§ COLONEL HUGHES-HALLETT (Rochester)asked the Surveyor General of the Ordnance, How many hides sold by Messieurs Ross, of Bermondsey, to the Government, in 1886, and passed at the time as sound and good by the Viewer, who was formerly in the employment of Messieurs Ross, but since condemned as "worthless," have been returned to Messieurs Ross; and, whether the Government have recovered from that firm the money paid for those hides?
§ THE SURVEYOR GENERAL (Mr. NORTHCOTE) (Exeter)Nine hundred collar hides were supplied by Messrs. Ross in the early part of 1886; and after they had been in store for several months 340 some of them were found to have lost colour, and to have become hard and dry. All these were re-dressed by Messrs. Ross without charge, though they had been passed and out of their custody for many mouths, and the Commissary General now reports the leather to be quite satisfactory.