388  THE  CHINESE  EMPIRE
audited  and  passed  to  a  General  Account  for  the  whole
Service.
The  organisation  as  above  described,  incomplete  as  it
is  yet,  answers  the  most  immediate  requirements  of  postal
work  ;  and  the  progress  made  these  last  few  years—that  is,
since  steady  expansion  began  in  1901—vouches  for  the
soundness  of  the  system  upon  which  it  is  established.
A  few  comparative  figures  will  prove  interesting.

District  Offices
Branch  Offices
Agencies
Articles  dealt  with
Parcels  :  number
,,  weight  in  lbs.
Letters  in  Native
clubbed  mails

1901.

30
134
12
10,500,000
126,800
552,000
7,300,000

1903.

34
320
609
42,500,000
487,000
2,673,000
7,267,500

1905.

41
396
1,189
76,000,000
1.132.000
7,176,400
8.896.000

1906.

38
484
i,574
113,000,000
1.383. 000
9.482.000

Divided  between  the  four  large  geographical  divisions
of  China,  the  results  for  1906  can  be  summarised  as
follows  :—

Establishments. ­


North  China  :  Peking  to  Kiaochow
Central  China  :  Kiukiang  to  Chunking
Lower  Yangtze  :  Wuhu  to  Hangchow..
Southern  China  and  Yunnan  Stations..

696
415
322
663

Articles.

37.000.  000
17,500,000
38,500,000
20.000.  000

Parcels.

nnO

Total

2,096

i  X  3,000,000

A  few  words  must  be  said  on  the  financial  means  of  this
large  Service.  It  may  not  be  generally  known  that,  n ot
only  had  the  postal  experiment  started  in  1861  to  b e
carried  on  for  over  thirty  years  against  numerous  difficulté
and  without  the  avowed  support  of  the  Government,  but,
even  after  its  formal  recognition  in  1896,  without  %nY
special  pecuniary  help  from  it.  The  Customs  Service,  under
the  leadership  of  Sir  Robert  Hart,  had  alone,  from  the