Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1899 American Edition.djvu/564

 220 THE BRITISH EMPIRE :— CANADA

which 300,954 were British. There are 36 miles of telegraph wire, and 15 of cable. There is also a private telephone company, which has about 240 sub- scribers and upwards ol 700 miles of wire in line. A telegraph cable connect- ing the islands with Halifax, Nova Scotia, was successfully laid in July 1890. The currency, weights, and measures are British.

Rkferences : Beniinda in Colonial Reports. Annual. London.

Heilf.riii (A.), Bernuula Islands. 8. Philadelphia, 1889.

Newton (Margaret), Glinijises of Life in Bernuida and the Tropics. London, 1897.

CANADA.

(Dominion of Canada.) Constitution and Government.

As originally constituted the Dominion of Canada was com- posed of the Provinces of Canada — Upper and Lower — Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick. They were united under the pro- visions of an Act of the Imperial Parliament passed in March 1867, known as 'The British North America Act 1867,' which came into operation on the 1st July, 1867, by royal proclamation. The Act provides that the Constitution of the Dominion shall be ' similar in principle to that of the United Kingdom ; ' that the executive authority shall be .vested in the Sovereign of Great Britain and Ireland, and carried on in her name by a Governor- General and Privy Council ; and that the legislative power shall be exercised by a Parliament of two Houses, called the ' Senate ' and the ' House of Commons.' Provision was made in the Act for the admission of British Columbia, Prince Edward Island, the North- West Territories, and Newfoundland into the Do- minion ; Newfoundland alone has not availed itself of such provision. In 1869 the extensive region known as the North- West Territories was added to the Dominion by purchase from the Hudson's Bay Company ; the province of Manitoba was set apart out of a portion of it, and admitted into the con- federation of 15th July, 1870. On 20th July, 1871, the pro- vince of British Columbia, and on the 1st July, 1873, the province of Prince Edward Island, respectively entered the confederation.

The members of the Senate of the Parliament of the Do- minion are nominated for life, by summons of the Governor- General under the Great Seal of Canada. By the terms of the Constitution, there are now 81 senators — namely, 24 from the Province of Ontario, 24 from Quebec, 10 from Nova Scotia, 10 from Now Brunswick, 4 from Manitoba, 3 from British Columbia,