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A STATE PARCEL POST. 337
charge they like. No excuse for such oxcoseivo charges can
possibly be given. It may bo explained, indeed, that tho
newspaper parcels, being R regular daily uniform tmffio, oan
be more easily provided for; but how are FVC to apply tho
same explanation to commercinl travelIors’ luggage P For the
charge statcd, many of the companies allow a commercial
traveller to bring as many heavy pncknges ILS bo likos, and to
takc them in and out of the trains as many times in t.ho day
ns he likes, without estrn charge. Several porters nro sometimes
needed to manipulate this luggage, and tila trnin is
occasionnlly detnincl’l thereby. But though tho eotnp:~niw
urge that thcy do this to proulotc trndc in their tlist~*icts,
why cannot thcg promote the trndc iu smnll parcels nlso?
If properly devclnped, this trafic ~~ould include ILII iru~non~e
mass of orders for s~nnll tradesmen, and tho vast loss
of labour and money involvcd in tl~c conlmsrcinl traveller
system might bo partially avoided by the copions use of
sampIe packages. Really it sometimes strikes me ns very
questionable how far a small body of directors, sitting :It
Euston Square or Pnddington, should bo dlowcd to constitute
themselves t,he judges of thc way in which tho commcrce and
the traffic of the country are to go on. They can promoto this
form of traffic, oppress another, estinguisll a third, in (L way
which Parliament itself would not vcnturc to do.
But let us now turn to another side of t,his subject, and
attempt to decidc whether thc convcysncc of pnrcols is n kind
of industry which is likely to bo well and economically conducted
by a Government department. As I havc pointed out
in two previous publications, * me must not assume that a
Government department will manage every kind of industry
as badly as the Admiralby manage the boilers of their ironclads,
nor, on the other hand, as apparently well as tho Post
* Transactions of the Manchester Statistical Society, April, 1867,
pp. 89-104: On the Analogy between the Post Office, Telegraphs,
and other Systems of Conveyance of the United Kingdom, as regards
Gorernment Control,- Essays and Addresses by Professors and
Lecturers of Owens College, Manchester, 1874 (Macmillan), pp- 46.7-
505 : The Railways and the State.
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