upon a despatch does not positively preclude the Government from giving it publicity?—Certainly not.'—Ibid., 110–11, 113.
(3) Evidence of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe:
'With regard to communications between the Foreign Minister and the head of a mission, do you think that any advantage has resulted from the largely increased habit of writing private letters?—The practice of private correspondence, I think, is one upon which it would hardly answer any good purer to lay restriction. Upon the whole, I think that more advantage results from the use of private correspondence than the contrary; but the practice may be carried too far.
'In a certain degree, must not a very continual private correspondence detract something from the influence of the public documentary correspondence?—Not, if it be carried on in the right spirit. I conceive that the use of private correspondence is to afford a clearer view of the scope and intent of the official instruction, and to convey suggestions, or matters of information, without being committed to the formalities of the official correspondence, and to the publicity which frequently attends it; but anything which has the effect of contradicting in private what is made matter of instruction in the public correspondence, or anything that produces an action in public affairs, of which there is no trace in the public correspondence, is open to objection, as it is liable to abuse.
'Have you found yourself annoyed or restricted in your correspondence with the Secretary of State by the circumstance of most of the important despatches being from time to time laid before Parliament?—I do not remember at this moment to have experienced any annoyance from it myself; but there are, doubtless, occasions where the public interests might be compromised by indiscriminate publication. There have been cases where I cud have wished a Despatch to be published, and others where I should have deprecated its publication. It would be difficult to lay down any precise rule for such matters.
'Have you ever had cause to complain of communications,
