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new fact — fait nouveau —you would probably find the Frenchman, German, or Italian much more disposed to examine these rapacious railway charges with an open mind. A Congress of the Postal Union will meet at Rome early next year, at which a resolution for universal penny postage will be submitted, with the fervent good wishes of the most enlightened and trusted of European statesmen. The experts recognise the railway difficulty, and despise it. A Postmaster-General of long standing writes to me, after expressing himself in favour of the proposal, " The principal difficulty is in the utterly absurd transit dues, which, if swept away, would render penny postage instantly possible." That such a measure would have (lie happiest effects on our foreign trade and international relations, the most pessimistic of cynics will admit. That it would, in view of the certain development of correspondence, entail permanent loss on any of the Governments concerned is more than doubtful. Even in the first year, and allowing the railway shark his .full pound of flesh, it would cost vs —this grand step towards the brotherhood of nations —but £250,000 —onefourth the cost of a battleship. The subject of cheap electrical communication with the outer world is, if possible, of still greater urgency. This heavily taxed industrial community, subsisting by its trade over-sea, is mulcted some four millions sterling annually for a cable service which ought not to oost £100,000. This huge sum is a first charge on our commerce, and fatally handicaps our merchants in various directions. It is hardly necessary to argue that competition with the cable company is as justifiable as with a telephone company. The sole question with you will be to secure fair treatment for the public. I say we have not sucli fair treatment, either from companies or the Post Office. To begin with, why do you charge four times as much for telegraph communication with a Frenchman as with an Irishman? We can telegraph from Hull to Galway, across the stormy channel of St. George, for Jd. per word ; but from Dover to Calais (twenty-one miles) you insist on 2d. The French Government, more compunctious, offers an international penny rate, but you object. Do you suppose our 'cute Parisian friends are blind to this curious illustration of our sincerity in advocating the entente cordialei In Australia, a poor country, we can telegraph 3,000 miles for Id. But your exactions sink into insignificance before the gigantic demands of the oable companies. The whole of their lines could be laid at an expenditure, involving interest, of, say, £100,000 per year, and they net £4,000,000 a year. Their fariffs swarm with significant anomalies. Thus, the annual stream of 200,000 travellers via the Suez Canal complain of having to pay Is. 10d. and Is. 7d. a word to England, though from Gaza, several hundred miles higher up the Mediterranean, the charge is 6|d From El Arich, sixty-five miles from Gaza, the charge is 2s. l()d. One company transmits telegrams to Australia, as far as Bombay, for Is. 3Jd. a word, but charges 2s. 6d. a word for messages to Bombay. The Russian Government conveys telegrams from St. Petersburg to Vladivostock, 6,000 miles, past our Indian Empire, for about 4Jd. a word ; but we charge 2s. 6d. to India. Let me suggest that you come to our aid. Summon a conference of European PostmastersGeneral, point out the vast interests at stake, and invite them to establish a general penny-a-word rate all over Europe, or, as a compromise, to agree that the total charge for an international message shall not exceed the sum of the inland rates of the countries traversed. In concluding this letter, which is necessarily of a general character, let me add that I do not. ask you, a Cabinet Minister and Postmaster-General, to commit yourself to definite approval of any suggestion or statement contained in it. But, as one representing a widespread interest in the subjects here dealt with, I trust I may reckon on your careful examination of all facts and arguments laid before you, and, I believe I may add, on your sympathy with the policy of working the freest, cheapest possible communication between the peoples. I am, my dear Postmaster-General, Very faithfully yours, The Right Hon. Lord Stanley. J. Henniker Hbaton.

11. Dkak Mb. PoSTMASTER-GENBRAii, — Carlton Club, London, 28th Feb., 1906. The duty falls to me, on the very eve of the Postal Union Congress, of laying the case for universal penny postage before a new British Postmaster-General. Ido so with the more confidence because your well-known sympathy with postal progress will effectually supply any deficiencies in the arguments I may advance. You will certainly not think them less weighty because of the place from which they are dated and addressed. The ship's watch is changed, but all are satisfied that the engines are in good hands. I trust I may add, without being suspected of any arriire pensge, that your great office is just now one of enviable importance and responsibility. At this critical moment in the world's history, when nations long divided are fraternising, and a vague yearning for peace and goodwill is working and fermenting in the mind of humanity, any reasoned proposal for developing and facilitating international communication claims serious attention. Ignorance is the breeding-ground not only of discord and war, but of even' plague that afflicts us. How impotent for evil are bellicose Ministers when the masses of the governed peoples thoroughly understand, and, as a necessary consequence, esteem, one another!