Certificates of the posting of parcels can be got at all post offices.  If you have any doubt about the trustworthiness of the person entrusted with the posting of a parcel, instructions should be given to bring back a receipt.  A few months ago the Post Office was charged at Liverpool with the non-delivery of a bottle of wine and a box of figs.  It turned out, however, that the missing goods had never come under its charge, the person to whom the packet had been given to post having eaten the figs and drunk the wine.

Parcels can also be insured against loss and damage by the payment of a small sum.  Paying a penny insures to the extent of L5 and twopence to the amount of L10.

In order to understand the outs and ins of the Post Office—­and it is a subject with which every sensible person should be familiar—­let a girl invest sixpence in a copy of the Post Office Guide, a publication of which an edition is issued every quarter.  She will there find everything necessary to be known about the posting of letters, postcards, newspapers, book packets, and parcels to places in the United Kingdom, or abroad, the sending of telegrams, the rates for money and postal orders, and the regulations of the Savings Bank.  To turn over its 300 pages or so is decidedly interesting.  One sees what a complicated machinery is now employed for the convenience of the public, what wonders—­to speak of letters alone—­can be done for a penny, and how thousands of miles can be reduced to insignificance by the magic of twopence-halfpenny.

In the twelve months from the 31st of March, 1885, to the same day of this year, the number of letters delivered in the United Kingdom was 1,403,547,900, giving an average of 38.6 to each person in the kingdom.  The total number of postcards was 171,290,000.  Adding to the letters and postcards the book-packets, newspapers, and parcels which passed through the Post Office during the twelve months, we have a grand total of 2,091,183,822, which shows an average to each person of 57.5.

VARIETIES.

THE “WOMAN OF STENAY.”

“And so you have not heard the story of the ’Woman of Stenay’?” said a Lorraine peasant.  “It was in war-time, and she offered a barrel of wine to a detachment of Austrians, saying—­

“‘You are thirsty, friends.  Drink.  You are welcome to all my store.’  And as she spoke she drank a cupful in their honour.

“The soldiers accepted with pleasure, and in a few minutes four hundred men were writhing on the ground in agony.

“Then the ‘Woman of Stenay’ rose, and with her dying breath shrieked out—­

“‘You are all poisoned! Vive la France!’

“She then fell back a corpse.”

This is the legend of Lorraine, and the memory of its heroine is revered by the peasantry as highly as that of Charlotte Corday.

SINGING SERVANTS.