s have since been
made by its members and first given to the world at its meetings.

Franklin's appointment as one of the two Deputy Postmasters General
of the colonies in 1753 enlarged his experience and his reputation. He
visited nearly all the post offices in the colonies and introduced
many improvements into the service. In none of his positions did his
transcendent business ability show to better advantage. He established
new postal routes and shortened others. There were no good roads in the
colonies, but his post riders made what then seemed wonderful speed.
The bags were opened to newspapers, the carrying of which had previously
been a private and unlawful perquisite of the riders. Previously there
had been one mail a week in summer between New York and Philadelphia
and one a month in winter. The service was increased to three a week in
summer and one in winter.

The main post road ran from northern New England to Savannah, closely
hugging the seacoast for the greater part of the way. Some of the
milestones set by Franklin to enable the postmasters to compute the
postage, which was fixed according to distance, are still standing.
Crossroads connected some of the larger communities away from the
seacoast with the main road, but when Franklin died, after serving also
as Postmaster General of the United States, there were only seventy-five
post offices in the entire country.

Franklin took a hand in the final struggle between France and England
in America. On the eve of the conflict, in 1754, commissioners from the
several colonies were ordered to convene at Albany for a conference with
the Six Nations of the Iroquois, and Franklin was one of the deputies
from Pennsylvania. On his way to Albany he "projected and drew a plan
for the union of all the colonies under one government so far as might
be necessary for defense and other important general purposes." This
statesmanlike "Albany Plan of Union," however, came to nothing. "Its
fate was singular," says Franklin; "the assemblies did not adopt it, as
they all thought there was too much PREROGATIVE in it and in England it
was judg'd to have too much of the DEMOCRATIC."

How to raise funds for defense was always a grave problem in the
colonies, for the assemblies controlled the purse-strings and released
them with a grudging hand. In face of the French menace, this was
Governor Shirley's problem in Massachusetts, Governor Dinwiddie's in
Virginia, and Franklin's in