing the cost of the packet establishment increased by more than L2300
a year.
From Falmouth Walsingham turned his attention to other ports where
packets were stationed. At Dover and at Harwich the establishments were
too small to admit of any reduction. At the latter port, indeed, what
little change took place was on the side of increase, the victualling
allowance being raised from 7-1/2d. a day for each man to 9d., so as to
be uniform with that given at Falmouth; and for the same reason the
seamen's wages were raised from 23s. a month to 28s.
With Holyhead the case was different. Here Walsingham had resolved upon
making a reduction, and it was only on an earnest remonstrance from the
Marquis of Buckingham, the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, that he abandoned
his intention. The Holyhead packets were at this time five in number,
and they were of seventy tons each and carried twelve hands. Walsingham
held that this tonnage and complement of men were more than enough; and
Buckingham maintained a directly contrary opinion. Between England and
Ireland, he urged, the number of passengers was increasing every year,
and surely this was not a time to lessen the confidence of the public in
the security of the packets. The danger of navigation in those seas
could not, he felt sure, be appreciated. He had himself crossed the
Channel in all weathers. Once he had been nearly lost, and not on that
occasion alone he had seen the crews, though at their full complement,
absolutely prostrate with their exertions. Could it be known that, for
purposes of passenger traffic, the captains of the Holyhead packets had
recently built and fitted out at their own expense a sloop named the
_Duchess of Rutland_; and that for this sloop, which, although vastly
superior in point of accommodation to any one of the packets, was of no
higher tonnage, the complement had been fixed at twelve hands? This
would shew what was the opinion on the point of those who were most
competent to judge. The fact, moreover, that Ireland had undertaken to
pay to Great Britain the sum of 2d. on every letter passing to and fro
placed the English Post Office under a sort of moral obligation not to
reduce the amount of accommodation and security existing at the time the
undertaking was given. Such were the arguments by which Buckingham
prevailed upon Walsingham to abandon his intention. He at the same time
hinted that there were other objects to which Walsingham's energies
might more properly be directed. "Does your Lordship know," he asked,
"that an immense communication of letters is kept up by the Liverpool
packets[62] which sail weekly to Dublin?"
[62] _i.e._ boats. At Liverpool packets, in the sense of boats
commissioned by Government to carry letters, did not at this time
exist.
One line of packets remains, the line between Milford Haven and
Waterford. Here five boats were employed, of which three were of eighty
tons and the others somewhat less; and the service was six days a week.
This, though the youngest of the packet stations, was by no means the
least interesting. It had been opened in April 1787; and in the first
year the proceeds from passengers alone amounted to more than L1200. No
doubt had been entertained that in the matter of letters there would be
an equally satisfactory account to render; but it soon became evident
that all hopes on this score must be given up. The Irish Post Office was
no longer subject to the Post Office of England; and in the supposed
interests of Dublin, which regarded with jealousy the postal facilities
enjoyed by the southern towns, advantage was taken of this freedom from
control to checkmate the new service. From Waterford the post for Cork
had been used to start at two o'clock in the afternoon, an hour most
convenient for the packets. Under orders from Dublin it was now to start
at twelve; and, as shewing the vexatiousness of the proceeding, an
express leaving Waterford as late as four o'clock would overtake the
mail at Carrick, a distance of no more than fifteen miles. Under the
same orders Limerick was forbidden to send letters by way of Waterford;
and the post between this town and Clonmel was reduced from six days a
week to three. This was a state of things which, under the system of
Home Rule then existing, Walsingham was powerless to remedy. He could
only lift his hands in amazement that such perversity should be
possible.
But it was not exclusively or even mainly to the packet establishment
that Walsingham's attention was directed. There was no part of the Post
Office with which he did not make himself thoroughly acquainted; and in
the course of his investigations nothing struck him more than the
pitiable condition of the clerks of the roads. The case of these men had
been gradually getting worse and worse. It is true that ten years before
a part of the salaries and pensions for which they were responsible had
been transferred to the State; but the relief thus afforded had been
neutralised and more than neutralised by the decrease which had since
taken place in their emoluments from the franking of newspapers. Of
these emoluments, indeed, little now remained. In the seventeen years
from 1772 to 1789 the notices served upon the Post Office by members of
Parliament to send newspapers into the country free had risen from a
little more than 2000 to 7000, and the number of newspapers which these
7000 notices covered amounted to no less than 65,760 a week. In the face
of such competition the special privilege enjoyed by the clerks of the
roads was practically valueless, and Walsingham and Carteret clearly
discerned that to compensate them for the loss of their emoluments by an
increase of salary was an act dictated no less by justice than policy.
The case indeed was urgent if a catastrophe were to be averted; and
Carteret, whose experience led him to believe that the salaries would
not be increased with the consent of the Treasury, proposed to increase
them without. Walsingham was shocked at the audacity of the proposal,
and read his colleague a homily on the constitutional proprieties. "I
know," replied Carteret, "we shall have the power of increasing salaries
with the consent of the Treasury, but many may starve before that
consent comes." Even Walsingham admitted the gravity of the occasion;
and with the full knowledge that at this time no representation from the
Post Office reached the Treasury which did not come under Pitt's own
observation, the two peers, after recommending a substantial measure of
relief, concluded their letter thus: "We shall find ourselves compelled,
if the present weight of Parliamentary and official duties shall make
it impossible for your Lordships to give us the authority we request in
the course of a week, to take it upon ourselves to issue the money at
our own risk, or the persons who are the object of this relief will be
unable to attend their duty, and the business of the office will be
literally at a stand." Whatever Pitt may have thought of the somewhat
unusual terms of this address, he allowed no sign of dissatisfaction to
escape him, and the authority sought was given.
As long as Walsingham confined his attention to the packets and the
clerks of the roads, there was no danger of a collision with Palmer.
Palmer, on the contrary, offered his congratulations to Walsingham on
the improvement which he had been instrumental in making in these
officers' condition. It was when Walsingham gave an instruction which
even indirectly affected the inland posts that Palmer's jealousy was
aroused. This he regarded as his own peculiar domain, a domain upon
which even the postmasters-general themselves were trespassers; and a
trespass or what he considered as such he never lost an opportunity of
resenting. The earliest and not the least curious illustration of these
pretensions appears in the case of the King's coach. In the summer of
1788 the King repaired to Cheltenham for the purpose of drinking the
waters, and Walsingham, who was above all things a courtier, had
arranged that during the royal visit a mail-coach should be stationed at
that town for the exclusive use of His Majesty. The coach was to be a
new one, sent down from London for the occasion, and the leading
contractor on the Cheltenham road, one Wilson by name, was to provide
the horses. The royal visit at an end, the contractor's bill was sent
in, and Palmer, in forwarding it to Walsingham, professed to be
extremely dissatisfied with the magnitude of the charge. On the sale of
the horses and harness alone, after only a month's use, there had been a
loss of L550. "Nothing," he said, "could have been more absurdly or
extravagantly conducted." But the thing was done. It would be useless to
dispute the payment. Besides, it would "soil the compliment" designed
to His Majesty. "We must," he added, "take more care next time, for, had
it been properly settled, the loss at most could not have exceeded
L300."
The actual arrangement for the coach had been made not through Palmer
but through Bonnor, Palmer's lieutenant; and to him Walsingham now
applied for further information. Bonnor's reply was a strange compound
of candour and insolence. It was indeed not to be wondered at, he said,
that his Lordship's indignation should be roused by the magnitude of the
bill. Had the matter been left as originally settled under Mr. Palmer's
orders, Wilson could never have made so monstrous a claim. By those
orders he had been given to understand that, the coach being designed as
a mere compliment to the King, not more than 1d. a mile would be allowed
at the outside. And "so the undertaking stood 'till your Lordship
ordered the circular letter to the horse-keepers respecting Sir George
Baker's[63] being accommodated with the mail horses if he had occasion.
Your Lordship will recollect that I remonstrated against it, and urged
the impossibility of Wilson ever allowing his mail horses to be taken
out of his stables for posting, and the regularity of the work
destroyed, and the cattle drove along by people he knew nothing of; to
which your Lordship was pleased to say that Wilson had no business to
trouble his head about that; that, whatever his expenses were, he should
be paid; and that no feelings of his about his horses or anything else
should prevent the thing being done in the best possible style."...
"Thinking as little in the delivery of the message as your Lordship did
in sending it that such an advantage would be taken, I of course obeyed
the directions, and it seems that this is the ground upon which the
charge is made out as it is."
[63] The King's physician.
Walsingham was not satisfied, and resolved to contest the bill. Palmer
now took alarm, and urged every consideration he could think of to
dissuade Walsingham from his purpose. To have recourse to a Court of Law
might seriously damage his infant undertaking. A legal dispute had been
avoided hitherto, and, with a cunning and refractory set of persons such
as the contractors were, might have the effect of raising the present
terms of conveyance. These terms were low, lower than the Post Office
was likely to obtain again; and the mail-coaches were running smoothly.
It would be a thousand pities to introduce an element of disturbance.
Besides, how unpleasant it would be to his Lordship to be subpoenaed as
a witness; and, in the hands of an expert counsel, how supremely
ridiculous the whole business might be made to appear! The King's jaunt
with a mail-coach in attendance! For his own part, when he had been
unfortunate enough to be imposed upon, he generally found it best to put
up with the imposition and to take more care another time. Nor should it
be forgotten that the matter might have been much worse. When first he
had heard of the arrangement, he had rebuked Bonnor for his
extravagance; and Bonnor had produced two letters from his Lordship in
justification. These letters shewed not only that no expense was to be
spared, but that it had originally been in contemplation to have two
coaches, and that it was only owing to Bonnor's earnest expostulation
that the idea of a second coach had been given up. Surely it was cause
for congratulation that the bill was no higher. Had two coaches been
established instead of one, Wilson might have clapped on another L1000.
As the bill stood, it was a gross imposition, an imposition which must
condemn him in the eyes of all honest men; and yet it would be pure
madness to go to law. These arguments prevailed, and Walsingham
abandoned his intention of contesting the bill. He did not at this time
see, what he saw clearly enough some years later, that in retaliation
upon himself for presuming to interfere Wilson had been cajoled or
coerced into making an exorbitant demand, and that of the several
persons who were concerned in the transaction Wilson himself was the
least to blame.
This may be a convenient place to notice a point in which the practice
of 1788 differed from that of the present time. It was only a few
months after his return from Cheltenham that the King was taken with the
serious illness which so nearly proved fatal. On the 9th of November the
accounts from Windsor were such as to leave little room for hope. On the
10th intelligence reached the Post Office at three o'clock in the
afternoon that, contrary to all expectation, the King was still living;
and on the 14th a form of prayer was issued, to be used in all churches,
for His Majesty's recovery. At the present time a circular of this kind
would reach the Post Office already addressed to the persons for whom it
was intended, and the Post Office would do nothing more than carry and
deliver it like an ordinary letter. But such was not the case in 1788.
The form of prayer, as it was issued by the printer, was sent to the
Post Office in bulk, and the Post Office despatched fifty copies to the
postmaster of each town with instructions to distribute them "with all
possible expedition to the rectors, vicars, or resident ministers of
your town and all places in your delivery." The point is hardly
deserving of mention, for, of course, it would make little difference to
the postmaster whether the copies were sent in bulk or as single
letters. He would be bound to deliver them in either case. It is more
worthy of note that, as the number of Post Offices in England was at
this time only 608, and the area subordinate to each of correspondingly
wide extent, to go over the whole of his delivery at one time as these
instructions obliged the postmaster to do was no slight undertaking, and
one which, owing to the paucity of letters, he had probably not been
required to perform on any previous occasion. In this instance, however,
we may feel sure that a sense of loyalty alone precluded all disposition
to murmur. With far other feelings, it may well be believed, was an
order regarded which had been issued rather more than thirty years
before. The year 1756 was a year of scarcity; and, under direction from
Whitehall, postmasters were to frequent the local markets and to
ascertain and report the price of corn. This is the first instance on
record of postmasters having been employed outside their own proper
duties as such. It may be added that two years later the Duke of
Newcastle sent down in hot haste to Lombard Street to inquire the latest
prices, when it was explained to His Grace that, despite the course
which had been adopted in 1756, the Post Office was not an office for
the collection of agricultural returns.
It is a common practice to laugh at public offices for their rigid
adherence to routine. This, we think, is not quite reasonable. No doubt
it is calculated to excite ridicule, and indeed to irritate beyond all
endurance when a course obviously proper in itself is condemned because,
forsooth, there is no precedent for it; and we are by no means sure that
some public servants would not be all the better for taking to heart the
maxim--Wise men make precedents, only fools require them. But, without
the order and regularity which a strict adherence to routine can alone
produce, the business of a Government department must inevitably drift
into a state of hopeless confusion. This is a truth which persons
outside the public service have always found it hard to accept; as well
indeed as persons inside who have entered late in life or after their
habits are formed. Palmer was of the latter class; and a striking
instance now occurred of his inability to adapt himself to the
requirements of his new situation. Walsingham had asked whether the
surveyors were keeping their journals regularly. These officers, besides
a small salary, were now receiving an allowance of one guinea a day when
travelling; and not only was a journal indispensable in order to shew
whether they had been travelling or not, but the keeping of one had been
made an express condition of the allowance being given. No subordinate
cared to pass on the inquiry to Palmer, implying, as this might seem to
do, a doubt. Walsingham had no such scruple and wrote to Palmer asking
that the journals might be sent to him for examination. Palmer's reply
will explain how it is that the records which now exist respecting
himself and his achievements are so surprisingly few. There were no
journals, he said. The surveyors' own letters, with their bills of
expenses attached, were sufficient evidence of the journeys they had
made. And these bills and letters, he added, as soon as the charges
which they represent have been paid, "are and must be useless paper, for
if I did not constantly clear my office both of their as well as my own
and the other officers' rubbish, I should be buried under it." The
auditors of the imprests had recently made good progress, but,
fortunately for the Post Office, they were still many years in
arrear.[64]
[64] The Post Office accounts for the year 1749 were not passed until
1784; and then only through the exertions of Lord Mountstuart, who had
succeeded Mr. Aislabie as one of the auditors of His Majesty's imprests.
Among Walsingham's correspondents was George Chalmers, a merchant of
Edinburgh. Chalmers was no mere maker of crude and impracticable
suggestions. He had thirty years before been instrumental in shortening
the course of post between Edinburgh and London. Before 1758 the Great
North Mail, as it was called, went three days a week and occupied
eighty-seven hours in going from London to Edinburgh, and 131 hours in
going from Edinburgh to London. Thus, a mail leaving Edinburgh at twelve
at night on Saturday did not reach London until eleven o'clock on Friday
morning. Chalmers, in a paper of singular ability, dwelt upon the
absurdity of the various detentions, ranging from three hours at Berwick
to twenty-four hours at Newcastle, which made the course of post longer
by nearly two days in one direction than in the other, and shewed how,
by avoiding these unnecessary delays and getting rid of a diversion of
twelve miles to York, the distance might be accomplished between London
and Edinburgh in eighty-two hours, and between Edinburgh and London in
eighty-five. The plan was adopted, and some years later, in recognition
of its merits, Chalmers received from the Government a gratuity of L600.
More recently he had prevailed upon the Post Office to increase from
three to six days a week the service between London and Edinburgh, and
from Edinburgh to the principal towns in Scotland; and in London, at
his suggestion, the letter-carriers who collected letters by the sound
of bell, or bellmen as they had begun to be called, were being employed
after nine o'clock at night.
It was not, therefore, as a novice in Post Office matters that Chalmers
now entered into correspondence with Walsingham. His present
representation was in the nature partly of a suggestion and partly of a
complaint. He had been staying some time in London, and was surprised to
find that at the capital of the first commercial nation in the world the
Post Office closed as early as seven o'clock in the evening. He
contended that it ought not to close before ten. But it was in respect
to his own native city of Edinburgh that he felt and expressed himself
most warmly. Edinburgh was without a penny post. He was himself an old
man or he would undertake to farm one, although, in his judgment, the
farming of such an institution, until at least it was well established,
was not for the public interests. But surely, whether farmed or not, a
penny post should be opened without delay, and on his return to
Edinburgh he would let Walsingham know how this could best be done. Nor
was the want of such a convenience by any means the chief thing of which
the inhabitants of Edinburgh had to complain. Since 1758 their post had
not gone out until eight o'clock at night. Now, to suit Palmer's
arrangements, it went out at half-past three in the afternoon; and, more
than this, the diversion to York, which it had cost such pains to get
rid of some thirty years before, had been revived. Thus, between
Edinburgh and London the course of post was actually longer now than
before the introduction of mail-coaches by as much as five hours. Were a
little more consideration to be given to the correspondence of the
country and a little less to the convenience of passengers, more than
these five hours might be saved. At all events the mails might start
from Edinburgh at eight o'clock as before, and from London at ten, and
yet arrive at their destination no later than now. For himself, he
thought it hardly decent that passengers should be allowed to travel by
the same coaches as the mails, and predicted that a time would come when
the mails would have coaches to themselves. Much of this, Chalmers
added, he had pointed out to Palmer some time before, and the only
result was an angry letter which had terminated a friendship of years.
Even as he now wrote, another letter had come to hand in which Palmer
told him, almost in so many words, to mind his own business.
Walsingham was at this time at Old Windsor. Hither it was his habit to
repair whenever he had anything of more than ordinary interest to engage
his attention; and such was the case at the present moment. He had
recently had lent to him, under a pledge of the strictest secrecy, a
copy of the Report of the Royal Commission which had sat upon the Post
Office in the preceding year; and this Report he was now having copied
under his own eye with a view to the preparation of an elaborate
criticism upon it. But though absent from London he relaxed not his hold
upon the Post Office for a single moment. Each morning's post brought to
Lombard Street its own budget of drafts, to be written out fair, of
questions to be answered, of scoldings to be given, and of instructions
to heads of departments in the minutest details of their duty.
Walsingham absent was a far more important personage than Carteret
present; and a mandate from Old Windsor superseded any that might be
given on the spot. It was while Walsingham was thus engaged that he
received one morning from Palmer a few hurried lines, of which the last
were as follows: "You ought not, meaning as well as you do, to be
unpopular anywhere. Nor must you. You fret me now and then, tho' you
don't intend it, and I am angry with myself for it." A visit from Palmer
on the following morning, especially as that morning was Sunday, was
little calculated to lessen the surprise with which Walsingham must have
read this letter. The truth is that Palmer had repaired to Windsor with
the intention of resigning his appointment; but the courteous reception
he met with from Walsingham disconcerted his plan, and he returned to
London as he had come, with the letter of resignation in his pocket.
The reasons which Palmer afterwards gave for his conduct on this
occasion throw a flood of light upon his character. These reasons were:
1st, That Walsingham was ready to listen to proposals for improving the
Post Office, come from what quarter they might, thus leaving it to be
inferred, as Palmer put it, either that he was himself incompetent to
effect improvements or else that there was a sinister design to detract
from his reputation. 2nd, That from himself, though vitally interested
in its contents, a report was being kept which clerks from his own
office had been sent down to Windsor to copy. 3rd, That the same feeling
of distrust was evidenced in the constant pressure which was being put
upon him to require the surveyors to keep journals. How hollow these
reasons were, a very little consideration will shew. In the course of
the correspondence with Chalmers, on which the first of Palmer's reasons
was obviously founded, Walsingham had been careful to state that, while
ready to consider proposals for establishing a penny post in Edinburgh,
he must decline to interfere with any of Palmer's arrangements. The
second reason, though more plausible, was the merest pretext. Not a
month before, with the full knowledge of what was going on at Windsor,
Palmer had offered to send down, if required, the whole of his office to
assist. And more than this. Although Walsingham could not in honour
disclose a document which had been lent to him under a pledge of
secrecy, Palmer must have been perfectly well acquainted with so much of
the Report of the Royal Commission as dealt with his own undertaking,
for it is beyond all question that this part of the Report had been
written by himself. There was no other man living who was capable of
writing it; and even if there had been, the opinions, the
recommendations, the mode of expression, the disparagement of Ralph
Allen, all of which are common to the Report and Palmer's private
writings, unmistakably betray the author. The third reason requires
little remark. Walsingham would have neglected his obvious duty if he
had not taken steps to establish some check upon the travelling expenses
claimed by the surveyors; and the experience of the hundred years which
have since elapsed has failed to devise any better check than the
journal. The keeping of the journal, moreover, had been an express
condition imposed by the Treasury when the allowance of a guinea a day
was authorised.
Walsingham treated Palmer on this occasion with great kindness. Rightly
judging that jealousy was at the root of the whole matter, he followed
up the conversation which had taken place at Windsor by a letter, in
which he exhorted Palmer to speak out, to declare his sentiments freely,
and to dismiss idle apprehensions. Then came a full statement from
Palmer, written, as he expressly declared, "not as a justification but
as an apology for my suspicions," and explaining the object and the
motives of his visit on the preceding Sunday. "Your habits are not my
habits," he concluded; "I would give a great deal for but a part of your
correctness and inveterate attention to business and accounts."
Walsingham's reply, which came by return of post, was an invitation to
dinner. Palmer accepted it, and the courteous and hearty welcome he
received called forth his warmest acknowledgments.
The duty of the mail guards, as their title implies, was to guard and
protect the mails. This body of men, as it existed during the first
forty or fifty years of the present century, was one of which the Post
Office might well be proud. The very nature of their employment
engendered in them a habit of self-reliance and an independence of
character which invested them with a peculiar interest. But it was not
always so. When mail-coaches were first established, Palmer had it in
contemplation to employ retired soldiers as mail guards, on the ground
that soldiers would be accustomed to firearms; but constitutional
objections prevailed and the contractors who furnished the mail-coaches
with horses were required also to furnish firearms arms and the men to
use them. The result was not satisfactory. For economy's sake men were
employed of little or no character, and the weapons with which they were
supplied were of the most worthless description. More than worthless,
they were dangerous. "Cheap things;" they were declared to be, "that
burst and often did mischief." Accordingly, at Palmer's suggestion, the
Post Office undertook to appoint its own mail guards. Honest and
faithful as these men always were, it was only by degrees that they grew
into the fine body they afterwards became. At first the novelty of their
position led them into little excesses such as were never heard of in
later years. Thus, a statute passed in 1790 imposed a penalty of 20s. on
any mail guard who should fire off the arms with which he was entrusted
for any other cause than the protection of the mail; and even this
enactment appears to have been insufficient to correct the abuse against
which it was directed. "These guards," writes Pennant two years later,
"shoot at dogs, hogs, sheep, and poultry as they pass the road; and even
in towns, to the great terror and danger of the inhabitants."[65]
[65] A letter to a member of Parliament on mail-coaches, by Thomas
Pennant, Esq., 1792.
It must not be supposed, because Palmer's name is associated with the
establishment of mail-coaches, that to these his attention was
exclusively confined. In virtue of his appointment as comptroller-general
he exercised control, subject of course to the postmasters-general,
over the whole of the Post Office, the offices of account excepted;
and he now took advantage of this position to create a newspaper
office. Newspapers had long been a source of trouble. By the clerks
of the roads they were not only posted in good time but were tied
up in bundles, covered with strong brown paper, and addressed to the
postmasters of the respective towns, who took out the contents and had
them delivered. So long as the newspapers were thus dealt with, no
inconvenience resulted from their being mixed up with letters; but from
the moment that the distribution passed into the hands of the printers
and dealers the case was different. The newspapers were now posted at
the last moment, and, being clumsily folded and still wet from the
printing press, they damaged and defaced the addresses of the letters
with which they came in contact in the mail bags. The inconvenience had
been tolerated for years. As early as 1782 the postmasters-general had
contemplated the creation of a newspaper office, an office in which
newspapers might be dealt with separately from letters, but nothing had
been done. Palmer now took the matter in hand and carried it through
with his usual vigour. Having satisfied himself that a separate office
was necessary, he forthwith established one, appointed to it eighteen
sub-sorters and fixed their wages; and not even the postmasters-general
were aware of what he was doing until it was done.[66]
[66] At this time the number of newspapers passing through the London
office averaged 80,000 a week, of which 78,000 were from London to the
country and 2000 from the country to London. Mixed, that is wet and dry
together, they were computed to weigh sixteen to the pound.
Such an instance of energy, worthy as we may think it of imitation,
would be impossible on the part of any one who had been brought up in
the public service, because he would have learnt that no wages can be
fixed or new offices created without the consent of the Treasury. In the
Post Office, too, the postmasters-general alone were legally competent
to make appointments. But to Palmer these were the merest trifles, if
indeed he gave them a thought. To create a newspaper office was a right
thing to do, and he had done it; and to haggle about the circumstances
of the doing appeared to him sheer pedantry. Not so thought Walsingham.
It ill accorded with his sense of propriety that a number of new places
should have been created without the requisite authority which the
Treasury alone could give; but that to these places, whether authorised
or not, a subordinate should have presumed to make appointments--a power
which by the postmaster-generals' patent was vested in themselves
alone--struck him as little short of an outrage.
Unfortunately for Palmer, another irregularity on his part came to light
at the same time. The mail guards' wages had been fixed at 13s. a week;
but of this sum Palmer paid only 10s., retaining the balance for the
purpose of providing uniforms, pensions, and an allowance during
sickness. Again, the plan was excellent; but it was unauthorised, and
had the effect of leaving in Palmer's hands, without any means of
checking it, a sum of liberated money amounting to about L900 a year.
Walsingham now called upon Palmer to give the details of his plan, with
a view to its being properly authorised, and to submit the names of
those whom he had appointed to the newspaper office, so that their
appointments might be confirmed. Palmer would do neither the one nor the
other. Walsingham persisted in his demand, and Palmer persisted in his
refusal. No course remained but to submit the matter for Pitt's
decision; and Pitt decided in Walsingham's favour. Palmer, said the
minister, had the power of suspending Post Office servants but not of
appointing them, although the postmasters-general, it might well be
believed, would consent as a matter of favour to accept his nominations.
Pitt also agreed that the mode of dealing with the mail guards' wages
was highly irregular. The decision of the minister was communicated to
Palmer, but it had not the slightest effect upon his conduct. The mail
guards' wages continued to be dealt with as before; and the appointments
to the newspaper office remained unconfirmed.
Pitt's decision was not given until the autumn of 1789; and meanwhile
other matters had occurred to strain the relations between Walsingham
and Palmer. Chief among these was Walsingham's inveterate habit of
scribbling. Both men were endowed with an amount of energy which nothing
could repress; but while Palmer expended himself by rushing from one
part of the country to another as fast as horses could carry him,
Walsingham's sphere of activity was restricted to writing. And well he
exemplified the law that force asserts itself in proportion to the
limits within which it is confined. His notes and questions were
literally endless. At one time all the ingenuity of Lombard Street, with
the assistance of erasers and acids, is being exercised to remove
remarks he has written upon a document which, not being the property of
the Post Office, had to be returned. At another, he has sent for a blank
form of contract, of which only a single copy remains in the Office. "I
implore your Lordship," writes the sender, "to let me have it back, and
that the margin may not be written on." Palmer, to whom pens, ink, and
paper were an abomination, would think nothing of posting a hundred
miles and more to avoid the necessity of writing a letter; and by
Bonnor, Palmer's lieutenant, who always aped his master as far as he
dared, answers to the questions put to him would be withheld altogether
or reserved for the next Board meeting. "I can perceive," wrote Todd to
Walsingham about this time, "you are hurt that neither Mr. Palmer nor
Mr. Bonnor pay a proper regard to your many observations."
Another matter occurred at this time which, while only indirectly
affecting Palmer, was not calculated to promote harmonious relations.
Bonnor, who had sent some accounts to Windsor for Walsingham's
signature, wrote two or three days later, urging that they might be
signed and returned at once, and giving as a reason the importunity of
the letter-carriers. "What these poor oppressed creatures will do," he
said, "I know not. They all came in a body this morning and gave a most
affecting description of the distresses with which their wives and
families laboured, their credit exhausted, not a shilling to buy bread,
and each having between L30 and L40 of hard-earned wages due to them
from a public office whose revenues are every day increasing." This
struck Walsingham as very strange. The letter-carriers were paid by
weekly wages; and what, over and above their wages, they had earned for
extra duty should also have been paid weekly. Besides, the accounts had
been in his hands for only two or three days, whereas for the last
twelve months and more he had been pressing for their production, and
had only now succeeded in getting them.
There was a mystery somewhere, and, as the best means of solving it,
Walsingham called for the vouchers. Bonnor now lost himself in excuses.
The vouchers were essential to his reputation. He could not part with
them. If once they left his hands, they might be lost. It could not but
be known to his Lordship how often this had happened with official
papers passing to and fro. Besides, to inspect the vouchers would be to
pry into his private concerns. This was enough for Walsingham, and he
directed the accountant-general to look into the matter forthwith. The
examination revealed a curious state of things. The amounts which the
letter-carriers had earned for extra duty had not been paid for a whole
year, and a part of the money which had been issued for that purpose had
been applied to the payment of the persons irregularly appointed to the
newspaper office. More than this. The accounts shewed, or professed to
shew, that during the last eighteen months the mail-coach contractors
had received in payment of their services the sum of L20,000; but the
receipts for more than L16,000 of this amount bore no dates, and others
were signed by Bonnor himself. "Signed," to use his own words, "by
myself for money paid by myself to myself." In short, the so-called
vouchers were no vouchers at all. Bonnor now made an apology, which, in
point of abjectness, has probably seldom been equalled; and Walsingham,
unwilling to force matters to extremities, let him off with a sound
dressing. This disclosure did not tend to restore either harmony or
confidence. Palmer, it is true, gave no heed to accounts; but Bonnor was
under his protection, and Palmer resented a censure upon his lieutenant
and friend even more than a censure upon himself.
We doubt whether in England a public department has often been in so
singular a position as that which the Post Office occupied during the
six months beginning with September 1789. Carteret had been
dismissed;[67] and Westmorland, Carteret's successor, whose patent had
been delayed owing to the absence of the law officers from London, had
not even entered upon his duties as postmaster-general before he wrote
to announce his appointment as Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland. Meanwhile
Palmer resolutely withheld obedience from the orders of his chiefs,
backed though those orders were by the minister; and Walsingham was
powerless to act. Minutes indeed he prepared by the score, proposing the
most drastic measures; but Carteret refused to sign because he was on
the point of going out, and Westmorland refused to sign because he had
only just come in, and had no intention of remaining. Walsingham's
signature alone carried no legal force. It was not until the following
March, the March of 1790, that the office of postmaster-general was
again properly filled by the appointment of Lord Chesterfield as
Walsingham's colleague.
[67] How Carteret managed to retain his appointment for more than
eighteen years is not the least perplexing of Post Office problems.
Meanwhile the joint postmaster-generalship had undergone the following
changes:--
Lord Le Despencer } From Jan. 16, 1771,
Right Hon. Henry F. Thynne (afterwards Carteret)} to Dec. 11, 1781.
Right Hon. Henry F. Carteret (sometime Thynne) { From Dec. 11, 1781,
{ to Jan. 24, 1782.
Right Hon. Henry F. Carteret } From Jan. 24, 1782,
Viscount Barrington } to April 25, 1782.
Right Hon. Henry F. Carteret } From April 25, 1782,
Earl of Tankerville } to May 1, 1783.
Right Hon. Henry F. Carteret } From May 1, 1783,
Lord Foley } to Jan. 7, 1784.
Right Hon. Henry F. Carteret, created Lord }
Carteret Jan. 29, 1784 } From Jan. 7, 1784,
Earl of Tankerville (a second time) } to Sept. 19, 1786.
Lord Carteret } From Sept. 19, 1786,
Earl of Clarendon } to Dec. 10, 1786.
Lord Carteret { From Dec. 10, 1786,
{ to July 6, 1787.
Lord Carteret } From July 6, 1787,
Lord Walsingham } to Sept. 19, 1789.
At the risk of interrupting the course of our narrative we cannot
refrain from mentioning here in its chronological order memorial which
was at this time received from certain merchants of the city of London
trading with foreign parts. This memorial, or rather the
counter-memorial to which it gave rise, is interesting if only as
serving to shew that the conservative instinct--an indisposition to
change, is not confined to public offices. The delivery of inland
letters had been recently expedited; but foreign letters continued to be
delivered as of old. Lest the practice in the case of these letters
should seem to be overstated, we give it in the memorialists' own words.
"It is the practice of the Post Office," they write under date the 20th
of January 1790, "if a mail does not arrive before one o'clock to
withhold the delivery of the letters till the next day, and even to
protract the delivery till after the same hour the succeeding day,
provided any other mail be expected or due. This happening on a Saturday
(a case by no means uncommon), the letters are kept back till the
Monday, when three other mails being due, and they not arriving perhaps
till the stipulated hour of one, the delivery of the mail which arrived
on Saturday is not made till between three and four o'clock on the
Monday and sometimes later. Thus the advice of property shipt to a great
amount on which insurances should immediately have been made, the
receipt of remittances on which the credit of many persons may depend,
and the general information so essential in commercial affairs are
cruelly withheld for upwards of fifty hours without the least apparent
necessity." The remedy which the memorialists proposed was moderate
enough. They asked nothing more than that, in the case of mails arriving
before four o'clock in the afternoon, letters might be given out to
persons who should call at the Post Office for them in two or three
hours after the mail had come in, such as were not called for being, at
the expiration of that interval, sent out by letter-carrier; and that,
in the case of mails arriving after four o'clock, the letters might be
delivered at ten o'clock on the following morning.
The unfortunate merchants who signed this memorial little bethought
themselves of the storm they were raising. Other merchants, also trading
with foreign parts and more numerous than those who advocated an
earlier delivery, put forward a counter-memorial strongly protesting
against any change. The custom of postponing until the following day the
delivery of all foreign letters arriving at the Post Office after one
o'clock was, they said, a wise custom, a "custom recommended by our
ancestors," and one that could not be altered save to their own great
prejudice. The original memorial had been studiously kept from
themselves, and "this most extraordinary proceeding" they could only
ascribe to a well-founded apprehension on the part of the promoters that
otherwise the impropriety of the "novelty" which they sought to
introduce would be exposed. The remonstrants added that many and cogent
reasons might be given in support of the existing usage; but, unhappily,
they omitted to state what these reasons were. Doubtless, however,
jealousy lest others should obtain priority of information was at the
bottom of the protest; although it is not very clear how, under a
regulation that was to be common to all, any one in particular would
enjoy an undue advantage.
The Post Office, unassisted in this instance by Palmer, declared the
change to be, if only on account of want of space, impossible. The
average number of letters arriving by each foreign mail were at this
time--from France 2500, from Holland 2000, and from Flanders 1500, or
6000 altogether. At the present day, when as many as 500 sacks full of
letters come by a single mail, and several mails may arrive
simultaneously, 6000 letters more or less make little appreciable
difference. One hour at most is enough for three men to sort them. But
in 1790 the office in which the foreign letters were sorted possessed
but a single table and a single alphabet or sorting rack.
Although want of space was the ostensible reason for refusing an earlier
delivery, there was another, not avowed indeed, and yet which, there can
be no doubt, materially influenced the decision. This will be best
explained in the words of the comptroller of the foreign letter
department. "The delivery of foreign letters," writes this officer to
Walsingham, "is so complicated with _the secret office_[68] that any
alteration will deserve the most serious consideration when you come to
the Board."
[68] Sir Rowland Hill, in his _Autobiography_ (vol. ii. p. 28), does not
hesitate to write as follows: "Incredible as it may appear to my
readers, it is nevertheless true that so late as 1844 a system, dating
from some far distant time, was in full operation, under which clerks
from the foreign office used to attend on the arrival of mails from
abroad, to open the letters addressed to certain ministers resident in
England, and make from them such extracts as they deemed useful for the
service of Government."
It would hardly excite surprise if Chesterfield, on entering upon his
duties in Lombard Street, had fallen under the influence of a colleague
who, besides being possessed of a strong will, had had some years'
experience in Post Office administration; but, as a matter of fact, he
does not appear to have surrendered his private judgment. On one point,
indeed, he took a view somewhat different from Walsingham. Walsingham
regarded Palmer, in so far as he withheld obedience from the
postmaster-generals' orders, as simply an insubordinate servant. To
Chesterfield, on the contrary, Palmer was an object of no common
interest. That two peers of large social influence, deriving their
authority direct from the Crown, and to some extent supported by the
minister, should be held in check by one man, and that man a
subordinate, was an incongruity which struck Chesterfield's imagination.
It amused him. It interested him. He could not withhold his meed of
admiration from the masterful spirit which fought single-handed against
long odds, and not always without success. The very terms Chesterfield
employed, while implying a consciousness of defeat, implied also a
certain amount of homage to the victor. It was always as "our Master,"
"our Dictator," "our Tyrant" that he referred to Palmer; and it is
difficult to believe that a man who could thus playfully express himself
would have proved implacable.
For ourselves, we have little doubt that, if at this time Palmer had
demeaned himself with only moderate reserve, all might yet have been
well; but it must be admitted that, from now till the end of his
official career, his conduct was strangely aggressive. We have already
seen how he made appointments to the newspaper office without reference
to the postmasters-general, and how, in their despite, he retained in
his own hands a considerable balance arising out of deductions from the
mail guards' wages. He now went further. He declined to attend the Board
meetings: he not only omitted but refused to answer inquiries which the
postmasters-general addressed to him; he persistently withheld the
surveyors' journals, if, indeed, he had required journals to be kept; he
claimed to make contracts and to introduce what measures he pleased
without the postmasters-general being so much as consulted; and because
Walsingham and Chesterfield would not admit the claim, he suffered the
contracts to expire, and the mail-coaches were run on mere verbal
agreements. "Except the warrants we have signed," wrote the
postmasters-general in October 1790, "there is no record whatever in our
possession of any of Mr. Palmer's proceedings since his appointment."
From disobedience Palmer proceeded to defiance. We will give
instances. The proprietors of the mail-coach between Carlisle and
Portpatrick had demanded payment at the rate of 2d. a mile, and Palmer
had agreed to the demand. This was just double the usual rate, and the
postmasters-general, fearing that if given on one road it could not be
refused on another, determined, before signing the warrant presented for
payment, to obtain Treasury authority. Palmer, knowing that delay would
thus be caused, protested that no such authority was necessary, and, in
order to enforce his protest, stopped four mail-coaches, for which was
being paid more than the usual allowance of 1d. a mile, namely, the
coach to Falmouth, the coach to Bristol, the coach to Plymouth, and the
coach to Portsmouth--coolly informing the postmasters-general that he
had done so "under the idea that appears to influence their Lordships,
that paying a higher rate to the proprietors on one road might induce
others to make a similar demand." He next inquired whether the
postmasters-general were to be understood as preferring a cart to the
mail-coach, even though a cart should be the more expensive of the two.
As nothing had been said about a cart, the postmasters-general remarked
that this could only be meant for insult. Insult! rejoined Palmer, he
was as little capable of offering an insult as he was of putting up with
one; and then he proceeded to charge the postmasters-general with the
grossest partiality. The postmasters-general had increased the salary of
the postmaster of Tewkesbury beyond what Palmer conceived to be
necessary. He denounced the transaction as extraordinary and ill
advised, and, while himself professing to believe that it proceeded only
from motives of benevolence, expressed his conviction that others would
regard it as "a job." Smuggled goods had been found in the mail-box of
the Dover coach; and coach, horses, and harness had, in consequence,
been seized by the Commissioners of Customs. The same man who, in order
to force a decision, had stopped four mail-coaches in a single morning,
now rated the postmasters-general soundly because they did not at once
and without inquiry take steps to get the Commissioners' proceedings
reversed. "The comptroller-general," wrote Palmer on another occasion,
"has informed their Lordships of his motives for not answering several
of the postmaster-generals' minutes, which he trusts cannot but be
satisfactory to them. The same reasons will prevent him from answering
any others their Lordships may send but such as appear to him absolutely
necessary."
But the particular case which brought matters to a climax was connected
with Scotland. Palmer had sent two officers to Edinburgh, not to promote
the conveyance of mails by coach, but to reform the internal management
of the Scotch Post Office; and these officers had given orders for
various changes to be made. Robert Oliphant was at this time deputy
postmaster-general for Scotland, and from him alone, according to the
terms of his commission, were Post Office servants in Scotland to
receive instructions. It was by mere accident that the postmasters-general
heard of the proceedings of Palmer's agents in Edinburgh, and, as
soon as they did so, they wrote to Oliphant desiring that the
proposed changes might be suspended until he had reported his
opinion upon them and received authority from London for carrying them
into effect. They at the same time wrote to Palmer, sending him a copy
of their letter to Oliphant, and giving him to understand that he had
exceeded his powers.
Palmer now threw off all restraint. He charged the postmasters-general
with superseding his commission; he cautioned them against further
interference with his regulations, and he appealed to the minister, to
whom alone he declared himself to be responsible. It was true, he said,
that he was nominally responsible to the postmasters-general, but,
except for a legal difficulty connected with the constitution of the
Post Office, he would have received an independent appointment. His
commission had been made out as it stood merely as a matter of present
necessity; and that in such circumstances they should venture to
supersede it appeared to him a hasty and ill-advised measure--a measure
not consistent with the judgment and temper which usually guided their
proceedings. He had a profound veneration for the nobility of the
country, and he could give no stronger proof of it than by stating that
he still retained his respect and esteem for them in spite of their
unhandsome conduct. The more he reflected on this conduct, the more he
was struck at the haste and violence of it. Was it reasonable to suppose
that he would consent to carry out his plan in trammels and fetters,
and, liable as the postmasters-general were to change, to submit his
regulations to them to be checked and controlled? The considerations for
which he had received his appointment were twofold--for the good he had
done in the past, and for the good he might do in the future. "When,
therefore," he continued, "your Lordships from mistake or ill-advice
shall send me any commands that I think may go to mischief instead of
good, I shall most certainly not observe them; and if I apprehend ill
consequences from any you may think proper to send to any of the
officers under me, I shall take the liberty, for your Lordships' sake
as well as my own and the public's, to contradict them."
It was impossible that this state of things should continue. Palmer had
appealed to Caesar; and to Caesar he should go. Such at least was the
postmaster-generals' intention, and they so far carried it into effect
as to state their case in writing; but an interview with the minister,
though solicited over and over again, the minister always found some
excuse for declining. "We shall wait with the utmost impatience to hear
from you that you have found a leisure moment when we may wait upon you
to explain the nature of the question between Mr. Palmer and us." "The
postmasters-general," they wrote again after a long interval, "present
their compliments to Mr. Pitt. He will see by the enclosed copy of a
minute from Mr. Palmer how totally the business of this Office must
stand still, as far as respects the comptroller-general's department,
till they can have the honour of seeing Mr. Pitt." And again, a
fortnight later, "the postmasters-general present their compliments to
Mr. Pitt, and take the liberty to remind him of the comptroller-general's
two last minutes, and desire to have the honour of waiting upon him
on Wednesday next at any hour he may be pleased to appoint previous
to their holding their usual Board."
But all to no purpose. The truth is that Pitt was heartily tired of
these unhappy dissensions. Palmer was doing, and doing admirably, the
task which he had set himself to do. He might not indeed be all that
could be desired. His conduct might be masterful and his pretensions
absurd. Yet much allowance was to be made for a man who had undertaken a
difficult business, and whose efforts had been crowned with success. And
lamentable as the dissensions might be, there was no certainty that
interference would effect a reconciliation. On the contrary, it might
serve only to widen the breach, and, to judge from the past, this was
the more likely result. And should the breach prove irreparable and a
decision have to be given against the reformer who had done so much for
his country, and from whom yet more was expected, it would be little
short of a disaster. Better that matters should remain as they were than
incur such a risk. We can well believe that some such considerations as
these influenced Pitt in avoiding an interview; and doubtless he was
confirmed in his decision by what he learned from another quarter.
Palmer was a friend of Camden's, and Camden was a friend of Pitt's. To
this common friend Palmer gave his own version of the differences
between himself and his chiefs; and this version, which was altogether
different from the one which the postmasters-general gave, was
studiously impressed upon Pitt to their prejudice.
Thus matters stood when, early in 1792, in consequence of some
discrepancies in the accounts, the postmasters-general determined that
letters for the city by the first or morning delivery should be checked.
Care had been taken that the check should not be of a nature to retard
the delivery; and yet, strangely enough, the delivery became later and
later every day. At length a public advertisement appeared inviting the
merchants and traders to meet at the London Tavern on Wednesday the 15th
February in order to consider the subject. The meeting was held under
the presidency of Alderman Curtis, one of the members of Parliament for
the city; and strong resolutions were passed directing the
postmaster-generals' attention to the delay, and calling upon them to
explain and remove the cause.
Charles Bonnor, the deputy comptroller-general, owed all he possessed to
Palmer. It was by Palmer that he had been brought into the Post Office
in July 1784, and the same influence procured for him shortly afterwards
a salary of L500 and an allowance of L150 a year for a house. Warm in
his attachments as he was fierce in his animosities, the great reformer
extended to Bonnor a confidence which probably no other man possessed,
and during his frequent absences from London kept up with him a
correspondence in which he poured out his inmost thoughts. This person,
stung with jealousy at some fancied coolness on Palmer's part, now
published a pamphlet in which he charged his friend and benefactor with
wilfully delaying the delivery of the morning letters, and then
promoting the meeting at the London Tavern in order to protest against a
mischief of his own making. According to Bonnor, Palmer had spared no
effort to induce persons to attend the meeting, and had furnished
Alderman Curtis, the chairman, with materials for denouncing the Post
Office. All this, it was alleged, had been done in order to bring the
postmasters-general into discredit, and to create a demand that Palmer
might have larger powers given him and be left to deal with Post Office
matters according to his unfettered judgment.
The postmasters-general were overwhelmed with astonishment. At first
they could not bring themselves to believe that the pamphlet was
authentic, and it was not until they had been reassured on this point
that they began to make inquiries. Palmer, of course, denied the charge,
and Bonnor reaffirmed it. Meanwhile the resolutions passed at the London
Tavern had been sent to the Post Office; and the postmasters-general,
not knowing what to believe, simply referred them to Palmer, with a
request that he would explain the cause of the late delivery. Palmer's
reply shews the frame of mind he was in. "The cause of the late
delivery," he answered, "as well as every other existing abuse in the
Post Office, arises from the comptroller-general not having sufficient
authority to correct it." The postmasters-general naturally inquired in
what respects his authority was insufficient to prevent the late
delivery, and to what other abuses he referred. Palmer, without
specifying what these abuses were, replied that among the causes which
had produced them were "an unfortunate difference in opinion, and an
equally unfortunate interference in his office"; and then he proceeded
to ask for larger powers, which the postmasters-general, consistently
with the terms of their patent, were unable to give.
A few days later Palmer did that which should perhaps have been done
before. He suspended Bonnor. The postmasters-general also took action,
but at the very moment when it might have been better if they had
remained passive. They inquired the reason of Bonnor's suspension, and
Palmer returned no reply. After waiting a week, the postmasters-general
decided that, as no reason had been given, the suspension must be taken
off; and Bonnor was directed to resume duty. On presenting himself for
this purpose, however, Palmer refused to give up the key of his room,
and sent him word that, if he dared to come to the Office again, the
constables would have orders to turn him off the premises. The
postmasters-general had put themselves in a false position. If their
intention was to try conclusions with Palmer, they had selected the
worst possible ground. Their only choice now was between submitting to
defiance of their authority and supporting a worthless subordinate
against his illustrious chief. They elected the latter alternative; and
the suspension which had been imposed upon Bonnor was transferred to
Palmer.
An interview with the minister had now become indispensable; and at
length, but not without a great deal of pressure, Pitt fixed the 2nd of
May for the purpose. Chesterfield was at Bath, slowly recovering from an
attack of the gout. He was reluctant to leave his colleague unsupported
on the occasion; and yet for a man who was still far from well it was a
long and tedious journey to London. Should he go or should he not? A
decision could not be longer delayed, as the 1st of May had already
arrived. He ordered horses to be put to his carriage, then he
countermanded them, then he changed his mind again, and finally, in
response to a sudden twinge of the gout, he finally abandoned his
journey, and determined to write to Walsingham a letter such as he might
shew.
Chesterfield, unlike Walsingham, wrote a beautiful hand, a hand that was
clear and easy to read; but on this particular occasion, in order that
Pitt might have no excuse for not reading the letter, he wrote more
clearly and legibly than usual. He had--thus the letter ran--been in
fifty minds whether he should not repair to London and take part in the
interview with Pitt; but he was still so lame that he durst not venture
on so long a journey. His desire to be present had not indeed been
prompted by the slightest doubt as to what Walsingham would do or say.
On the contrary, he had the fullest confidence that his colleague would
strictly adhere to the resolution which they had adopted, that on no
consideration could Palmer remain with them at the Post Office. This
resolution the experience which they had gained since his suspension had
served to strengthen, for how much better and with how much greater
regularity had they gone on since they had in fact as well as in name
been postmasters-general. All this would doubtless be pressed upon Pitt,
and, should he waver in the least, he must be informed of their
ultimatum, which nothing could make them change. If, contrary to
expectation, they should be driven to that option, they must be
satisfied to retire from an office where they had done their duty and
could do it no longer. To the full extent of the resolution they went
hand in hand to Pitt, and this point could not be pressed upon him too
strongly. Should he begin to propose any middle measures, Walsingham
should stop him at once. It would be disgraceful to listen to them. "Our
resolution once taken, no power, no persuasion, no influence ought to
shake it, and I am confident nothing will."
Walsingham waited upon the minister at the appointed time. Pitt received
him courteously indeed, but coldly. Walsingham stated his case. Pitt
said little, but that little clearly shewed that his leanings were in
Palmer's favour. Palmer had done good service to the public. Was it
impossible that he should be restored to duty? Or, much having been
alleged and nothing proved, might not a court of inquiry be held by
which the questions at issue between him and his chiefs should undergo a
thorough and impartial investigation? After these and other questions
had been put and answered, Walsingham produced Chesterfield's letter.
Pitt read it from beginning to end, folded it up, and returned it.
Formal civilities followed, and the interview was at an end. That night
a letter from Walsingham informed Chesterfield that assuredly two
persons would be dismissed from the Post Office, and that of these two
persons Palmer would not be one.
The postmasters-general were in a state of sore perplexity. Of Pitt's
intentions they entertained not the slightest doubt. "The Post Office
chair," wrote Chesterfield, "totters under us"; and again, "I see that
can the ingenuity of man detect a flaw in our proceedings, we are to be
the victims." The doubt which the postmasters-general felt concerned
their own conduct. Rightly or wrongly, they believed that they were
powerful enough to depose the minister, and the question which now
agitated their minds was whether they should have recourse to so violent
a measure, or whether they should simply resign. Bonnor saved them from
the necessity of coming to a conclusion on the point. This person had
hoarded up the private correspondence which, during years of close
intimacy and friendship, had passed between himself and Palmer; and
among the correspondence were many compromising letters. Such of these
as he could readily lay his hands upon Bonnor, with incredible baseness,
now carried to Walsingham, and Walsingham in an evil moment accepted
them.
The temptation was no doubt strong. Even in the eyes of the
postmasters-general themselves it was a comparatively small matter that
they were on the point of losing their places. But it was by no means
immaterial to them that they should appear to Pitt, as they were
conscious of appearing at the present time, in the light of false
accusers, persons who had brought false charges, or at all events
charges which they could not substantiate; and these letters would prove
all, and more than all, that had been alleged or even suspected. They
laid bare the story of the King's coach. They shewed how on that
occasion the contractor had been cajoled into making an exorbitant
charge in order that Walsingham might be deterred from again interfering
in what Palmer regarded as his own peculiar province. They shewed also
how, from that time to the present, a deliberate plot had existed at
headquarters to hinder and thwart Walsingham in everything he
undertook.
And yet they were private letters, letters which had passed under the
seal of confidence. It is by no means the least strange part of a
strange and painful business that it appears never to have crossed the
mind of either Walsingham or Chesterfield that this was a class of
evidence which could not with propriety be used. Bonnor, not content
with the letters he had already produced, searched his correspondence
through from the time that he and Palmer became connected with the Post
Office, and hailed any additional testimony he was able to collect
against his former friend and benefactor with fiendish delight. He
literally revelled in the shameless task he had set himself to perform.
Evidence-hunting he called it. "We shall not only prove all that has
been asserted," he wrote, "but a great deal more; and on the grand point
of his premeditating a thorough and complete confusion in the business
of the inland office, for the declared purpose of thereby disgracing the
postmasters-general, I have proof that for strength and conviction no
holy writ can exceed. But," he added, "I have a great deal to work up
yet."
As soon as the unholy brief was completed, a second interview took place
with the minister. Pitt appears again to have said little, even less
than on the previous occasion. He had been deceived. The
postmasters-general must take their own course. The rest is soon told.
Two official minutes were prepared, the one in Lombard Street and the
other at Whitehall. By the postmaster-generals' minute Palmer, the
insubordinate Post Office servant, was dismissed.[69] By the minister's
minute Palmer, the distinguished Post Office reformer, was granted a
pension equal to double the amount of his salary. His salary was L1500,
and he derived another L1500 a year from his percentage. The pension
which Pitt conferred upon him was L3000. To this was added later on,
after an interval of many years, a Parliamentary grant of L50,000.
[69] Even in such a detail as the manner of dismissal, Pitt shewed his
usual consideration for Palmer. By the minister's direction Palmer was
not to be dismissed in so many words. The postmasters-general were
simply to make out another nominal list of the establishment, and from
this list Palmer's name was to be excluded.
Bonnor--we blush to record it--received as the reward of his infamy the
place of comptroller of the inland department. His promotion brought him
little pleasure. The Post Office servants, with all their faults, were
loyal to the backbone, and they could ill understand being presided over
by one who was branded with the foulest of all private vices, with
treachery to a friend and ingratitude to a benefactor. His subordinates
would hold no communication with him beyond what their strict duty
required. His equals shunned him. Outside the Post Office, go where he
would, he received the cold shoulder. Never was man left more severely
alone. At the end of two years fresh postmasters-general came who, under
the plea of abolishing his appointment, dismissed him with a small
pension. Then he became insolvent, and was thrown into prison. Released
from confinement at the end of the century, he published pamphlet after
pamphlet, having for their object to vindicate what he was pleased to
call his good name; but these vindications, though replete with
professions of honour, proved nothing more than that the writer was a
poltroon as well as a traitor.