As fast as by a sorting-clerk the letters, | 6 feet long, at the side walls, on which like a pack of cards, are rapidly dealt out separately reinscribed the words Fra

hose for "India," "America," "Ship" lind," are finally arranged for desThe letters for America are desnight and morning to Liverpool, hey are sorted; the Ship letters are ed through a wooden shaft into a -ove; the Blind ones to the Blindand those for India, which, however, e observed, seldom arrive until three days before the departure of the the end of the foreign vestibule, to osed of as follows.

At five minutes only before 8 o'clock, the hour at which these metallic boxes are actually despatched, a curious and very interesting process takes place. Within each lid, which is made securely to overlap the receptacle for the documents, there are welded to a strong iron frame six stout notched square bolts, about 6 inches long, so adjusted as to fit exactly into the same number of corresponding spring catches within. No sooner therefore does a loud snap suddenly announce that the union has taken place than, like that of another description, it is out of the power of any human being to divorce "the parties," or, without metaphor, to open the box; as an additional precaution the interstices between the lids are then, all the way round, carefully soldered up; and lastly, by means of a red-hot iron, the Post-Office seal is affixed in solder.

-oid the inconvenience of quarantine, m other weighty considerations, it deemed proper by the Post-Masterto protect all letters, and even pers, for our Eastern dominions, have to travel through France, by ossible precaution. Accordingly, the 1 mails forwarded from London on of every month to Bombay, from the various bags are sent to their ze destinations, are packed in iron black boxes, 1 foot 8 inches foot wide, 10 inches deep, and eigh 13 lbs. (the newspapers, about ach box, are in like manner general- There now only remains for us to say that ed separately); and as the letters as soon as the Post-Office clock strikes 8 n unequal sized parcels were one set these black and variegated boxes are from other deposited or lowered into these the door of the vestibule (all other foreign coffins, we could not, as we stood mails being lowered by a rope and pulley g the operation, but anticipate their from a window in the story above) packed ion in the Eastern world-and re-into an "accelerator" omnibus under the espemuch happiness-and, alas! where cial care of "the officer in charge," who never ils or edges were visible, what deep leaves them until he hands over his imporwould be created! tant charge to the commander of the British steam-packet at Marseilles.

On the outside of the top of each box there are inscribed the words "India Mail, outwards," and on the side "India Mail." On the arrival of all these coffins in India the lids are forcibly cut open by chisels, and their contents extricated.

› overland mail on the 24th the letnewspapers, averaging from 6000 of the former, and from 8000 to the latter, for our Eastern dominiding Australia and Java, are in the proportions packed into these iron inted (not all in black, like those he 7th) but in the undermentioned the brightest hues:

The letters for India, &c., despatched from Southampton in steam-packets on the 20th of each month, are packed in pine boxes (painted the same colors as the iron ones above) 2 feet 3 inches in length by 1 foot 3 inches in width, as also in depth. The number usually despatched is as follows:

1850. On the 20th of January, 154; on the 20th of February, 161; on the 20th of March, 141.

Those at least of our readers who have relations and friends in India will, we trust, forgive the minute details we have just offered.

PACKETS. On its being notified by the Postmaster-General, immediately after the establishment of Mr. Rowland Hill's Penny System, that, at progressive rates of nostage

ance.

From

suddenly appear a crowd of rectangular | Brunswick-square, a fish; also seve parcels of various lengths, breadths, and ages of plants in wet moss. thicknesses-some sealed, some wafered, to Bath, a bunch of grapes; also some tied, but all containing written or From Kingston to Westminster-Brid printed documents of more or less import- to Mrs. a roast duck. A gunpowder. Fifty-three separate "p containing each a box of lucifer mate of which, on being handled, exploded Post-Office. A traveller or bagma to his beloved wife for his pistol; sl tionately sent it, merely labelled, lo most to the mouth with powder, ba slugs. To the Countess of flesh-brushes; the mail-cart in comin the West was upset into a brook, wh solving the paper covering of these b they, probably fancying they had ar their journey's end, instantly set to w destroyed a considerable portion of th tolary contents of the bag. To Mr. a live snake. From London to Well Somersetshire, a very long cucumber. naturalist in London, a live mouse, tw teacups, and a box of live spiders. Oxford street to Merion-square, Dubl dressed to Miss a most be

It appears, however, from a certain most extraordinary ledger which we were permit ted to peruse, that a portion of the public availed themselves of this inestimable literary indulgence with about as much consideration as a herd of very hungry pigs might be expected to evince on being allowed, for recreation, to walk in a garden of beautiful tulips; and certainly, if the ghost of our excellent old friend, the late Sir Francis Freeling, could but by conjuration be made to read the list of the "packets" which have been transmitted and delivered by post, it certainly, like that of Hamlet, would exclaim to our energetic Postmaster-General

"O, horrible! O horrible! most horrible! If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not."

For instance, it appears that there have been transmitted as "packets "-From Blackburn in Lancashire to Spitalfields, London. two canary-birds, delivered by the postman alive and well. From Devonport to London, a pork pie. To London, a woodcock, also a pair of piebald mice, which were kept in the Post-Office a month, fed, and at last delivered to the owner, who called for them. From Manchester to Castle-street, Borough, two rabbits and one bird-fifteen parcels of plum-pudding. From Bognor to Plymouth, a lobster.

In one day 31 letters containing wedding-cake. On more than one occasion, without any envelope, a bank-note (one was for no less than £50) the two ends being merely folded upon each other, wafered, and the back of the note then directed! Innumerable leeches in bladders, several of which having burst, and the water having wetted the letters, many of the poor creatures were found crawling over the correspondence of the country. From Plymouth to "Hunmanby," a bottle of cream. From a mother to her son, a pottle of strawberries, which, being smashed in the bag, completely destroy ed a "packet full of very valuable lace addressed to the late Queen Dowager. A ship-biscuit, the address being on a very small piece of paper pasted thereon. From Totness to Dublin, an uncovered bottle full of liquor, merely labelled with an address and the words "sample of cyder." From Ex

mouth to Hastings, half a nound of soft soan

head-dress of the genus Jigamaree. London to Sudbury, two sweetbreads a human heart; a partrid mackerel; a paper of fish-hooks; a stomach, &c. &c. &c.

THE BLIND-MAN.-Our readers wil observed that in the first operation of ing into fourteen main classes the wh the letters for the United Kingdom, as as for all foreign countries, which pass through the Inland Department of the don Post-Office, there exists among the number of pigeon-holes one marked BLI

Into this little hospital for the destitu houseless poor, are thrown, by each s throughout the department, all letters ing either an illegible, an incomprehen or an inadequate address. It appears, several experiments which have been in the Post-office, that of any given nu of letters taken up at random as they poured out of the bags, about one tent them have not, on their addresses, any town! On one day, 3559 letters arrive St. Martin's-le-Grand addressed" Lond only; most of them being to petty shopk ers, who, with a turkey-cock's desire to grand, had struttingly supplied their cou correspondents with this single word as t sufficient address; and yet, such is the in

licence of the Post office

s was delivered to the person for whom |

= meant !

readily learn to understand "broad” Yorkshire, broad Devonshire, broad Scotch, or must here pause for a moment to ob- any other patois, so it is not, on reflection, that it would relieve the servants of surprising that a gentleman of ready abilities, Post-office from infinite vexation and should, in due time, learn to decipher "broad e, and, to the advantage of all classes, writing"-such as "sromfredevi," for Sir consequently materially expedite the Humphrey Davy; "Ner the Wises," for near ry of letters, if the public, of their own Devizes; "Biley Rikey," for Billericay; 1, would, or by the imposition of a "Steghelhester Sussexese," for Chichester, extra postage could be required to, re- Sussex; Sussex; "Wardling Street, Noher Londer the existing foolish fashion by writing Brutz Schibseed," for Watling street, near , as the first word of the address of London Bridge, Cheapside; Wharan Que letter-the only one out of the presentner Ne Wcasal Pin Tin," for Wareham Quay, ed irrelevant mass which the sorter near Newcastle-upon-Tyne, &c. &c. But to discover, and has now to search where the direction is incorrect, or, as in the mely, THE POST TOWN; after which generality of cases (especially in circular me of the pretty little village, of the tracts addressed by rellgious societies to our of "the hall," the lodge," "the clergy at their parish "rectories," "vicar-or anything else might at any length ages," &c.,) the post towns are omitted, the st harmlessly inserted-with, lastly, difficulty is not only clearly evident, but it at hich is of no earthly importance ex-first appears to be insuperable; nevertheless, the postman who actually delivers in attentively watching the blind man's back, ter, the name of Hobbs, Dobs, or it is astonishing to observe how easily and in short, of the person or personage fluently he does his work. For a consideram it is addressed. ble time he is to be seen, evidently from duty of solving all the enigmas, and memory, writing post-haste the omitted post hering the astonishing specimens of towns on each letter, as rapidly as he can that are continuously afflicting the handle them. Now and then, as if his gasPost-office, is imposed upon a gentle- lamp had, without any apparent reason, half ected from all the sorting-clerks, and fainted away, he holds a letter before him om being gifted with extraordinary for a few moments, turning it a little on this , very sharp wits, and above all, with side, and then on that, until he suddenly . Samuel Weller termed "a pair of deciphers it. a pair of deciphers it. In extreme cases, he is occalouble-million-magnifying-gas-micro-sionally obliged convulsively to scratch the

f-hextra-power-eyes," is gravely dis-
ed throughout the department, as
in its books, by the title of "The
in."
Accordingly to his little desk,
long, two broad, modestly leaning
he wall of a small chamber close
"Foreign" room, and adjoining the
ble sorting hall, are brought all the
hich every sorter has, in despair,
into his "blind" pigeon-hole; and
g for several minutes at nothing but
man's back, we beheld one basket
otherations after another brought to
could not-when we considered that
gering is mercilessly continued
ut every day, week, month, and
his life-help wondering why the
or the Prevention of Cruelty to An-
not yet come to his rescue!

, however, who has watched the
ith which every compositor in a

side of his head, just above his right ear, for half a second with the sharp-pointed black holder of his iron pen; however, on he goes, placing occasionally beside him, at the left extremity of his desk, those letters for which reference to his little library, arranged before him, is necessary; and thus, with the help of about half a dozen thick well-thumbed books, and of an intelligent assistant who sits beside him, he usually manages by the evening mail, or, at all events, by that of the following day, to despatch the mass of mysteries which have been so mercilessly imposed upon him.

DEAD-LETTER OFFICE.-Dead letters and dead newspapers are such as cannot be delivered to the persons to whom they are written for one or more of the following cogent reasons :

1st. Because they have no addresses at all.

4thly. Because the persons to whom they are addressed cannot be found.

| tucky, called at a log-hut for refre The young woman of the hovel, t might quickly spread the table, ga her infant to hold, and in a few minu ing before him a homely meal, sh Th

5thly. Because the person to whom they are addressed is found to be "dead and gone.' The number of dead letters and dead newspapers received at the London Dead-modestly returned to her work. Letter Office, from the 5th of January, 1848, to the 5th of January 1849, with the amount of postage due thereon, was as follows:

Number.

From country postmas-
ters and foreign stations 1,002,118
From inland carriers in

Postage.
£ s. d.

backed man, naturally enough, was tured at the sight of the repast, and whelmed by conflicting feelings of g to the young woman, of admiration lovely infant that sat smiling on hi and of extreme hunger-in a fit of abs 7,250 15 4 mind, exactly such as caused the pe England to post a letter containing without any address, he, to the horro hostess, all of a sudden, with great kissed the loaf,-butter child's face, and cut its head off!—a so runs the story in Kentucky.

1,602 10 10

516 15 4

Packets allowed to the

letter carriers by the President in Packet

1,311 1 7

1,476,456 £10,681 3 1

Of dead letters, a considerable number, containing property valued in two consecutive years at upwards of £10,000, have actually been posted without any address at all! indeed, many years ago, a blank undirected letter, on being opened at the Dead-Letter Office in London, was found to contain in notes no less than £1500 !

The only way in which this extraordinary and, at first, almost incomprehensible fact can be accounted for is that the attention of the good lady or good gentleman who had folded and sealed such a valuable

money

letter, had been so hysterically exhausted by the desire to do both with extreme caution, that, under a moral syncope, there had not remained between the crown of the head and the soles of the feet strength of mind enough to enable her or him to finish the operation; in short, the neglect had proceeded from what is properly enough called "absence of

Each postmaster in the United Ki is required to send up to London every day, enclosed and addressed to "The In or of Dead Letters," his dead letter newspapers, of which he forwards a m account, which is settled quarterly. London inland carriers transmit their letters and accounts twice a-week; the don district carriers, daily.

The Dead-Letter Office in London is posed of six rooms-besides the cham death, exclusively occupied by the pre -whose clerks, thirty-two in number employed for six hours a-day in opening letters :

:

1. from the London district.
2. From all parts of the United King
excepting the London district.

3. From transmarine countries.
4. Packets and letters apparently co
ing property. In this room one cl
also exclusively occupied in op
letters unpaid or unstamped.
Formerly very few dead letters were
turned from America to this cou
but by a treaty with the United S
which came into operation on the 6t
March, 1849, the Americans being now
ited with the postage of the charged le
there have lately been transmitted to Lo
from the United States, by one
24,000, and, by the following return, 25
paid and unpaid letters, which could no
delivered to the persons to whom they

been addressed.

re

The Dead-Letter Office in London is