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most men in Canada are substantially of one mind with respect to the establishment of a great channel of communication linking together in an electric girdle the self-governing British communities. In the concluding words of the communication they appear to think that it is of transcendent importance to inaugurate an Imperial cable service, which, while satisfying in the highest degree the needs of commerce, would at the same time perform the functions of a continuous spinal cord encircling the globe, by and through which would freely flow every national aspiration, every sympathetic impulse of the British people in longitude and latitude. Much evidence has been accumulated to establish that the system of Empire cables advocated by the Board would cheapen oversea telegraphy between every one of the great British possessions around the globe to an extent now little dreamed of. If the policy be adopted of making the charges on ordinary messages transmitted just sufficient to pay working-expenses, and if a uniform rate, irrespective of distance transmitted, be charged, as in the case of Imperial penny postage, a complete revolution would follow, which would undoubtedly lead up to a wonderful advance in the consolidation of the Empire. Every British citizen within range of the globe-encircling Empire cables would practically be brought into one neighbourhood, telegraphically. Every person in the Mother-land, in Canada, and in the East and West Indies, in South Africa, in Australia, and in New Zealand would be free to exchange thoughts one with the other as readily and almost as cheaply as we do by telegraph at present with friends in neighbouring cities. In these few words we have endeavoured to indicate to Your Excellency the great ideal in constructive Imperialism which we have set before us, and we venture to think that there can be no more fitting corollary to the concluding act of the Imperial Conference. We therefore make free to suggest that a system of State cables encircling the globe may be regarded as a supplementary Imperial necessity. On behalf of the Board of Trade of the City of Ottawa, we respectfully express the hope that Your Excellency will be pleased to bring the subject to the attention of the several Governments. We have, Ac, Jas. W. Woods, President. Cecil Bethune, Secretary. His Excellency Earl Grey, Governor-General of Canada.

Sub-enclosure 2 to Enclosure in No. 102. Earl Grey's Reply. You, gentlemen, representing the Ottawa Board of Trade, have asked that I should receive you for the purpose of enabling you to explain the measures which you think should be adopted in the interests of Canada and the Empire with regard to the establishment of what is known as the All-red Line, and to enable you to give expression to your desire that I should bring the subject of your hopes before the attention of the Crown. The Ottawa Board of Trade already enjoys throughout the Empire an honourable reputation as an organization which is animated by a spirit of lofty and far-seeing Imperialism, and any request coming from you would naturally call from me the friendliest and most sympathetic consideration, but the fact that Sir Sanford Fleming is the member of the Board of Trade through whom the request for this interview has reached me, invests it with an exceptional urgency. The admiration I feel for him and the sympathy I have for the objects with which his name is so closely and honourably connected would make it difficult, almost impossible, for me to refuse your request. For upwards of twenty-five years Sir Sandford Fleming has devoted his energies to the task of -securing for Great and Greater Britain the advantages of cheapened telegraphic service. The bare recital of his efforts in this direction almost suggest the missionary fervour of St. Paul. He has without hope of personal gain visited five continents; he has traversed all the great oceans—the Atlantic many times; he has given himself, his time, and his substance ungrudgingly and without stint to the service of the Empire, and in the realisation of his hopes, which I trust is not far off, and in the general recognition that the life of Britons all the world over will have been made the happier by his efforts, he will find at the appointed time his well-merited reward. Referring to the address you have presented, I thank you for the welcome which you have given me on my return from England. The chief reason that caused me to absent myself from my happy home in the Dominion for a space of less than a month was my desire to support Sir Wilfrid Laurier in his endeavour to impress upon the members of the Imperial Government the importance of establishing a fast transatlantic service between Canada and England, and of thus making Canada not only the natural and God-appointed but the accepted mail and passenger route between Great Britain and the Orient and those great British dominions in the southern seas, of New Zealand and Australia. You have referred to the concluding act of the Imperial Conference which has pledged the Empire to quicken the connections between Canada and the United Kingdom on the one hand, and Australia and New Zealand on the other. I congratulate you that, through the action of your representative at the Imperial Conference, Sir Wilfrid Laurier, the representatives of the Empire in conference assembled resolved that the time had come for the establishment of a mail and passenger service between Great Britain and Canada equal to the best supplied New York. The time is not far off when Canada will reap the great advantage of the geographical position with which nature has endowed her by the