8 In stating that the British Post Office is the only really organised Postal administration in China there is no intention to convey any idea that this Office at all claims or even desires a monopoly of Postal work in that country. Few things would be regarded by the Hongkong Post Office with more satisfaction than the establishment of a really efficient Chinese Post Office at every port on the Coast. Such an office could at present be worked only by the foreign Customs, and the pleasure of co-operating with it, instead of directing our own few and under-manned Agencies, is a thing to look forward to (like the entry of Australia and the Cape into the Postal Union) as extremely desirable rather than at all probable. An Official Post Office has been established by the Chinese Government at Canton under the title of Man-pò Kuh. It is intended to facilitate the exchanging of correspondence with Chinese Ambassadors, Ministers, Consuls, and other officials stationed abroad. It is understood that such correspondence will be transmitted through this Office.
9 There is at length every prospect of the appointment of an Assistant to this Office who will be able to give his whole time to it. More than four years have now elapsed since the gentleman whose place he will take was temporarily lent to the Supreme Court, and during the whole of that time this Department has been either partly or more generally wholly without Assistant. An idea no doubt prevails that, however much strength may be abstracted from the working staff of an Office, it will still continue to drift along somehow, and the application of this theory reached its climax when during the unavoidable absence of the writer, the then Assistant Postmaster General was expected efficiently to manage the Post Office (in itself too much for any one man) and also to keep the accounts of the Supreme Court. The natural result has of course been a breakdown. It must be recorded with pleasure that the routine of the Office has been kept together, so far as it has been kept together, during the four years alluded to, almost entirely by Mr. J. G. DA ROCHA, Accountant and subsequently Acting Assistant, who has done good service under very unfavourable conditions.
10 Towards the close of the year it became apparent that there was something radically wrong in the Department somewhere. Letters alleged to have contained money were missing, even a Registered Letter had disappeared in a very unaccountable manner. Suspicion at first fell on the Chinese staff, but when more Registered Letters disappeared it was evident that a clerk was the thief, and the measures taken resulted in the arrest and conviction of a lad who had been employed, in very misplaced charity, since March last as junior sorter, and who had plundered the Registered Letter case in a wholesale way which any more intelligent person would have known could not but ensure speedy detection. It is satisfactory to be able to add that, with the exception of money, of which he got a good deal out of unregistered letters, most of the stolen property has been restored to its owners. But even when this offender was disposed of, robberies of ordinary letters still went on. The want of sufficient superintendence had, in a few months, leavened the whole Office with dishonesty. Severe measures have been taken, and will continue to be taken should such evils continue.
But an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and is also very much easier. Facilis descensus.
11 These painful incidents have revealed the fact that very much larger sums in bank notes are sent through the Post in unregistered letters than the Department had suspected. It was hoped that reiterated warnings and appeals had induced some measure of consideration and caution as to this matter. It appears not to be so, however, and the facts being as they are, the immunity of this office in past years from serious cases of letter-stealing becomes only the more remarkable. Such offences have hitherto been confined to petty thefts by Chinese for the sake of clean stamps when they could get hold of them, and though perhaps such annoying robberies have always gone on a little, they have seldom led to complaints. It must be said of the clerks of this office that such a thing as dishonesty amongst them has hitherto been unknown, nor could it be believed, till the proof became indisputable, that a clerk was the offender in the late unhappy case.
12 It will be said that the Post Office has been for years past advocating the Registry of letters as rendering them perfectly safe, and here is a case in which more than a few of such letters have been stolen. Is not this a proof that the public is right in its idea that Registration is merely a pedantic crotchet of Postal Officials, and that an ordinary letter has as good a chance of reaching its destination as a Registered letter, if not a better?
13 To begin with, the late robberies were quickly detected because the letters stolen were Registered, and not only so, but also the Registration system enabled the Department to forward much of the stolen property to its owners. But also there are some evils for which no remedy exists except the selection of proper persons to fill places of trust. The clerk now in prison was one of those whose duty it is to watch over Registered Letters, to apply the various checks necessary to ensure their safe transit, and to prevent their being stolen. When the policeman himself turns thief, owners of property are apt to suffer for a while, and there is no remedy but to get a better policeman.
14 With regard to the transmission of Bank Notes, &c., in unregistered letters, this Department has adopted a line to which it is intended to adhere, namely, to make no enquiries whatever about the alleged losses of such letters. Such enquiries are, in any case, a farce, the enaction of which simply encourages the sending of this most objectionable kind of correspondence. When once a system of robbery fairly gets established in a Post Office, it is almost impossible to stop it, except by checking the transmission of the articles stolen. All other means of inducing the public not to send money in unregistered covers having failed, it may possibly be found that to turn a resolutely deaf ear to complaints of its loss will have the desired effect.