ness it nightly,
Our ancestors lived unca lang in the dark;
Their wisdom was folly, their sense melancholy
When compared wi' sic wonderfu' modern wark.
Neist o' rags, bags, and size then, let no one despise them,
Without them whar wad a' our paper come frae?
The dark flood o' ink too, I'm given to think too,
Could as ill be wanted at this time o' day.
The Quill is a queer thing, a cheap and a dear thing,
A weak-lookin' object, but gude kens how strang,
Sometimes it is ceevil, sometimes it's the deevil.
Tak tent when you touch it, you haudna it wrang.
The Press I'll next mention, a noble invention,
The great mental cook with resources so vast;
It spreads on bright pages the knowledge o' ages,
And tells to the future the things of the past.
Hech, sirs! but its awfu' (but ne'er mind it's lawfu')
To saddle the Postman wi' sic meikle bags;
Wi' epistles and sonnets, love billets and groan-ets,
Ye'll tear the poor Postie to shivers and rags.
Noo Jock sends to Jenny, it costs but ae penny,
A screed that has near broke the Dictionar's back,
Fu' o' dove-in and dear-in, and _thoughts_ on the shearin'!!
Nae need noo o' whisp'rin' ayont a wheat stack.
Auld drivers were lazy, their mail-coaches crazy,
At ilk public-house they stopt for a gill;
But noo at the gallop, cheap mail-bags maun wallop.
Hurrah for our Postman, the great Roland Hill.
"Then send round the liquor," etc.

The advantages resulting from a rapid and cheap carriage of letters must
readily occur to any ordinary mind; but perhaps the following would
hardly suggest itself as one of those advantages. Dean Alford thus
wrote about the usefulness of post-cards, introduced on the 1st October
1870: "You will also find a new era in postage begun. The halfpenny
cards have become a great institution. Some of us make large use of them
to write short Latin epistles on, and are brushing up our Cicero and
Pliny for that purpose."

Unlike some of the branches of post-office work, other than the
distribution of news, either by letter or newspaper, the money order
system dates from long before the introduction of penny postage--namely
from the year 1792.

It was set on foot by some of the post-office clerks on their own
account; but it was not till 1838 that it became a recognised business
of the Department. Owing to h