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A STA TE PARCEL PUS?. 3-47
the use of stamps to their parcel tr&c generally. The
Glasgow Tramway Company too have adoptad tho parcel
stamp with numbered coupon, to sewe aa a waybill, and
to be torn off by the person delivering thc parcel. An
oasy development of this systcm would soon replace tho
cumbrous booking method.
Any person seriously poposing tho establishment of a
general parcel post might no doubt bo expected to produce
some estimate of its probable cost. Much minute information,
however, only to bo obtained by t.he power of I'urlinment,
would be needed to form a reliable estimate. I nm eucouragd
* indeed, to &tempt some calculations by tho fact that, in tho
case of the telegraphs, I was, in respect to on0 important item,
twenty-five times mora correct than Mr. Scudamorc, with all
his information,* though, of course, neither I nor any other
reasonable person could have imagined beforehand how much
he would have agreed to pay the telograph companies for
their rights. But in this case of parcel traffic, me have nom
of the accurnt,e inforlnation which existed concerning tho
telegraph companies and thcir capitals and dividends. We
have, of course, tho official accounts of railway traffic, but tho
Act of Parliament under which theso aro collected allowed, or
rather prescribed, a form of account in which tho receipts from
parcel traffic are mcrged with thoso from excess luggage,
carriages, horses, and dogs ! Nor are these items disbinguished
in any of the reports issued by the companies to their shareholders
which I possess. Taking, however, Mr. Giffen's
summary tables of railway traffic for 1876, wo find that tho
totals of these items are given as follow :
England and Wales . . . . . $22,076,490
Scotland , . , . . . . 237,115
Ireland . . . . . . . lO.t,452
United Kingdom . . . . . S2,418,057
. .. ." - .
This sum represents the total gross receipts from such
trdlic, and 89 the working and capital expenses can hardly
Treneactione of the Manchester Statistical Society, 1867, p. 98.
" Fortnightly Review," vol. xviii. N.S. p. 827.