addressee.[432] To a limited extent a service is given in certain
localities not directly served by railway. In these cases, which are
arranged only with the concurrence of the companies, the service is
conducted by the ordinary road carriers.[433] The extension of the
service in the rural districts is one of the problems which face the
postal administration.[434]

A local parcel post service was established in Paris in 1881 by
arrangement with the Compagnie des Messageries Nationales, but it did
not prove profitable, and was discontinued in 1887. A new service was
set up in 1890. The contractor is required to make two deliveries on
week-days and one on Sundays and feast days (_les jours f['e]ri['e]s_),
and to maintain an office in each arrondissement. The system has,
however, developed. Three daily deliveries are now given, and nearly 500
offices have been opened. The rate of postage is 25 centimes for parcels
not exceeding 5 kilogrammes, and 40 centimes for parcels between 5 and
10 kilogrammes.

The total number of inland parcels posted during the year 1913-14 was
about 52 millions.

* * * * *

PARCEL POST IN GERMANY

In the days of the horse-posts it was obviously undesirable to burden
the mails with weighty packages, and the transmission of parcels by post
was from the first discouraged in Germany, although not forbidden.
Parcels were charged as letters by the half-ounce, a sufficiently high
rate to prevent the use of the posts for their transmission to any
inconvenient degree. The first Imperial posts did not, indeed, undertake
the transmission of parcels. The business was left to private
enterprise, and was conducted by the _Boten-Anstalten_. The posts
themselves were, however, made use of for the transmission of parcels of
merchandise for private individuals at least as far back as the Thirty
Years' War. Owing to the dislocation of industry and commerce during
that war and the high rates of postage charged, the number of parcels
was extremely small, and their transmission was confined to limited
areas.[435]

As early as 1635 the messengers were allowed to carry parcels so long as
their travelling was not thereby impeded,[436] and in 1652 a regular
parcel service was in operation between Basel and Zurich, Schaffhausen,
Lindau, and Ulm. In 1660 the Great Elector ordered that no parcels
should thenceforward be carried by the posts free of postage. This may
perhaps be taken