The Sun.
London, England, 1837-12-23 00:00:00

set aside her Majesty's authority, and to appoint justices
from among the pacificators, and in which it was declared
that no obedience should be given to the recognised law of
the country ? And were they to say that Lord Gosford,
when all law and all authority had been set at defiance,
should take no steps to discharge his duty to his country
• and his loyalty to his Queen? He (Mr. Maclean) would like
to be told by Hon. Gentlemen opposite what ccurse they would
have recommended Lord Gosford to pursue, when placed in
the position which he was admitted to have been? If he had
conceded to those who were almost in open rebellion, he would
have given up the Queen's right, and would he not have been
rightly considered a traitor to his country and his Queen ?
chen he came home would be not have been rightly taunted
with baying Abandoned his important duties, and with having
displeyeel arrant cowardice ? And would he not have rightly
lost the conilessese of his Sovereign and his character as it
British subject 2- He (Mr. Maclean) would not then
enter upon the character of Lord Gosford's mission; but
he believed that, taking all the circumstances into con-
sideration, the Noble Lord had fully discharged his duty,
and it was curious to hear him now charged with an
abandonment, having been forced to a most severe exercise of
it. A hope had been expressed by an Hon. Member of that
House, that the time was coming when that painful dominion
of the mother country would cease, and it was supposed to
come from a person speaking the sentiments of a majority of
the people of England, and it was thus calculated to excite
dissension among the people, because the English people were
thus considered favourable to the views of Papincau's party in•
the colony, and he thought that the advice would have been
Lees followed if it were known that it possessed so little autho-
rity as it really did from this adventitious vveight. The Noble
Lord the Secretary for the Home Department had requested
the postponement of any discussion on the affairs of the colony,
and he (Mr. M.) must say that the &bete might have been
I spared, and the irritating topics which had been urged might
well have been avoided; but as they tad been introduced, he
must take the first opportunity which presented itself of de-
claring his surprise, that if what he regretted as much as
the Honourable Baronet the Member for Leeds should hap-
pen—if there should unfortunately be a collision between
her Majesty's troops and persons in arms, any Member of
that House should express a hope that her Majesty's arms
would be defeated, he could not help entering his protest
against any such doctrine, and expressing his own wish, and
what he hoped was also the wish of the majority of that House,
however painful it might be to coretemplate the possibility of a
meeting of a hostile nature, that they might not witness the
defeat of the authority of the Crown, ens(' esf those sent to sup-
part it; and if, unfortunately, a collision should take place
between the discontented and her Majesty's troops, he did sin-
cerely hope that the loyalty of the people would succeed, and
that her Majesty's troops would be victorious. With regard
to the comments on the characters of the gentlemen who
were now, or who were about to be conneceed with the co-
lony, he must also say a few words. Of Colonel Arthur he
knew nothing; but with regard to the officer wi:o was now
entrusted with the command there, he must observe that the
remarks of the Honourable Gentleman the Member tor Kil-
kenny were entirely unwarranted. Sir John Colborne was
the son of an old officer who had borne the best of names ; he
had been highly esteemed in all the relations of private life,
and he had discharged most important services to his country,
and had displayed great loyalty to his Sovereign. When the
Hon. Member talked of him, therefore, as a firebrand, did he
think that he was likely to allay the ill-feeling at present ex-
isting ? Was it wise to distinguish with the name of a fire.
brand the most respectable officer who was sent to the dis-
turbed province ?—( Hear, hear)—and who, he was sure, in
the opinions of military men of all parties, was considered as
meriting the esteem and the confidence of the country. He
(Mr. Maclean) deprecated this most unseasonable discussion,
because its tendency was to give a false colouring to events
which had happened, and to give an evil direction to those
which were about to follow.

Sir C. B. VERE bore testimony to the great claims of
Sir J. Colborne to that respect and esteem which he had ac-
quired among his brother officers. Heebelieved that the cha-
racter of no officer in the public servierktood higher, nor was
there one better qualified to have trust reposed in him. He
was a friend whom he ( Sir C. B. Vere) had not seen for
years ; but he might safely say that every Minister with whom
he had had communication in the situation in which he had
been placed, whether of the one political party or the other,
was perfectly satisfied with the manner in which that Gallant
Officer had discharged his duty.
Mr. JOHN EL LIS impressed upon Ministers the neces-
sity of withdrawing their consent from any lengthened ad-
journment. When he considered the nature of the sentiments
which had been that night expressed, when he considered
that the present debate would be a long way on its road to
Canada before the three weeks would be up, and before any
counteraction could be given to these sentiments, and when
the House remembered that Lower Canada was on the very
verge of insurrection, and that the flames of rebellion were
ready to break forth there, he trusted that Honourable Mem-
bers would induce the Noble Lord to fix an earlier day than
the 16th of January for the re-assembling of Parliament. He
must at the same time express his astonishment that the Hon.
Gentleman, the Member for Westminster, so soon after the
news of a collision between the British troops and the insur-
gents had reached England should come down that House and
deliver a speech, he would net say tainted, but at any rate
completely pregnant, with gratulation,—( Hear, hear,)—in
which he did not point out any means of effecting an amicable
separation, but suggested means by which the colony might
resist that connetion with the mother country, which the ma-
jority of the English people were most anxious to keep up.
He ( Mr. Ellis) hoped that the debate would be resumed at
an early period, and that the language then held would be
more in acco:dance with the sentiments expressed by the Noble
Lord in bis opening speech than had been uttered that evening.
Mr. C. HINDLE Y said that if there were any one vote
which he had given in that House with which he was better
satisfied than another, it was on the Noble Lord's Resolutions
regarding Canada. He thcught that all must most earnestly
desire that Government should take some conciliatory steps on
this pressing question. If England could keep Canada, let
them act towards it as they would towards any other part of the
British empire ; and if they must part with it, let them part on
the best of terms, and make the necessary arrangements for
rendering it a prosperous and separate country.
Mr. BORT H WICK remarked that the last recommenda-
tion of the Hon. Member for Ashton differed most materially
from the course suggested by the Hon. Member fur West-
minster, when he expressed his cordial and hearty approba-
tion to what amounted to all but open rebellion.—( Hear,
hear.) He (Mr. Borthwick), however, thought that the
Hon. Member for Westminster did not speak the senti-
ments of the great body of the people, who were indis-
posed to enter upon a course of headlong revolution. He
thought that the country would rather support the dignity of
the Crown and mint lin the present connection with the co-
lonies. When the Canadians had laid down their arms,
when they had returned to peaceful allegiance, then, and
not till then could they talk of the redress of grievances ; then,
and not till then, could they pay any regard to the suggestion
for the :peaceful separation of the colony from the mother
country. The Hon. Member for Bridport had stated his sur-
prise at the course which the Whig party were now taking,
and had referred to the opinions of Mr. Burke upon the Ame-
rican question; but he (Mr. Borthwick) thought that if Mr.
Burke were alive he would take the same course as had been
pursued by her Majesty's Ministers—that he would assert the
authority of the Crown and of Parliament as the only means of
restoring peace and tranquillity to this unhappy province. In
conclusion, he had only to contrast the wishes of Hon. Gentle-
man opposite, that tbo arms of Queen Victoria might be de.-
feated in one of her own colonies, with the desire expressed by
the same Gentlemen with regard to Spain ; they had then de-.
dared that however unjust might be the cause in which they
were employed, they hoped that the British arms might never
experience defeat ; but now, when the cause was just, and the
scene was in one of our colonies, they expressed a wish that
the same arms might be defeated, and that rebellion might be
successful.
Lord JOHN RUSSELL thought that the Hon. Baronet
the Member for the University of Oxford could hardly have
been in his place when he (Lord John Russell) originally
made his statement to the House. For the information of the
Hon. Baronet, and of others who might not have bsen pre-
sent, he would recal to the recollection of the House what he
bad originally stated, and the actual circumstances of the case.
He was about to move the adjournment of the House from
to-morrow to the Ist of February, and no complaint had been
made to such a course. The House was quite ready to leave
to the Government the responsibility and the arrangement as
to the administration of the affairs of Canada as well as of the
other parts of the empire. He (Lord John Russell) had,
without any suggestion, come forward with the proposition
that the House should adjourn to the 16th of January instead
of the Ist of February, not on the ground that it was neces-
sary to take any measure fitted for any immediate emergency,
or that the Government thought that Parliament need take
any steps to promote the honour of the Crown and the main-
tenance of the colony ; but what he did state was, that as un-
certain intelligence might arrive, week by week, and some
important information had been already received, it was
not parliamentary, nor was it according to the Constitution
of the country, that Parliament should separate for so long
a time as five weeks without an expression of concurrence
on the part of the House in the course of policy which
the Government had thought it its duty to pursue. On
this ground alone it was that ho had stated his intention of
moving a shorter adjournment • and if ha made it still shorter,
if he bad moved only for an adjournment of one week with-
out immediate and sufficient necessity, be would have run the
risk of not obtaining so full an attendance of Members as
was requisite to ascertain tho fair opinion of the House with
respect to the policy which had been pursued in Canada.
( Hear, hear.) He should have had little to add to these
few observations, had it not been for the spirit that had
sprung up in the course of the debate ; but he could not
help noticing the tone and manner that had been exhibited
in some of the speeches that had been delivered that night.
He did not find fault with the t.hilosophic view which the
Hon. Member for Bridport had taken of the subject, when he
said that it was no matter or consequence whatever whether
or not the complaint@ of the Canadians were unfounded and
unjust, but that the consequence of those complaints ought to
have been an instant separation. He would not now go into
a discussion of this philosophical view of the question beyond
merely observing, that if Canada was justified in a separation
for such a cause, why should not some parts of this country
be equally justified in a separation ? For instance, Scotland.
Suppose that country to require another Sovereign than a
member of the House of Hanover, when that family was

called to the Throne of England, and that it considered a re-
fusal a ground of just complaint—would Scotland be justified
then in calling for a separation and dissolution of the union
with this country ? If this were the case would it not lead
to the destruction of all social order? If this country were
to give way to Canada in order to avoid a civil war, did the
Hon. Member for Bridport imagine, after the speeches he had