THE POSTAL REFORMER,

Evening Post, Volume LVII, Issue 33, 9 February 1899, Page 5

THE POSTAL REFORMER,

In a long and interesting letter to Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper, Mr. Henniker Heaton, whose name will certainly go down to posterity in company with Howland Hill's, relates the following anecdote in support of the cause for which he has pfleaded so sucqessfully :— " About 13 years ago a member of Parliament happened to be standing in a post office of a Lincolnshire village, when a poor old woman in deep black came in with a letter for her son in Australia, on which letter she, in her ignorance, intended to place a Id stamp. On being told that the postage was 6d, she took back her letter, and was going away with it. 'If,' she said, apologetically, 'it had been Id I should have had 5d left for tea, and bread.' Of course, the politician, having human feelings, paid the 6d, and the letter was despatched. Some three months afterwards that member passed through the village again, and asked at , the. jpo3t office for news of the old widow. The postmaster was radiant. ' The son sent her £5 in reply, sir,' said he, ' and is going to pay for her passage out. They had not corres ponded for years until she wrote that letter three months ago, on the death of her husband.' 1 " He adds:— "The motion which called for Universal Penny Poscage was supported by 142 members, to each of whom I have, within the last few days, taken upon me to despatch a silver penny, as a- memento of the achievement of Imperial, and an l earnest' of the speedy at tainment of Universal, Penny Postage. The first great task of my political career is now accomplished. It has been necessary for me, in the -work of promoting more than 40 postal reforms, to write a good deal in the newspapers, and to ihousands of private correspondents, to address meetings, Chambers of Commerce, and the House of Commons rather frequently ; to remonstrate with, the officials to take up innumerable ' hard cases,' to spend money freely on printing and post nge, and to travel to nearly every civilised land, in order to inspect the foreign and colonial post offices. I have travelled some 250,000 miles during the last 12 years on postal business. I have made, I hope, a certain number of friends ; I know I have made enemies enough in the post office to last me for life."