The Development of Rates of Postage. By A. D. Smith.
(Allen and Unwin. 16s. net.)—Mr. Smith's elaborate study of postal rates, not merely in Great Britain but on the Continent and in America, is specially interesting in view of the increased rates proposed in the Budget. The author is an official of the General Post Office, but he expresses his own views, coloured perhaps by his Departmental training, and yet explained with a clearness and precision that are not the attributes of the bureaucrat. Mr. Smith draws a sharp distinotion between the Letter Post and the Parcel Post—on which there is a considerable loss—and shows why it would be undesirable to extend the Parcel Post facilities, and why also it might be advantageous to vary the rates according to the distance to which the parcel is to be conveyed. His analysis of cost shows that there is a large profit on letters and postcards. His book contains a mass of information, carefully tabulated and indexed, and will long remain the standard work on an important subject.
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