carrying the mails be adopted, substituting space for weight as the principal factor in fixing compensation.  Under this plan it will be possible to determine without delay what additional payment should be made on account of the parcel post.  The Postmaster General’s recommendation is based on the results of a far-reaching investigation begun early in the administration with the object of determining what it costs the railways to carry the mails.  The statistics obtained during the course of the inquiry show that while many of the railways, and particularly the large systems, were making profits from mail transportations, certain of the lines were actually carrying the mails at a loss.  As a result of the investigation the department, after giving the subject careful consideration, decided to urge the abandonment of the present plan of fixing compensation on the basis of the weight of the mails carried, a plan that has proved to be exceedingly expensive and in other respects unsatisfactory.  Under the method proposed the railway companies will annually submit to the department reports showing what it costs them to carry the mails, and this cost will be apportioned on the basis of the car space engaged, payment to be allowed at the rate thus determined in amounts that will cover the cost and a reasonable profit.  If a railway is not satisfied with the manner in which the department apportions the cost in fixing compensation, it is to have the right, tinder the new plan, of appealing to the Interstate Commerce Commission.  This feature of the proposed law would seem to insure a fair treatment of the railways.  It is hoped that Congress will give the matter immediate attention and that the method of compensation recommended by the department or some other suitable plan will be promptly authorized.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

The Interior Department, in the problems of administration included within its jurisdiction, presents more difficult questions than any other.  This has been due perhaps to temporary causes of a political character, but more especially to the inherent difficulty in the performance of some of the functions which are assigned to it.  Its chief duty is the guardianship of the public domain and the disposition of that domain to private ownership under homestead, mining, and other laws, by which patents from the Government to the individual are authorized on certain conditions.  During the last decade the public seemed to become suddenly aware that a very large part of its domain had passed from its control into private ownership, under laws not well adapted to modern conditions, and also that in the doing of this the provisions of existing law and regulations adopted in accordance with law had not been strictly observed, and that in the transfer of title much fraud had intervened, to the pecuniary benefit of dishonest persons.  There arose thereupon a demand for conservation