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Metcalfe had triumphed, but he held power by a very narrow majority; the parties stood forty-six to thirty-eight. In the usual trial of strength--the election of a Speaker--Sir Allan MacNab was chosen by a majority of only three votes. And yet Draper, that expert balancer on the tight rope, managed to carry on a government under these conditions for three full years. Perceiving that he must secure the support of the French if his party was to survive at all, he adroitly brought in favourite Reform measures as if they were his own, thus cutting the ground from under his opponents" feet. For example, English had been made the sole official language of the legislature. Now, the astute party leader managed to get this obnoxious clause in the Act of Union repealed. He even went further and endeavoured to win over the French-Canadian party wholesale by offering desirable positions; but in this intrigue he failed.
In the meantime the Act appointing a new capital had come into effect.
Kingston gave place to Montreal, for a season. The huge Ste Anne"s market building in the west of the city was turned into a parliament house, destined to the fate of Troy. Here was held {95} the session of 1844-45. Such legislation as was pa.s.sed had no direct bearing on the question of responsible government. Before the session ended news came that the home government intended to raise the governor to the peerage as Baron Metcalfe of Fern Hill. His brief two years in Canada formed only an episode in the long career of a distinguished public servant.
He had made his name and spent his life in India. The contemplated honour was well deserved; and it was designed by the home government as recognition of his services to the state as a whole, rather than as special approval of his administration of Canada. But so the Reformers construed Metcalfe"s elevation; and they were furious. Even the moderate Baldwin was betrayed into unwonted vehemence. What would have happened, if Metcalfe had remained in office, none can tell. Perhaps a second civil war. But "death cut the inextricable knot." His deadly disease returned after a delusive interval, as is its hideous custom.
His health failed; the cancer ate into his eye and destroyed the sight.
It was apparent that he could no longer perform the duties of his office. He asked to be recalled; but the authorities at {96} home, knowing of his malady, had antic.i.p.ated his desire. The courage that sent the boy "writer" into the deadly a.s.sault on Deeg sustained the old proconsul through the slow torture of the months of life remaining to him. He quitted Canada in November 1845, a dying man, and, to the shame of Canada, amid the untimely exultation of his political opponents. In less than a year he was dead. Macaulay composed his epitaph. Metcalfe was a man of mark; and he had his share in building up the British Empire. His name distinguishes a street in Ottawa and a hall in Calcutta; and his statue stands in the former capital of Jamaica.
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CHAPTER IV
THE GREAT ADMINISTRATION
On Metcalfe"s departure from Canada the administration pa.s.sed into the hands of Lord Cathcart, commander-in-chief of the forces. He was one of the many fine soldiers who have had their part in the upbuilding of Canada and whose services have received the very slightest recognition.
Of an ancient Scottish family, he had fought in the great Napoleonic wars from Maida to Waterloo, where he had greatly distinguished himself. After the peace he had turned his attention to the study of natural science, and he had made some important contributions to mineralogy. Cathcart held office from November 26, 1845, until January 30, 1847, some fourteen months. He wisely left Canadian politics to Canadian politicians, and merely watched the machinery revolve. At first he was merely administrator, but, on danger threatening from the unsettled dispute over {98} the Oregon boundary, he was raised to the rank of governor-general.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Charles, Earl Grey. From the painting by Sir Thomas Lawrence]
His successor was also a Scot, James Bruce, Earl of Elgin and Kincardine, directly descended from the patriot king Robert the Bruce.
His father was the British amba.s.sador who salvaged the "Elgin marbles"
from the Parthenon and sold them to the nation, thus drawing down upon himself the angry satire of Byron in "The Curse of Minerva" and "Childe Harold"s Pilgrimage." The new governor-general was young, poor, and able. Far more than his predecessors, he had enjoyed the advantages of a regular education. At Eton he had Gladstone for a school-mate, and at Oxford he was in the same college with Dalhousie, the future governor-general of India. He was also distinguished in two ways: he was a sincere Christian of the devout evangelical type, and he had a gift of speech that would have been remarkable in any man, but was remarkable most of all in a high official of a rather tongue-tied race.
His native gift of eloquence was carefully cultivated and proved to be of great value in many points in his public career. His family ties are interesting. His first wife, a Miss Bruce, met a tragic fate. The vessel in which {99} she accompanied her husband to the West Indies was wrecked on the voyage out; she never recovered from the shock and exposure, and died not long after. His second wife was a daughter of Lord Durham and a niece of Earl Grey, who was, in 1845, colonial secretary, and to whose influence Elgin owed his appointment as governor-general. He was thoroughly well qualified for the post. At the same time it was a way of providing for a relative who was not rich. Like Metcalfe, Lord Elgin came to Canada by way of Jamaica, which he had administered in the dark days that followed the emanc.i.p.ation of the slaves. His broad training, his Liberal politics, his family affiliations all predisposed him to accept the role which Metcalfe had definitely refused, the role, namely, of a const.i.tutional governor-general, guided solely by the advice of a ministry representing the majority in parliament. In other words, Elgin had his mind made up to conform entirely to the principle of responsible government as understood in the colony. He was not long in the country before he made his intentions public; and to his fixed policy he adhered through good report and through evil report, at no small cost to himself, for {100} never were a Canadian governor-general"s principles put to a more severe test.
Elgin reached Montreal in the end of January 1847, and was heartily welcomed by both political parties. He, on his part, was ready to admire the "perfectly independent inhabitants" of this "glorious country," whose demeanour was certainly not that of the recently liberated slaves in his former satrapy. The "independent inhabitants"
voted him "democratic" for walking out to "Monklands" in a blizzard, when hardly any one else was stirring abroad. He was made welcome for another reason. The experiment of popular government was not working particularly well. The const.i.tution did really "march," but with ominous creakings and groanings, which seemed to threaten a complete break-down. This must be the case with every government which tried to perform its functions with but a small majority at its back. The unanimous welcome accorded to the governor-general by both sides of politics implied a belief that somehow or other he could find a way out of the present difficulties and induce the governmental machine to work smoothly. It was a faith in the efficacy of the G.o.d from the machine.
{101} The Draper government was growing weaker and weaker, being continually defeated in the House, and consequently discredited before the country. Its difficulties were increased by events outside of Canada over which the government could have no control. The hideous Irish famine of 1846-47 had its reaction upon Canada, for thousands of starving emigrants tried to escape to the new land, and, after enduring the long-drawn horrors of the middle pa.s.sage, reached Canada only to die like plague-stricken sheep of fever and sheer misery. The monument at Grosse Isle does not tell half the shame and suffering of that tragic time. And the Draper government showed no ability to cope with the problem. At length, in December 1847, Lord Elgin dissolved the House and a new election took place. It resulted in a complete victory at the polls for the party of Reform. The leaders, Baldwin, LaFontaine, and Hincks, were all returned. Only a handful of the other party came back; but among them were Sir Allan MacNab and the young Kingston lawyer, John A. Macdonald.
The new House met on February 25, 1848. In the trial of strength over the Speakership the Reformers won. Sir Allan MacNab was {102} again the nominee of the Tories; Baldwin nominated his friend, Morin, who had command of both French and English, a necessary qualification for the presiding officer of a bilingual parliament. And Morin was chosen Speaker by a large majority. In accordance with the rules the remnant of the Draper ministry resigned, and LaFontaine and Baldwin formed a new Cabinet. This is known in Canadian history as the "Great Administration," which lasted until the retirement in 1851 of both the noted leaders from public life. The distinction is well deserved, not only on account of the high character of the leaders, and the value of the political principles affirmed and put in practice, but also on account of the permanent value of the legislative programme which it carried to successful completion. The ensuing session was very short; for time was needed to prepare the various important measures which the Reformers intended to bring forward. The troubled year of European revolution, 1848, was rather colourless in the annals of Canada; not so the year which followed.
The eventful session of 1849 opened on the eighteenth of January, in a parliament building improvised out of St Anne"s market near {103} what is now Place d"Youville, Montreal. The Speech from the Throne announces a programme of the more important measures to be brought before parliament. In this case the Speech was a promise to deal with such vital matters as electoral reform, the University of Toronto, the improvement of the judicial system, and the completion of the St Lawrence ca.n.a.ls. It also contained two announcements most gratifying to the French: first, that amnesty was to be offered to all political offenders implicated in the troubles of "37-"38; and second, that the clause in the Act of Union which made English the sole official language had been repealed. The governor-general displayed his tact and his goodwill by reading the Speech in French as well as in English, a custom which has continued ever since.
A striking incident in the opening debate on the Address was the pa.s.sage at arms between LaFontaine and Papineau, between the new and the old leader of French-Canadian political opinion. In "37 Papineau had roused his countrymen to armed resistance of the government; but he had wisely refrained from placing himself at the head of the insurgents. Together with his secretary, {104} O"Callaghan, he had witnessed the fight at St Denis from the other side of the river, but took no part in it. He had afterwards reached the American border in safety. From the United States he had pa.s.sed over to France, where he had consorted with some of the advanced thinkers of the capital. In 1843 LaFontaine, by his personal exertions with Metcalfe, was able to gain for his exiled chief the privilege of returning without penalty to his native land. Papineau, however, did not avail himself of the privilege until four years later; he found life in Paris quite to his taste. A curious result of his return, a pardoned rebel, was his claiming and receiving from the provincial treasury the nine years"
arrearage of salary due to him as Speaker in the old a.s.sembly of Lower Canada. In the elections of 1847 he stood for St Maurice, and he was elected. In the new parliament he took the role of irreconcilable; his whole policy was obstruction. What he could not realize was, that during his ten years of absence the whole country had moved away from the position it had occupied before the outbreak of the rebellion; and, in moving away, it had left him hopelessly behind. His only programme was {105} uncompromising opposition to the government which had forgiven him, and the vague dream of founding an independent French republic on the banks of the St Lawrence. In the brief session of 1848 he attempted, but without success, to block the wheels of government.
Now, in the second session, the fateful session of 1849, he delivered one of his old-time reckless philippics denouncing the tyrannical British power, the Act of Union--the very measure he was supposed to have battled for--responsible government, and, above all, those of his own race who supported the new order. LaFontaine took up the gauntlet.
His retort was as obvious as it was crushing. If the French Canadians had refused to come in under the Act of Union, they would have been depriving themselves of any share whatever in the government of their country. If they had refused to come in, Papineau would not have been permitted to return, or to sit once more as a legislator and a free man in the national parliament. The reply was unanswerable, and it put a period to the influence of Papineau. Foiled and discredited, the old leader was never again to sway the ma.s.ses of his countrymen as the moon sways the tides. His day was done. None the less, {106} the prestige of his name drew after him a small following of the younger and more ardent men to whom he taught the pure Radical doctrine. In _L"Avenir_, the propagandist journal which he founded, he preached repeal of the Union and annexation to the United States. Before long he abandoned an arena in which he was no longer the great central figure for dignified seclusion on his seigneury of Montebello beside the n.o.ble Ottawa.
In spite of all blind opposition a broad and enlightened programme of legislation was carried out. Nearly two hundred measures, many of prime importance, stand to the credit of this busy session. The vexed question of a provincial university was finally settled. Baldwin"s bill for the founding of the University of Toronto, which had been laid to one side by the Metcalfe crisis, was taken up again and carried through all its stages to the status of a law. Conceived as the apex and crown of a comprehensive scheme of education as broad as the province, the University of Toronto more than met the hopes of its founder. A straight road had been devised from the first cla.s.s in the common school to the highest department of collegiate instruction. The needs of the {107} democracy had not been neglected, but wise and ample provision had been made for the ambitious and aspiring few. How completely the university has justified its existence is attested by the spectacle of both political parties competing with each other in their benevolence towards an honoured, national foundation. By the multiplying generations of Toronto graduates the name of Robert Baldwin should be held in high esteem as of the man who made possible the seat of learning they are so proud to name their _alma mater_.
Another wise measure for which Baldwin deserves no little praise is the Munic.i.p.al Corporations Act. The t.i.tle has a dry, legal look, and will suggest little or nothing to the general reader except, possibly, red tape. Moreover, the system by which the subdivisions of the country--the county, the township, the incorporated village--govern themselves seems so obvious and works so smoothly in actual practice that it seems part of the order of nature, and must have existed from the time beyond which the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.
But the present extended system of home rule in Canada did not descend from heaven complete, like the {108} Twelve Tables. It was a gradual growth, or evolution, from the old system, by which the local justices of the peace, sitting in quarter sessions, a.s.sessed the local taxes, with the difference that it was not an unconscious growth. The plant set by Sydenham"s hand was tended, cultivated, and brought to maturity by Baldwin. The measure, as it became law in 1849, has proved to be of the greatest practical value; it has won the approval of competent critics; and it has served as a model for the organization of other provinces. Commonplace and humdrum as this measure may seem to Canadians in the actual domestic working of it, there are other parts of the Empire--Ireland, for example--which were to lag long behind.
The lack of such privileges is a grievance elsewhere. Even to-day, the rural districts of England have not as extensive powers of self-government as the counties of Ontario. If the farmers of the Tenth Concession had to go to Ottawa and see a bill through the House every time they wanted a new school, if they had months of waiting for proper authorization, not to mention expenses of legislation to meet, they might appreciate more keenly the advantages they enjoy in virtue of this {109} forgotten Act of 1849. The lover of the picturesque will not regret that terms with the historic colour of "reeve" and "warden"
were made part and parcel of a democratic system in the New World.
It was a session of constructive statesmanship. The judicial system of the province needed to be revised, extended, and simplified; and these things were done. The economic condition of Canada was anything but satisfactory. For years the country had "enjoyed a preference" in the British markets, in accordance with the old, plausible theory that mother country and colony were best held together by trade arrangements of mutual advantage, by which the colony should supply the mother country with raw material and the mother country should supply the colony with manufactured products. Suddenly all Canada"s business was dislocated by Peel"s adoption of free trade in 1846. In consequence Canada had no longer any advantage in the British market over the rest of the world, and Canadian timber-merchants and grain-growers had an undoubted grievance. The general commercial depression, which had set in at the time of the rebellions, became worse and worse. {110} Lord Elgin"s often-quoted words picture the deplorable state of the country: "Property in most of the Canadian towns, and more especially in the capital, has fallen fifty per cent in value within the last three years. Three-fourths of the commercial men are bankrupt, owing to free trade; a large proportion of the exportable produce of Canada is obliged to seek a market in the United States. It pays a duty of twenty per cent on the frontier. How long can such a state of things be expected to endure?" For a remedy the active mind of Hincks turned to the obvious alternative of the British market, the natural market just across the line; and he opened up negotiations with the United States looking towards reciprocal trade. He could scarcely obtain a hearing. The way was blocked by the complete indifference of the United States Senate towards the whole project. Not until five years later did relief come; and it came through the initiative and personal diplomacy of Lord Elgin. To him belongs the credit for the famous Reciprocity Treaty of 1854. This signifies that for the twelve years during which the treaty was in force the artificial barriers to the currents of trade between {111} adjacent countries were, to a large extent, removed, certainly to the great advantage of all British North America. It was a unique period in Canadian history. Never before had the trade relations between Canada and the United States been so friendly, and never have they been so friendly since.
In another great enterprise of national importance Hincks was more successful. The forties of the nineteenth century saw the first great era of railway building. This novel method of transportation was perceived to have immense undeveloped possibilities. In Britain, where steam traction was invented, companies were formed by the score and lines were projected in every direction. It was a time of wild speculation, in which emerged for the first time the new type of company promoter. From England the rage for railways spread to the Continent and to America. While Hincks was working at the problem in Canada, Howe was working at it in Nova Scotia. To link the East with the West, Montreal with Toronto, Montreal with the Atlantic seaboard, Montreal with the Lake Champlain waterways to the southward, was the general design of the first Canadian railways. It was in this period that the first {112} sections were built of those Canadian lines which, in half a century, have grown into immense systems radiating across the continent. Hincks"s idea was to aid private enterprise by government guarantees of the interest on half the cost of construction. Canada is now laced with iron roads from ocean to ocean. The man who laid the foundation of these immense systems in the day of small beginnings should never be forgotten.
So the busy session went on, until a measure was introduced which aroused a storm of opposition, threatened a renewal of civil war, and tested the principle of responsible government almost to the breaking strain. This was the Act of Indemnification, a part of the bitter aftermath of the rebellion twelve years before.
War, even on the smallest scale, means the destruction of property. In the troubles of "37 buildings were burned down in the course of military operations. For example, good Father Paquin of St Eustache had long to mourn the loss of his church and the adjoining school. As it stood on a point of land at the junction of two streams and was strongly built of stone, it was an excellent {113} place of defence against the attack of Colborne"s troops. On the fatal fourteenth of December 1837 it was stoutly held by Chenier and his men, until two British officers broke into the sacristy and overset the stove. Soon the fire drove the garrison out of the building, which was destroyed along with the new school-house near by. His parishioners were loyal, Father Paquin contended in a well-reasoned pet.i.tion; it was not they but the discontented people of Grand Brule who had seized the town; yet the result was ruin. In the affair of Odelltown in 1838 a citizen"s barn was burnt down by orders of the British officer commanding because it gave shelter to the rebels. Near St Eustache the Swiss adventurer and leader of the rebels, Amury Girod, took possession of a farm belonging to a loyal Scottish family. His men cut down the trees about the farm-house, fortified it rudely, and lived in it at rack and manger until Colborne came to St Eustache. These were typical cases of loss, and surely, when order was again restored, they were cases for compensation. The loyal and the innocent should not have to suffer in their goods for their innocence and their loyalty.
{114}
Claims for compensation were made early. In the very year of the rebellion the a.s.sembly of Upper Canada pa.s.sed an Act appointing commissioners to inquire into the amount of damage done to the property of loyal citizens; and in the following year it voted a sum of 4000 to make good the losses. Men were paid for a cow driven off, or for an old musket commandeered. The Special Council of Lower Canada made similar provision, as was only natural and right; but its task was much harder than that of the a.s.sembly"s. Clearly, the property of loyalists destroyed or injured during the civil strife should be made good. This was mere justice. It was equally clear that the property of open rebels which had been destroyed or injured should _not_ be made good.
But there was a third category not so easy to deal with. There were those who were not openly in rebellion, but who were grievously suspect of sympathy with declared insurgents of their own race and religion.
How far sympathy might have become aid and comfort to opponents of the government was hard to say. The village of St Eustache, for example, was set on fire the night following the fight; the troops turned out in the bitter cold to fight the fire, {115} but did not master it until some eighty houses were burned. What claim could the owners have upon the government for their losses? In the winter of 1838 the sky was red with the flames of burning hamlets, says the _Montreal Herald_.
The law"s delay is proverbial. Compensatory legislation dragged its slow length along for years, and the loyalists who had suffered in their pocket saw session after session pa.s.s, and their claims still unsatisfied. In 1840 the a.s.sembly of Upper Canada pa.s.sed an Act authorizing the expenditure not of four thousand, but of forty thousand pounds, to indemnify the loyalists who had lost by the "troubles."
However, as the a.s.sembly, at the same time, forbore to provide any funds for the purpose, the Act remained with the force of a pious wish.
The claimants for compensation were none the better for it. Then came the union of the Canadas. Five more years rolled away, and, in spite of the usual siege operations of those who have money claims against a government, nothing was done. The various barns and cows and muskets were still a dead loss. Then in 1845 the Tory administration of Draper put the necessary finishing touch to the quaker act of 1840 by {116} providing the sum of money required. By drawing on the receipts from tavern licences collected in Upper Canada over a period of four years, the government was in the possession of 38,000 for this specific purpose. But, after the Union, it was manifestly unjust to pay rebellion losses, as they came to be known, in Upper Canada and not in Lower Canada. The Reformers of Lower Canada pointed out with emphasis the manifest injustice of such a proceeding. It therefore became necessary to extend the scope of the Act. Accordingly, in November 1845, a commission consisting of five persons was appointed to investigate the claims for "indemnity for just losses sustained" during the rebellion in Lower Canada. This commission was instructed to distinguish between the loyal and the rebellious, but, in making this vital distinction, they were not to "be guided by any other description of evidence than that furnished by the sentences of the courts of law."
The commission was also given to understand that its investigation was not to be final. It was to prepare only a "general estimate" which would be subject to more particular scrutiny and revision. Appointed in the end of November 1845, the {117} commission had finished its task and was ready to report in April 1846. Its "general estimate" was a handsome total of more than 240,000; it gave as its opinion that 100,000 would cover all the "just losses sustained." Of the larger amount, it is said that 25,000 was claimed by those who had actually been convicted of treason by court-martial. Not unnaturally an outcry rose at once against taking public money to reward treason. The report could not very well be acted upon; and the government voted 10,000 to pay claims in Lower Canada which had been certified before the union of the provinces. Another delay of three years followed, until LaFontaine took the matter up in the session of 1849.
His general idea was simply to continue and complete the legislation already in force, in order to do justice to those who had "sustained just losses" in the "troubles" of "37 and "38. The bill provided for a new commission of five, with power to examine witnesses on oath. In accordance with the finding of the previous commission, the total sum to be expended was limited to 100,000. If the losses exceeded that sum, the individual claims were to be proportionally reduced. {118} The necessary funds were to be raised on twenty-year debentures bearing interest at six per cent. LaFontaine introduced and explained the bill, and Baldwin supported it in a brief speech. It was easy enough, with their unbroken majority, to vote the measure through; but the storm of opposition it raised might have made less determined leaders hesitate or draw back.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Sir Louis H. LaFontaine. After a photograph by Notman]
The vehemence of the opposition was not due merely to the readiness with which the faction out of power will seize on the weak aspects of a question in order to embarra.s.s the government. Such sham-fight tactics are common enough and may be rated at their proper value. The leaders of the British party were sincere in their belief that the success of this measure meant the triumph of the French and the reversal of all that had been done to hold the colonies for the Empire against rebels whose avowed purpose was separation. Twelve years had gone by since they had failed in the overt act. Now Papineau was back in the House, about to receive his arrears of salary as Speaker. In Elgin"s eyes he was a Guy Fawkes waving flaming brands among all sorts of combustibles.
Mackenzie had been granted amnesty by the monarch {119} he had called "the b.l.o.o.d.y Queen of England." Wolfred Nelson, who had resisted Her Majesty"s forces at St Denis, was to have his claim for damages considered. It was not in the flesh and blood of politicians to endure all this; and before condemning the opposition to this bill, as is the fashion with Canadian historians, we might ask what we should have done ourselves in such circ.u.mstances. What the Tories did was to raise the war-cry, "No pay to rebels." It resounded from one end of the province to the other and roused to life all the pa.s.sion that had slumbered since the rebellion.
In the debate on the second reading of the bill a scene almost without parallel took place on the floor of the House. The Tories taunted the French with being "aliens and rebels." Blake, the solicitor-general for Upper Canada, retorted the charge, and accused the Tories of being "rebels to their const.i.tution and country." In a rage Sir Allan MacNab gave him "the lie with circ.u.mstance," and the two honourable members made at each other. Only the prompt intervention of the sergeant-at-arms prevented actual a.s.sault. The two belligerents were taken into his custody. Some of the excited spectators who {120} hissed and shouted were also taken into custody; and the debate came to a sudden end that day. Those were the days of "the code," and why a "meeting" was not "arranged" and why Sir Allan did not have an opportunity of using his silver-mounted duelling pistols is not quite clear. The tempers of our politicians have much improved since that violent scene occurred. No slur on the word of an honourable gentleman, no imputation of falsehood, would now be so hotly resented in our legislative halls.
The violence and the excitement which prevailed in parliament were repeated and intensified throughout the country. Everything that could be effected by public meetings, pet.i.tions, protests, was done to prevent the bill from pa.s.sing, or, if it pa.s.sed, to prevent the governor-general from giving his a.s.sent to it, or, as a last resource, to induce the Queen to disallow the obnoxious measure. The whole machinery of agitation was set in motion and speeded up, to prevent the bill becoming law. "Demonstrations"--in plain English, rows--took place everywhere. Sedate little Belleville was the scene of fierce riots. Effigies of Baldwin, Blake, and Mackenzie were paraded through the streets of Toronto {121} on long poles "amid the cheers and exultations of the largest concourse of people beheld in Toronto since the election of Dunn and Buchanan." Finally the effigies were burned in a burlesque _auto-da-fe_. This ancient English custom was a milder method of expressing political disapproval than the native American invention of tar-and-feathers; but it seems to have been equally soothing to the feelings. An outside observer, the _New York Herald_, expected the disturbance to end in "a complete and perfect separation of those provinces from the rule of England"; but in those days American critics were always expecting separation.
No clearer mirror of the crisis is to be found than in the words of the man on whom lay the heaviest responsibility, the governor-general himself. This is his private opinion of the bill: "The measure itself is not free from objection, and I very much regret that an addition should be made to our debt for such an object at this time.
Nevertheless I must say I do not see how my present government could have taken any other course." He also calls it "a strict logical following out" of the Tory party"s own acts; and he has "no doubt whatsoever {122} that a great deal of property was wantonly and cruelly destroyed at that time in Lower Canada." He was pet.i.tioned to dissolve parliament if the bill should pa.s.s; his judgment on this alternative runs: "If I had dissolved parliament, I might have produced a rebellion, but most a.s.suredly I should not have produced a change of ministry." The other alternative of reserving the bill seemed, as he balanced it in his mind, cowardly. He would create no precedent.
Bills had been reserved before, and had been refused the royal sanction; to reserve this one would be no departure from established custom; but, he writes to Lord Grey, "by reserving the Bill, I should only throw upon Her Majesty"s Government ... a responsibility which rests, and ought, I think, to rest, on my own shoulders." The sentences which follow evince an ideal of public service that can only be called knightly. The executive head of the government was ready to face failure and disgrace, to the ruin of his career, rather than shirk the responsibility which was really his. "If I pa.s.s the Bill, whatever mischief ensues may possibly be repaired, if the worst comes to the worst, by the sacrifice of me. Whereas {123} if the case be referred to England, it is not impossible that Her Majesty may have before her the alternative of provoking a rebellion in Lower Canada ... or of wounding the susceptibilities of some of the best subjects she has in the province." From the first Elgin had firmly made up his mind to fill the role of const.i.tutional governor; he believed that the best justification of Durham"s memory, and of what he had done in Canada, would be a governor-general working out fairly the Dictator"s views of government. Although he had definitely made up his mind what course of action to follow, he was never betrayed into committing himself before the proper time. Deputations waited on him with provocative addresses; but none was cunning enough to snare him in his speech. The "sacrifice" came soon enough.
In spite of all the furies of opposition within the House and out of it, the Indemnity Bill pa.s.sed by a majority of more than two to one.
The next question was what would Lord Elgin do? Would he give his a.s.sent to the bill, the finishing vice-regal touch which would make it law, or would he reserve it for Her Majesty"s sanction? Some unnamed {124} persons of respectability had a shrewd suspicion of what he would do, as the sequel proved. An accident hastened the crisis. In 1849 the navigation of the St Lawrence opened early; and on the twenty-fifth of April the first vessel of the season was sighted approaching the port of Montreal. In order to make his new Tariff Bill immediately operative on the nearing cargo, Hincks posted out to "Monklands," Lord Elgin"s residence, in order to obtain the governor-general"s formal a.s.sent to this particular bill. The governor did as he was asked. He drove in from "Monklands" in state to the Parliament House for the purpose. The time seemed opportune to give his a.s.sent to several other bills. Among the rest he a.s.sented in Her Majesty"s name to the "Act to provide for the indemnification of parties in Lower Canada whose property was destroyed during the Rebellion of 1837 and 1838." What happened in consequence is best told in his own words. "When I left the House of Parliament, I was received with mingled cheers and hootings by a crowd by no means numerous, which surrounded the entrance of the building. A small knot of individuals consisting, it has since been {125} ascertained, of persons of a respectable cla.s.s in society, pelted the carriage with missiles which they must have brought with them for the purpose." The "missiles" which could not be picked up in the street were rotten eggs. One of them struck Lord Elgin in the face. That was the Canadian method of expressing disapproval of a governor-general for acting in strict accordance with the principles of responsible government. But this was only part of the price he had to pay for doing right. Worse was to follow.
Immediately after this outrage a notice was issued from one of the newspapers calling an open-air meeting in the Champ de Mars. Towards evening the excitement increased, and the fire-bells jangled a tocsin to call the people into the streets. The Champ de Mars soon filled with a tumultuous mob, roaring its approbation of wild speeches which denounced the "tyranny" of the governor-general and the Reformers. A cry arose, "To the Parliament House!" and the mob streamed westward, wrecking in its pa.s.sage the office of Hincks"s paper the _Pilot_. The House was in session, and though warned by Sir Allan MacNab that a riot was in progress, it hesitated to take the extreme step of {126} calling out the military to protect its dignity. At this time the whole police force of the city numbered only seventy-two men, and, in emergencies, law and order were maintained with the aid of the regiments in garrison, or by a force of special constables. Soon the House found that Sir Allan"s warning was against no imaginary danger. Volleys of stones suddenly crashed through the lighted windows, and the members fled for their lives. The rabble flowed into the building and took possession of the a.s.sembly hall. Here they broke in pieces the furniture, the fittings, the chandeliers. One of the rioters, a man with a broken nose, seated himself in the Speaker"s chair and shouted, "I dissolve this House." It seems like a scene from a Paris _emeute_ rather than an actual event in a staid Canadian city. Soon a cry was heard, "The Parliament House is on fire." Another band of rioters had set the western wing alight, and, in a quarter of an hour, the whole building was a ma.s.s of flames. Although the firemen turned out promptly, they were forcibly prevented by the mob from doing their duty, until the soldiers came to their support, and then it was too late to save the building. Next day only the ruined walls {127} were standing. The Library of Parliament was burned in spite of efforts to save it, and the student of Canadian history will always mourn the loss of irreplaceable records and ma.n.u.scripts in that tragic blaze. One thing was rescued. Young Sandford Fleming and three others carried out the portrait of the Queen. It was almost as gallant an act as rescuing the Lady in person.
Nor was the destruction of the Parliament Building the final outbreak.
Next evening the mob was at its work again, attacking the houses or lodgings of the various Reform leaders. LaFontaine"s government ordered the arrest of four ringleaders in the last night"s riot. In revenge his house was entered forcibly, the furniture smashed, the library destroyed, and the stable set on fire. In fact, for three days Montreal was like a city in revolution. A thousand special constables, armed with pistols and cutla.s.ses, in addition to the soldiery were needed to restore something like order in the streets. But the rioting was not over even yet. The most violent scene of all took place on the thirtieth of April. The House was naturally incensed at the insults offered to the governor-general and drew up an address expressing the {128} members" detestation of mob violence, their loyalty to the Queen, and their approval of his just and impartial administration. It was decided to present the address to him, not at the suburban seat of "Monklands," but publicly at Government House, the Chateau de Ramezay in the heart of the city. Such a decision showed no little courage on both sides, but the end was almost a tragedy. Lord Elgin came very near being murdered in the streets of Montreal. On the day appointed he drove into the city, having for escort a troop of volunteer dragoons. All through the streets his carriage was pelted with stones and other missiles, and his entry to Government House was blocked by a howling mob. His escort forced the crowd to give way, and the governor-general entered, carrying with him a two-pound stone which had been hurled into his carriage. It was a piece of unmistakable evidence as to the treatment the Queen"s representative in Canada had received at the hands of Her Majesty"s faithful subjects. When the ceremony was over he attempted to avoid trouble by taking a different route back to "Monklands," but he was discovered, and literally hunted out of the city. "Cabs, {129} caleches, and everything that would run were at once launched in pursuit, and crossing his route, the governor-general"s carriage was bitterly a.s.sailed in the main street of the St Lawrence suburbs. The good and rapid driving of his postilions enabled him to clear the desperate mob, but not till the head of his brother, Colonel Bruce, had been cut, injuries inflicted on the chief of police, Colonel Ermatinger, and on Captain Jones, commanding the escort, and every panel of the carriage driven in." Even at "Monklands" Lord Elgin was not entirely safe. The mob threatened to attack him there, and the house was put in a state of defence. Ladies of his household driving to church were insulted. To avoid occasion of strife he remained quietly at his country-seat; and, for his consideration of the public weal, was ridiculed, caricatured, and dubbed, in contempt, the Hermit of Monklands.
The riots did not end without bloodshed. Once more the rioters attacked LaFontaine"s house by night; shots were fired from the windows on the mob, and one man was killed. The appeal to racial pa.s.sion was irresistible. A man of British blood had been slain by a Frenchman.
The funeral {130} of the chance victim was made a political demonstration. LaFontaine was actually tried for complicity in the accident, but was acquitted. Montreal underwent something like a Reign of Terror; a murderous clash between French and English might come at any moment. Elgin was urged to proclaim martial law and put down mob rule by the use of troops. Wisely he refused to go to such extremes.
The city authorities themselves should restore order, and at last they did so with their thousand special constables. Those April riots of "49 cost Montreal the honour of being the capital of Canada, and ultimately caused the transformation of queer little lumbering Bytown into the stately city of Ottawa, proudly eminent, with the halls of legislature towering on the great bluff above the gla.s.sy river.
Of Elgin"s conduct during this long-drawn ordeal it is almost impossible to speak in terms of moderate praise. He must have been less or more than human not to feel bitterly the insults heaped upon him. The natural man spoke in the American who "could not understand why you did not shoot them down"; and also in the Canadian {131} who "would have reduced Montreal to ashes" before enduring half that the governor endured. But Elgin acted not as the natural man, but as the Christian and the statesman, He refused to meet violence with violence; and he refused to nullify the principles of popular government by bowing before the blast of popular clamour. But a more unpopular governor-general never held office in Canada.