Mr. CLARKE.

Who dumped the bags in ?

They were sent by the House of Commons postmaster to the city postmaster.

Mr. BELL.

Is not that a perfectly regular proceeding ?

Certainly, that is the proper thing to do.

Mr. BELL.

Why then characterize it as dumping ?

Because the expression aptly describes what was done. I am trying to give the facts. The postmaster or rather his deputy then took me to the entrance of the building, where there is a very considerable lobby space, and he here pointed out to me the accumulation of bags and said : ' In our efforts to accommodate we have received all the bags we can find storage for inside the building,' and he pointed to me-may I use the word *[DOT] monuments.'

Mountains.

He pointed to a mountain of bags, and said that there was not space for another bag. When he told me that the mail clerks on the cars had complained that they could not handle any more matter, and that the quantity forced on them was calculated to interfere with the general mail service of the' country, I prosecuted the inquiry further.

Mr. GOURLEY.

Will the hon. gentleman allow me to ask him a question ?

Certainly.

Mr. GOURLEY.

I want to ask if he reprimanded this underling, this understrapper who undertook to interfere with the privilege of parliament ? He ought to have dismissed him at once, instead of listening to his impudence.

I do not know to what officer the hon. gentleman re-

fei-s. The city postmaster informed me that they were sending out by train all that the trains could take. I made inquiry of another officer in order to learn the fact from him also.

Mr. CLARKE.

Who was that officer ?

The controller of the railway mail service. I asked him why they did not remove more of this matter by the trains, and he gave me this explanation : * Most of this mail matter,' he said, ' was for Ontario.' There was some small proportion of it for the west, but the great and overwhelming bulk of it was for the province of Ontario. There are only four passenger trains a day carrying mails leaving Ottawa for the west. He told me that, considering the limited capacity of the postal cars-for every one knows that only a portion of a car, as a rule, is devoted to postal purposes, there being a compartment for express, and, perhaps one for baggage also-they were carrying all that they could possibly carry.

Hon. Mr. HAGGART.

In four cars ?

Yes.

Hon. Mr. HAGGART.

Did you believe him ?

I did and I do believe him.

Mr. BRODER.

Will the hon. minister allow me to ask him how it is that this matter can come here so quickly if it cannot get away ?

I understand that it came by post, by express, by baggage and in every way it could get here. But, when mail matter is being exported from the city, it cannot be sent away under conditions which allow of it being sent in carloads; it must be sent under such conditions that the bags may be opened the moment the train starts on its journey, and the separate pieces of mail matter which the bags contain sorted for their destination. Mr. Armstrong, the controller of the railway mail service, informed me that there is a very considerable volume of mail matter from the city, from the public generally, that must leave by every outgoing train, and an additional average of ten bags per postal car is all that can be accommodated. My hon. friend from Pictou (Mr. Bell) represented that it was only the question of the despatch of forty bags a day. It is not such a question, but a question of despatching a very large number of bags per day. But the whole of the mail service, from Ottawa westward cannot be assigned exclusively to any particular class of work. But if there must be a choice, I should think that we should be bound to give precedence to the general correspondence of the people dealing with trade and other matters, rather than allow it to be shut out by any other Sir WILLIAM MTILOCK.

class of mail matter. For example, there are large quantities of goods sent by mail, as well as a great many newspapers and other pieces of printed matter. If the situation is such that there is not accommodation for everything in the mails, I think priority should be given to correspondence. But, whether that view is acquiesced in or not, Mr. Armstrong-and there is no better authority ; he is not one of my appointees ; I promoted him to his high office, but he is an old and experienced officer appointed by hon. gentlemen opposite and there is no more faithful official in the public service of Canada-Mr. Armstrong informed me that considering the demands upon the service of postal cars leaving Ottawa, they are not able to handle an average of more than ten bags per train in addition to the other dfe-mands upon the accommodation upon the cars.