THE  POST  OFFICE

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at  the  Inspectorate  and  in  the  Custom  Houses  at
Shanghai  and  Chinkiang,  and,  similarly,  for  the
transmission  of  mails  by  coast  steamers  during  the
open  season,  the  opening  of  quasi-Postal  Departments
in  the  Tientsin  and  other  coast  port  Custom  Houses.
At  that  early  date  it  could  be  seen  that  out  of  this
simple  beginning  might  be  elaborated  a  system
answering  other  and  larger  requirements,  on  the
principle  of  a  National  Post  Office.  This  idea
gradually  shaped  into  form  and  had  already  so  much
ingratiated  itself  in  the  official  mind  that  in  1876,
when  the  Chef00  Convention  was  being  negotiated,
the  Tsung-li  Yâmen  authorised  the  Inspector  General
to  inform  the  British  Minister,  Sir  Thomas  Wade,  that
it  was  prepared  to  sanction  the  establishment  of  a
National  Postal  System  and  willing  to  make  it  a  Treaty
stipulation  that  postal  establishments  should  be
opened  at  once.  Unfortunately,  through,  so  to  speak,
a  conspiracy  of  silence,  the  insertion  of  the  postal
clause  was  omitted  in  the  official  text  of  the  Treaty,
and  thus  the  project  was  postponed  sine  die.  Meanwhile, ­
  however,  the  experiment  was  persevered  with
and  warmly  encouraged  by  the  Imperial  Commissioner
Li  Hung-chang,  who  promised  to  '  father  '  it  officially
as  soon  as  it  proved  a  success.  Hence  the  more
formal  opening  of  Postal  Departments  at  various
Custom  Houses,  the  1878  experiment  of  trying  a
Native  Post  Office  alongside  the  Customs  Post,  and
the  establishment  of  Customs  couriers  from  Taku
to  Tientsin,  from  Tientsin  to  Peking,  and  the  Customs
winter  mail  service  overland  from  Tientsin  to  Newchwang,
  from  Tientsin  to  Chefoo,  and  from  Tientsin
to  Chinkiang,  as  also  the  introduction  of  Customs
postage  stamps  in  1878.
“  The  growing  importance  of  the  Service  thus
quietly  built  up  and  its  convenience  for  regular  communications ­
  with  Peking  and  between  Treaty  ports
were  not  only  appreciated  by  the  foreign  public,  but