THE IMPORTANCE OF SPEED TO COMMERCE. [To THE EDITOR OF
THE "SPECTATOR."] SIR,—Referring to Mr. Ackworth's letter in the Spectator of December 15th. How many letters could the Post Office deliver without delay if the addresses they bore were, say-
(the first meaning "J. G***n and Nephew, London," and the second "To F*****n, London, from B*****m ") And yet hundreds of thousands of crates of earthenware identical in appearance in Staffordshire, and hundreds of thousands of bales of goods in Lancashire and Yorkshire, and millions of casks of ale throughout the country are handed to the railway companies with similar cabalistic marks, and without anything further to indicate their destination: the reason being that manufacturers are so afraid of their rivals and competitors finding out who their customers are, that the only " address " they put on their goods is intentionally such that even the " cutest " of their rivals if he gets a chance view of them shall be unable to tell who they are for or where they are going; and where, as it is so often the case, the goods are pur- chased through a " middleman," he is so anxious that neither the manufacturers shall know who the consumer is, or the consumer who the manufacturer is, that he takes even greater precautions to " blind the trail," and then because occasionally one of these packages gets astray the railway company is blamed; for this sums up the complaints which have been made in your columns.—I am, Sir, &c.,
W. D. PHTLLIPPS.
North Staffordshire Railway, General Manager's Office, Stoke-upon-Trent.
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