tches are conveyed to their
destinations by a staff of men specially employed for the purpose, and
under the control of the Board of War in Peking. They ride from
station to station at a fair pace, considering the sorry, ill-fed nags
upon which they are mounted; important documents being often carried
to great distances, at a rate of two hundred miles a-day. The people,
however, are not allowed to avail themselves of this means of
communication, but the necessities of trade have driven them to
organise a system of their own.

In any Chinese town of any pretensions whatever, there are sure to be
several "letter offices," each monopolising one or more provinces, to
and from which they make it their special business to convey letters
and small parcels. The safety of whatever is entrusted to their care
is guaranteed, and its value made good if lost; at the same time, the
contents of all packets must be declared at the office where posted,
so that a corresponding premium may be charged for their transmission.
The letter-carriers travel chiefly on foot, sometimes on donkeys, to
be found on all the great highways of China, and which run with
unerring accuracy from one station to another, unaccompanied by any
one except the hirer. There is little danger of the donkeys being
stolen, unless carried off bodily, for heaven and earth could no more
move them from their beaten track than the traveller who, desirous of
making two stages without halting, could induce them to pass the door
of the station they have just arrived at. Carrying about eighty or
ninety pounds weight of mail matter, these men trudge along some five
miles an hour till they reach the extent of their tether; there they
hand over the bag to a fresh man, who starts off, no matter at what
hour of the day or night, and regardless of good or bad weather alike,
till he too has quitted himself of his responsibility by passing on
the bag to a third man. They make a point of never eating a full meal;
they eat themselves, as the Chinese say, six or seven tenths full,
taking food as often as they feel at all hungry, and thus preserve
themselves from getting broken-winded early in life. Recruited from
the strongest and healthiest of the working-classes, it is above all
indispensable that the Chinese letter-carrier should not be afraid of
any ghostly enemy, such as bogies or devils. In this respect they must
be tried men before they are entrusted with a mail; for an ordinary
C