one_ person, who shall be responsible to the
Governor-General for the appointment of the other ministers, and that
the system of dual first ministers, which has hitherto prevailed, shall
be put an end to.[1]

The selection of Macdonald was inevitable. When George Brown by his
action in 1864 made Confederation possible and entered a Cabinet where
his great rival was the commanding influence, he must have foreseen
that, in the event of the cause succeeding, his own chances of
inaugurating the new state as its chief figure were not good. And by
leaving the coalition abruptly before union was accomplished he had put
himself entirely out of the running. In a group of able men which
included several potential prime ministers Macdonald had advanced to
the first place by reason of gifts precisely suited to the demands of
the hour. Lord Monck's choice was therefore justified. Nor was the
resolve to abolish the awkward and indefensible system of a dual
premiership less open to question. It may have given pain to Cartier,
but it was a wise and necessary decision.

{139}

Lord Monck, however, does not rank high in the list of talented men who
have filled the office of governor-general. The post had gone
a-begging when he accepted it in 1861. It had been offered to and
refused by Lord Wodehouse, a former viceroy of Ireland; Lord Harris,
once governor of Madras and a contemporary of Elgin; Lord Eversley, who
had been speaker of the House of Commons; and the Duke of Buckingham.
Lord Monck had scarcely arrived in Canada when the _Trent_ Affair
occurred. Later on the St Albans Raid intensified the bitter feelings
between Great Britain and the United States. On both occasions he
performed his duties as an Imperial officer judiciously and well. But
his relations with Canadian affairs were not so happy. He became
dissatisfied with the political conditions as he found them; and his
petulance over the slow progress of Confederation led him to threaten
resignation. He contrived, moreover, to incur much personal
unpopularity, which found vent, during the first session of the
Dominion parliament, in a measure to reduce the salary of the
governor-general from L10,000 to $32,000. That this unparalleled
action was, in part, directed at Lord Monck is shown in the
determination {140} to put the reduction in force at once. The home
authorities, however, disallowed the bill. In his speech in the House
of Lords on the British Nort