the West.

The line was frequently used by the British Government in forwarding its
Asiatic correspondence to London. In 1860, a report of the activities of
the English fleet off the coast of China was sent through from San
Francisco eastward over this route. For the transmission of these
dispatches that Government paid one hundred and thirty-five dollars Pony
Express charges.

Nor did the commercial houses of the Pacific Coast cities appear to mind
a little expense in forwarding their business letters. Mr. Root says
there would often be twenty-five one dollar "Pony" stamps and the same
number of Government stamps - a total in postage of twenty-seven dollars
and fifty cents - on a single envelope. Not much frivolity passed
through these mails.

Pony Express riders received an average salary of from one hundred
dollars to one hundred and twenty-five dollars a month. A few whose
rides were particularly dangerous or who had braved unusual dangers
received one hundred and fifty dollars. Station men and their assistants
were paid from fifty to one hundred dollars monthly.

Of the eighty riders usually in the service, half were always riding in
either direction, East and West. The average "run" was seventy-five
miles, the men going and coming over their respective divisions on each
succeeding day. Yet there were many exceptions to this rule, as will be
shown later. At the outset, although facilities for shorter relays had
been provided, it was planned to run each horse twenty-five miles with
an average of three horses to the rider; but it was soon found that a
horse could rarely continue at a maximum speed for so great a distance.