proceedings of the committees of supply and ways and means, in the same manner as the Speaker presides over the deliberations of the house. He is chosen for the whole parliament, and it is usual for him to take the chair whenever any important measure proposed by the government is discussed by a committee of the whole house,

In order to ensure a proper acquaintance with the provisions of private bills, some of which are very voluminous, the House of Commons have lately adopted a rule requiring breviates of the bills to be laid before them three days before the second reading, and breviates of the amendments made by the committee, before the house take the report into consideration.

Conferences between the two Houses.-The progress of bills in each house of parliament having been detailed, it still remains to describe the subsequent proceedings in case of difference between them. When a bill has been returned by either house to the other, with amendments which are disagreed to, a conference is desired by the house which disagrees to the amend ment, to acquaint the other with the reasons for such disagreement; in order, to use the words of Hatsell, "that after con sidering those reasons, the house may be induced, either not to insist upon their amendments, or may, in their turn, assign such arguments for having made them, as may prevail upon the other house to agree to them. If the house which amend the bill are not satisfied and convinced by the reasons urged for disagreeing to the amendments, but persevere in insisting upon their amendments, the form is to desire another conference; at which, in their turn, they state their arguments in favour of the amendments, and the reasons why they cannot depart from them; and if after such second conference the other house resolve to insist upon disagreeing to the amendments, they ought then to demand a free conference,' at which the arguments on both sides may be more amply and freely discussed. If this measure should prove ineffectual, and if, after several free conferences, neither house can be induced to depart from the point they originally insisted upon, nothing further can be done, and the bill must be lost." An interesting occasion on which all these proceedings were successively adopted occurred not long since; a free conference had not been held since 1702, until a contest arose in 1836 upon amendments made by the lords to a bill for amending the Act for regulating Municipal Corporations.

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Whether the conference be desired by the lords or by the commons, the former have the sole right of appointing the time and place of meeting. The house that seeks the conference must clearly express in their message the subject upon which it is desired, and it is not granted as a matter of course. There are many instances to be found in the Journals in which a conference has been refused, but not of late years. The reasons that are to be offered to the other house are prepared by a committee appointed for that purpose, who report them for the approval of the house. These reasons are generally very short, but in some cases arguments have been entered into at considerable length. The conference is conducted by "managers" for both houses, who, on the part of the house desiring the conference, are the members of the committee who have drawn up the reasons, to whom others are occasionally added. Their duty is to read and deliver in the reasons with which they are entrusted to the managers of the other house, who report them to the house which they represent. At a free conference the managers on each side have more discretion vested in them, and may urge whatever arguments they think fit. A debate arose in the last free conference, to which we have just alluded, and the speeches of the managers were taken in short-hand and printed. While the conference is being held, the business of both houses is suspended until the return of the managers.

Amendments made to bills by either house are not the only occasions upon which conferences are demanded. Resolutions of importance, in which the concurrence of the other house is desired, are communicated in this manner. Reports of committees have also been communicated by means of a conference. In 1829 a conference was demanded by the commons to request an explanation of the circumstances under which a bill that

had been amended by the lords had received the royal assent without being returned to the commons for their concurrence, The lords expressed their regret at the mistake, and stated that they had themselves been prepared to desire a conference upon the subject, when they received the message from the commons.

Conferences were formerly held in the Painted Chamber, but since the destruction of the houses of parliament by fire in 1834, that apartment has been appropriated to the sittings of the House of Peers, and conferences now meet in one of the lords' committee-rooms.

Royal Assent to Bills.-When a bill has passed both houses, it remains in the House of Lords until the royal assent is given, unless it be a bill of supply, in which case it is returned to the commons. The royal assent may be signified by the king either in person or by commission. Several bills are usually allowed to accumulate before the royal assent is given, and then, if it be during the progress of a session, a commission is generally issued under the great seal for that purpose. Three of the lords commissioners, seated on a form between the throne and the woolsack in the House of Lords, command their usher of the black rod to signify to the commons that their attendance is desired, upon which the commons with the Speaker come to the bar. The titles of the bills being then read, the royal assent to each is signified by the clerk of the parliament in Norman French. For a public bill the form of expression is "Leroy le veult ;" for a private bill, "Soit fait come il est desiree;" upon a petition demanding a right, whether public or private, “Soit droit fait come il est desiree." A bill of supply is carried up and presented by the Speaker, and the assent is pronounced in the words "Le roy remercie ses bons subjects, accepte leur benevolence, et ainsi le veult." In an act of grace which has the royal assent before it is agreed to by the two houses, the clerk says, "Les prelats, seigniors, et commons, en ce present parliament assemblees, au nom de touts vos autres subjects, remercient tres humblement vostre majestee, et prient a Dieu vous donner en santé bonne vie et longue." The form of words used to express a denial of the royal assent was "Le roy s'avisera." The last occasion in which this power was exercised was in 1707, when Queen Anne refused her assent to a bill for settling the militia in Scotland.

The royal assent is rarely given in person, except at the close of a session, when the king attends to prorogue the parliament, and then he signifies his assent to such bills as may have passed since the last commission was issued: but bills for making provision for the honour and dignity of the crown, such as the bills for settling the Civil Lists, have generally been assented to by the king in person immediately after they have passed both houses.

During the Commonwealth the lord protector consented to bills in English, but on the Restoration the old form of words was reverted to, and only one attempt has been made to abolish it. In 1706 the lords passed a bill "for abolishing the use of the French tongue in all proceedings in Parliament and courts of justice." This bill dropped in the House of Commons. An act passed in 1731 for conducting all proceedings in courts of justice in English, but no alteration was made in the old forms used in parliament.

When acts are thus passed, the original engrossment rolls are preserved in the House of Lords, and all public and local and personal acts, and nearly all private acts, are printed by the king's printer, and printed copies are referred to as evidence in courts of law. The original rolls may also be seen, when necessary, and copies taken, on the payment of certain fees.

Committees.-Committees are either "of the whole house" or "select." The former are in fact the house itself, with a chairman instead of the Lord Chancellor or Speaker presiding. There is a more free and unlimited power of debate when the house is in committee, as members may speak any number of times upon the same question, from which they are restrained on other occasions. Select committees are specially appointed, generally for inquiring into particular subjects connected with legislation. It is usual to give them the "power to send for persons, papers, and records;" but in case of any disobedience

to their orders, they have no direct means of enforcing compliance, but must report the circumstances to the house, which will immediately interfere.

In case of an equality of voices, the chairman, who is chosen by the committee out of its own members, gives the casting vote. Some misconception appears to have existed as to the precise nature of the chairman's right of voting. In 1836 the House of Commons was informed that the chairman of a select committee had first claimed the privilege to vote as a member of the committee, and afterwards, when the voices were equal, of giving a casting vote as chairman, and that such practice had of late years prevailed in some select committees; when it was declared by the house that, according to the established rules of parliament, the chairman of a select committee can only vote when there is an equality of voices. (91 Commons' Jour. nals, p. 214.) This error was very probably occasioned by the practice of election committees, which was, however, confined to them, and only existed under the provisions of acts of parliament.

In 1837 some regulations were made by the House of Commons for rendering select committees more efficient and responsible. The number of members on a committee was limited to fifteen. Lists of their names are to be affixed in some conspicuous place in the committee-clerk's office and the lobby. Members moving for the committee are to ascertain whether the gentlemen they propose to name will attend. To every question asked of a witness, the name of the member who asks it is prefixed in the minutes of evidence laid before the house; and the names of the members present at each sitting, and, in the event of any division, the question proposed, the name of the proposer, and the votes of each member, are entered on the minutes and reported to the house.

Trial of Election Petitions,-Before the year 1770 controverted elections were tried and determined by the whole House of Commons, as mere party questions, upon which the strength of contending factions might be tested. In 1741 Sir Robert Walpole, after repeated attacks upon his government, was at last driven from office by a vote upon the Chippenham election petition. "Instead of trusting to the merits of their respective causes," said Mr. Grenville, in proposing the measure which has since borne his name, "the principal dependence of both parties is their private interest among us, and it is scandalously notorious that we are as earnestly canvassed to attend in favour of the opposite sides, as if we were wholly self-elective and not bound to act by the principles of justice, but by the discretionary impulse of our own inclinations; nay, it is well known that in every contested election, many members of this house, who are ultimately to judge in a kind of judicial capacity between the competitors, enlist themselves as parties in the contention, and take upon themselves the partial management of the very business upon which they should determine with the strictest impartiality." The principle of the Grenville Act, and of others which were passed at different times since 1770, was to select committees for the trial of election peti tions by lot. By the last of these (9 Geo. IV. c. 22), thirtythree names were balloted from the members present at the time, and each of the parties to the election was entitled to strike off eleven names, and thus reduce the number of the committee to eleven. Whichever party attended on the day appointed for a ballot in the greatest force, was likely to have a preponderance in the committee; and the expedient of chance did not therefore operate as a sufficient check to party spirit in the appointment of election committees. Partiality or incompetence was very generally complained of in the decisions of committees appointed in this manner, and in 1839 an act passed establishing a new system,-upon different principles, increasing the responsibility of individual members, and leaving scarcely anything to the operation of chance.

The following is an outline of the present mode of selecting members for the trial of election petitions. At the beginning of a session the Speaker appoints a general committee of six members, to any or all of whom the house may object, in which case the Speaker is bound to appoint others. If by irrecon

cilable disagreement of opinion, or by the continued absence of more than two members, the committee, when appointed, should be unable to proceed in the discharge of its duties, or if the house should determine that it shall be dissolved, its functions are to cease. To this general committee all election petitions are referred. The names of all the members of the house are put into an alphabetical list and called over, when certain excuses are allowed to be made; but all who do not then excuse themselves from serving are bound to act as members of election committees when hereafter chosen. This list is taken by the general committee, from which are selected six, eight, ten, or twelve members, who, on signifying their willingness to serve, are formed into "the chairman's panel." The list is then divided into five panels by the general committee, exclusive of the chairmen, the order of which is decided by lot, and a number attached to each in the order in which it is drawn. These panels are to be corrected from time to time by the general committee, according to circum. stances. The general committee gives fourteen days' notice in the Votes before it proceeds to appoint a committee for the trial of an election petition. At the expiration of that time it chooses, from the panel standing first in order of service, six members, whose names are read to the parties, who have power to object to any of them on grounds of disqualification specified in the act. When the six members are finally chosen, the chairman's panel appoint one of their own body to act as chairman, who is added accordingly by the general committee. The committee, when thus completed, is sworn, and proceeds to business. If it be reduced to less than six by the non-attendance of members, except it has already sat fourteen days or more, it is dissolved. It may sit with four members only, if it has met for twenty-five days, and with any number, without reference to the time during which it has met, provided all the parties give their consent. All questions are decided by a majority, and in case of an equality of voices, the chairman gives a second or casting vote,

This system has now been in operation for two sessions, and a few elections have been determined during that time; but as yet the opportunity of testing its value has not been afforded by a general election, which alone gives rise to numerous petitions. As yet the general opinion has not been very favourable to the success of the experiment. It will never perhaps be possible to give satisfaction in the trial of controverted elections. Even in common litigation one party always considers himself aggrieved by the judgment of the court, however plain the facts and the law of the case may be. In election law there is little certainty, and the facts which generally have to be elicited may easily bear different constructions, according to the feelings and judgment of either party. Political oppoments are in the habit of distrusting each other, and imputing the worst motives to actions; and in politics it cannot be denied there is a certain lax morality which in the minds of many will justify conduct for the sake of a party, which would not be excused were it not for the impulse of esprit du corps. All these circumstances cause suspicion and discontent on the trial of elections, which even the high character of the members composing a committee, and the fairness and judgment with which they are selected, cannot altogether remove. No system can be more fair than the present. The general committee chosen by the Speaker, upon whom is the main responsibility, is such as no party could object to; and the chairman's panel selected by that committee are gentlemen whose character for fairness is unimpeachable. The committee, however, with a view to secure perfect impartiality, have adopted a practice the advantage of which is questionable, viz. that of selecting three members from each party. This practice recognises the distinction of parties, and presents them opposed to each other in the committee-room, leaving the chairman as umpire. It will often happen that the two parties vote against each other, three and three, and the chairman has to give the casting voice. This must lead to observation and distrust, and the decisions, however just, will naturally be imputed to party predilection. The general committee have a very difficult duty to perform,

and doubtless if they allowed either party to have the preponderance they would give dissatisfaction; yet it might be tried whether a personal selection, without reference to party, would not secure a better tribunal. But what is most needed is a judicious consolidation of election laws, with clear definitions of the disputed points upon which contradictory decisions are continually given by committees. By many it is thought that the determination of elections should be removed from the House of Commons, and entrusted to some tribunal less involved in political contests. But it is not likely that that body would divest themselves of their privilege and submit to another court; neither is there any ground for anticipating a satisfactory result from such an experiment. The decisions of revising barristers have been quite as inconsistent and contradictory as those of election committees, and from this we would infer that the law itself, rather than the court, requires amendment.

As witnesses giving false evidence before an election committee, being all examined upon oath, are guilty of perjury, it is usual for the house, when acquainted with such misconduct, to instruct the attorney-general to prosecute the parties. The same course has also been pursued with respect to persons proved to have been concerned in bribery.

The determinations of election committees are final, and are immediately carried into effect by the house. If an election be reported void, a new writ is issued; if it be decided that a member has not been duly elected and that another candidate should have been returned, the deputy clerk of the crown is ordered to attend and amend the return, after which the new member is sworn, and takes his seat; and if a petition or the opposition to it be held by the committee to have been frivolous or vexatious, the petitioner or sitting member, as the case may be, is liable to the payment of all the costs.

The last proceeding in parliament which we shall describe is that of

Impeachment.-Impeachment by the commons is a proceeding of great importance, involving the exercise of the highest judicial powers by parliament; and though in modern times it has rarely been resorted to, in former periods of our history it was of frequent occurrence. The earliest instance of impeachment by the commons at the bar of the House of Lords was in the reign of Edward III. (1376). Before that time the lords appear to have tried both peers and commoners for great public offences, but not upon complaints addressed to them by the commons. During the next four reigns, cases of regular impeachment were frequent, but no instances occurred in the reigns of Edward IV., Henry VII., Henry VIII., Edward VI., Queen Mary, or Queen Elizabeth. The institution "had fallen into disuse," says Mr. Hallam, "partly from the loss of that control which the commons had obtained under Richard II. and the Lancastrian kings, and partly from the preference the Tudor princes had given to bills of attainder or of pains and penalties, when they wished to turn the arm of parliament against an obnoxious subject." Prosecutions also in the Starchamber during that time were perpetually resorted to by the crown for the punishment of state offenders. In the reign of James I. the practice of impeachment was revived, and was used with great energy by the commons, both as an instrument of popular power and for the furtherance of public justice. Between the year 1620, when Sir Giles Montressor and Lord Bacon were impeached, and the Revolution in 1688, there were about 40 cases of impeachment. In the reigns of William III., Anne, and George I., there were 15, and in the reign of George II. only one (that of Lord Lovat, in 1746, for high treason). The last memorable cases are those of Warren Hastings, in 1788, and Lord Melville, in 1805.

An outline of the forms observed in the conduct of impeachments may be briefly given. A member of the House of Commons charges the accused of certain high crimes and misdemeanors, and moves that he be impeached. If the house agree

to it, the member is ordered to go to the lords, and at their bar, in the name of the House of Commons and of all the commons of the United Kingdom, to impeach the accused. A committee is then ordered to draw up articles of impeachment, which are reported to the house, and having been discussed and agreed upon, are engrossed and delivered to the lords. Further articles may be delivered from time to time. In the case of Warren Hastings the articles had been prepared before his impeachment at the bar of the House of Lords. The accused sends answers to each article, which are communicated to the commons by the lords; to these, replications are returned, if necessary. After these preliminaries, the lords appoint a day for the trial. The commons desire the lords to summon the witnesses required to prove their charges, and appoint managers to conduct the proceedings. Westminster Hall has been usually fitted up as the court, which is presided over by the lord high steward. The commons attend with the managers as a committee of the whole house. The accused remains in the custody of the usher of the black rod, to whom he is delivered, if a commoner, by the serjeant-at-arms attending the House of Commons. The managers should confine themselves to charges contained in the articles of impeachment. Mr. Warren Hastings complained of matters having been introduced which had not been originally laid to his charge, and the house resolved that certain words ought not to have been spoken by Mr. Burke. Persons impeached of high treason are entitled, by statute 20 Geo. II., cap. 30, to make their full defence by counsel—a privilege which is also enjoyed by persons charged by the commons with high crimes and misdemeanors.

When the managers have made their charges and adduced evidence in support of them, the accused answers them, and the managers have a right to reply. The lords then proceed to judgment in this manner :-The lord high steward puts to each peer, beginning with the junior baron, the question upon the first article, whether the accused be guilty of the crimes charged therein. The peers in succession rise in their places when the question is put, and standing uncovered, and laying their right hands upon their breast, answer "guilty," or "not guilty," as the case may be, "upon my honour." Each article is proceeded with separately in the same manner, the lord high steward giving his own opinion the last. The numbers are then cast up, and being ascertained, are declared by the lord high steward to the lords, and the accused is acquainted with the result.

Coke's Fourth Institute,' cap. 1; 'The Soveraigne Power of Parliaments,' by W. Prynne, 1643; 'Parliamentary Writs,' by W. Prynne, in four parts, 1659-1664; 'Privileges of the Baronage of England when they sit in Parliament,' by John Selden, 12mo., 1642; Modus tenendi Parliamentum,' by W. Hakewel, 1660; Lex Parliamentaria,' by G. P., Esq., 12mo., 1690; Constitution of Parliaments in England, deduced from the time of King Edward the Second,' by Sir John Pettus, 1680; Original Institution, Power, and Jurisdiction of Parliaments,' by Sir M. Hale, 1707; republished by Hargrave, with preface, 1776; 'Antient Right of the Commons of England,' by William Petyt, 1680; Parliamentary and Political Tracts,' written by Sir Robert Atkins, 2nd edit., 1741; History of the High, Court of Parliament,' by T. Gurdon, 1731; 'Manner of holding Parliaments in England,' by Henry Elsynge, Cler. Parl., 1768; Free Parliaments,' by Roger Acherley, 1731; Blackstone's 'Comm.,' book 1st; D'Ewes's 'Journal;' Lords' Journals; Commons' Journals; 'General Indexes and Calendars to Lords' Journals,' 1509-1819; 'General Indexes to Commons' Journals,' 1547-1837; Trial of Henry Lord Viscount Melville,' published by order of the House of Lords, fol., 1806; 'State Trials;' 'Parliamentary History ;' Wynn's 'Argument upon the Jurisdiction of the Commons to commit,' 1810; Hatsell's Precedents,' new edit., 1818; Hallam's 'Const. Hist. and Middle Ages;' Turner's 'Hist. of the Anglo-Saxons; Henry's Hist. of England,' &c.

CORRESPONDENCE is the offspring of advanced civilization. When the state of society in this country anterior to the seventeenth century is considered, there can be little surprise that we hear nothing of a post-office before that period. Few of the motives to written communication could be said to exist. Each district of the country supplied its own wants. The little foreign trade which flourished was conducted between the English buyer and the foreign seller in person, at the place of import. Literature and science dwelt only in the convent or the cell. There was little absence from the domestic hearth, excepting that of the fighting man following the service of his lord; but neither the serf nor his master had the power, even if they had the will, to write letters.

In the Auglo-Saxon times, the great body of the people were as much fixed to the soil as the trees that were planted on it. Even towards the close of the fourteenth century, when the commons were rising in social importance, it was ordained by the 'Statute of Labourers' that "no servant or labourer, be he man or woman, shall depart at the end of his term out of the hundred where he is dwelling, to serve or dwell elsewhere." Three centuries afterwards, when the serfs of former times had become free men, the same system of coercion was applied to paupers and destitute persons. They were forbidden to seek employment out of their respective parishes; and this prohibition, which was enforced by pains and penalties, continued in full operation for 133 years, when it was somewhat relaxed. It is only within the last seven years that the restraint has been wholly removed, but the disposition which it created in the minds of many of the labouring classes will for some time to come exercise its influence upon their habits.

In the present day, however, the necessity of a frequent and rapid communication by post is an imperious want. England is no longer exclusively an agricultural country. Thousands leave their father's house at an early age, and pass their lives at a distance from their family connexions. A stream of immigration is constantly pouring into England from Ireland and Scotland. In one year, above 100,000 persons have emigrated to the British colonies and to the United States of North America. The influence of the law of settlement being diminished, men of the humblest ranks look round to discover how they shall best advance their interests, and no longer despair because the narrow bounds of their native parish do not afford them employment. The excavators employed in the formation of a railway will talk of going to Belgium or some other part of the Continent when they have completed their present contract; and the agricultural labourer, with his scythe at his back, may be seen stepping on board a steam.boat in the Thames, bound for Yorkshire; the low fare of half-a-crown enabling him, after having worked at the most profitable description of agricultural labour as long as it could be obtained in the southern counties, to proceed to the opposite extremity of England in search of similar employment. Objections may be made to these migrations, but if employment is not to be obtained at home, it is better to go even to some distance, where it is to be had, than to be dependent upon the parish. The occasional migration of labourers was even permitted by the law passed in 1351, called the 'Statute of Labourers.' Those who resided in the upland districts, where the harvest was late, were allowed to leave their hundred and assist in getting in the harvest in the plains, where it was ready for the sickle much earlier.

In the state of civilization to which we have now attained in this country, we possess many advantages of the highest importance, which are indeed essential to our daily comfort, but which,

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presenting themselves with unfailing regularity, pass without observation, and almost without our being conscious of enjoying them. Among the principal of these may be reckoned an efficient and well-regulated system for the transmission of letters, not only through every district and into every nook and cranny of the British islands, but also to and from every part of our wide spread dominions, as well as every other civilized country on the habitable globe.

We cannot, perhaps, more forcibly present to our minds the great value of this institution than by imagining what must be the condition of this country, in all its various relations, if a sudden stop were put to the active operations of our Post-office. What a check would this occasion to profitable commerce! How greatly would it interfere with that proper proportioning of supply to demand which is essential to the comfortable existence of every well-peopled country! What losses would sometimes be occasioned by gluts,-what privation, at other times, by scarcity, if the channels for information were closed by which the wants of each community are now regularly made known to every other! Nor would it be found the least among the misfortunes which such an accident would bring about, that the anxieties of friendship and affection on account of those from whom we might be separated, could only be relieved by communication, which would be often uncertain, and always at considerable intervals. But it is unnecessary to enlarge upon this topic, since everybody must acknowledge that the destruction of our Post-office system would inflict upon the social body one of the heaviest blows that it is capable of receiving.

In a very early stage of society the rulers of every country would perceive the necessity of employing messengers for the transmission of their commands to every part of their dominions; and as this necessity would be constantly recurring, it would soon be found advantageous—if not indeed indispensable-to organize a system by which the labour of such a service might be diminished, and its details simplified. At first special messengers would probably be sought for as each occasion for employing them arose. The next step would be to appoint professional couriers, and to assign particular stations or posts between which each of these couriers should pass, delivering their despatches from one to the other so as to insure certainty and celerity in their transmission. It would not be long before individuals, seeing the benefit accompanying this institution, would be desirous of profiting by it for the transmission of their own correspondence, and would willingly pay something to the sovereign for such a privilege. Posts thus established must be considered as at once marks of civilization and means for extending it. It can only be in an advanced condition of society that the private correspondence of a country would be so increased that the conveyance of letters would come to be a source of revenue to the state. It is sometimes said that the institution of the post existed among the ancient Persians; but the passages in which it is mentioned merely show that a means of rapid communication was established for the purpose of sending the commands of the emperor from one part to another of his extensive dominions. Relays of horses were placed at certain intervals, and the message was thus transmitted from one hand to another, and rapidly conveyed to the most distant parts of the empire. (Herodotus, viii. 98; Xenophon, Cyropædia, viii., c. 6.) Such arrangements bore small resemblance to the systematic plans in operation at present for the conveyance of intelligence both public and private. Three centuries ago the couriers, or foot messengers, that were employed in Europe for the conveyance of letters from one persou of distinction to another, made

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their way slowly and laboriously over countries thinly populated and almost without roads.

EARLY HISTORY OF THE POST-OFFICE IN ENGLAND. We will take a brief view of the origin and progress of the means for maintaining epistolary communication in this country. At first, then, the business of the state only demanded correspondence. The king summoned his barons from all quarters of the kingdom by letters or writs, and held frequent communication with his sheriffs, to collect his parliament together, to muster his forces, to preserve his peace, to fill his treasury. The expenses of the establishment of " Nuncii," who had the conveyance of letters, formed a large item in the charges of the royal household. As early as the reign of King John, the payments to Nuncii for the carriage of letters may be found enrolled on the Close and Misæ- Rolls, and these payments may be traced in an almost unbroken series through the records of subsequent reigns. Nuncii also formed part of the establishment of the more powerful nobles. In a wardrobe account of the 27th year of Edward I., we find a specimen of the mode in which the payment is entered.* The Nuncius of the time of King John was probably obliged to provide his own horse throughout his journey; whilst, in the reign of Edward II., he was able, and found it more suitable, to hire horses at fixed posts or stations. In 1481, Edward IV., during the Scottish war, is stated by Gale to have established at certain posts, 20 miles apart, a change of riders, who handed letters to one another, and by this means expedited them 200 miles in two days: this is exactly the mode of communication which, as Herodotus and Xenophon inform us, was established by Cyrus, the first king of the Persians. It would seem that the posts, at which relays of riders and horses were kept, were wholly private enterprises; but that when their importance became felt and appreciated, the state found it both politic and a source of profit to subject them to its surveillance. Before any substantive evidence appears of the superintendence of the posts by the government, the superscription often met with, of "haste poste haste," on letters written at the close of the fifteenth and beginning of the sixteenth centuries, is sufficient to show that the posts had become a customary channel for transmitting letters in the speediest way.

A statute in 1548 (2 and 3 Edw. VI., c. 3) fixed a penny a-mile as the rate to be chargeable for the hire of post-horses. In 1581, one Thomas Randolph is mentioned by Camden as the chief postmaster of England; and there are reasons for concluding that his duties were to superintend the posts, and had no immediate connexion with letters. The earliest recital of the duties and privileges of a postmaster seems to have been made by James I. The letters patent of Charles I. in 1632 (Pat.,' 8 Car. I. p. i., m. 15 d; 'Fœdera,' vol. xix. p. 385) recite that James constituted an office called the office of postmaster of England for foreign parts being out of his dominions. This functionary was to have "the sole taking up, sending, and conveying of all packets and letters concerning his service, or business to be dispatched into forreigne parts, with power to grant moderate salaries;" the office was granted to Mathewe le Quester, and Mathewe le Quester his son: all others were publicly prohibited that they should not directly or indirectly exercise or intrude themselves: the said M. le Quester made and substituted William Frizell and Thomas Witherings his deputies, and his majesty accepted the substitution. The king, "affecting the welfare of his people, and taking into his princely consideration how much it imports his state and this realm that the secrets thereof be not disclosed to forreigne nations, which cannot be prevented if a promiscuous use of transmitting or taking up of forreigne letters and packetts should be suffered," forbids all others from exercising that which to the office of such postmaster pertaineth, at their utmost perils.

In 1635 a proclamation was made, "for settling of the letter office of England and Scotland." It sets forth" that there hath been no certain or constant intercourse between the king

*"x die Januarii nuncio Domini Regis de Hastang redeunti ad eundem dominum suum cum litteris Regis, pro expensis suis sic redeundo-xiii.”

doms of England and Scotland;" and commands "Thomas Witherings, Esq., his majesty's postmaster of England for foreign parts, to settle a running post or two, to run night and day between Edinburgh and Scotland and the city of Loudon, to go thither and come back in six days." Directions are given for the management of the correspondence between post-towns on the line of road and other towns which are named, and likewise in Ireland. All postmasters are commanded "to have ready in their stables one or two horses: " 2d. for a single horse and 5d. for two horses per mile were the charges settled for this service. Letters in places lying near the road were to be taken, and bye-posts to and from the high road established with Lincoln, Hull, and other important places. Similar arrangements were directed for the post between London and Dublin through West Chester and Holyhead, and for the post between London and Plymouth through Exeter, &c. Oxford, Bristol, Colchester, and Norwich were to have corresponding advantages as soon as possible. A monopoly was established, with exceptions in favour of common known carriers and particular messengers sent on purpose, most of which have been preserved in all subsequent regulations of the post-office. This is decisive as to the pre-establishment of a comparatively efficient system by private parties, who were apparently too popular to be summarily put down, and therefore for the present the Government satisfied itself by a vague enactment (that could have had but an arbitrary application) against “other messengers," &c. Owing partially perhaps to the rivalry here indicated, but still more to the general confusion attendant on the breaking out of the civil war, the establishment failed, and for a considerable period great difficulty was experienced in the safe and speedy transmission of letters.

In 1640 Witherings, who, by the Act of 1635, had been appointed inland, and was previously foreign, postmaster, was superseded by the Long Parliament for abuses in the execution of his office. One of these abuses was the endeavour, on his part, to stop the private adventurers, by forcibly depriving one of their servants of the letters that he carried, and which was voted to be "against the liberty and freedome of the subject." Witherings' offices were sequestered into the hands of Philip Burlamachy, to be exercised thenceforth under the superintendence of the king's principal secretary of state; and thus was the first step taken as to the making the Post-office authorities responsible. But in 1642 it was resolved by a committee of the House of Commons that such sequestration was “a grievance and illegal, and ought to be taken off," and that Mr. Witherings ought to be restored. As late as 1644 it appears that the postmaster's duties were not connected directly with letters. A parliamentary resolution entered on the Journals of the Commons states that "the Lords and Commons, finding by experience that it is most necessary, for keeping of good intelligence between the parliament and the forces, that post stages should be erected in several parts of the kingdom, and the office of master of the posts and couriers being at present void, ordain that Edmund Prideaux, Esq., a member of the House of Commons, shall be, and is hereby constituted, master of the posts, messengers, and couriers." He first established a weekly conveyance of letters into all parts of the nation, thereby saving to the public the charge of maintaining postmasters to the amount of 70001. per annum." (Blackstone.) An attempt of the Common Council of London to set up a separate Post-office, in 1649, was checked by a resolution of the House of Commons, which declared "that the office of postmaster is, and ought to be, in the sole power and disposal of parliament." The motive to the change here indicated in the opinion of Parliament since the vote of 1640, is to be found in the preamble to an ordinance passed in 1657, where it is stated, as a recommendation in favour of the institution of government posts, that "they will be the best means to discover and prevent many dangerous and wicked designs against the commonwealth."

In spite, however, of the decision above mentioned, the private carriers flourished; they not only established more frequent posts than the government, but carried letters at cheaper rates.