A missing order would cause unnecessary delays, but the officials in charge would still hesitate to act without documents lest they be accused of corruption. Efficient as the postal system appears to have been, keeping the Pasha in touch with his troops in Syria or the Hijaz hundreds of miles away, different government departments in Cairo would sometimes find difficulty in communicating with each other, even though they might have been located across the same street in Cairo; and "missing letters" were always referred to for not fulfilling orders.

XREF: Builds on loc 916 about postal modernization depending on scarce literate officials — this highlight shows the concrete failure that scarcity produced.

Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed…, loc. 943