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.