Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations. 1989.
| NUMBER: | 1439 |
| AUTHOR: | Herodotus (484?–425? |
| QUOTATION: | It is said that as many days as there are in the whole journey, so many are the men and horses that stand along the road, each horse and man at the interval of a day’s journey; and these are stayed neither by snow nor rain nor heat nor darkness from accomplishing their appointed course with all speed. |
| ATTRIBUTION: | A paraphrase of this motto—“Neither snow, nor rain, nor heat, nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds”—is carved over the entrance to the central post office building in New York City. The method of carrying messages Herodotus describes was a Persian invention and enabled the messengers to travel swiftly. In this fashion King Xerxes sent a message home to Persia that the Greeks had destroyed his fleet off Salamis in 480 |
| SUBJECTS: | Postal Service |