have been consistent, the Postmaster-General should have dismissed the whole body of sorters who were responsible for the instruction acted on. In twenty-four hours practically the whole of the London sorting force, Chief Office men and District men, had signed a memorial to the Postmaster-General, asking his reconsideration of the dismissals on the ground that they fully identified themselves with the policy adopted and the instruction given Clery and Cheesman as two officers of their association. Not only from the class directly affected, but from the postmen, the postal clerks all over the country, the telegraphists, and others, came an almost unanimous cry of indignation and disapproval. And this indignation was echoed with surprising unanimity by the press, both Tory and Liberal joining in condemning Sir James Fergusson’s action as intolerant and unjustifiably severe. Even the few organs that were induced to say a word in favour of the Postmaster-General’s action, based their conclusions for the most part on the supposition that insubordination had been committed; whereas there was no insubordination, and no contravening of any known existing rule of the department in asking merely for a public inquiry. Others, while opining that discipline must be maintained in a great public department of State, nevertheless agreed that it was neither fair nor constitutional that the political rights of citizens should in this free country be at the mercy of official caprice. The Fawcett Association promptly carried the question one step further, and obtained counsel’s opinion that the action of Sir James Fergusson was illegal and unconstitutional, a view in which Sir Charles Russell, the present Lord Chief-Justice, fully concurred, as did also Mr. S. D. Waddy, Q.C., M.P. Yet despite all appeals, all arguments, and all criticism, Sir James Fergusson stuck to his position with the dogged pertinacity of an old-time soldier and a martinet. Rightly or wrongly, he had taken the step, and he owed it to his pride and his reputation to stand by it. And he stood by it, a solid rock of obstinacy against which the waves of protest splashed in vain. The dismissed chairman and secretary of the Fawcett Association remained in their respective offices, and the members of the organisation rallied round them stronger than ever. There was a feeling that they had been made the martyrs of an injustice for their sakes and for promoting their cause, and they stood by them to a man.