I have frequently remarked that, although in England any person may pass a life-time without becoming acquainted with his next-door neighbour, he can hardly fall into conversation with a fellow-countryman in Canada, without finding some latent link of relationship or propinquity between them. Thus, in the case of Mr. C. Poulett Thomson, I trace more than one circumstance connecting that great man with my humble self. He was a member--the active member--of the firm of Thomson, Bonar & Co., Russia Merchants, Cannon Street, London, at the same time that my brother-in-law, William Tatchell, of the firm of Tatchell & Clarke, carried on the same business of Russia Merchants in Upper Thames Street. There were occasional transactions between them: and my brother Thomas, who was chief accountant in the Thames Street house, has told me that the firm of Thomson, Bonar & Co. was looked upon in the trade with a good deal of distrust, for certain sharp practices to which they were addicted.

Again, Sir John Rae Reid, of the East India Company, had been the Tory member of Parliament for Dover. On his retirement, Mr. Poulett Thomson started as Reform candidate for the same city. I knew the former slightly as a neighbour of my mother's, at Ewell, in Surrey, and felt some interest in the Dover election in consequence. It was in the old borough-mongering times, and the newspapers on both sides rang with accounts of the immense sums that were expended in this little Dover contest, in which Mr. Thomson, aided by his party, literally bought every inch of his way, and succeeded in obtaining his first seat in the House of Commons, at a cost, as his biographer states, of £3,000 sterling. In the matter of corruption, there was probably little difference between the rival candidates.

The Right Hon. Charles Poulett Thomson, it was understood in England, always had the dirty work of the Melbourne Ministry to do; and it was probably his usefulness in that capacity that recommended him for the task of uniting the two Canadas, in accordance with that report of Lord Durham, which his lordship himself disavowed.[10] That Mr. Thomson did his work well, cannot be denied. He was, in fact, the Castlereagh of Canadian Union. What were the exact means employed by him in Montreal and Toronto is not known, but the results were visible enough. Government officials coerced, sometimes through the agency of their wives, sometimes by direct threats of dismissal; the Legislature overawed by the presence and interference of His Excellency's secretaries and aides-de-camp; votes sought and obtained by appeals to the personal interests of members of Parliament. These and such-like were the dignified processes by which the Union of the Canadas was effected, in spite of the unwillingness of at least one of the parties to that ceremony.

His Excellency did not even condescend to veil his contempt for his tools. When a newly nominated Cabinet Minister waited upon the great man with humility, to thank him for an honour for which he felt his education did not qualify him, the reported answer was--"Oh, I think you are all pretty much alike here."

In Toronto, anything like opposition to His Excellency's policy was sought to be silenced by the threat of depriving the city of its tenure of the Seat of Government. The offices of the principal city journals, the Patriot and Courier, were besieged by anxious subscribers, entreating that nothing should appear at all distasteful to His Excellency. Therefore it happened, that our little sheet, the Herald, became the only mouth-piece of Toronto dissentients; and was well supplied with satires and criticisms upon the politic manoeuvres of Government House. We used to issue on New Year's Day a sheet of doggerel verses, styled, "The News Boy's Address to his Patrons," which gave me an opportunity, of which I did not fail to avail myself, of telling His Excellency some wholesome truths in not very complimentary phrase. It is but justice to him to say, that he enjoyed the fun, such as it was, as much as anybody, and sent a servant in livery to our office, for extra copies to be placed on his drawing-room tables for the amusement of New Year's callers, to whom he read them himself. I am sorry that I cannot now treat my readers to extracts from those sheets, which may some centuries hence be unearthed by future Canadian antiquaries, as rare and priceless historical documents.

Whether the course he pursued be thought creditable or the reverse,
there is no doubt that Lord Sydenham did Canada immense service by the measures enacted under his dictation. The Union of the Provinces Municipal Councils, Educational Institutions, sound financial arrangements, and other minor matters, are benefits which cannot be ignored. But all these questions were carried in a high-handed, arbitrary manner, and some of them by downright compulsion. To connect in any way with his name the credit of bestowing upon the united provinces "Responsible Government" upon the British model, is a gross absurdity.

In the Memoirs of his lordship, by his brother, Mr. G. Poulett Scrope,
page 236, I find the following plain statements:

"On the subject of 'Responsible Government,' which question was again dragged into discussion by Mr. Baldwin, with a view of putting the sincerity of the Government to the test, he (Lord S.) introduced and carried unanimously a series of resolutions in opposition to those proposed by Mr. Baldwin, distinctly recognising the irresponsibility of the Governor to any but the Imperial authorities, and placing the doctrine on the sound and rational basis which he had ever maintained."

What that "sound and rational basis" was, is conclusively shown in an extract from one of his own private letters, given on page 143 of the same work:

"I am not a bit afraid of the Responsible Government cry. I have already done much to put it down in its inadmissible sense, namely, that the Council shall be responsible to the Assembly, and that the Government shall take their advice, and be bound by it. In fact, this demand has been made much more for the people than by them. And I have not met with any one who has not at once admitted the absurdity of claiming to put the Council over the head of the Governor. It is but fair too, to say that everything has in times past been done by the different Governors to excite the feelings of the people on this question. First, the Executive Council has generally been composed of the persons most obnoxious to the majority of the Assembly; and next, the Governor has taken extreme care to make every act of his own go forth to the public on the responsibility of the Executive Council. So the people have been carefully taught to believe that the Governor is nobody, and the Executive Council the real power, and that by the Governor himself. At the same time they have seen that power placed in the hands of their opponents. Under such a system it is not to be wondered at, if one argument founded on the responsibility of the Governor to the Home Government falls to the ground. I have told the people plainly that, as I cannot get rid of my responsibility to the Home Government, I will place no responsibility on the Council; that they are a Council for the Governor to consult, but no more. And I have yet met with no 'Responsible Government' man who was not satisfied with the doctrine. In fact, there is no other theory which has common sense. Either the Governor is the Sovereign or the Minister. If the first, he may have ministers, but he cannot be responsible to the Government at home, and all colonial government becomes impossible. He must, therefore, be the Minister, in which case he cannot be under the control of men in the colony."

It is only just that the truth should be clearly established on this question. Responsible Government was not an issue between Canadian Reformers and Tories in any sense; but exclusively between the Colonies and the statesmen of the Mother Country. On several occasions prior to Mackenzie's Rebellion, Tory majorities had affirmed the principle; and Ogle R. Gowan, an influential Orangeman, had published a pamphlet in its favour. Yet some recent historians of Canada have fallen into the foolish habit of claiming for the Reform party all the good legislation of the past forty years, until they seem really to believe the figment themselves.[11]

I am surprised that writers who condemn Sir F. B. Head for acting as his own Prime Minister, in strict accordance with his instructions, can see nothing to find fault with in Lord Sydenham's doing the very same thing in an infinitely more arbitrary and offensive manner. Where Sir Francis persuaded, Lord Sydenham coerced, bribed and derided.

Lower Canada was never consulted as to her own destiny. Because a fraction of her people chose to strike for independence, peaceable French Canadians were treated bodily as a conquered race, with the undisguised object of swamping their nationality and language, and over-riding their feelings and wishes. It is said that the result has justified the means. But what casuistry is this? What sort of friend to Responsible Government must he be, who employs force to back his argument? To inculcate the voluntary principle at the point of the bayonet, is a peculiarly Hibernian process, to say the least.

[Footnote 10: On reference to Sir F. B. Head's "Emigrant," pp. 376-8, the reader will find the following letters:--

"1. From the Hon. Sir. A. N. MacNab.
"Legislative Assembly,
"Montreal, 28th March, 1846.

"My dear Sir Francis,

"I have no hesitation in putting on paper the conversation which took place between Lord Durham and myself, on the subject of the Union. He asked me if I was in favour of the Union; I said, 'No;' he replied, 'If you are a friend to your country, oppose it to the death.'

"I am, &
"(Signed) Allan N. MacNab.

"Sir F. B. Head, Bart."
"2. From W. E. Jervis, Esq.
"Toronto, March 12th, 1846.

"Dear Sir Allan,

"In answer to the inquiry contained in your letter of the 2nd inst., I beg leave to state, that, in the year 1838, I was in Quebec, and had a long conversation with the Earl of Durham upon the subject of an Union of the Provinces of Upper and Lower Canada--a measure which I had understood his Lordship intended to propose.

"I was much gratified by his Lordship then, in the most unqualified terms, declaring his strong disapprobation of such a measure, as tending, in his opinion, to the injury of this Province; and he advised me, as a friend to Upper Canada, to use all the influence I might possess in opposition to it.

"His Lordship declared that, in his opinion, no statesman could propose so injurious a project, and authorized me to assure my friends in Upper Canada, _that he was decidedly averse to the measure.