[126] Letter to Rowland Hill from Mr Baring, dated “Downing Street, 14th September 1839.”

[127] “Life,” i. 371.

[128] An amusing character-sketch of Colonel Maberly is to be found in the pages of Edmund Yates's “Recollections and Experiences.”

[129] In connection with the putting up of one receptacle in London not many years ago, a gruesome discovery was made. The ground near St Bartholomew's Hospital had been opened previous to the erection of a pillar letter-box, when a quantity of ashes, wood and human, came to light. “Bart's” looks upon Smithfield, scene of the burning of some of the martyrs for conscience' sake. No need, then, to ponder the meaning of these sad relics. They clearly pointed to sixteenth-century man's inhumanity to man.

[130] The first person to post a letter under the new system is said to have been Mr Samuel Lines of Birmingham, Rowland Hill's former drawing-master, whose portrait hangs in the Art Gallery of that city. He was warmly attached to his ex-pupil, who, in turn, held the old man in high esteem, and maintained an occasional correspondence with him till the artist's death. Determined that in Birmingham no one should get the start of him, Mr Lines wrote to my father a letter of congratulation, and waited outside the Post Office till at midnight of the 9th a clock rang out the last stroke of twelve. Then, knocking up the astonished clerk on duty, he handed in the letter and the copper fee, and laconically remarked: “A penny, I believe.”

[131] Another well-known literary woman, the poetess, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, according to her “Letters” recently published, wrote to an American friend earnestly recommending adoption of “our penny postage, as the most successful revolution since 'the glorious three days' of Paris”—meaning, of course, the three days of July 1830 (i. 135).

[132] This window and the amusing scramble outside it are immortalised in Dickens's pleasant article on the Post Office in the opening number of Household Words, first edition, 30th March 1850. (Our friend, Mr Henry Wills, already mentioned in the Introductory Chapter, was Dickens's partner in Household Words, and brought the famous novelist to our house at Hampstead to be dined and “crammed” before writing the article. It was a memorable evening. No doubt the cramming was duly administered, but recollection furnishes no incident of this operation, and only brings back to mind a vivid picture of Dickens talking humorously, charmingly, incessantly, during the too brief visit, and of his doing so by tacit and unanimous consent, for no one had the slightest wish to interrupt the monologue's delightful flow. His countenance was agreeable and animated; the impression made upon us was of a man, who, as the Americans aptly put it, is “all there.” We often saw him both within doors and without, for one of his favourite walks, while living in Tavistock Square, was up to Hampstead, across the Heath—with an occasional peep in at “Jack Straw's Castle,” where friends made a rendezvous to see him—and back again to town through Highgate. Every one knew him by sight. The word would fly from mouth to mouth, “Here comes Dickens!” and the lithe figure, solitary as a rule, with its steady, swinging pace, and the keen eyes looking straight ahead at nothing in particular, yet taking in all that was worth noting, would appear, pass, and be lost again, the while nearly every head was turned to look after him.) Whenever visitors were shown over the Post Office, they were advised so to time their arrival that the tour should end a little before 6 P.M., with a visit to a certain balcony whence a good view could be obtained of the scene. One day my father escorted the Duchess of Cambridge and her younger daughter—better known since as Duchess of Teck—over the Post Office. He was delighted with their society, being greatly struck with the elder lady's sensible, well-informed talk, and the lively, sociable manner of the younger one. Both were much amused by the balcony scene, and Princess Mary entered keenly into the fun of the thing. She grew quite excited as the thickening crowd pressed forward faster, laughed, clapped her hands, and audibly besought the stragglers, especially one very leisurely old dame, to make haste, or their letters would not be posted in time.

[133] “Life,” i. 451. In 1841 the census gave the population of England and Wales as a little under 16,000,000. The delay above mentioned therefore affected at least a fourth of the number.

[134] “Report of the Committee on Postage” (1843), p. 29.

[135] See also chap. vi.

[136] “Life,” i. 412.

[137] “First Annual Report of the Postmaster-General, 1854.”

[138] “Life,” i. 414.

[139] “Life,” ii. 4, 5.

[140] “Life,” ii. 87.

[141] Ibid, i. 448.

[142] “Hansard,” lxiv. 321.

[143] “Life,” i. 460.

[144] “Life,” i. 471.

[145] Ibid., i. 468.

[146] The registration fee is one of the postal charges which have become smaller since that time, to the great benefit of the public. It is pleasant to know that the threatened plan of highly-feed compulsory registration was never carried into effect.

[147] “Gentle Tom Hood,” as the wittiest of modern poets has been called, was a friend of old standing. Though little read to-day, some of his more serious poems are of rare beauty, and his Haunted House is a marvel of what Ruskin used to call “word-painting.” His letters to children were as delightful as those of the better-known “Lewis Carroll.” Hood was very deaf, and this infirmity inclined him, when among strangers or in uncongenial society, to taciturnity. Guests who had never met him, and who came expecting to hear a jovial fellow set the table in a roar, were surprised to see a quiet-mannered man in evidently poor health, striving, by help of an ear-trumpet, to catch other people's conversation. But, at any rate, it was not in our house that the hostess, piqued at the chilly silence pervading that end of her table which should have been most mirthful, sent her little daughter down the whole length of it to beg the bored wit to “wake up and be funny!” Hood had many cares and sorrows, including the constant struggle with small means and ill-health; and it is pleasant to remember that when the final breakdown came, Sir Robert Peel—concealing under a cloak of kindly tactfulness, so kindly that the over-sensitive beneficiary could not feel hurt—bestowed on the dying man some sorely-needed monetary assistance.

[148] This and the previous paragraph are contributed by Mr Pearson Hill, who was always, and deservedly, entirely in our father's confidence.

[149] “Life,” i. 436. The only time, later, when there seemed a chance of such increase was during the Crimean War, “when,” said my father in his diary, “being called upon to make a confidential report, I showed that, though some immediate increase of revenue might be expected from raising the rate to twopence, the benefit would be more than counterbalanced by the check to correspondence; and upon this the project was abandoned.”

[150] It was during Rowland Hill's connection with the Railway Company that a riddle appeared in a certain newspaper which was copied into other papers, and was therefore not slow in reaching our family circle. It was worded much as follows: “When is Mr Rowland Hill like the rising sun?—When he tips the little Hills with gold.” We never knew who originated this delightful jeu d'esprit, but our father was much amused with it, and we children had the best possible reason for being grateful to its author. The riddle cropped up afresh in Lord Fitzmaurice's “Life of Lord Granville” (i. 174); but the Duke of Argyll, then Postmaster-General, is therein made the generous donor.