[We avail ourselves of this opportunity of inserting the following
extract from Mr. Rowland Hill's _Post-Office Reform; its Importance and
Practicability_, p. 86. of the third edition, published in 1837, as it
shows clearly the use which Mr. Rowland Hill made of the story in his
great work of Postage Reform; and that Miss Martineau had clearly no
authority for fathering the story in question upon that gentleman:--
"Coleridge tells a story which shows how much the Post-office is open
to fraud, in consequence of the option as to pre-payment which now
exists. The story is as follows:--
'One day, when I had not a shilling which I could spare, I was passing
by a cottage not far from Keswick, where a letter-carrier was demanding
a shilling for a letter, which the woman of the house appeared
unwilling to pay, and at last declined to take. I paid the postage, and
when the man was out of sight, she told me that the letter was from her
son, who took that means of letting her know that he was well; the
letter was _not to be paid for_. It was then opened and found to be
blank!'[1]
"This trick is so obvious a one that in all probability it is
extensively practised."]
[Footnote 1: _Letters, Conversations, and Recollections of S. T.
Coleridge_, vol. ii. p. 114.]
The quotations of your correspondent G. P. P., from Polwhele's _Cornwall_,
relate to the same individual, and a more general construction must, I
think, be put upon the expression "our countryman," than that it inferred a
native of the county. The family of Prideaux was one of great antiquity,
and originated in Cornwall (their first seat being at Prideaux Castle
there), and had estates there in the time of the above Edmund. His father,
Sir Edmund Prideaux, of Netherton (the first baronet), studied the law in
the Inner Temple, where he became very eminent for his skill and learning.
He is stated to have raised a large estate in the counties of Devon and
Cornwall. He married * * *; secondly, Catherine, daughter of Piers
Edgecombe, of Mount Edgecombe, Esq., by whom he had two sons, Sir Peter his
successor, and Edmund, the subject of your correspondent's Queries, who is
thus described in Prince's _Worthies of Devon_, p. 509.:--
"This gentleman was bred to the law, and of so great a reputation, as
well for zeal to religion as skill in the law, it is not strange he was
chosen a Member of that which was called the Long Parliament, wherein
he became a very leading man; for, striking in with the prevailing
party of those times (though he never joined with them in setting upon
the life of his Sovereign), he grew up to great wealth and dignity. He
was made Commissioner of the Great Seal [1643. Rushworth, vol. iii. p.
242.], worth 1500l. a-year and by ordinance of Parliament practised
within the bar as one of the king's counsel, worth 5000l. per annum.
After that he was Attorney General, _worth what he pleased to make it_
[!!], and then _Postmaster General_ ... from all which rich employments
he acquired a great estate, and among other things purchased the _Abbey
of Ford_, lying in the Parish of Thorncombe, in Devonshire, where he
built a noble new house out of the ruins of the old," &c.
Prideaux cannot be called the inventor of the Post-office, although to him
may be attributed the extension of the system. The first inland letter
office, which, however, extended to some of the principal roads only, was
established by Charles I. in 1635, under the direction of Thomas
Witherings, who was superseded in 1640. On the breaking out of the civil
war, great confusion was occasioned in the conduct of the office, and about
that time Prideaux's plan seems to have been conceived. {268} He was
chairman of a committee in 1642 for considering the rates upon inland
letters; and afterwards (1644) appointed Postmaster, in the execution of
which office he first established a weekly conveyance of letters into all
parts of the nation. Prior to this, letters were sent by special
messengers, or postmasters, whose duty it was to supply relays of horses at
a certain mileage. (_Blackstone_, book i. c. 8. s. 3.)
I am unable to discover when Edmund Prideaux died; but it appears that
either he, or one of his descendants, took part in the rising of the Duke
of Monmouth in the West of England, upon which occasion the "great estate"
was found of great service in providing a bribe for Lord Jeffreys. In the
Life of Lord Jeffreys, annexed to the _Western Martyrology; or, Bloody
Assizes_ (5th ed. 266. London, 1705), it is said that "A western
gentleman's purchase came to fifteen or sixteen hundred guineas, which my
Lord Chancellor had." And Rapin, vol. ii. p. 270., upon the authority of
Echard, iii. p. 775., states that in 1685 one Mr. Prideaux, of Ford Abbey,
Somerset, gave Jeffreys 14000l. [probably misprint for 1400l.] "to save his
life."
I think it likely that your correspondent may find further information upon
the subject of this note, in the _Life of Dr. Humphrey Prideaux, Dean of
Norwich_ (born 1648, died 1724), published in 1748.