Next day, while everybody was discussing what ought to be done in the emergency-two Ministries having fallen within a few weeks, and it being manifest that another, if formed, would at once share the same fate-Mr. George Brown, in conversation with Mr. Alxander Morris, intimated his willingness to meet with his opponents and talk over the situation. He was immediately taken at his word. Mr. John A. Macdonald and Mr. A. T. Galt waited on him at his hotel, and from that interview sprang what afterwards developed into the Dominion of Canada. The union of the four Provinces, consummated on the first of July, 1867, having led to such great results, there has been much controversy as to who should have the honour of being considered the "Father of Confederation." In the sense of having first suggested it, it would be difficult to decide, for a union of the British North American colonies had been a dream of statesmen for a great many years, and had on various occasions been advocated in more or less definite form. But until this memorable meeting no practical step toward it had really been taken. History will record it to the credit of Mr. George Brown that at the critical juncture he sank his personal feelings, and came forward to cooperate with his opponents in a patriotic attempt to extricate the country from its difficulties and neither friends nor opponents who remember the warm animosities he cherished, and know what an effort it must have cost him, will be sparing in their praise for his patriotic act. But when this interview took place it does not appear that Mr. Brown was prepared to take up the question of Confederation at once. Indeed the official memorandum shows that when Messrs. Macdonald and Galt proposed a Federal union of all the British North American Provinces as a remedy for the difficulty, he said that this would not be acceptable to the people of Upper Canada; that though a Federal union was desirable, and would come eventually, it was remote; and he proposed "Parliamentary reform, based on population, without regard to the separating line between Upper and Lower Canada." Messrs. Macdonald and Galt, sticking to their proposal, Mr. Brown acquiesced in its being tried, and although averse at first to entering the Government, finally came in with Messrs. William Macdougall and Oliver Mowat to help in carrying the scheme through.

The important events which followed mark the greatest epoch in the history of Canada. It is necessary in a sketch such as the present to touch but lightly upon them. A Convention having been called at Charlottetown to discuss a proposed union between Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, a deputation from the Canadian Government attended, and took the Convention by storm with the great scheme they had to propose. It was subsequently considered at Quebec and resolutions passed with which eventually delegates from the different Provinces went to England and secured the passage of the British North America Act. Although great service was rendered by Messrs. Tilley of New Brunswick, Tupper of Nova Scotia, Cartier of Lower Canada, Macdougall of Upper Canada, and others whose names will always be illustrious in Canadian history for the part they took in these events, it is conceded on all sides that the one conspicuous figure throughout was that of John A. Macdonald. His was the directing mind and his the moulding hand which practically shaped the constitution of the Dominion of Canada. He was knighted by Her Majesty, and when the Act took effect on the 1st of July, 1867, he had the honour of being called to be the first Premier of the Dominion.

In the elections which followed Sir John had once more to meet the bitter opposition of Mr. George Brown, who had left the Government before Confederation was consummated. But notwithstanding this formidable obstacle, the Government carried Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick by large majorities, although in Nova Scotia the Anti-Confederates made almost a clean sweep-Dr. Tupper being the only supporter returned from that Province. From this time till the next general election in 1872 were years of arduous labour, which might fairly be called an era of nation building. Never in a similar length of time has any other country made such strides in Territorial expansion as did Canada during that period. The machinery of the new Dominion had to be got under way, laws had to be devised and passed organizing the various departments of State, the Inter-colonial Railway had to be located and its construction proceeded with. Such works as these latter might have been considered sufficient to task the energies of Premier and Government for one Parliamentary term; but Sir John started with

large conceptions of the future in store for Canada and lost no time in setting to work to carry out his grand ideas. Steps were at once taken to acquire for the Dominion sovereignity over the vast British region which stretched westward from Ontario until it reached the Province of British Columbia on the Pacific, and northwards to the Arctic Ocean; and, after a substantial payment to extinguish the rights of the Hudson's Bay Company, this was achieved and a commencement of organization made for the new territory by erecting and admitting into Confederation the Province of Manitoba in 1870. British Columbia was next approached and brought into the Dominion in 1871, and then Prince Edward Island, which had held out when the original Union was being formed, was wooed and won in 1872-thus completing Canadian sway from ocean to ocean and from the Great Lakes to the North Pole.

Meanwhile a number of irritating questions had arisen between Great Britain and the United States, and Sir John had the honour of being selected, along with four British statesmen, as one of the Imperial Commissioners to arrange a settlement. It was the first time a Colonial statesman had ever been associated in treaty-making on behalf of the Empire. When he returned he had to encounter bitter criticism, not so much for what the Treaty of Washington contained, as for its failure to deal with subjects which Canada had a fair right to have considered, but he fought it through Parliament and left his vindication for the future. It has come since his death, for his letters to his colleagues published in Mr. Joseph Pope's Memoirs show how stoutly he contended for Canada's rights-being overborne by the other British Commissioners who for Imperial reasons did not wish to have Canada's claims pressed at that time. After the Treaty of Washington was ratified, Sir John was made an Imperial Privy Councillor in recognition of his great services to the Empire, being the first Colonial statesman upon whom that high honour had been conferred. One of the terms on which British Columbia had been admitted to the Union was that a railway across the continent, to connect the railway system of Canada with the Province on the Pacific coast, should be commenced and constructed within ten years. This was immediately assailed as the height of folly. British Columbia was

described as a " sea of mountains"; it was said that from the Red River Valley eastward there was nothing but a succession of rocks and muskeg; that the whole length of the line would be through an uninhabited wilderness; that such an undertaking, which was enough to task the energies of an old and wealthy country, would certainly crush the new Dominion under a burden from which it could never recover; that to undertake it for the sake of a few people on the Pacific Coast was sheer madness. Sir John, however, was not to be daunted. He believed that such a line would be the making of Canada, and with the help of his energetic colleague, Sir Charles Tupper, he resolutely went ahead.

But while the greatest triumph of his life was connected with this magnificent work, perhaps the greatest trial of his career was associated with its early days. Parliament having decided that it would be preferable to have the Pacific Railway built by an incorporated company rather than by the Government direct, Sir Hugh Allan, of Montreal, and Hon. D. L. Macpherson, of Toronto, each promoted companies to undertake the work. When the elections of 1872 were over someone obtained access to the private correspondence of Sir Hugh Allan's solicitor. Based on the information which the Opposition was thus put in possession of, when the House met in 1873, Mr. L. S. Huntington made a series of charges against the Government to the effect that they had sold the Charter for the Pacific Railway to Sir Hugh Allan for a large sum of money with which to carry on the elections. There was great excitement throughout the country, and the proceedings of the Royal Commission, consisting of Judges Day, Polette and Gowan, appointed to take evidence on the charges, were followed with intense interest. The charge that the Government had bartered the Pacific Railway Charter to Sir Hugh Allan was not sustained by the evidence-in fact it was shown that Sir John had refused to give the work to the Company promoted by Sir Hugh and had insisted that a new Company from which Sir Hugh's American associates were excluded should be formed out of the two. It was also proved that he had given Sir Hugh Allan no advantage over others. It

was, however, admitted that Sir Hugh, who was very wealthy and had great interests at stake in addition to his prospective interest in the Pacific Railway, (and felt that a change of Ministry would be disastrous to them), gave large sums of money in the elections to sustain the Government, and the fact of accepting such sums from a prospective public contractor raised a feeling that it was difficult for the Ministry to stand up against. The House met in October to receive the evidence and a fierce debate ensued. Sir John did not wait for a vote, but after one of the most spirited speeches he ever delivered, tendered the resignation of the Ministry and vacated office.

The Hon. Alexander Mackenzie was called on to form a Government, and securing a dissolution, carried the country by a very large majority. It was not long, however, till the rising tide of Sir John's popularity began again to manifest what a wonderful hold he had upon the public of Canada, and the movement was accelerated by a new element which now came into Canadian politics. The low tariff of Canada, which had been a sufficient protection while the industries of the United States were handicapped by the War of the Rebellion, now offered little obstacle to the traders of the latter country flooding the Canadian market with their surplus of manufactured and natural products whenever it suited them to do so whilst the Canadian products were religiously excluded from the United States markets by a high tariff. Strong representations were made to the Government that this was unfair to Canadian manufacturers and agriculturists, who ought to be afforded some protection against the inroads of their Southern neighbors. But Mr. Mackenzie was a free-trader who had the courage to stand by his convictions, and he refused to yield to appeals made by his own political friends, as well as by his opponents. Sir John, as leader of the Opposition, voiced the popular demand by resolutions which he introduced into the House. They were voted down, but when the elections came in September, 1878, he was once more returned to power by an overwhelming majority, and on October 17 ensuing, his Cabinet was duly announced.

The following statement gives the Ministry, as it existed, with occasional change, until the death of the Premier on June 6, 1891: