§ MR. MACNEILLI beg to ask the Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education whether a letter, written on the 1st of this month by the Director of the Science and Art Museum, Dublin, to the President of the Royal Irish Academy, suggesting that six or eight cases containing the best objects in the collection of the Academy, such as the Cross of Cong, etc., should be, during alterations to the room in which the collection of the Royal Irish Academy is now displayed, transported in one of Her Majesty's ships, to be obtained through His Excellency the Lord Lieutenant, to Woolwich, and from thence to a good position in the South Kensington Museum, when, after remaining there for four or six weeks, they would be brought again to Dublin with the same precautions as on their outward journey, has had the sanction of the Lords of the Committee of Council on Education; whether the agreement between the Lords of the Committee of Council on Education and the Royal Irish Academy, sealed and signed in November, 1890, whereby it was expressly conditioned and declared that the said Lords of the Committee of Council on Education shall, by acceptance hereof, be bound and obliged to retain the said collection in Ireland, is still binding on both parties; or, if abrogated, for what reasons and from what date; and, if this communication from an official of the Department of Science and Art be unauthorised, will the Department assure the Royal Irish Academy that no further attempts to remove their museum from Dublin will be made?
§ SIR J. GORSTI understand that the letter in question was a private one. The President of the Royal Irish Academy replied that there were objections to the 106 arrangement suggested, and the matter has dropped.
§ MR. MACNEILLIs the right Hon. Gentleman aware that this private letter emanated from the official office, written on official paper, and signed by this gentleman as director?
§ SIR J. GORSTPrivate letters are sometimes written by official persons.