ODD COMPLAINTS.
The Post-office, in its extensive correspondence with the public, has
often great difficulty in satisfying what are deemed to be the
reasonable claims and representations of reasonable people; but it has
also to endeavour to satisfy and persuade persons who, as shown by the
demands made by them, are not altogether within the category above
mentioned. What would be thought of the following appeals made to the
Secretary on the subject of the injury supposed to be done by
electricity thrown off from telegraph wires?--
"SIR,--I have been rejoicing in the hope that when the last telegraph
wire was removed I should be at peace; but alas for human hopes! Last
Sunday and Saturday nights, I suppose all the wires must have been
working simultaneously, for about 2.0 A.M. I was awakened by the most
intense pains in my eyes, and for the two nights I do not think I had
more than six hours sleep--that is, none after 2.0 in the morning. Since
then I have slept from home, and must continue to do so until either the
wires are removed or I leave the house, which I shall be obliged to do,
even though it remain unoccupied. The wires are carried in a tube to a
pole about 30 yards from my house on the angle, and I imagine that when
they are all working, and emerge from the tube, that the electrical
matter thrown off must be very great. Pipes have now been run up ----
Road, where a pillar or pole might very easily be fixed, and the present
one might be removed 100 yards farther off, where it would electrify
nothing but fields.--With many apologies for troubling you again, for, I
hope, the last time, and with many thanks for your kindness hitherto, I
am," &c.
"SIR,--I am sorry to be obliged to trouble you again respecting the
wires opposite my house at ----. You promised in your favour of ----
that the wires should be removed within a month from that date, a great
amount of labour having to be gone through. I was not surprised that six
months were required for their removal instead of one, and therefore
bore patiently with the delay, although my eyesight, and indeed every
one's in the house, suffered most severely; but why, when at last eight
were removed, should one be allowed to remain? Since the eight have
gone, I have been able to sit in my own house without being in as
excruciating pain as formerly; but still I am pained, and particularly
between the hours of four and seven in the morning. If one wire affects
me so much, imagine my sufferings when nine were working! Such being the
case, will you kindly cause the remaining wire either to be removed or
encased in the vulcanized tube, so as to contract the current.--Thanking
you for your kindness hitherto, and hoping you will add this favour to
the rest, I am," &c.
There are some persons who suffer from the delusion that their
landladies and the sorters in the Post-office habitually conspire to
keep up, or rob them of, their letters--letters generally which they
look for to bring them money or the right to property. These people are
always giving trouble, and are difficult to shake off. On one occasion a
lady, who was possessed of a set idea of this kind, called at the
General Post-office in London to state her grievance, which she did in
most fluent terms. Her complaint was noted for inquiry, and then she
went away. An hour or two after, she returned to ascertain whether she
had left a packet of papers which she had meanwhile missed; but they
could not be found. This circumstance, she stated, convinced her that
she had been robbed; and an incident that happened when she quitted the
building in the morning confirmed her, she stated, in her idea. A man
came up to her and asked if he could show her the way to the Dead-letter
Office. "No, thank you," was the reply; "I can find the way myself." She
said she knew him to be a magistrate or a judge: "He had a thick neck
and flat nose, and the bull-dog type of countenance, and was altogether
repulsive-looking." She felt assured he was watching her, &c.
An aged couple in the south of England moved about from place to place
in order to escape from persons who were supposed by them to open their
letters. Persecuted, as they imagined, in one town, they would take
lodgings in another town, and very soon they would suspect the servants
of the house and the officers of the Post-office of obtaining a
knowledge of the nature of their correspondence. Then they would wait on
the postmaster, and generally go through their chronic grievance. The
postmaster, in turn, would assure them that their letters were fairly
dealt with; but this did not satisfy them, and very soon they were off
to another town, in the hope of evading their tormentors, but in reality
to go through the same course as before.
Mr Anthony Trollope has left us, in the account of his life, a capital
specimen of the frivolous and groundless complaints with which the
Post-office has frequently to deal. His account is as follows:--"A
gentleman in county Cavan had complained most bitterly of the injury
done to him by some arrangement of the Post-office. The nature of his
grievance has no present significance; but it was so unendurable that he
had written many letters, couched in the strongest language. He was most
irate, and indulged himself in that scorn which is so easy to an angry
mind. The place was not in my district; but I was borrowed, being young
and strong, that I might remember the edge of his personal wrath. It was
mid-winter, and I drove up to his house, a squire's country seat, in the
middle of a snowstorm, just as it was becoming dark. I was on an open
jaunting-car, and was on my way from one little town to another, the
cause of his complaint having reference to some mail-conveyance between
the two. I was certainly very cold, and very wet, and very uncomfortable
when I entered his house. I was admitted by a butler, but the gentleman
himself hurried into the hall. I at once began to explain my business.
'God bless me!' he said, 'you are wet through. John, get Mr Trollope
some brandy-and-water,--very hot.' I was beginning my story about the
post again, when he himself took off my greatcoat, and suggested that I
should go up to my bedroom before I troubled myself with business.
'Bedroom!' I exclaimed. Then he assured me that he would not turn a dog
out on such a night as that, and into a bedroom I was shown, having
first drank the brandy-and-water standing at the drawing-room fire. When
I came down I was introduced to his daughter, and the three of us went
in to dinner. I shall never forget his righteous indignation when I
again brought up the postal question, on the departure of the young
lady. Was I such a Goth as to contaminate wine with business? So I
drank my wine, and then heard the young lady sing, while her father
slept in his arm-chair. I spent a very pleasant evening, but my host was
too sleepy to hear anything about the Post-office that night. It was
absolutely necessary that I should go away the next morning after
breakfast, and I explained that the matter must be discussed then. He
shook his head and wrung his hands in unmistakable disgust,--almost in
despair. 'But what am I to say in my report?' I asked. 'Anything you
please,' he said. 'Don't spare me, if you want an excuse for yourself.
Here I sit all the day,--with nothing to do; and I like writing
letters.' I did report that Mr ---- was now quite satisfied with the
postal arrangement of his district; and I felt a soft regret that I
should have robbed my friend of his occupation. Perhaps he was able to
take up the Poor-law Board, or to attack the Excise. At the Post-office
nothing more was heard from him."
The Department not only takes much trouble to investigate cases of
irregularity of which definite particulars can be given, but it has
frequently to enter into correspondence with persons who seem to have no
clear idea of the grounds upon which they make their complaints. A
person having stated that his newspapers were not delivered regularly,
was requested to answer certain questions on the subject, and the
following is the result:--
Questions. Answers.
Title and date of newspaper? Don't know.
Whether posted within eight days from date of
publication? Don't know.
How many papers were there in the packet? One.
Was each newspaper under 4 oz. in weight? Don't know.
Where posted, when, and at what hour? Don't know.
By whom posted? Don't know.
Amount of postage paid, and in what manner
paid? Don't know.
The want of information on the part of the public in regard to postal
matters of the most ordinary kind cannot at times but give rise to
wonder. A person in a fair position of life, residing in one of the
eastern counties of England, having obtained a money-order from his
postmaster, payable at a neighbouring town, called again a few days
afterwards and complained that his correspondent could not obtain
payment in consequence of some irregularity in the advice. Thereupon a
second advice was sent; but a few days later the sender called again,
stating that the payee was still unable to obtain payment. The sender
added that he was quite sure that he had sent the money, as he had the
receipt in his pocket. On being asked to show it, he produced the
original order, which should, of course, have been forwarded to the
payee, and without which the money could not be obtained.
A similar instance of ignorance of the method of business as carried on
by the Post-office was exhibited by a poor Irishman in London, and is
thus described in the 'Life of Sir Rowland Hill':--
"The belief has more than once been manifested at a money-order-office
window that the mere payment of the commission would be sufficient to
procure an order for L5,--the form of paying in the L5 being deemed
purely optional. An Irish gentleman (who had left his hod at the door)
recently applied in Aldersgate Street for an order for L5 on a Tipperary
post-office, for which he tendered (probably congratulating himself on
having hit upon so good an investment) sixpence. It required a
lengthened argument to prove to him that he would have to pay the L5
into the office before his friend could receive that small amount in
Tipperary; and he went away, after all, evidently convinced that his not
having this order was one of the personal wrongs of Ireland, and one of
the particular injustices done to hereditary bondsmen only."