CONCERNING FOREIGN POST OFFICES
The whole tendency of the postal system in Europe and America is towards
uniformity. The Postal Union is largely responsible for this, while the
necessities of trade and foreign travel have brought about a
simplification of methods and rates everywhere. Still, wherever there
are differences of race and nationality even identical systems will be
worked differently, and anybody who has travelled in Europe and America
is forced at every turn to compare, favourably or unfavourably as the
case may be, the foreign Post Office with the one which he is accustomed
to at home. Perhaps the chief differences that an Englishman notes in
several European countries are the more leisurely ways of the official:
this individual does not understand the necessity for speeding up, and
he looks upon the man who is in a hurry as simply a mad Englishman. The
leading features of our own postal system are to be found in most
countries: the postal service, the telegraph, and the telephone are
usually linked together, and the difference is the human factor. The
experiences of all travellers differ for this very reason. Some return
home with really heartrending accounts of their experiences with the
foreign Post Offices, with tales of red tape and “the insolence of
office” which are not to be matched with the complaints of our people
against their own Post Office. Many of these complaints of travellers
arise obviously out of difficulties with the language, and the absurd
irritation of the average Britisher at ways and methods of doing things
which do not correspond with his idea of good business. Other travellers
return with glowing accounts of the superiority of foreign methods, of
the courtesy which has been shown to them by officials, and of the many
conveniences they have found abroad to which this country is still a
stranger. Many of us, for instance, have revelled in the privileges
offered to the tourist in Switzerland. There is scarcely anything you
cannot send by post in Switzerland, from a piece of card to a
well-filled travelling trunk or a sack of potatoes. But then we must
remember that the chief industry of Switzerland is tourists, and she
certainly caters for these in a most exemplary manner. There is,
perhaps, more rigidity in applying postal regulations on the Continent
than in this country. Especially is this the case in Germany, where the
whole nation understands discipline. What we sneer at as red tape the
German regards as a necessary part of the organisation of his empire.
But, broadly speaking, the Continental Post Office is closely allied to
our own in its methods, and where it differs is in its adaptation to
local habits and peculiarities.
There is a type of English traveller who habitually regards the
foreigner as a person incapable of the higher civilisation to be found
in the British Isles. We can have no sympathy with him, and the British
Post Office has learnt much and is learning much from the Post Offices
of other countries. The German Post Office is, for instance, one of the
best-organised systems in the world. The German people owe this state of
things largely to the ability and energy of Dr. Von Stephan, who was
mainly instrumental in establishing the Postal Union. The post offices
of the German Empire are among the finest modern buildings in Europe.
Many were built under the direction of Dr. Von Stephan, and they are an
example to the British Post Office of how such buildings should be
erected. It was a fixed principle with Dr. Von Stephan, that when any
special type of architecture distinguished any particular town the
architecture of the post office should faithfully reflect it. As a
consequence the offices which have been erected since 1870 reveal great
diversities of style, and are in striking contrast to the monotony
characteristic of our English post offices. We may be quite sure that
the German Postmaster-General would never have sanctioned the erection
in a quaint old English town, full of Tudor and Jacobean architecture,
of a “standard post office.” Yet this enormity is constantly being
perpetrated in some of our old English towns and villages, and the
consequence is that the beauty and picturesqueness of the place are
seriously damaged. The post office swears at the rest of the buildings,
and if the buildings had only a voice I am quite sure they would swear
at the post office.
Then Germany was for years in advance of Great Britain in the provision
of underground cables for telegraphic purposes. Before even a start in
this direction had been made by the British Post Office over 220 cities
and towns of the German Empire had secured telegraphic communications in
spite of storms, and above all in spite of the accidents of war.
But against all this we have the accusation that the German official is
rude and overbearing. He gives the impression that you, being only a
civilian, should wait on his convenience: it is your recognition of the
dignity of his office. A writer in _The Sketch_ some time ago described
the outcome of his temerity in venturing to enter a post office in
Germany to purchase a postage stamp. The first thing which struck him
was the arrangement of little slits in the glass walls, behind which the
postal officials sat. He took up his place at the end of a queue of
people, but after waiting some time without being able to report
progress, took steps to find out the cause and found that the slit had
not been opened. The official on duty appeared unperturbed, and was not
doing anything in particular.
“Finally, with a gravity unsurpassed, I should venture to think, in
history, an official undid the slit. Then a few stamps and cards were
sold to members of the queue. Then the official's attention was
distracted.
“'Would it be possible—?' a lady with bowed neck humbly began.
“'No.'
“The hope of the post office shut down the slit with a snap; and the
queue settled down to more patience and more beating time.”
The German accepts this as a part of his divinely organised scheme of
things; it is the Englishman who meditates murder.
Many of us are familiar with the French Post Office. In many ways the
French have been in advance of our own methods. It is only since 1897
that we have had in this country a complete system of rural posts, but
as early as 1830 a law was passed in France, that in every village where
there was no post office, there should at least be a delivery of letters
every two days. In 1877 the Chief of the French Post Office could say
with justice that the rural delivery in France was the most perfect in
the world. The real hero of the French Postal Service, it has been said,
is the rural postman. From year's end to year's end he trudges on,
without a rest even on the greatest holidays. In France nothing less
than a revolution stops the postman's rounds, and even then he has often
been seen, bag in hand, smiling on the summits of barricades with the
bullets whistling around him.
The most stirring times in the history of the French Post Office were
during the war of 1870-71. The efforts to maintain the postal system led
to acts of great heroism on the part of the officials. The first
expedient was to organise a pigeon service carrying microscopic
despatches, prepared by the aid of photographic appliances. On their
arrival in Paris these were flattened out and thrown by means of the
electric lantern on to a screen, copied by clerks, and despatched to
their destination. The number of postal pigeons employed was 313. The
second expedient was to establish a regular system of postal balloons,
fifty-one being employed for letter service and six for telegraphic
service. These were very successful, in spite of the building by Krupp
of twenty guns, supplied with telescopic apparatus, for the destruction
of the balloons. The bravery of the French balloon postmen was only
equalled by that of many of the ordinary letter carriers, who conveyed
letters through the catacombs and quarries of Paris and its suburbs,
and, under various disguises, often through the midst of the Prussian
army. Several lost their lives in the discharge of their duties. The
eagerness of the Germans to defeat the schemes of the brave Frenchmen is
illustrated by the fact that they employed hawks to catch the postal
pigeons.
France has lagged behind Great Britain in other directions. The French
Postal Savings Banks only date from 1881, although from 1875, the post
offices had been used as agencies for existing banks. But we must
remember that the French Government has for years offered special
facilities to the small investor in “Rentes,” the equivalent of Consols
in this country, and the special need of a State Savings Bank was not so
marked as in this country. The French Postal Telegraph system was
established nearly ten years after the British system, but on the other
hand there have been postal telephones in France since 1879.
The Parcel Post is managed differently in France from this country. The
service is carried on under the control of the Post Office by railway
and steamship companies. Parcels are not accepted at post offices except
in places distant from railway stations, and in Paris and important
towns they are taken in at special parcel booking offices. Neither are
parcels delivered by the Post Office but by the railway companies.
Then in France there is a postal service called “Valeurs à recouvrer.”
Everybody is allowed to deposit bills at a post office for collection.
This is a great convenience and very practical. You enclose the bill, or
the invoice or draft which you want to be paid, in a special envelope
called “Enveloppe de valuer à recouvrer,” and you hand it to an officer
of the Post Office. A certificate of the posting must be obtained. When
the bill or invoice has been paid by the addressee, the Department sends
you a money order which can be cashed at any post office.
The French Post Office also supplies card money orders payable not at a
post office, but at the payee's address.
The Spanish Post Office is trying. Spain is a thinly populated country,
with comparatively few large towns, and if you travel off the beaten
track you will meet all kinds of inconveniences. A Spanish post office
is usually superior to so petty a trade as the sale of stamps: you
obtain these at the shops. Moreover, though other postal business is
transacted at the Post Office, there are certain hours set apart for
different kinds of business. A Spanish post office may be open from nine
until ten for the registration of letters, from ten until eleven for the
sale of postal orders, from eleven until noon for the payment of postal
orders, and so on. This is the Spaniard's idea of simplifying business,
not only for the public, but the official. The Spanish postal official
is often a poorly paid and rather badly used individual. The postmaster
of a large town in the Canary Islands confessed to a friend of mine, who
was postmaster of a big city in the United Kingdom, that his salary was
less than a third of the Englishman's. And he added, “I don't even get
that as a rule unless I go to Madrid for it.”
A visitor to Grand Canary on asking for a postcard was informed that
there had been none in the island for three months. The postmaster had
applied to Madrid for a supply but in vain. He was probably expected to
fetch his stores as well as his salary. The Spaniard, at any rate, is
modest about his Post Office: he does not increase your annoyance by
claiming perfection. He is one of the oldest members of the Old World,
and he has not learnt the art of self-advertisement.
But cross the Atlantic, visit the United States, and before you have
time to experience any of the inconveniences of the postal service, you
will be told it is the smartest in the world. It is not only the man in
the street who makes this claim; the Postmaster-General does it
frequently in his Annual Report. Here is the conclusion of one Annual
Report: it is the Postmaster-General's peroration: “It is therefore not
too much to state that in most of the more important relations of the
Postal Service, as shown by the statistics, the United States leads the
world.” It is not too much to say of this outburst that if the British
Postmaster-General were to say this of his Post Office in his Annual
Report, a reduction in his salary would be at once moved in the House of
Commons, and it would probably be carried by the combined votes of
Imperialists and Little Englanders. Owing partly to the language used by
postal reformers there is an idea prevalent in parliamentary circles
that the British Post Office is behind the times.
I am not denying that the United States Post Office is splendidly
organised, nor that in many respects it is in advance of our own system
and that of other countries, but we like to discover the advantages
ourselves. If, however, the service is excellent, it certainly does not
pay: the United States Post Office is carried on at a loss. And this is
due, as their own officials admit, to the low rates, and the way the low
rates are taken advantage of unfairly by smart Americans. The “mail
matter,” as it is called, is classified, and there are different rates
for each class. First class, letters and post cards; second class,
periodical publications; third class, miscellaneous printed matter; and
fourth class, matter not included in other classes. It is the lowness of
the charges for the second-class matter which is the despair of the Post
Office economist in America, and to this he attributes largely the loss
on the business. There is, for instance, a monthly publication in a
large eastern city which weighs 4 lbs. It is delivered by the Post
Office for two cents in the city in which it is mailed: it is carried
free of charge to any post office within the county in which it is
published, and is sent to such remote places as San Francisco, Cuba or
Hawaii, at the rate of four cents a copy. For what is virtually a
volume, this is an absurdly low charge for carriage, and in comparing
rates of postage with those in the United Kingdom, it must not be
forgotten that letters are conveyed in America over much greater
distances than in this country.
There is a growing demand in this country for a cheaper rate for
periodical publications, and those who make the demand are justified in
claiming that the Post Office exists for the convenience of the public,
and that a reform which would be the means of increasing the circulation
of useful and entertaining publications should receive the support of
the State. But they are not justified in pointing to the example of
America, unless they are prepared to admit that the increased charge
will ultimately fall on the taxpayer of this country. The question is,
“Are we justified in charging the taxpayer for a reform which will only
benefit a comparatively small number of the public?” If they can
convince the public through the representatives of the people in the
House of Commons, the reform will be carried; but it is difficult to see
how, if it is, the postal revenue of something over three millions,
which at present goes to the relief of taxation, will be maintained.
In one respect the American officials are vastly ahead of us. They too
have apparently suffered much from the applicants for information who
are ignorant of the very elements of postal business. It has therefore
occurred to the officials that systematic instruction might be given to
the public on postal subjects. Here is the official order to
postmasters: “Postmasters are hereby directed to confer with their local
school authorities with the view of adopting the most effective method
of instructing school-children as to the organisation and operations of
the postal service. These instructions should cover such features of the
service as the delivery of the mails, the classification of mail matter,
the registry and money order systems, and particularly the proper
addressing of letters and the importance of placing return cards or
envelopes. Postmasters should arrange if possible to deliver personal
talks to the pupils on these subjects, and should give teachers access
to the Postal Guide and Postal Laws and Regulations, and render them
every assistance in securing necessary information.”
Instead of being treated as a joke, as a similar order might have been
in this country, numerous letters were at once received by the United
States Post Office from postmasters and school-boards all over the
country indicating the liveliest interest in the subject.
This is a chance for a British Postmaster-General to save his successors
much unnecessary and trying correspondence, by adopting a similar
policy.
The rural delivery of letters in the United States was during many
recent years in a very backward state, but considerable advances have
lately taken place. The fetching of letters from the post office was the
practice in places with even a large population.
A writer in the _Paris Messenger_ not long ago was very indignant at the
claims made by an official of the American Government, “that the
American postal system was the best in the world and the best managed.”
The writer said he had made an examination of European postal systems
recently, and this was about as impudent a pronouncement as can well be
imagined. America possesses no Postal Savings Bank, no Postal Telegraph
system (in many Western States it costs three francs to send a dozen
words a hundred miles over the monopolist private wires), there is no
system of Parcel Post such as exists in England, and until recently
there was no rural delivery. To see a long line of citizens, even in
towns of five and six thousand inhabitants, waiting outside the post
office for their morning mail, was as curious a sight for a European as
could be imagined. I should add that the writer was an American.
The report of the United States Postmaster-General is frequently a more
plain-spoken and colloquial document than the purely business statement
which the British Postmaster-General issues annually. This is only to be
expected. Other officials in the United States have the same breezy
style.
A complaint was made to the Postmaster-General by a sheriff in Texas on
the conduct of a postmistress. He accused her of incivility. “We don't
set up any claim that our manners are all that they should be, but we'd
like to be reasoned with and helped along. The postmistress here is a
worthy woman all right, and there ain't a thing against her character,
but she certainly is rude and hasty. One day last week the mayor, being
some flushed up and careless, refused to remove his hat and bow on
asking for the official mail, whereupon his hat was shot off and plumb
ruined, and he left the post office so swiftly and undignified that it
told against the standing of the town. There's another thing we don't
think is fair. The postmistress won't let niggers and greasers come in
the office under any consideration. We ain't over fond of niggers and
greasers ourselves; but it is sure discommoding for the leading citizens
to have to go to the post office personally to get the mail just because
this lady don't like to see anything but a gentleman. We don't like to
appear fault-finding and picayunish where a lady is concerned, but this
I'm telling about is sure arbitrary and abrupt, and we'd like to have
her tamed down some.”
The Post Office Bulletin of Chicago, a publication similar in object to
our own Post Office Circular, often contains very plain-spoken words.
Unlike the authorities in England, the Chicago postmaster is quick to
record, in his periodical reports of the work of his office, any
humorous incidents which have come under his notice. The following
lightens up a page devoted to departmental changes, hours of delivery,
and new telephone services:—
“Twenty times a day some one calls at a post office or a station and
requests the address of some dear friend, father, mother, daughter,
wife, or delinquent debtor. The delinquent debtor is in the majority,
and he usually covers his tracks successfully. To the Post Office,
therefore, the creditor comes as a last resort, and he is often amazed
when he is informed that addresses cannot be given; that the Post Office
is not a court; is bound to respect the confidences imposed on it; that
its sole business is to deliver mail; and that anyway it really has no
time to ferret out addresses.
“On Monday a gentleman searching for a delinquent, hit upon the plan of
sending out a special letter from the Twenty-second Street station
addressed to the debtor. The debtor's residence had formerly been in
this district, and the creditor was anxious to find out if he was still
in the neighbourhood. So he began with a special letter. An hour after
mailing he called at the station and inquired if the letter had been
delivered. He was told that it had. Then he was aware it must have been
delivered from this station, or the question could not have been
answered off-hand. As a Sherlock Holmes he had made a great beginning.
His next step was to write and address another special letter and
announce his intention of following the special messenger and his wheel
in a cab. The clerk in charge preserved a wooden countenance, and said
that he could not prevent him following the messenger. In five minutes
after the mailing of the letter two special messengers issued from the
station. Each had letters to deliver. The man in the cab followed one of
them. He followed the wrong one.”
If our Post Office Circular contained racy reports of this nature
concerning the smart deeds of our officials, the vested interests of the
halfpenny press would be imperilled, and an injunction would be demanded
against the Postmaster-General to prevent him entering into competition
with private enterprise.
The Postmaster-General in one report gravely stated that the postmaster
of Sheridan, Wyoming, “had been removed from his office because he had
an unfortunate habit of burning all mail matter which did not meet with
his approval.” This action of the Postmaster-General seems certainly to
have been justified: the Post Office has eccentric servants all over the
world, but it draws the line at the destruction of mail matter. Wherever
this happens the man is dismissed, and in England, at least, he would be
prosecuted.
The South American post offices in many instances take after the mother
country of Spain. The _Monte Video Times_ in July 1896 made this
pathetic complaint: “It is now some two years that we have been without
postcards.”
The Japan Post Office is, as may be imagined, splendidly organised.
Before the year 1854 the state of Japan resembled that of Europe in the
twelfth century. A few nobles ruled the country with despotic authority,
and their united policy was to exclude the foreigner. Then the United
States fleet appeared off the coast and forced upon the nobles a treaty
which brought their country into the family of nations. The gates were
opened; and the advance has been one of the most extraordinary
happenings in modern history. In 1872 Japan established her first Post
Office, and in 1877 she joined the Postal Union. She is always eager to
adopt the newest ways of transacting business, and for her Savings Bank
work she has given up ledgers and has adopted the card system for
keeping accounts. Her Postal Savings Bank is a wonderful success.
Upwards of 8,000,000 accounts have been opened out of a population of
about 47,000,000. Japan's telegraph system is equal to any in Europe. It
may, perhaps, be interesting to state how Japan is related
telegraphically to foreign countries. Of her messages about 40 per cent.
are credited to Korea, 28 per cent. to China, 9 per cent. to England, 7
per cent. to the United States, 4 per cent. to India, 3 per cent. to
Germany, 2 per cent. to France and Russia. Japan has peculiar
difficulties to contend with in Post Office work owing to the great
number of islands included in the Empire, the exceptionally mountainous
nature of the country, and the wide areas covered by the cities in
proportion to the number of their inhabitants. Of course the astonishing
nature of the advance of Japan is that it has all taken place in recent
years. The first effort at telegraphy was only made as recently as 1870.
As in most countries, the sudden introduction of so mysterious an agency
created great opposition on the part of the superstitious lower orders,
and there were many attempts to cut the wires.
China has an interesting Post Office system. She has not yet joined the
Postal Union, and has only partially assimilated Western ways of doing
business. The service has been spoken of as “reasonably efficient.” The
Post Office serves all the open ports and every important city in the
interior. The Chinese Postal Guide, first published in 1900, is for
completeness and utility not far behind our own. Postal communication
with the outside world is carried on through the agencies of the various
Postal Union countries located at the treaty ports. The great volume of
the business is, however, conducted through Hong-Kong. “My message from
Pong-King was the first that has been despatched from that office in the
six years of its existence. This detail may serve as a sufficient
description of the country,” wrote a correspondent of the _Daily
Telegraph_ in 1907. The Postmaster-General of the Straits Settlements
received a petition for the reduction of rates to China. “If the prayer
is not granted,” the petition went on, “the results will be that the
wife, not receiving information respecting the whereabouts of her
husband, will contract a new marriage, and taking her children with her
to follow her new lord, leave no one behind to perpetuate that ancestral
worship so dear to the heart of every Chinaman. The aged parents, not
hearing from their son, will be occasioned to have a thousand anxious
thoughts about him, will lose their appetite and die. The sister-in-law
who is a widow, and depends upon her brother-in-law for support, will
starve through receiving no remittances from him. In this way many
Chinese homes will be rendered wretched.” In spite of this heartrending
appeal the petition was not granted, and we suppose the melancholy
results prophesied followed. Postal officials everywhere are supposed to
be heartless, and to regard human beings as simply revenue-producing
agents.
I have only attempted in this chapter to give to the reader glimpses of
the Postal Administrations of a few big countries. To do anything else
would require twenty chapters instead of one, and to give a complete
account would involve countless statements in figures and comparative
estimates. There are annual reports published by most of the Post
Offices of the world, and they are very much alike in style and matter.
The human touch has to be sought for in other ways and in other
documents. Post Office history and economics are interesting to the
student, but what interests us all are the men and women inside the Post
Office, on both sides of the counter.