Sir John Eldon Gorst's statement that he knew of no instance of the Treasury exercising its power of instituting an inquiry conducted by Treasury officers, into the administration of a Department of State, recalls to mind some testimony given by Sir R. E. Welby, Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, before the Royal Commission on Civil Establishments, 1888. Mr. Cleghorn, a Member of that Commission, asked Sir R. E. Welby: "Is there anybody at the Treasury, for instance, who could say to the Board of Trade, or any other particular Department: 'You have too many clerks, you must reduce them by ten?' Is there anybody at the Treasury with sufficient power and knowledge of the work to be in a position to say that, and to take the responsibility of it?" Sir R. E. Welby replied: "No." Thereupon Mr. R. W. Hanbury, another Member of the Commission, asked: "There is not?" Once more the answer was: "No."[431] Again, in 1876, before the Select Committee on Post Office Telegraph Departments, Mr. Julian Goldsmid, a Member of the Committee, asked Mr. S. A. Blackwood, Financial Secretary to the Post Office: "You would not like, perhaps, to give the reasons for that enormous overmanning which existed in some of the [telegraph] offices [in 1873 to 1875]?" Mr. Blackwood replied: "I am not acquainted with the reasons myself."[432] Sir Ralph H. Knox, in the course of his testimony, had quoted Mr. Bagehot's statement: "If you want to raise a certain cheer in the House of Commons, make a general panegyric on economy; if you want to invite a sure defeat, propose a particular saving." He had continued: "I should like to add, 'If you want to lose popularity, oppose the proposals for increase.' There ought to be some Members in the House of Commons who would undertake that line." [Sidenote: _Gladstone's Tribute to Hume_]