onged, was
discovered, and executed in 1869.

The reorganization of the various departments of state, in view of the
wider interests with which they had to deal, occupied much of the
attention of the first parliament of the Dominion. In 1867 the postal
rates were reduced and unified. In 1868 a militia system for the whole
Dominion was organized, the tariff altered and systematized, and a Civil
Service Act passed. The banking system of the country was put on a sound
footing by a series of acts culminating in 1871, and in the same year a
uniform system of decimal currency was established for the whole
Dominion. While the new machinery of state was thus being put in
operation other large questions presented themselves.

Inter-Colonial railway.

The construction of the Inter-Colonial railway as a connecting link
between the provinces on the seaboard and those along the St Lawrence
and the Great Lakes was a part of the federation compact, a clause of
the British North America Act providing that it should be begun within
six months after the date of union. The guarantee of the imperial
government made easy the provision of the necessary capital, but as
this was coupled with a voice in the decision of the route, it
complicated the latter question, about which a keen contest arose. The
most direct and therefore commercially most promising line of
construction passed near the boundary of the United States. Recent
friction with that country made this route objected to by the imperial
and many Canadian authorities. Ultimately the longer, more expensive,
but more isolated route along the shores of the Gulf of St Lawrence was
adopted. The work was taken in hand at once, and pressed steadily
forward to completion. It has since been supplemented by other lines
built for more distinctly commercial ends. Though not for many years a
financial success, the Inter-Colonial railway, which was opened in 1876,
has in a marked way fulfilled its object by binding together socially
and industrially widely separated portions of the Dominion.

Hudson's Bay Company territories.

Within a month of the meeting of the first parliament of the Dominion a
question of vast importance to the future of the country was brought
forward by the Hon. W. McDougall in a series of resolutions which were
adopted, and on which was based an address to the queen praying that
Majesty would unite Rupert's Land and the North-West Territories to
Canada. A dele