A RECORD MAIL.

Press, Volume LI, Issue 15223, 10 March 1915, Page 7

A RECORD MAIL.

73,000 LETTERS FOR CHBJSTCHURCH. Tito largest mail ever brought to the Dominion by the Vancouver route — 1725 bags and hampers—was landed at ! Auckland on Sunday from the Niagara. Included are English and American mails; which had been detained at San Francisco owing to the accident to the Marama. On tho same day the Maheno from Sydney, brought 585 bags and hampers of European and Australian mails, including the biggest mail that has ever come out of the land of Egypt to Australasia. Since Sunday these mails have been speeding ever South, setting tho postal officials humming everywhere on the way. and will bo still speeding by train, coach, and buggy to the remote places of the Islands for days to come. It is a mail thac has interested more people probably than any other mail that has ever been received in New Zealand, this largely due to the-Ex-peditionaries and the war. The Christchurch soriion, received yesterday, consisted of 442 bags— 7o,(XK) letters and 90,500 newstvapers. Tno Chief. Mail Clerk described ft as the heaviest mail that has ever come to the local G.P.O. The difficulty of handling was added to. by the fact that yesterday was posting day for the "Weekly Press," which added thousands of packets for sorting to all parts of the , world to the day's task. The officials, however, tackled it manfully, and all day long a constant stream of letters and papers was going ont. Owing to the accidents and congestions which, triplicated this mail many hundreds of people- received an accumulation of three weekly letters from the came cor- j respondents by it, so that yesterday the whole town was goin<£ through an orgy of letter reading.

The work of sorting began at 8 a.m., and practically took twelve hours to complete. The work done by the Post Office staff may be imagined when it is borne in mind that the average mail from Britain contains about 120 begs.