Those were taken in purely Catholic counties.
Mr. MONK.
If any argument has been drawn from that, which I believe has been, I should say that the findings of our clergy have been put to very base and irregular uses. I would not at all question the findings of my own clergy, but it would not surprise me that they should be widely different from those of our enumerators, who proceed under a totally different set of rules. There is no ground possible for comparison, but I do not want to speak without examining the record. Would my hon. friend bring to our next meeting, not only the vouchers connected with that investigation. but the books in which the entries were made ? That would greatly shorten the work of my hon. friend and mine. Is this list, which my hon. friend has handed me, really a list of the permanent staff of the census employed at Ottawa ?
That is a list of the people now engaged in the census work here at Ottawa, with the exception perhaps of one or two employees, permanent in the departments, but who are also engaged in this census work. It is a list of the nominees appointed to do the work of tabulation at Ottawa in connection with the census.
Mr. MONK.
Will my hon. friend bring down a complete list of those specially employed at Ottawa on the census of 1901, giving their names and salaries ?
I will provide a supplementary list, if there are any names not on.
Mr. MONK.
Are these officers paid by the day, week or month ?
I think that everybody on the list is paid by the day. They are paid every day right aiong, including Sunday.
Mr. MONK.
Do they work on Sundays ?
No.
Mr. BENNETT.
Mr. INGRAM.
When we had a discussion on the census some time ago, the hon. gentleman argued that the Conservative party in 1891 had stuffed the lists in the province of Quebec, and he gave a number of constituencies, in which a large number of families were enumerated in 1891, who were not there at the time. How can he reconcile that with the statement made frequently throughout the country that the French population of the province of Quebec had been under-enumerated in the census of 1891 by the Conservatives, and that Mr. Cote's circular was sent out for the special purpose of guarding against a similar occurrence ?
I am not aware that the charge has ever been made that people were left out in the province of Quebec from the census taken in 1891.
Mr. INGRAM.
Then why was the Cote circular sent out ? The reason given was that the French families in the province of Quebec had not been properly enumerated in 1891. Yet, according to the hon. gentleman's own statement, instead of people being left out of the census then, the census lists in the province of Quebec were stuffed in 1891.
The reason why the Cote circular, as the hon. gentleman describes it, was sent out, was to obtain a correct census in 1901, without any reference whatever to the census of 1891.
Mr. INGRAM.
But the hon. gentleman must have heard his colleague's statement that was circulated in the press.
I am not responsible for his statement.
Mr. INGRAM.
The Minister of Public Works was charged with circulating a statement that the French families of the province of Quebec had not been properly enumerated in 1891, that the Conservative party had not done justice to that population," and that was the reason why this circular was issued.
I sent out that circular for the purpose of getting a correct census in 1901, I never understood that there was any accusation that the French Canadians in the province of Quebec had not then been fully enumerated, but what I did understand-and I think that certain words in the first volume of the census of 1891 will bear me out-was that there were French speaking people all over the Dominion who had not been enumerated as such. There were Acadians in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and French Canadian people in Ontario and Manitoba. But there was only one description of them, that of French Canadians. A great many of these people, especially
the Acadians, did not return themselves as French Canadians, thinking that ' French Canadian' was a term applied only to the French Canadian habitant of the province of Quebec. There were a large number of people of French origin, and of the Catholic religion, and who are really French nationality, but who were not returned as French Canadians. I think that was the complaint made by certain French Canadian members on the floor of this House after the census of 1891. I was not in the House at the time when the debates took, place, but my recollection is that this is what has been explained to me as having occurred.
Mr. INGRAM.
Then the Conservative party are not open to the charge of having given credit to Quebec for too large a population in 1891 ?
I am not accusing them of that.