Efficiency Without Fussiness.

A visit to the chief post office in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch or Dunedin during a busy time is an inspiration and a galvanic tonic. Magic hands move among the mail. Here is speed, without confusion. System is linked with efficiency and despatch. Everybody seems to feel the prod of the clock's hands, and the work goes with a whirr.

Seeing the mail coming into one of those offices, the rapid and orderly handling inside, and the quick despatch will give any observer a feeling of pride in his country's postal system, and of admiration for the staff. One has an impression that if New Zealand as a whole has the same indomitable carry-on spirit, with the same efficiency, as the Postal Department has, the slump will be getting a send-off well ahead of the dates guessed by pessimists.

In one corner of the Chief Post Office at Wellington a date-stamping machine has the rapid chatter of a quick-firing gun. That machine takes 900 letters a minute, and it has a hungry hum, as if it were eager for even larger feeds.

It is pleasant to be told that this speedy stamper is a New Zealand invention, and that it was made at Petone. Another very helpful New Zealand invention is the automatic franker, in use in thousands of private offices throughout the Dominion. The stamp-vending machines at the entrances of a number of post offices were also invented in New Zealand by a former employee of the Post Office, and they are now being made in this country.