State of the Packet Service--Ship Letters--Special Boats built for the Harwich Station--M. Pajot, Director of the French Posts--Establishment of West India Packets--Edmund Dummer, Surveyor of the Navy--Regulations for the Management of the Packet Stations--Conditions of Employment-- Smart and Bounty Money--Passes required for Passengers--and for Goods-- Regulations habitually infringed--Smuggling--Packets forbidden to give Chase--Practice on Capture of a Prize--Packet Stations at Falmouth and at Harwich conducted on different Principles--Packets employed to carry Recruits--Letters not to be carried in Foreign Bottoms--Court-Post-- Restoration of Packet Service with Flanders--John Macky, Packet Agent at Dover--The Postmasters-General act as Purveyors of News to the Court-- Their Interview with Godolphin--Posts set up for the Army in Flanders-- Packet Establishment placed on a Peace Footing--Dummer's Bankruptcy and Death 72
American Posts--Thomas Neale--Andrew Hamilton--Ocean Penny Postage--Posts transferred to the Crown--Become self-supporting 110
Condition of the Post Office in Scotland at the time of the Union-- Inaction of the English Post Office--Charles Povey--William Lowndes-- Diversion of Postage from the Crown to the Public--Postage Rates increased--Electoral Disabilities--Restrictions on the common Carrier-- Modification of the Penny Post--Post-horses--Franking--Illicit Traffic in Letters--Treasury Inconsistency--Post Office Farmers converted into Managers--Treaty with France--Matthew Prior--Single and Double Letters-- Change of Postmasters-General--Disagreements with Merchants--Twopenny Post--Comparative Statement of Revenue--Gross and Net Revenue confounded 117
Allen's Contract--General Review--The Secretary's Dismissal--Earl of Abercorn's Complaint--Sketch of Allen's Plan--His Qualifications for carrying it into effect--His local Knowledge--His Difficulties with Postmasters--Post-boys--Illegal Conveyance of Letters--Contrast between Allen's Mode of Procedure and that of the Post Office--Posts increased in Frequency--Opening of Letters--Falmouth Packets--Late Delivery of Foreign Letters--Erection of Milestones--Letters containing Patterns and Writs--Apertures to Letter-boxes--Expresses--Highwaymen--Bank Notes-- Decadence--Allen's 146