Of all their alleged Parliamentary advocates, however, perhaps Mr. Murray Macdonald was at this time the most painstaking and consistent. Mr. Macdonald had sought every opportunity to bring on a discussion of postal claims generally, but had several times been defeated in his endeavour. It was then arranged through him to hold a conference of M.P.’s and postal representatives for a full discussion of the case, which it was anticipated must presently be brought before the House. With this end in view, Mr. Murray Macdonald asked the Postmaster-General privately if he would guarantee that postal representatives might take part in this conference without risk to their prospects or position. But Mr. Arnold Morley squelched the intention by replying that such a course would be “contrary to the regulations.” Sooner than they expected came the Postmaster-General’s reply to the March memorial dealing with pay, pensions, hours of duty, conditions of work, &c., and the extra promptitude of the reply was perhaps explained by its containing a refusal on every single point. The uncompromising attitude of the Postmaster-General served only to stimulate postal servants generally to the adoption of a vigorous Parliamentary policy, and sorters, sorting clerks, and telegraphists were now more than ever coming to join hands on questions of common interest. This feeling of relationship was perhaps fostered not only by a sense of common adversity, but by the fact that the telegraphists’ friends in the House were also, for the most part, the friends of the sorters and sorting clerks. The Parliamentary friends of the postal cause were now representative of every shade of party politics, and included men of widely divergent views. The question of Civil Rights for Civil Servants was one that enabled men like Sir Albert Rollit, Professor Stuart, Mr. William Saunders, and Mr. Keir Hardie to stand side by side on the same platform; and this was actually the case on the occasion of a meeting held at the Memorial Hall, June 8, 1893. With such advocates as these and many others in the House to champion their cause, it seemed that the coveted Royal Commission could not now be far off, or at any rate the existence of such a solid phalanx of Parliamentary support must surely overcome all the objections that could be centred in a single Postmaster-General, even with a more powerful personality than that of Mr. Arnold Morley. But in spite of all the combined activity of telegraphists, sorters, and sorting clerks, things in the Post-Office continued only to drag their slow length along towards the hoped-for goal of improvement.