fellow-peers,
in marked contrast to the open hostility they had shown
towards his old enemy, Lord George Germain, when that
vile wrecker had been 'kicked upstairs' among them. The
Carleton motto, crest, and supporters are all most
appropriate. The crest is a strong right arm with the
hand clenched firmly on an arrow. The motto is _Quondam
his vicimus armis_--_We used to conquer with these arms_.
The supporters are two beavers, typifying Canada, while
their respective collars, one a naval the other a military
coronet, show how her British life was won and saved and
has been kept.

Carleton was a man of great reserve and self-control.
But his kindly nature must have responded to the cordial
welcome which he received on his return to Quebec in
October 1786. It was not without reason that the people
of Canada rejoiced to have him back as their leader. All
that the Indians imagined the Great White Father to be
towards themselves he was in reality towards both red
man and white. Stern, when the occasion forced him to be
stern, just in all his dealings between man and man,
dignified and courteous in all his ways, a soldier through
every inch of his stalwart six feet, he was a ruler with
whom no one ever dreamt of taking liberties. But neither
did any deserving one in trouble ever hesitate to lay
the most confidential case before him in the full assurance
that his head and heart were at the service of all
committed to his care. And no other governor, before his
time or since, ever inspired his followers with such a
firm belief that all would turn out for the best so long
as he was in command.

This power of inspiring confidence was now badly needed.
Everything in Canada was still provisional. Owing to the
war the Quebec Act of 1774 had never been thoroughly
enforced. Then, when the war was over, the Loyalists
arrived and completely changed the circumstances which
the act had been designed to meet. The next constitution,
the Canada Act of 1791, was of a very different character.
During the seventeen years between these two constitutions
all that could be done was to make the best of a very
confusing state of flux. Not that the Quebec Act was a
dead letter--far from it--but simply that it could not
go beyond restoring the privileges of the French-Canadian
priests and seigneurs within the area then effectively
occupied by the French-Canadian race. Carleton, as we
have seen, had faced its problem for the first four years.