Directions to the Deputy Post-Masters, for keeping their Accounts.

The second Book referred to in your Instructions must be in Folio, of Post or Demy Paper, about fifteen Inches long, and Eighteen and a Half wide. The Quantity of Paper to be contained in it must be determined by the Number of Letters you receive and dispatch: A Book that will contain three, four, or more Years Transaction, will be best. You are to begin it with an Account of Letters sent from your Office, according to the following Specimen, mark’d B. Every Time you dispatch a Mail, you are to turn to this Account, and fill it up from the Post-Master’s Bills you send to each Office. After heading this Account (that you may have Room to carry it forward from Time to Time, as the Pages become fill’d) you are to leave a Quantity of blank Paper after it, extending to about the Middle of your Book, where you must enter an Account of Letters received into your Office, according to the Form mark’d C.

C.

That you may be at no Loss to fill up each Column of this Account (mark’d C) properly, observe the following Directions. On the Receipt of any Mail, lay all the Post-Masters Bills before you (having first examined whether they are right or no, as directed in the third Instruction.) Enter the Time of receiving in the first Column. From each of the Bills enter the Name of the Office in the second Column: The Date of the Bill in the Third: The Pennyweights and Grains of the Unpaid Letters you receive from such Office in the fourth Column, exactly according to the Foot of the Bill, whether right or wrong cast up, whether under or overcharged, because the 6th and 7th Columns will rectify the Mistake, if any. Enter the Amount of the Way Letters you receive from the Post-Man, belonging to your Stage only, and also the Amount of the Letters you deliver him from your Stage (not being charged to you in any Bill) to be left on the Road, for which he is to pay you the Postage, in the 5th Column. Enter the Under and Overcharges of each Bill in the 6th and 7th Columns, opposite to the Name of the Office where such Under or Overcharges were made. Enter the Amount of Paid Letters you receive from each Office, in the 8th Column, opposite to the Name of such Office. When you receive any Letters in the Mail, mis-sent, and which you have forwarded to other Offices, place the Amount of such Letters, as charged to you in the Bill, in the 9th Column. When you receive Letters from on board any Ship or Vessel, you are to enter the Name of such Vessel in the 2d Column; the Number of Letters you have paid the Captain or others for in the 10th Column; and the Amount of such of them as belong to your Office only, in the 11th Column, marking the Rates on them at the Time of receiving. Hence you may with little Trouble make up your Quarterly Account, as follows;

For filling up this Account, observe the following Directions:

Sum up the whole Amount of Pennyweights and Grains, on both Sides, and extend it in the current Coin of your Province, in the Columns for that Purpose, at the Rate you receive for Pennyweights and Grains. Then strike a Balance, due from you to the General Post-Office.

Some of the Articles in the above Account will be often unnecessary, as when during the whole Quarter, you have received no mis-sent Letters; have not been under or overcharged; where the Office is not a Sea-port, &c. so that in the printed Account sent to the General Post-Office every Quarter, some of these Articles will remain blank.

It will be proper to copy the Quarterly Accounts you send to the General Post-Office into the latter Part of your Book.

You have now only an Account to raise for the General Post-Office; which, as it will take up but little Room, may be on the last Folio of your Book save one: To the Creditor Side of which Account, you must carry all your Quarterly Balances; and on the Debtor Side, charge all the Money you remit to, or pay by Order of, the Post-Master General, the Comptroller, or either of them.

In placing the aforementioned Accounts in different Parts of your Book, as directed, you may contrive it, as nearly as possible, that every Part of your Book may be filled at one and the same time.