The History of the Postmarks of the British Isles from 1840 to 1876 - John Hendy (1909)

POSTAGE STAMPS. 125
great boon, as an assistance alike to postmasters and the public, would undoubtedly have
been delayed for many years ; by the perforating process postage labels were made
more readily separable, and also more adhesive.
The following was the mode of perforating postage stamps in the year 1861. The
adhesive stamp sheets were perforated by machines constructed by Messrs. Napier and Son,
of Vine Street, Lambeth, at a cost of ^400 each, five such machines being continually in
use at Somerset House, London. These machines, which were worked by steam, were
capable of perforating about three thousand sheets, or seven hundred and twenty thousand
single stamps each, per day. The sheets were placed accurately upon one another, in
packs of five sheets each, and perforated by the descent of solid steel punching pins
which fitted into holes in a steel plate, so that the circular bits of paper were cut out and
driven through the plate into a box below. Each stroke of the machine perforated the
pack of sheets along one row of stamps, twentj'-one such strokes being required to
complete each pack, which was moved by the machine successively into twenty-one
different positions. The cost of perforation was estimated at six shillings and eightpence
per thousand sheets, or one-third of a penny per thousand stamps. About nine thousand
sheets, or upwards of two millions of stamps, were perforated daily.
Attempts have been made by private persons, from time to time, to infringe the exclusive
privilege conferred upon the Postmaster-General by the Post Office Acts. In
October, 1865, one Robert Brydone established in St. Andrew Street, Edinburgh, a
Company under the title of "The Edinburgh and Leith Circular Delivery Company."
The object of the Company was to undertake to deliver circulars for one farthing each,
and for the purpose of indicating prepayment they issued stamps (see Fig. 831) to be
affixed to the circulars.
Fig. 831.
The local delivery of such circulars must have very materially affected the Post
Office revenue, since the public preferred getting their circulars delivered by the
Company for a farthing to paying the Post Office a penny for the same service.
The stamps were of various colours, and bore the arms of Edinburgh and Leith, and
were in some instances actually cancelled by an obliteration mark (see Fig. 832).
Fig. 832 (R. B. &'Co.).
So long as Mr. Brydone's operations were confined to Edinburgh no action was
taken by the Government to prevent his carrying on the business, but when he extended
his operations to London, in 1866, under the title of "The London Circular and Pamphlet
Delivery Company" and the "London and Metropolitan Circular and Pamphlet
Delivery Company," the Postal Authorities became alarmed at these undertakmgs. The
Companies, however, did not play their cards very judiciously ;
they issued stamps of the