ness of perception and his faculty for detecting the weak point in
an argument were almost abnormal, while his power of eloquent and subtle
exposition had no rival among the Canadian public men of those times.
His famous speech--to be hereafter more particularly referred
to--delivered in the Assembly, in 1836, on the subject of the Clergy
Reserves, was one of the most powerful indictments ever heard within the
walls of a Canadian Parliament. His arraignment of Sir Francis Bond Head
before the same body early in the following year was hardly less
impressive. He was of a full habit of body, even in comparative youth,
and though he was rather under than above the middle height, there was
a dignity and even majesty in his presence that gave the world assurance
of a strong man, while it at the same time effectually repelled unseemly
familiarity. A pair of deep clear blue eyes, surmounted by rather heavy
eyebrows, glanced out from beneath his smooth and expansive forehead. He
had light brown hair, a well-moulded chin, a firmly-set nose, and a
somewhat large and flexible mouth, capable of imparting to the
countenance great variety of expression. Such, according to the
universal testimony of those who knew him, and according to portraits
painted from life and preserved in his family, was the John Rolph of
fifty to sixty years ago.

There was unquestionably a _per contra_. Though he was a man of many
friends, and was the repository of many familiar confidences, there was
probably no human being--not even the wife of his bosom--who ever
possessed John Rolph's entire confidence. There was about him no such
thing as self-abandonment. This was not because he was devoid of natural
passions or affections, or even of warm friendship, for he was a kind,
if not a tender husband and father, and there were many persons whom he
held in very high esteem, and for whom he cheerfully made great
sacrifices. But the quality of caution seems to have been
preternaturally developed within his breast. No man was ever less open
to the imputation of wearing his heart upon his sleeve. He had a
temperament of great equableness, and doubtless felt much more deeply
than was suspected, even by those who were constantly about him. To the
outer world he was ever self-possessed, calm and dignified, of pleasant
and amiable manners, and not deficient in good-fellowship, but seldom or
never abandoning himself to frolicsomeness or fun. His smile had a
winsome swee