compassion for the weak, whose trust in God and the teachings of
Christ, are human qualities more worthy of the admiration of us all
than the grandest attributes of nature.

None of the distinguished Canadian statesmen who were members of Lord
Elgin's several administrations from 1847 until 1854, or were then
conspicuous in parliamentary life, now remain to tell us the story of
those eventful years. Mr. Baldwin died five years before, and Sir
Louis Hypolite LaFontaine three months after the decease of the
governor-general of India, and in the roll of their Canadian
contemporaries there are none who have left a fairer record. Mr.
Hincks retired from the legislature of Canada in 1855, when he
accepted the office of governor-in-chief of Barbadoes and the Windward
Islands from Sir William Molesworth, colonial secretary in Lord
Palmerston's government, and for years an eminent advocate of a
liberal colonial policy. This appointment was well received throughout
British North America by Mr. Hincks's friends as well as political
opponents, who recognized the many merits of this able politician and
administrator. It was considered, according to the London _Times_, as
"the inauguration of a totally different system of policy from that
which has been hitherto pursued with regard to our colonies." "It gave
some evidence," continued the same paper, "that the more distinguished
among our fellow-subjects in the colonies may feel that the path of
imperial ambition is henceforth open to them." It was a direct answer
to the appeal which had been so eloquently made on more than one
occasion by the Honourable Joseph Howe[27] of Nova Scotia, to extend
imperial honours and offices to distinguished colonists, and not
reserve them, as was too often the case, for Englishmen of inferior
merit. "This elevation of Mr. Hincks to a governorship," said the
Montreal _Pilot_ at the time, "is the most practicable comment which
can possibly be offered upon the solemn and sorrowful complaints of
Mr. Howe, anent the neglect with which the colonists are treated by
the imperial government. So sudden, complete and noble a disclaimer on
the part of Her Majesty's minister for the colonies must have startled
the delegate from Nova Scotia, and we trust that his turn may not be
far distant." Fifteen years later, Mr. Howe himself became a
lieutenant-governor of Nova Scotia, and an inmate of the very
government house to which he was not admitted in the stormy days