r,
and Langevin drew heavily on Allan's funds, $162,500 in all, with a
promise from Cartier that 'any amount which you or your Company shall
advance for that purpose shall be re-couped to you.' After the
election a new company, the Canadian Pacific, was organized, with
representative men from each province as directors; and the new board,
of its own motion, it was declared, elected Allan president. To this
company the government granted a charter, promised a subsidy of thirty
million dollars and fifty million acres of land, but insisted upon
excluding the American interests. Allan acquiesced, and, repaying the
advances made, informed New York that negotiations were ended.
M'Mullen and his associates, angry at this treatment, conveyed rumours
to Opposition leaders, and finally Allan's confidential {125}
correspondence, stolen by a clerk in the office of J. J. C. Abbott,
Allan's solicitor, was made public.[3] The fat was in the fire.

With the political controversy which followed we are not here
concerned. In Sir John Macdonald's defence it could be said, that
though Allan's money was taken no {126} special favours were shown in
the contract made; and that all that Allan secured by the government's
victory was the certainty that the railway project would not be
postponed or dropped altogether, and that he would be given control.
Sir Hugh Allan had said with much force: 'The plans I propose are in
themselves the best for the interests of the Dominion, and in urging
them on the public I am really doing a most patriotic action.'
Undoubtedly Sir John Macdonald sincerely held a similar opinion.

{127}

The Allan Company gave up its charter, unable to raise capital in face
of financial depression and political upheaval. The Liberal party, led
by Alexander Mackenzie, and swept into power by a wave of popular
indignation, first endeavoured to induce other capitalists to take up
the work. But the government's offers of $10,000 in cash and of 20,000
acres of land for each mile, plus an undetermined guarantee, had no
takers in the years of depression that followed. Mackenzie then
decided that the government should {128} itself build the road. He
planned to build at first only the indispensable sections, using the
waterways wherever possible, and hoped, but in vain, to secure British
Columbia's consent to an extension of the time set for completion. His
first step was to subsidize the Canada Central, which ran from Ottaw