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CANADA, DOMINION OF. 



to the bench. The portfolio of Minister of 

 Railways and Canals, vacant for over a year, 

 was intrusted to the Hon. J[ohn Henry Pope. 

 Mr. Pope was succeeded as Minister of Agri- 

 culture by the Hon. Mr. Carling, who in turn 

 was succeeded as Postmaster-General by Sir 

 A. Campbell. Sir David Macpherson, who 

 resigned his portfolio of Minister of the Inte- 

 rior, presumably on account of the outcry 

 raised against his administration of the de- 

 partment in connection with the Northwest 

 rebellion, was succeeded by the Hon. Thomas 

 White, M. P. for Cardwell, one of the oldest 

 newspaper men in Canada. The Minister of 

 Militia was knighted for his services in con- 

 nection with the rebellion. In October Sir 

 Leonard Tilley resigned the portfolio of Min- 

 ister of Finance, on account of ill health, and 

 was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of New 

 Brunswick. 



Finances. On June 30, 1884, the public debt 

 of Canada was $242,482,416.21, against $93,- 

 046,057.73 in 1867. By May 31, 1885, the 

 debt had mounted to $258,711,088. The rapid 

 increase in the public debt was the occasion of 

 many ominous prophecies in the Dominion, but 

 the credit of the country was never better. 

 The Minister of Finance, Sir Leonard Tilley, 

 paid a visit to England in June, to raise the 

 money to pay off a loan made in 1860, which 

 the Government had the option of maturing in 

 1885. Sir Leonard placed a 4 per cent, loan, 

 at an average price of 100 17s. Sd. the most 

 successful loan ever floated by Canada. The 

 rate of interest on the Canadian public debt 

 has steadily decreased from 5'21 per cent, in 

 1867, to 3-98 per cent, in 1885. The Cana- 

 dian Pacific loans and the Northwest rebellion 

 assisted greatly to swell the debt this year. A 

 grant of $5,000,000 was made to meet the ex- 

 penses of the latter. The customs changes in 

 1885 were unimportant, but the customs and 

 excise duties on spirits and tobacco were in- 

 creased for revenue purposes in consequence 

 of the rebellion. The fiscal year ending June 

 30, 1885, closed with a deficit of two and a 

 half million dollars, and with a prospect that 

 about a third of the revenue of the Dominion 

 would now be required to pay the interest on 

 the public debt. 



Rebellion. The rebellion of the French half- 

 breeds, or Metis, of the Northwest Terri- 

 tories will make the year 1885 memorable in 

 the history of Canada. The insurrection broke 

 out with startling suddenness. There had been 

 vague rumors of discontent and grievances 

 among the half-breeds of the Saskatchewan, 

 but that they would attempt to obtain redress 

 by an appeal to arms was hardly believed until 

 the first shots were fired. The Hon. Edward 

 Blake, leader of the Liberal party, charged the 

 Government with " grave instances of neglect, 

 delay, and mismanagement, prior to the out- 

 break, in matters deeply affecting the peace, 

 welfare, and good government of the country," 

 and endeavored to show that for some years 



past the half-breeds had been pressing their 

 grievances upon the attention of the Govern- 

 ment. The half-breeds had certainly made de- 

 mands in 1878 (during the Mackenzie regime) 

 and subsequently, which the Government only 

 appointed a commission to investigate in the 

 spring of 1885. In 1878 the half-breeds of the 

 Northwest Territories asked for a distribution 

 of scrip and lands among themselves similar 

 to that already made among the half-breeds of 

 Manitoba. The Council of the Northwest Ter- 

 ritory, on Aug. 2, 1878, passed resolutions com- 

 mending these claims to the Dominion Govern- 

 ment. The Council advised the Government 

 " that it would be injudicious to set apart re- 

 serves of land for the half-breeds of the North- 

 west Territory or to give them negotiable scrip ; 

 that in view, however, of the fact that grants 

 of land or issues of scrip were made to the half- 

 breeds of Manitoba, toward the extinguishment 

 of the Indian title to the lands of that province, 

 there will undoubtedly be general dissatisfac- 

 tion among the half-breeds of the said Terri- 

 tories unless they receive some like considera- 

 tion ; that this consideration would tend most 

 to the advantage of the half-breeds were it 

 given in the form of anon-transferable location 

 ticket for say 160 acres for each half-breed 

 head of a family and each half-breed child of 

 parents resident in the said Territories at the 

 time of the transfer thereof to Canada," etc. 



While there is abundant evidence that some 

 of the grievances of the half-breeds had been 

 frequently brought before the notice of the 

 Government, it can not be pretended that they 

 had exhausted all constitutional means of ob- 

 taining redress before appealing to arms. The 

 people of the older provinces of Canada hardly 

 knew that the half-breeds had any grievances 

 until the eve of the rebellion. In the summer 

 of 1884 the half-breeds sent a deputation to 

 Louis Kiel, the leader of the Red River rebel- 

 lion of 1869, who was living in Montana, to 

 invite him to lead them in a constitutional agi- 

 tation for their rights. On July 8, 1884, Riel 

 arrived at Duck Lake with his family, and im- 

 mediately began a systematic agitation among 

 the half- breeds and Indians. At a meeting held 

 at St. Laurent on Sept. 5, Riel stated the 

 claims of his followers to be: "The subdi- 

 vision of the Northwest Territories into prov- 

 inces; for the settlers of the Northwest the 

 same advantages as those granted in 1870 to 

 the settlers of Manitoba ; a grant of 240 acres 

 of land to the half-breeds who have not yet 

 received that grant from the Government ; an 

 immediate gratuitous grant by letters patent, 

 to the proprietors who occupy them, of the 

 lands of which they are in possession ; the 

 offer for sale by the Government, of half a 

 million acres of land, the products of this 

 sale to be placed at interest and applied to the 

 aid of half-breeds, in the establishment of hos- 

 pitals, orphanages, schools, etc., or in supply- 

 ing the poorer persons with plows or other 

 agricultural implements, and in distributing 



