: A Steam Navigation Company subject upon which I had pregnently written with very little effect, regarding the detention on board there Packets of the Box of House Letters which each brought from Shanghai on such occasion, until a considerable time after the mail Boxes had been brought to the Post Office, and this causing inconvenience to the Community, and a second delivery of letters, I mentioned the matter to him (although there was but little necessity for my doing so, because he must have been well acquainted with the state of things which existed) and named the firms whose correspondence was still carried by the Packets of the Company otherwise than through the Post, but my interview resulted, as I regret to say most others have with the gentleman unsatisfactorily. As I was not aware of the exact terms of the prohibition from carrying the Company's letters in a private manner under the contract with Government, I addressed a letter to the Secretary of the General Post Office in London, asking for a copy of the contract, and mentioning my reason for requiring it. I inclose copy of that letter and a copy of the reply I received to it.