at as well as I
do, and were it possible to play tricks in such grave concerns, it
would have been easy to throw them into utter confusion by merely
calling upon them to form a government. They were aware, however, that
I could not for the sake of discomfiting them hazard so desperate a
policy; so they have played out their game of faction and violence
without fear of consequences."

His reasons for not reserving the bill for the consideration of the
British government must be regarded as equally cogent by every student
of our system of government, especially by those persons who believe
in home rule in all matters involving purely Canadian interests. In
the first place, the bill for the relief of a corresponding class of
persons in Upper Canada, "which was couched in terms very nearly
similar, was not reserved," and it was "difficult to discover a
sufficient reason, so far as the representative of the Crown was
concerned, for dealing with the one measure differently from the
other." And in the second place, "by reserving the bill he should only
throw upon Her Majesty's government or (as it would appear to the
popular eye in Canada) on Her Majesty herself, a responsibility which
rests and ought to rest" upon the governor-general of Canada. If he
passed the bill, "whatever mischief ensues may probably be repaired,"
if the worst came to the worst, "by the sacrifice" of himself. If the
case were referred to England, on the other hand, it was not
impossible that Her Majesty might "only have before her the
alternative of provoking a rebellion in Lower Canada, by refusing her
assent to a measure chiefly affecting the interests of the _habitants_
and thus throwing the whole population into Papineau's hands, or of
wounding the susceptibilities of some of the best subjects she has in
the province."

A Canadian writer at the present time can refer only with a feeling of
indignation and humiliation to the scenes of tumult, rioting and
incendiarism, which followed the royal assent to the bill of
indemnity. When Lord Elgin left Parliament House--formerly the Ste.
Anne market--a large crowd insulted him with opprobrious epithets. In
his own words he was "received with ironical cheers and hootings, and
a small knot of individuals, consisting, it has since been
ascertained, of persons of a respectable class in society, pelted the
carriage with missiles which must have been brought for that purpose."
A meeting was held in the open ai