side with the representatives of the British Post Office in what is the nearest approach yet realised to

"The Parliament of man, the Federation of the world."

The internal development of the post offices of the Colonies has been remarkable. To take a few

examples :

In 1840 there were 54 post offices open in New South Wales, which in those days included what is now the Colony of Victoria; in 1898 there were 1500, not counting receiving offices. Sixty years ago the revenue was £4300 and the expenditure £3900; in 1898 the revenue was £920,000 and the expenditure £848,000. The bulk of the mails half a century ago is indicated by the statement in a report of 1845 that "The mails are conveyed to and from the harbour (at Sydney) in the mail cart, if the horse is not otherwise employed or the mail too bulky." In 1899 there were despatched from New South Wales for the United Kingdom alone 180,000 lbs. of ordinary mail matter, and 9000 parcels. The average number of letters, newspapers, &c., sent and received in New South Wales is about 100 per annum for each man, woman, and child. This is almost the highest average for any country in the world. For the United Kingdom, for instance, the corresponding number is 88.

In 1824 there were sixty-nine post offices in the Canadas-that is to say, in the present provinces of Ontario and Quebec-where, in 1899, there were 5000 offices. In the whole of the Dominion there are now 9500 offices, or one for every 500 inhabitants. The mail routes over Canadian territory are of great extent, even the remote district of Klondike getting a mail once or twice a week.

The postal service in the Cape Colony dates from 1806, when correspondence began to be forwarded from and to Cape Town by relays of Hottentots, the

postage ranging from 6d. for a single sheet to or from Simon's Bay, to 2s. for a single sheet to or from GraafReinet, Algoa Bay, &c. In that year the total revenue was £38. Six years later it is recorded that the weekly post to Graham's Town covered the distance of nearly 600 miles in eight days, and that to GraafReinet (about 500 miles) was due to arrive in seven days. These places are now only forty-three and thirty hours respectively distant by mail train from Cape Town.

Now there are nearly a thousand post offices in the colony, and the organisation of the mail service is very complete. Before the war, which broke out in October 1899, and ended in the annexation of the Transvaal and Orange Free State to the British Empire, travelling post offices ran between Cape Town and Johannesburg in the Transvaal; the thinly-populated territory is covered by a network of cart and mounted posts; and even if the stories of mail-carts drawn by zebras and ostriches are mythical, it is certain that in some districts near the Kalahari Desert the mails are carried on camel-back. The revenue of the post office in 1898 exceeded £600,000, showing a surplus over expenditure of nearly £9000.

All the principal Colonies, besides providing for the carriage and delivery of correspondence, have their money order, postal order, and savings bank services, and give all the other facilities expected from the post office in these days. Indeed postal reformers are beginning to hold up the colonial post offices as an example in some respects to the post office of the Mother Country. The latter, naturally more conservative and slow-moving, will probably in the future have much to learn from its progressive offspring. Should it, for example, ever be called upon to arrange for the payment of old age pensions, it will profit by the experience of New Zealand, where the post office already performs that function. Inspired thus by a

spirit of healthy rivalry in their separate spheres of operation, and heartily co-operating in all matters of joint utility, the post offices of the several parts of the British Empire may be expected to move forward in their great work of maintaining the social, commercial, and political communications of that Empire throughout the world.

ELECTRIC TELEGRAPH SERVICE

CABLE AND COLONIAL TELEGRAPHS

BY FERDINAND E. KAPPEY

FOR Great Britain, at least, that mighty electric nervesystem, known as the submarine telegraph, may be said to stand as a concrete definition of Imperial unity; and for the world, as an earnest of that mutual understanding and oneness of purpose by which alone the advancement of the race is possible. Regarded merely as the most potent factor in the maintenance of Empire, the submarine cable would more than justify its existence, though to narrow the issues to this extent would argue a poor appreciation of the immense benefits which have otherwise accrued from its employment. It is, perhaps, natural that the vast material interests which are fostered by its means should claim prior consideration. As the controlling instrument of national aggrandisement and individual enterprise, the tremendous powers for good or ill which it exercises throughout the civilised world are at once obvious and insistent; while its ethical significance is all too easily lost sight of. So that, to show something more than an intelligent apprehension of this mystery of instantaneous intercommunication, it is necessary to touch upon the various spheres of interest which its use involves, and to estimate as far as possible its influence on modern life and modern thought. To cover the whole field in anything like detail would, of course, be impossible in the space at our command, but some indication will be given later on of its general effects upon the political and

commercial tendencies of the age, and the moralities of our daily intercourse.

It will be of interest if, before considering the leading submarine cables and their principal land communications in their special relation to our colonies, we briefly record the "first beginnings," those experiments which ultimately led to the gigantic undertakings which are now among the everyday commonplaces; for, like all great epoch-making enterprises, enormous difficulties were encountered only to be overcome, and the final triumph achieved when failure appeared inevitable.

It must not be supposed that the credit of the inspiration falls wholly to the nineteenth century, for we find that as far back as 1793, Salva, a Spanish scientist who is best remembered in this regard, read a paper before the Barcelona Academy of Sciences, in which he suggested the possibility of submarine telegraphy, although he does not appear to have troubled himself about demonstrating the practicability of his theories. This apparently was left to Aldini, a nephew of the great Galvani, who in 1803 is said to have successfully conducted a series of experiments off Calais, and also across the river Marne; while Sömmering and Schilling in 1811, with the benefit of Aldini's experience to work upon, succeeded in obtaining fairly satisfactory results across the Isar near Munich. Their experiments, as Mr. C. Bright points out in his work upon this subject, were mainly concerned with the adoption of some soluble insulating material, the precise nature of which is at present doubtful, but which nevertheless proved practicable for the short distance operated over. Two years later, John Robert Sharpe took the work in hand, and was successful in transmitting a code of signals through seven miles of insulated wire. Of all the experiments referred to however, particulars are wanting, for beyond their mere mention there does not