to Canada, the esteem and affection in which he was held by the people, whom he had so long served during a continuous public career of half a century, were shown by the erection of stately monuments in five of the principal cities of the Dominion-an honour never before paid to a colonial statesman. The statues of Sir John Macdonald and Sir Georges Cartier-statues conceived and executed by the genius of a French Canadian artist-stand on either side of the noble parliament building where these statesmen were for years the most conspicuous figures; and as Canadians of the present generation survey their bronze effigies, let them not fail to recall those admirable qualities of statesmanship which distinguished them bothabove all their assertion of those principles of compromise, conciliation and equal rights which have served to unite the two races in critical times when the tide of racial and sectional passion and political demagogism has rushed in a mad torrent against the walls of the national structure which Canadians have been so steadily and successfully building for so many years on the continent of North America.

IN

CHAPTER XI

POLITICAL PROGRESS

the foregoing pages I have endeavoured to review-very imperfectly, I am afraid—all those important events in the political history of Canada from 1847 to 1854, which have had the most potent influence on its material, social, and political development. Any one who carefully studies the conditions of the country during that critical period of Canadian affairs cannot fail to come to the conclusion that the gradual elevation of Canada from the depression which was so prevalent for years in political as well as commercial matters, to a position of political strength and industrial prosperity, was largely owing to the success of the principles of self-government which Lord Elgin initiated and carried out while at the head of the Canadian executive. These principles have been clearly set forth in his speeches and in his despatches to the secretary of state for the colonies as well as in instructive volumes on the colonial policy of Lord John Russell's administration by Lord Grey, the imperial minister who so wisely recommended Lord Elgin's appointment as governorgeneral. Briefly stated these principles are as follows:

That it is neither desirable nor possible to carry on the government of a province in opposition to the opinion of its people.

That a governor-general can have no ministers who do not enjoy the full confidence of the popular House, or, in the last resort, of the people.

That the governor-general should not refuse his consent to any measure proposed by the ministry unless it is clear that it is of such an extreme party character that the assembly or people could not approve of it.

That the governor-general should not identify himself with any party but make himself "a mediator and moderator between all parties."

That colonial communities should be encouraged to cultivate "a national and manly tone of political morals," and should look to their own parliaments for the solution of all problems of provincial govvernment instead of making constant appeals to the colonial office or to opinion in the mother country, "always ill-informed, and therefore credulous, in matters of colonial politics.”

That the governor-general should endeavour to impart to these rising communities the full advantages of British laws, British institutions, and British freedom, and maintain in this way the connection between them and the parent state.

We have seen in previous chapters how industriously, patiently, and discreetly Lord Elgin laboured to carry out these principles in the adminis

A LETTER TO LORD GREY

tration of his government. In 1849 he risked his own life that he might give full scope to the principles of responsible government with respect to the adjustment of a question which should be settled by the Canadian people themselves without the interference of the parent state, and on the same ground he impressed on the imperial government the necessity of giving to the Canadian legislature full control of the settlement of the clergy reserves. He had no patience with those who believed that, in allowing the colonists to exercise their right to self-government in matters exclusively affecting themselves, there was any risk whatever so far as imperial interests were concerned. One of his ablest letters was that which he wrote to Earl Grey as an answer to the unwise utterances of the prime minister, Lord John Russell, in the course of a speech on the colonies in which, "amid the plaudits of a full senate, he declared that he looked forward to the day when the ties which he was endeavouring to render so easy and mutually advantageous would be severed." Lord Elgin held it to be "a perfectly unsound and most dangerous theory, that British colonies could not attain maturity without separation," and in this connection he quoted the language of Mr. Baldwin to whom he had read that part of Lord John Russell's speech to which he took such strong exception. "For myself," said the eminent Canadian, “if the anticipations therein expressed prove to be well

founded, my interest in public affairs is gone forever. But is it not hard upon us while we are labouring, through good and evil report, to thwart the designs of those who would dismember the empire, that our adversaries should be informed that the difference between them and the prime minister of England is only one of time? If the British government has really come to the conclusion that we are a burden to be cast off, whenever a favourable opportunity offers, surely we ought to be warned." In Lord Elgin's opinion, based on a thorough study of colonial conditions, if the Canadian or any other system of government was to be successful, British statesmen must “renounce the habit of telling the colonies that the colonial is a provisional existence." They should be taught to believe that "without severing the bonds which unite them to England, they may attain the degree of perfection, and of social and political development to which organized communities of free men have a right to aspire." The true policy in his judgment was "to throw the whole weight of responsibility on those who exercise the real power, for after all, the sense of responsibility is the best security against the abuse of power; and as respects the connection, to act and speak on this hypothesis-that there is nothing in it to check the development of healthy national life in these young communities." He was "possessed," he used the word advisedly, "with the idea that it was possible to maintain on the soil of North