The Sun.
London, England, 1838-10-22 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THZ PUBLIC JOURNALS.

the time he answered the deputies from the lower povai-
ces, and when he subsequently sent off his di 'patch to the
Colonial-office, that his authority had been so much
weakened that it would be inadequate to the emergency
which called for its existence ; and he might not be
.justi-
fied in abiding by the determination which that judgment
led him to declare, if the people of Canada rally round him
with such enthusiasm as to place beyond a doubt that his
authority cannot possibly be higher than it is now. But
this is not all. Lord Durham is bound to consider not
merely whether subsequent circumstances confirm his first
judgment. but whether his resignation, by damping the hopes
of the well-affected, and giving courage to the disaffected,
may not be of positive detriment to the authority of his So-
vereign and the interests of the empire. We have no
doubt that, in determining finally as to his course, all these
circumstances will be present to his mind. Merely
personal feelings he will not allow himself to en-
tertain, because he must know that, in the account
which he has to render, personal feelings, were he to
entertain them, would not be admissible. lie must be
able to show that his authority had really been so weakened
that it was no longer adequate to the emergency ; and,
further, that his withdrawal from the Government, after
the disposition evinced by all classes to support him, was
not calculated to injure the public service. So much for
the issue on which Lord Durham's justification can alone
be fairly put. But while we refuse to allow to Lord Dur-
ham the liberty to act on mere personal feelings, we are far
from justifying the disallowing the ordinances. We have
always been opposed to the course which Ministers were
led to adopt. The question was one for the politician, and
not for the lawyer. As is well observed by the Standard
of Saturday last, " Grant that the ordinance had been
illegal : a wise and zealous Governor may in time of diffi-
culty do things that are opposed to the letter of the law, and
his countrymen willsupport him if they are convinced that the
deviation was necessary, and prompted by a good motive; and
Lord Brougham himself was not able to deny the necessity
of sending the self-convicted traitors out of Canada, if they
were not hanged—and they were too many for the Go-
vernment to hang." The motive imputed by the Standard
to the Cabinet, that Ministers hated Lord Durham, and
wished to see him humbled, is too ridiculous to be worthy
of a serious answer. We should be glad to know in what
way Ministers could humble Lord Durham without involv-
ing themselves in both difficulty and danger. The plain
truth of the matter is, that, with the exception of the Lord

The newspapers here and in North 'America have since
Thursday last been loud in their assurances that her Ma-
jesty was pleased to accompany the despatches which ap-
prised Lord Durham of the treatment he had received
from her Ministers by an autograph letter, expressive of
his Sovereign's personal wish that he should retain the go-
vernment of her Canadian provinces. A similar statement,
and apparently on good grounds, in so far as concerned the
Queen's addressing a letter directly from herself to Lord
Durham, was made about the time of the Noble Lord's
appointment to the office which he has now relinquished.
The object of the first (reputed) letter was to exercise
upon the Noble Earl that species of gentle violence which
it is next to impossible for a gallant man and loyal subject
to resist—by engaging his Lordship to that which, when
applied to by her Majesty's Ministers, he had declined,
and to undertake an office from which we do not overrate
the judgment of the late Lord High Commissioner, by
conjecturing that he foresaw little prospect of deriving
honour for himself, or of producing benefit to his
country. Lord Durham may not have known a great deal
about Canada before he was offered the government, but he
knew perfectly the people under whose orders he was to
administer the government of those unsettled provinces ;
and that, we are sure, will sufficiently account for his ori-
ginal repugnance to acquiesce in the proposal of Ministers.
The "dignus vindice nodus" then seems, in the eyes of
her Majesty's official advisers, to have arisen—so the
word was passed by the " Mayor of the Palace." " In-
tersit Deo." cries Lord Melbourne. The extraordinary
interposition takes place forthwith—a mandate, re-
dolent of the Royal boudoir, is despatched. In an
evil hour for himself, and unquestionably for North
America, the pledged supporter of English democracy
becomes the victim of courtly blandishment. He
goes to attempt immeasurable purposes with pinched
and niggard means. He strives to enlarge his re-
medial powers to the width of his unforeseen emerg-
encies, is censured, sacrificed, and disgusted out of office.
Now, we have never ceased to think that it was a
most unfair proceeding of Lord Melbourne to render his
excessive and unbounded influence over a y oung Queen
supplementary to his natural want of influence with a
Nobleman of whom he was jealous, whim he personally
disliked, and by whom his offers of ostensible trust, but
real exile, had been unequivocally rejected. We say it

was an unfair—nay, more, an unconstitutional proceeding,
to clothe himself in such unaccustomed armour, and set an
irresponsible and irresistible agency to work upon the weak-
ness of Lord Durham. It was, with all reverence be it
spoken, like bringing a fireship, or still worse, a catama-
ran, into action with an enemy on the open sea, and that
enemy but indifferently armed. However, the stratagem
was successful for the time. The noble recusant was
prevailed upon, or more properly, coerced, and has paid
dearly for it. But is such a thing to be imagined as
that, winning the first game of his rubber by a trick
so reprehensible, this Lord Melbourne should be impu-
dent enough to try the same false card once more, and
trump a second time with his Queen of Hearts, after
all the honours had been played out already ? Can it be
true that the papers are correct in affirming the receipt by
Lord Durham of an additional autograph letter from the
same fair hand as the former one—that, after being once
humbugged, and then insulted, they should hope to entrap
him again? No ; if the fact were so, it would argue a
contempt for Lord Durham, which no Englishman arrived
at the age of 40, and not yet an outcast from society, could
by any moral possibility merit. When the gross conduct
of Ministers towards the Lord High Commissioner was
manifested, we declared on the instant that he or they
must eventually send in their resignation. We might have
added, what indeed all the world foresaw, that in the mat-
ter of resigning place and salary the initiative would not
be taken by the betrayers of Lord Durham. As
for the cock-and-bull stories about the troubles of
Lower Canada being appeased, the native Canadians
being more reconciled to Great Britain, and the
foundations of constitutional government having ac-
quired more strength since Lord Durham's arrival
at Quebec than before, the very details furnished of the
state of the province—the capture of smuggled guns, the
spread of conspiracy, and the universal anticipation of
another outbreak, which is known to have existed many
weeks before aught was heard of an intention on his part
to resign, give the lie emphatically to any such puerile
chimeras. It is useless to rip up old grievances for topics
of reproach, but it may be salutary for lessons of prudence.
The French race of Lower Canada have been rocked and
dandled into rebels. Always hating England since she
foolishly conferred upon them the privilege of speechmak-
ing, law-making, and stopping supplies, and putting on the
high-life-below-stairs pretensions of a sovereign Parliament,
and all that, they have ceased to fear her. Among many
enterprises indicative of short foresight in Mr. Pitt, there
was hardly one more conspicuous than that of teaching the
French Canadians to play with democratic institutions.
You might as well dress a poor Sunday school boy in bro-
cade. The Canadians thought themselves well enough
governed when they had a General Officer, with
or without his Council (is under the old French
colonial system), to issue his orders for the service of
the colony, instead of supplicating your Papineaus
for money to pay the salaries of the King's Judges,
and to support those just expenses which are essential to
the carrying on of all civil government, and in every in-
stance to be refused. India has been pretty well adminis-
tered until of late years, when such perverse or leather-
Fated animals as Lord William Bentinck and Lord Auck-
land have been sent thither. Yet no one but some wise-
acre
like Mr. Silk Buckingham ever thought himself the
worse for having placed over him a Governor-General and
Council of experienced men. Would Ireland—we mean
the O'Connell and incendiary part of it—be better ruled
by a Committee of turbulent agitators or intriguing priests,
or by a Governor-General and Council of statesmen, re-
sponsible to the Imperial Parliament ? Are what we term
liberal institutions, such as Houses of Assembly, Juries,
&c., to be deemed the end and consummation of all social
existence, or means constructed for paramount social ends ?
If a Jury, for example, be an end in itself, not an instru-
ment, then is such an end compatible with the impunity,
and therefore the encouragement, of the most shocking
crimes. Would it, let us ask, have been better for
society that the butcherly assassins of poor Char-
trand should have been convicted and hanged by a
Court-martial without a Jury, or tried by a Jury which
perjured itself to acquit the murderers ! Names are not
things. Juries are not always justice, nor representative
democracies dispensers of civil freedom. Where the forms
of liberty do not work for the ends of good government, it
is flagitious nonsense to talk of such countries being fit for
the enjoyment of what Englishmen for a long succession of
ages have been used to prize as their most sacred institu-
tions. The forms of a free constitution are wasted upon
Lower Canada. They are an actual nuisance there, where
the mass of the ignorant and anti-British inhabitants
do not want freedom, but do want separation from this

Chancellor, who spoke the language of sound sense, all the
lawyers were against them. An outcry was raised by the
Conservatives, who abetted Lord Brougham in his furious
proceedings on the occasion. The Times, indeed, tells us
now that it was mean in Ministers not to uphold the or-

dinances ; but the Times at that time proclaimed that

country. A Lower Canadian Parliament will always be a
thorn in our side, and must ulcerate the condition of all
our other colonies. The question has hardly ever been so
much as glanced at by any of our so-called statesmen here,
under that its true, and permanent, and essential aspect.
Let Lord Durham say now, like an honest man, what he
thinks of it, and our life for it, that (apart from the consi-
deration of his own wrongs) he will tcll us that Sir John
Colborne with his 10,000 or U,OOO disciplined soldiers is a
far better legislator for the Canadian people, not merely
with a view to the interests of the empire, but to theirs,
than a Papineau Parliament ever could or would be, with
its chronic rebellion in the back ground.—'!'lures.
Should Lord Durham persist in his determini.tion to re-
sign, the ground on which such a step can alone admit of
justification is that which he assigned in his answer to the
delegates from the lower provinces, namely, that by the in-
terference of a branch of the British Legislature, in which
the responsible advisers of the Crown had deemed it their
duty to acquiesce, his authority had been so weakened as to
render it totally inadequate to the grave emergency which
aline called for its existence. We put aside, as unworthy
of a moment's consideration, the supposition that in taking
this grave step he suffered himself to be influenced Ly
per-
sonalfeclings; for no man knows better than Lord Durham
that personal feelings would not justify his ahondoninent of
the high trust confided to him by his Sovereign, with the
approbation of Parliament and the country. When he ac-
cepted that trust, and entered on the execution
of its duties, he incurred a high responsibility,
which the conscientious_ conviction that cireum-
from
stances left him no longer the hope of being able to
perform the services anticipated from his appointment
could alone relieve him. Lord Durham himself put the
question on that issue ; and it is but doing justice to his
Lordship to state that the opinion that his authority had
been so weakened as to render it impossible for him to dis-
charge with advantage the duties of the trust confided to
more than onßeutof
neither
rhewr well-informed
Correspondents him was shared by
diHsaiislowLaonrdcesh
oipf
Correspondents in that quarter.
ham nor our Correspondents are
might be justified in anticipating
the way of weakening his au-
ifnr ofami
the ordinances an effect in When it is
thority which experience
ance of the ordinances
may e not
,confirm.
found that the effect of the disa
husiastic devotion
has been to silence all opposition to h;s Government, and
to call forth an unanimous burst of ent
towards him, no one will say that the
men are not
assume a new shape. The strongest-minded
question does not
proof against the
astrous intelligence, and it is not detracting from the
judgment
of of Lord Durham, or impugning the
of our Correspondents, to suppose that they over-rated
the effect which the disallowing the ordinance
ultimately have in weakening his Lordship's authority. ,
His Lordship . might
alight, therefore, be justified in judging et d

" a gene fal feeling of indignation has been excited by
that nobleman's (Lord Durham's) illegal and des-
potic ordinances." We wish Lord Melbourne, who
pointed out the mischief which the interference
with the ordinances would cause, and who was
quite sensible that the lawyers were leading the
House wrong, had not given way to them ; but, aban-
doned as he was, it is hardly to be wondered at that he
should at last have yielded. A loud outcry was rased
against that part of the ordinances in particular which
consisted in dealing with certain parties as convicted who
had never been tried, and of whose guilt there was, there-
fore, no legal evidence ; and in this country there is a
strong dislike to whatever appears to militate against
this first principle of justice, to condemn no man un-
heard. But in a country in the state in which Canada
then was, more especially when the object was to com-
bine the general safety with humanity, the measure was
fully justified by circumstances. It was necessary to
keep the parties out of Canada. To be trifling with
legal forms at a time when the safety of the pro-
vince was endangered would have been in Lord Durham
sacrificing the substance to the shadow. Yet the sapient
Conservative Peers who suffered Lord Brougham to lead
them by the nose would have had Lord Durham waste
his time in impeaching all the rebels who had not
confessed, and taking evidence in due form of their guilt
For the conduct of the Conservatives a queer sort of de-
fence has been set up by the Standard. Assuming that
Ministers wished to lay a trap for Lord Durham, in order
to crush him, the Conservatives, forsooth, wished to assist
them in that pious work !
This view of the matter may account for the otherwise in-
explicable course taken by some Conservatives. It is possible
that they may have felt the unconstitutional character of the
loose relation subsisting between the Cabinet and its Canada
Commissioner, and pressed upon his acts in order to compel

the Ministers to undergo the constitutional responsibility for
them. We do not approve of this policy, but we are not as-
sured that many persons experienced in the offices of Govern-
ment will agree with us in our dislike of it. With official
politicians—the . Idols trilau,' as Bacon calls them—the ido-
latry of system is all-prevailing—and thus it happens that in
extraordinary contingencies, beyond the sphere of system, the
Statesmen of experience seldom make the best guides."
The Conservatives are much beholden to our ingenious
Contemporary.—Morning Chronicle.
Woe to the age of intellect! Its pride has fallen—its
glory is in the dust, The liberal iconoclasts of the great
city and the image-breakers of Canada have confederated
together, and, with foul and most unnatural violence, have
torn from its pedestal the effigy of the leader of the " march
of mind," dragged it to the place of execution, consigned it
with rope and faggot to the fate of the malefactor, and, im-
patient of the slow process of extermination by fire, bat-
tered the " wooden features" into mummy with a ferocity
proportionate to their former veneration ! Thus have the
hands of the majesty of the people treated the image of
Lord Vaux as if he were another Guy Vau.r—a familiar
of the powers of darkness—not a diffuser of universal illu-
mination ; a clandestine disposer of gunpowder and other
combustibles—not a dealer in cheap knowledge and Penny
Magazines; a conspirator with his fire-balls and dark lan-
tern—not the " schoolmaster" with his rod and Primer.
" It is well," says a Morning Ministerial Journal,
after describing the scene of the execution done upon
the " excellent wooden likeness" of its once demi-
deified " Harry Brougham," now treated no better
than " Old Harry"—" it is well," says that organ of
Downing-street, " that the Noble and Learned Lord was
not in Canada," thereby giving us to understand that if the
veritable Brougham and Vaux, and not his graven image,
had been in Quebec, the sovereign people would have pre-
ferred performing an auto-da-fe upon the living original to
inflictine. a Smithfield martyrdom upon his mahogany sub-
stitute r Who, after this, would be " the man of the
people," to be treated as certain savage tribes treat their
idols—by scourging them with whips, pelting them with
dirt, and dashing them to the earth, because the divinity
with the "wooden features" sometimes gave them other
gifts than they asked for in their prayers? What a theme
for the moralist is here presented ! What an additional
illustration of Juvenal's vanity of human wishes! It ap-
pears but as yesterday when the name of Henry Brougham
had a talismanic effect upon the hearts of the multitude,
and the owner of that name was carried into power upon
the tide of the people's emotion. 0 that the day should
have come when " the masses" in any part of the
Queen of Great Britain's dominions could have thought
of putting a rope round his neck in person or in
effigy, and executing upon their deposed and buffeted idol
the mortal indignities which the Roman mob inflicted on
the fallen Sejanus / Have the image-breakers of Canada,
then, and the iconoclasts of the great city, resolved to be
done with idols, wooden or brass, for ever ? Have they de-
termined to get rid of man-worship, and to excercise the
godlike faculty of reason in thinking for themselves ? Not at
all. They have only knocked down one image to set up
another. They have only battered to pieces the one
" wooden" idol to set up another in its place, and prostrate
themselves in the dust before it. They have, in short, only
demolished the image of Brougham to place upon its pedes-
tal for a season that of Durham, soon in turn to suffer the
fate which mob-popularity hunters have undergone among
all people, and in all ages of the world. Such is the unsta-
blenatureopfrn
populario, favour, such the unreasonableness of
popular
icn thatnot Brougham
ofhashisbepeonlitliicaonlgeddelionr
burnedn effigy, -
quPncies, but -for a most meritorous public act. The
liberal iconoclasts of the Government press did not
I exult over the wreaking of popular vengeance upon
I his effigy because of tite prominent part Which he
took in " barring the gates of mercy" on the suffering
poor, and advocating the unchristian doctrines and
unmanly cruelties of the Malthusian oppression, or because
1 of his inconsistent conduct, when in and out of office, on
many great public questions--such as tithe, national edu-
cation, Wakley's " three powders," &c. ;—no, all their
malice was reserved for the punishment of an offence
which consisted in his vindicating the outraged authority of
law and the constitution against the wild freaks of des-
potic power, consigning untried British subjects to banish-
ment, and thereby establishing a precedent of the most
dangerous consequence to the liberties of Englishmen in
all parts of the Queen's dominions. This was the crime
of Lord Brougham ; and if ever there was an act of his
political life which ought to be held in grateful remem-
brance, it was that by which he wrested the iron sceptre
from the hand of the vain-glorious Canadian Autocrat,
and broke it on the altar of the Constitution. For this
crime—not against his country, but against the personal
—the of Lord Durham
approvingly relate the indig-
august dynasty visited the of the ennobled coal-
merchant'swrath—the image of the ex-Lord Chancellor--choosing ell.loern_cobjhencot
soinfgthneoirt
to recollect that Lord Melbourne and his colleagues were
acenioplices with the Toriesin the support of Lord Brougham's
nieftsfure. When we hear one of these Ministeri J
exclaim tohuart-
nalists, in tones of hypocritical indignation,
" the conduct of the Tories in abetting Lord Brougham
in his mischievous course is such as it is impossible to
144404 in, toms of, too ;troy; cogidennsiolv._we

THE SUN, LONDON, MONDAY, OCTOBER 22, 1838.

not avoid asking " whether has Lord Durham most rea-
son to complain of the adversaries who opposed or the
friends who sacrificed him ? Lord Durham has answered
that question himself ; for he says " opposition from Lord
Brougham, and from those who acted with him, was no
more than he might have expected. But he was compelled
to say that he was put down—sacrifieed by his friends, by
those whose duty it was to stand forth in his defence."
Of the conduct of such friends it is " impossible to speak in
terms of too strong condemn ,lion." But, having sent out
the lordly mimic of imperial power to Cenada with the
view of getting rid of a formidable rival at home, Lord
Melbourne and his colleagues were, probably, pleased at
the opportunity to lend a hand, as accomplices, to
humble his pride, and damage what small reputa-
tion for political wisdom he had carried from St.
Petersburgh to Quebec, though they never would
have had courage to attempt the thing as prin-
cipals, uncovered by such men as Lord Brougham.
Lord 'Lyndhurst, and the Duke of Wellington. For our
own part, instead of looking, like the Standard, at the
resignation of Lord Durham with dismay, we regard that
event, as we before observed, rather in the light of a deli-
verance of all our North American colonies. of which he
was the ruler, from the ruinous infliction of that scheme
of federal democracy, which, in respect of those states, would
realise for a demagogue, like Papincau or O'Connell, some-
thing like the idea of Caligula, in regard to the Roman
people, when he said he " wished they had but one neck,
that he might strike it off at a blow." So the federal de-
mocracy would enable one profligate and fortunate dema-
gogue to strike off the neck of British snpremacy, as to
all the British North American colonies, at a blow ;
and what would become of " the British party" then?
The Standard, we observe, denies the validity of the
opinion said to have been given by the law officers of
the crown, that " the transportation of the confessing
traitors to the Bermudas was illegal." It says the
question was not properly a question of law, but one of
geography, adding, " If the Bermudas constitute a part
of the Queen's dominions in North America, as we have
proved they do, aey are included in Lord Durham's com-
mission, and the ordinance of transportation could not be
held illegal." Our opinion is, that, had his supreme auto-
cratship transported the said traitors to the Balearic Isles
instead of the Bermudas, his act would have been not more
illegal than it was, though, in point of geography, that
would have hei n a considerable difference. He had no
right to deport untried prisoners at all for the purpose of
banishment. That sentence could only be executed in con-
sequence of some judicial proceeding. But the Standard
says they were " confessing traitors." We were not aware
that, in any of the dominions to which the shadow of the
British constitution extends, a confession of crime could be
made a ground of punishment, unless judicially notified
and recorded. What proof can the Executive Govern-
ment have of the confession of a crime but through some
court, civil or military, which is legally authorised to take
cognizance of it ? His commission could not have con-
ferred any such monstrous power on Lord Durham. If,
indeed, he could legally banish untried men, he could legally,
on the same principle, put untried men to death—a power
which, we are sure, does not belong to the prerogative
of the British Crown—a power which we take it does
not even belong to what is called the " omnipotence"
of the British Parliament, and therefore a power which
neither the Sovereign on the Throne nor the Lords and
Commons in Parliament assembled could have conferred
upon Lord Durham, although, the illegal ordinances having
issued, they undertook to indemnify him against the le al
consequences of proceedings which violated all notions of
British justice. A Morning Ministerial Journal, while
vainly endeavouring to rescue the Ministry from the charge
of having sacrificed their friend by the double-faced policy
which they pursued, attacks the Law Officers of the Crown,
and, with a maganirnous contempt for the restraints of law
upon power, says, " There is a fatality in the contact of
lawyers with great political questions." The restraints of
settled law we know are equally inconvenient to the pre-
rogative of the despot and the licence of the demagogue.
James 11. thought so, and so did Jack Cade. The latter
declared he would begin his government by banging ali
lawyers, for without lawyers the laws can neither be inter-
preted nor administered. And James 11., with his fa-
vourite Judge Jeffries, so entirely dispensed with law, that
when, upon the accession of William 111., old Sergeant
Maynard waited upon his Majesty, the King, having heard
that he had outlived all his early contemporaries at the bar,
alluded to that circumstance. "If it had not been for your
Majesty's timely arrival," was the ready answer of the Ser-
geant, I should have outlived the law itself." It is quitii
certain that, if James 11. had continued to reign, our Whig
Contemporary would not have to lament, in the present en-
lightened age, the checks which law places upon the exer-
cise qfpower.—Morning Herald.
All our Contemporaries continue to be tegroseed with
the resignation of Lord Durham, and almost all unite in
condemnation of the factious and vindictive proceeding,
which interrupted a course of government universally ap•
plauded as most conducive to the pacification and permit.
nent tranquillity of the revolted provinces. By some, how
ever, it is asserted that if Lord Durham had treated the
machinations of his enemies, and, must we add, the feeble
defence of his friends, with indifference, and persevered in
the course which his own conscience and the concurient
evidence of all interested in the result indicated as best
calculated to secure the prosperity and allegiance of the
Colonies confided to his government, and promote the
general interests of his country, he would have evinced a
more than human—a godlike magnanimity. But is it fair
to expect such magnanimity from any man ? Under the
most apparently judicious administration of the Canadian
Government that the heart of man could conceit e,
or his energy execute, the result, under all circum-
stances, must have been doubtful ; and coull it be
fairly expected twat in a position of so much difficulty
and responsibility, when a tacit censure was passed on
his conduct by his enemies, and acquiesced in by hi
friends, and a want of confidence evinced in his administra-
tion by the home authorities, at the very moment when the
fullest and most implicit confidence was necessary to give
effect to his government, and ensure it success—could it
fairly be expected that any man would risk his character
and fame—his most precious possession—a sacrifice to his
country under such circumstances ? Men have often been
found to sacrifice their lives to their country, but this sacri-
fice has been generally, if not always, prompted as much
from regard to character and fame, as from any more
patriotic impulse ; but there is scarcely an instance on
record wherein character and fame have been sacrificed
to a mere disinterested love of country. To expect
such sacrifice is to evince an utter ignorance of human
nature. In such en emi rgeney as this caused by Lord
Durham's resignation, it is, of course, competent for
her Majesty and Privy Council to adopt such measures
as the urgency of the case may demand, trusting,
whenever it. may be necessary to trench on the spirit
of the Constitution, to obtain an " indemnity" from Par-
liament ; but, as the extraordinary powers vested by the
recent Commission were granted in a great measure on the
faith of Lord Durham's character, his Lordship having,
been specifically named for their execution, we do not con-
sider that a successor can be legally appointed without the
consent of Parliament—and, therefore, unless his Lordship
be prevailed upon to withdraw his resignation, of which we
have little or no hope, an early assembling of Parliament
may be expected.—Morning Advertiser.
It is assumed by the whole of the Ministerial Press that
the abdication by Lord Durham of his Transatlantic throne
is an event of which the effect must certainly be to prolong
and increase the calamities and dangers in which our Cana-
dian Colonies are involved. The assumption is, perhaps, a
convenient one, although we do not very clearly perceive
how it cien render any service to the Ministers by whose
perfidy and desertion Lord Durham says—and Lord Dur-
ham ought surely to know the causes and motives of his own
conduct—he was compelled to abdicate. It is, indeed, a
very recent discovery of the Ministerial party, to which a
Journal, not professing tee be Ministerial, pointed out
to them the way, that the abdication of the Canadian
Autocrat is calculated to. retard, in the slightest degree the
restoration of tranquillity in the Canadas, or the consolida-
than of British authority in those colonies. Up to Thurs-
day last, the leading Ministerial Journals were assiduous
collectors of facts, or active fsbricatora of falsehoods, the
whole tendency of which was to show that Lord Durham,
daring his residence in Canada, had been utterly unsuccess-
ful in allaying the animosity of the French party, or restor-
ing the confidence of the British ; and that little hope re-
mained of these objects being accoleplished by his means.
The leading organs of the Ministry, up to the very day on
which the news of Lord Durham's resignation arrived, were
full of lamentations on the unfortunate and appalling condi-
tion of the Canadas. Property had fallen. Commerce was
extinct. Conspiracies were formed or forming in every part
of the country against the authority of the ritish Govern-
ment, and the propertyand persons of the British population.
The conspirators were bound together by secret oaths.
Arms were clandestinely introduced. Cannon and amtnu-
nition had been frequently captured by the loyal Canadian
volunteers near the boundary of the United States. Juries,
when empanelled for the trial of rebels and murderers, were
found to be imbued with the spirit of rebellion, and the
disposition to abet and defend murder. The sanctity of
the juror's oath had ceased to be of any value. The ordi-
nary administration of justice bad become impossible, and
to bring a criminal to trial by due course of law, however
numerous and aggravated his crimes, provided only that
treason were one of the number, was in effect to ensure his
impunity. Such being the representation of the condition
of Canada given by the Ministerial Journals—of the
condition of Canada before any thing was known there
of Lord Durham's resignation, or of the circum-
stances which were to produce it—it seems reaso' •
able to ask how much worse it could have been had
Lord Durham never been sent to Canada at all ; or what