RANGE: The Post Monster General is free to move, or not move, wherever the US mail moves, or doesn’t move. He can sometimes be found, improperly addressed, looking over post cards, shaking his head in a sad regretful way, down in the dead letter office. HABITS: When a pizza store owner in California receives a personal note of condolence from Isadora Duncan, or an Alaskan Congressman opens a letter from a Confederate general demanding a stay of execution for John Wilkes Booth, you may be sure that the Post Monster General has been on his self-appointed rounds. It is he who expedites the delivery of bulky, colorful offers from the Publishers Clearing House and delays the arrival of perishable packages or personal mail. He is especially concerned with envelopes distinguished by little cellophane address windows. By supernatural means he is able to determine whether they contain a bill, in which case he dispatches them to appear promptly in a mail box, or a check, in which case he sentences them to moulder indefinitely in a canvas bag. The Post Monster General is passionate about zip codes, and is working towards completely digital addressing. For example: Mr. 639 7644, 532 2nd Avenue, 67opolis, 51st State, 1st Country, 3rd World 56555555559867483948584777594 737747474733 (etc.) HISTORY: The Post Monster General’s original field of action was the byhand pouch traffic of the late Roman Empire. Many a Samaritan rolled his eyes and threw up his hands in a gesture of Semitic resignation after finding a two-hundred-bushel Epistle to the Ephesians stacked on his stoop— misdirected to him by the Post Monster General. In America, similar gestures were made by miners on the Barbary Coast upon receiving, via the Pony Express, pipe organs addressed to Pope Gregory XLV. Doubtless His Holiness was similarly puzzled at the arrival of his mail order bride. The citizens of his native Rome believed the Post Monster General to be a sort of Centaur-in-reverse—a creature with the hind-quarters of a horse for a head, atop a pair of all-too-human flat feet. How he made his way from Italy to these shores remains a mystery—but since he eventually did get here, we can safely assume that he didn’t mail himself. SPOTTER’S TIPS: One thing is certain: you needn’t bother looking in your mailbox. You might try the gutter, the house next door, the dashboard of a stranger’s car, or the bonfire on the corner over which your local postie is warming his hands. The Post Monster General has a morbid aversion to snow, rain, heat, and gloom of night.
棲息地 この妖精たちは,郵便
物が配達されるところならどこ
へでも行く。 ときには, まちが
へでも行く。ときには,まちが
って書かれた宛て先や、住所不
明の郵便物の山のしたで, 悲し
そうに,頭をふっていたりもす
る。
習性 超自然的な能力によって
封筒を見ただけで, そこに請求
書がはいっているのか、小切手
がはいっているのかわかってし
まう。 請求書の場合は、 速達な
みに早くとどけて、郵便受けか
ら半分のぞかせてめだつように
しておく。 小切手の場合は、郵
便袋の奥深くに隠して,配達さ
れないようにいたずらをする。
悲しい知らせは早くとどき,う
れしい手紙がなかなかやってこ
ないのは,みんなこの妖精たち
「悪いニュー
のしわざなのだ。
スは飛ぶように早く伝わる」と
いうことわざも,彼らのつくり
だした標語で, モットーにして
だした標語で,モットーにして
あなたの書い
いるものである。
たラブレターの返事が早くとど
いたら、けっして封はあけない
ほうがいいだろう。
歴史 むかし, ローマの大軍が
東方に遠征したとき, ある将軍
が自分の死亡通知をもたせて
国にのこしてきた妻にとどけさ
その将
せたのがことの始まり。
美しいトルコ嬢
軍は,じつは,
軍は,じつは,美しいトルコ嬢
のとりこになってしまったので
ある。
私立探偵の情報 ひとり机にむ
かって、せっせと 「不幸の手紙」
を書いている不幸な少女の肩に
のっている。
190
TOL
Habitat
These sprites go wherever mail is delivered. Sometimes they can be found sadly shaking their heads beneath piles of misaddressed or undeliverable letters.
Behavior
Through supernatural ability, they can tell just by looking at an envelope whether it contains a bill or a check. Bills get delivered express-fast, left sticking conspicuously halfway out of the letterbox. Checks get buried deep in the mail sack and mischievously prevented from arriving at all.
Bad news arrives quickly; good letters take forever to come — all the sprites’ doing. “Bad news travels fast” is actually a slogan they invented and adopted as their motto.
If a reply to a love letter you wrote arrives quickly, you would do well never to open it.
History
Long ago, when a great Roman army was campaigning in the East, a general had his own death notice delivered to the wife he’d left behind at home. In truth, the general had been entirely captivated by a beautiful Turkish girl.
Field Intelligence
Perched on the shoulder of an unhappy young girl sitting alone at her desk, diligently writing chain letters.
190
