THE  POST  OFFICE

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beginning,  to  support  this  stupendous  enterprise,  lending
to  it  the  assistance  of  its  staff  and  such  resources  as  it
could  spare  ;  the  independent  and  quiet  creation  of  an
administration  so  new  and  so  useful  is  the  more  wonderful
in  this  immovable  country,  and  it  will  not  be  the  least  of
the  services  rendered  by  the  Customs  and  its  chief  to  China
and  her  people.  In  the  middle  of  1904  the  Chinese  Government, ­
  confident  at  last  of  the  ultimate  success  of  the  National
Post  Office,  granted  the  subsidies  required  to  bring  up  this
Service  to  a  state  of  completeness.  On  June  12,  1904,
the  Inspector  General  was  notified  by  the  Yâmen  that
in  future  an  annual  grant  of  Hk.  Tls.720,000  would  be
issued,  payable  in  monthly  instalments  of  Hk.  Tls.  10,000
at  six  of  the  Treaty  Ports—Tientsin,  Shanghai,  Hankow,
Foochow,  Swatow,  and  Canton.  This  grant  has  not  been
received  in  full,  not  more  than  half  being  forthcoming,  but
it  enables  the  Service  to  provide  for  its  actual  money
deficiency.  The  Post  Office  is  worked  “  on  the  cheap."
Chinese  cheap  labour  is  utilised  to  the  fullest  extent  compatible ­
  with  paying  a  sufficient  living  wage  to  remove  from
the  staff  the  necessity  of  supplementing  it  by  peculation  ;
and  in  addition  much  is  still  provided  from  funds  of  the
Revenue  Department  of  the  Customs.  The  salaries  of  the
Inspector  General,  the  Deputy  Postal  Secretary,  the  District
Postmasters  ex  officio,  the  District  Accountants,  and  many
subordinate  employees  are  not  a  charge  on  postal  funds  ;  the
mass  of  printed  forms  required,  about  thirty  million  in
a  year,  are  provided  without  special  accounting  ;  office
accommodation  is  provided  on  Customs  premises  at  many
°f  the  smaller  ports  ;  steamer  mail  subsidies  are  paid  from
Customs  funds  ;  and  it  is  probable  that  a  complete  severance ­
  of  Customs  and  Postal  expenditure  would  add  to  the
fatter  some  lakhs  of  taels  a  year.
It  must  be  acknowledged  that  the  Postal  undertaking
has  long  passed  the  experimental  stage.  Large  communities,
mreign  and  Chinese,  are  now  dependent  on  the  Imperial
Post  Office  for  the  transmission  of  their  correspondence,
and  the  public  duties  of  the  Service  increase  every  day.