A supplement, explanatory and laudatory of the Duke of filcx-
momiis improvements and reforms in the Post-office department has been attached to the fifth and last edition of the Treasury; pamphlet of puffs entitled " The Reform illihisters and the Reformed Parliament.- Sundry new mail-coaches have been started, the travelling rates of others accelerated, new offices of delivery have been opened, and a number of other alterations and improvements have been eflbcted. We are sorry that among them nothing has been done to expedite or insure the safe delivery of Newspapers. This is a crying and a scandalous abuse of the Post-office department. Newspapers are delayed on the road, read, lent to read for hire, soiled and abused, by a parcel of im- pudent rascals ; and yet, forsooth, when complaint is made at head-quarters of these scandalous proceedings, the answer is- " probably your newsman is to blame." But every man, not an idiot, knows that it is the most especial interest of the news- man to transmit his papers in a cleanly condition, by the speediest possible conveyance; and that he is the very last man upon whom suspicion ought to fall of delaying or soiling a customer's news- paper.
We subjoin a letter which one of the subscribers to the Specta- tor addressed to Sir FRANCIS FREELING On this subject. The case of the writer is not an uncommon one. We are glad to say that in this instance DO pains will be spared to bring the guilty parties to exposure and punishment. But the Duke of RICHMOND and Sir FRANCIS-FREELING know perfectly well, that as long as Post-office Clerks,are allowed to traffic in newspapers, the regular newsmen and-their customers will always have more or less cause to complain of foul. play.
. " Northampton, 24th September 1S33.
" lave to reqnect your attention to the gross misconduct of some one of the Postmasters between this/pi:tee and Barnet. For several mouths past, my newsman in London has, on each Sundry-, regularly posted by the Barnet bags to me, the Spectator newspaper, directed as-follows : [Here the address is very explicitly gives.] Misdirection is written upon a printed /6cl/containing the name and direction ofthe newsvender, • Buck: • nail, King Street, Covent Garden: Thepaper, in due course, ought to be received by the Postmaster here on the Monday morning. The irregularity which I complainTif, first • began to take place iwth9 ef)1155e of last Spring ; and was this. The paper did not, as is the ease now, re(ach Northampton until Tuesday ; and withal, came so rumpled and soiled (its present condition), as to be totally unfit for binding. At the instance of my newsman, a complaint was made to the Post(offiee on the sukieet ; and it had the de- sired effect of checking such conduct, until within these few weeks, when I have been subjected to the detention of my paper until the Tuesday morning ; besides receiving it so soiled and rumpled, that the reading of it is quite disagreeable; and it is likewise rendered unfit for binding. I may likewise remark. that the direetiompaper, as made out by my newsvender, is sometimes partially torn, and the pieces sent on with a piece of packthre‘d tied round to keep on the remnant of the direction. At other times, an entirely fresh direetion.paper is put on, wi//& nay address. 'the latter was the case with the paper of last Sunday fortnight ; and which I forwardM to my newsreader, to enable him to prove that it is net the direct iompaper which he always semis. " As the Spectator is not oul■ all eXpellsiVO, had ;Lit extremely valuable publication, I Own that I feel excessively anno ell at the impudence of the party who is guilt y or Mu detention of my paper in t he o u, I have so minutely described to you: and as it is not the first complaint, I trust that you will consider it a ease worth y of investigation. From the state of the paper when I receive it, it is quite evident that it is extensively perused before it comes to my hands. I need ItArdly say, that no blame whatever at- taches to the respectable Postmaster of this plats, ; and I may here take the opportunity of mentioning, that in respect of the deli( ety of the Spectator of lust Sunday, on this day(Tnesday) it came by the London instead of the Barnet. Trusting that your early interference will put a stop to the above practiee, "1 have the honour to tentin,- Sze, Sir FRANCIS FREELING, pending the inquiry, suggests that our subscriber's own newsman may have been the thulty person. Did he read this very distinct, painstaking, and business-like statement, before he said this ? We would say to Sir FRANCIS—try Barnet.
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