4. As a general rule, the number of despatches from the suburban districts is the same as the number of deliveries.
5. Information relative to the time of delivery and the time for each despatch to the head office, and also from thence to the provinces, is afforded at each town and suburban receiving-house. At each of these houses, several hundreds in number, stamps are sold, letters are registered, and separate boxes are provided for "London District" and "General Post" letters.
THE "POSTE RESTANTE" AT THE GENERAL POST-OFFICE.
6. The "Poste Restante" arrangements for London are somewhat different to those in the provinces; but like the latter they are meant to provide for strangers and travellers who have no permanent abode in London,--residents in London not being allowed the privilege.
7. Letters addressed to "initials" cannot be received; if so addressed they are returned to their writers through the Returned Letter-Office.
8. Letters addressed "Post-Office, London," or "Poste Restante," are delivered only at the Poste Restante Office, on the south side of the hall of the General Post-Office, between the hours of 9 A.M. and 5 P.M.
9. All persons applying for letters at the Poste Restante must be prepared to give the necessary particulars to the clerk on duty, in order to prevent mistakes, and to insure the delivery of the letters to the persons to whom they properly belong. If the applicant be a subject of the United Kingdom (and subjects of states not issuing passports are regarded as British subjects), he must be able to state from what place or district he expects letters, and produce some proof of identification; and if he sends for his letters the messenger must be supplied with this information, as well as show a written authority to receive them. If the applicant be a foreigner, he must produce his passport; or should he send for his letters, the messenger must take it with him.
[206] The average weight of inland letters is now about a quarter of an ounce; that of colonial letters about a third of an ounce; of a foreign letter also about a quarter of an ounce. The average weight of newspapers is about three ounces, and of book-packets ten ounces.
[207] With charges extremely low, the Post-Office is victimized by all kinds of craftiness. The dodging of the proper payment is sometimes quite ludicrous. Hundreds of newspapers, for instance, are annually caught (and we may reasonably assume that thousands more escape) with short loving messages deftly inscribed between their paragraphs of type, or letters, different descriptions of light articles, and even money curiously imbedded in their folds. Almost everybody might tell of some adventure of this kind in his experience not only before penny-postage, but even after it.