Curiosities Of The Post Office.

found open in the Chief Office in London containing cheques for £ 200 , and bank notes for more than £ 500 . But more extraordinary still , a registered letter Avas misdirected , and upon inquiry being made for the packet it was found that Turkish

Bonds which it contained to the value of . £ 4 , 000 had been mistaken for foreign lottery tickets of no value , and had been put aside for the children of the family to p lay with !! There were last year received into the

Returned Letter Office 4 , 400 , 000 letters , of these upwards of 20 , 000 Avere posted Avithout any address ! All the letters that it is found difficult to deliver in consequence of the imperfect address are taken to the Dead Letter Office , where sit certain clerks

cunning in guessing any puzzling address the public may favour them Avith . Some of these addresses are perfectly astounding in their simplicity . For instance , ivhat does the reader think of the following ?—" Mr . Smith

" At the Back of the Church " England . " Or here is another still more enigmatical : "My dear Father in Yorkshire at the White Cottage with the White Pailings " Again Ave have the following : " This is for her that ' maks' dresses for young ladies that ' livs ' at tother side of the road to

" James Brooklip " Edensorer " Chesterfield . " Or more comical still : " This is for the young girl that wears spectacleswho minds ' two babies '

, " 30 Sheriff Street "Off Prince Edwin Street " Liverpool . " These , Ave beg to say , are all genuine addresses .

The " blind man " at the Post Office is quite up to deciphering such queer jmzzles as we have quoted , and the vast majority of them get delivered either to the persons addressed , or to the person sending them . A large number of le

very poor peop greatl y object to receive returned letters . They think it very unlucky . All letters containing valuables are kept for two years , and if still unclaimed » re sold at Debenham and Storr ' s , and the

proceeds are carried to the credit of the Life Insurance Office in connection with the Post Office , a much better arrangement this than that carried out by the Custom House authorities at the London Docks , Avhere goods of all kinds of a

perishable nature upon which duty has not been paid are put into Avhat is termed " the Queen ' s Pipe , " and destroyed by fire , not-Avithstanding that thousands of poor people are perishing for want whilst this destruction of good food is going on .

The number of letters passing through the General Post Office is by no means a constant number ; on certain occasions the number is augmented by hundreds of thousands . When Friday falls at the end of the mouthin addition to the

news-, papers the monthly magazines are posted ; this causes a great strain to be suddenly put upon the sorters at the Post Office . But the day before St . Valentine ' s day is the great day of influx . On that occasion , upwards of four million and a half of these

tender epistles crowd the Post Office in excess of the average number . More than a hundred years ago it was proposed in Parliament that the postage

should be reduced to a halfpenny . Of course in that age the idea was scouted , but only latterly Ave have come up to the old idea in a lame fashion , in the form of post-cards , which do not ensure secrecy . May we not ask , in the name of Education ,

if it is necessary to raise a revenue out of the pence of the people collected in this manner ? In 1874 the gross revenue from the Post Office Avas £ 5 , 751 , 600 , aud the profit we derived from this source Avas £ 2 , 724 , 012 . Coiild we not afford to

sacrifice some of this income for the sake of progress ? If the stamp Avere onl y a halfpenny , how many more millions would be enabled thereby to write than can UOAV ! We know the impulse the institution of : the penny post gave to Education in 1 S 40

; can we doubt that halving that stamp would in time double the amount of letterwriting ? If so , would not that be an impulse to Education far more powerful than the establishment of the most urgent School Boards throughout the country ?

We think it Avould , and shall Avith pleasure welcome so important a boon . —We take this from our amusing and interesting contemporary the Graphic of March 4 th . 2 a