POST OFFICE CURIOSITIES.

Temuka Leader, Issue 2411, 13 October 1892, Page 3

POST OFFICE CURIOSITIES.

People insensible to the romance which underlies the rind of hard facts are accustomed to welcome the postal report for its stories of ineradicable carelessness on the part of the public and the marvellous ingenuity displayed by the officials in remedying this defect. It is the proud boast of the Post Office that no pains are spared to fulfil its mission, and private blundering is not held to be an adequate reason for official neglect. In the present report it is related that a letter posted by a lady in the neighbourhood of Leamingicn without any address and without any clue to the sender was found to contain two £IOO Bank of England notes. The problem was a difficult one, but official ingenuity was enabled to find its solution. By diligent inquiry the sender was discovered, and in gratitude for the safe return of her property she sent a contribution of £2O to the Rowland Hill Benevolent Fund, which was founded for the relief of Post Office servants who through no fault of their own have fallen into necessitous circumstances. Nor was this illustration of carelessness a solitary example, for over 1700 letters were found to be posted uuaddressed containing money amounting in the aggregate to £15,000, Blank envelopes are not the only form of c mumlruro presented to the postal official. Ha is asked to intepet undecipherable writing, and to discover the true meaning of addresses so vague as to defy understanding. In mm case a letter was found at Dumbarton addressed as follows “ To the Manager of the public House with Walker’s Bign up Corner of the Fair grounds and the stables are at the back of Dhe House and last Christmas Mr Davis’ Switchback stood close to the house Wolverhampton.” The letter was delivered to the person for whom it was intended. In another instance a correspondent addressed the following communication to a provincial postmaster “ Dear Sir, —May I ask you to be good enough to let one of your carriers take the enclosed post card to my nephew. He is a young man, I believe, well known in your town, but whose address I forget (if 1 ever knew it). He walks lame owing to a cork leg, has also a bright projt nting set qf teeth. I think he is assistant o}- manager at ono of your best imveUers. Hoping this will not trouble you too much, —1 am, dear sir, yours, &c.” town to yhidi the missive waa sent

contains a population of about 72,C0 ) persons, but, notwithstanding this slight, difficulty, the nephew was discovered, and the post card delivered. The letter bags are frequently made the receptacles for curious impedimenta, which are transmitted in entire disregard of departmental regulations. Someone sent a parcel containing 550 leeches, while other “small deer” included tame rats, frogs, a live snake, and a live locust from the Cape of Good Hope. In an Indian mail bag, sealed before departure and not opened until its arrival in London some three weeks subsequently, was discovered a specimen of the Indian mouse, which arrived alive and unhurt after is lengthened jonrney without any indication of having suffered from want of food Perhaps the most extraordinary incident was the transmission of a live kitten which was shot from the mail bag apparatus, near Penrith, into the express train. The kitten, which was packed in a small cardboard box, although seriously alarmed escaped with comparatively slight injury, but did not recover from the shock for a day or two. The sender with a singular mixture of thoughtfulness and indifference, had provided a bottle of milk with a tube through the cork for the sustenance of the animal on the journey, but the creature did not appear to understand the baby’s method of feeding, and the beverage was untouched.