THE  POST  OFFICE  393
for  transmission.  Unprofitable  inland  lines  they  have  been
willing  to  abandon,  but  for  the  profitable  routes  they  fight
tooth  and  nail.  Between  them  and  the  National  Post  it
is  “  a  fair  field  and  no  favor,”  and  the  latter,  with  fixed
rules  and  more  or  less  fixed  hours,  is  heavily  handicapped
against  business  agencies  with  flexible  rules  and  no  hours
to  speak  of.  The  Chinese  trader  and  official  know  no  limitation ­
  to  their  hours  of  business,  and  they  patronise  the
agency  which  consults  their  convenience.  The  Post  Office
must  close  at  some  fixed  hour,  even  if  it  is  at  9  or  10  p.m.
The  business  agency  can  remain  open  until  2  or  3  or  4  a.m.
if  thereby  business  is  furthered,  and  makes  a  practice  of
collecting  mail  matter,  even  at  those  hours,  from  its  clients’
places  of  business.  By  these  conditions  the  Post  Office  in
China  is  driven  to  develop  on  lines  of  its  own,  without
much  regard  to  procedure  elsewhere,  and  several  innovations
have  been  introduced  experimentally.  An  “  express  delivery ­
  ”  system  has  been  instituted  at  and  between  Peking,
Tientsin,  Shanghai,  Hankow,  Foochow,  and  Canton  ;  house
to  house  collection  has  been  started  in  the  business  section
of  certain  large  cities  ;  and,  in  general,  every  effort  is  made
to  increase  postal  facilities  to  meet  the  views  of  an  exacting
Chinese  public.