ad had
several interviews with delegates from the discontented people of Red
River, who had prepared what they called "a Bill of Rights," and it was
therefore able intelligently to decide on the best form of governing the
territories. The imperial government completed the formal transfer of
the country to Canada, and the Canadian parliament in 1870 passed an act
to provide for the government of a new province of Manitoba.
Representation was given to the people in both houses of the Canadian
parliament, and provision was made for a provincial government on the
same basis that existed in the old provinces of the Dominion. The
lieutenant-governor of the province was also, for the present, to govern
the unorganised portion of the North-west with the assistance of a
council of eleven persons. The first legislature of Manitoba was elected
in the early part of 1871, and a provincial government was formed, with
Mr. Albert Boyd as provincial secretary. The first lieutenant-governor
was Sir Adams Archibald, the eminent Nova Scotian, who had been defeated
in the elections of 1867. Mr. Macdougall had returned from the
North-west frontier a deeply disappointed man, who would never admit
that he had shown any undue haste in commencing the exercise of his
powers as governor. Some years later he disappeared from active public
life, after a career during which he had performed many useful services
for Canada.

In another chapter on the relations between Canada and the United States
I shall refer to the results of the international commission which met
at Washington in 1870, to consider the Alabama difficulty, the fishery
dispute, and other questions, the settlement of which could be no longer
delayed. In 1870, while the Red River settlements were still in a
troublous state, the Fenians made two attempts to invade the Eastern
Townships, but they were easily repulsed and forced to cross the
frontier. They were next heard of in 1871, when they attempted, under
the leadership of the irrepressible O'Neil, who had also been engaged in
1870, and of O'Donohue, one of Riel's rebellious associates, to make a
raid into Manitoba by way of Pembina, but their prompt arrest by a
company of United States troops was the inglorious conclusion of the
last effort of a dying and worthless organisation to strike a blow at
England through Canada.

The Dominion government was much embarrassed for some years by the
complications that arose from Riel's revolt