THE NET REVENUE OF THE POST-OFFICE.
IN the debates on the public finances, the new Postage has very often been alluded to in a spirit of unfairness. Before it was seen how the revenue would be affected by the measure, its enemies said that the whole would be lost : now it is found that there is a net revenue of 400,0001. a year. But the decriers, or those who went to magnify " the deficiency," shift their ground, and say, there is no Post-office revenue at all if the cost of the new packets is taken into the account. What have the new packets to do with ROWLAND HILL's plan ? If they do not pay, consult as to the expediency of keeping up that expense; but do not debit it to the Penny Postage. They were established for political purposes, and, as Lord MONTEAGLE said on Tuesday night, to render this country independent of the United States packets for communica- tion with British North America. They may be worth their cost; but the expense is not an item of Post-office accounts. ROWLAND HILL did not make it a part of his scheme that letters should be carried to North America in British vessels fit for fighting, merely to save Government despatches from being exported to our Co- lonies in United States bottoms. In a comparison, therefore, of the past and present Post-office revenue, the packets must be omitted ; and then it will appear that the Penny Postage already returns a net revenue of nearly half a million.
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