, or his deputy, could
not lay his hands upon these gentlemen and the matter was no more
thought of until the editor of the Quebec _Mercury_ ridiculed the whole
proceedings, when it was ordered that Mr. Cary should be arrested. Mr.
Cary was afraid that such unpleasant investigations might give rise to
other unpleasant investigations with regard to the powers of the House.
He intimated that in France it was customary to tie up the tongue and
lock up the press, and for so doing he was compelled either to submit
to be himself locked up or apologize. On being arrested he apologized
at the Bar of the House and was released. The time of the House was
frittered away by empty discussions and wordy addresses upon the gaol
tax, previously mentioned, which the king did not disallow as required
by the mercantile community. Indeed the administrator of the government
in his prorogation speech remonstrated with the Assembly for the
non-completion of the necessary business. The civil expenditure of the
year came to L35,469 sterling, including L2,000 to General Prescott,
who was then in England, and L3,406 to Sir Robert Shore Milnes, with
the addition of L2,604 currency, for salaries to the officers of the
Legislature, the expenditure exceeding the revenue by L869.

General Prescott, the Governor General, absent in England, was yet in
the receipt of L2,000 a year, and the year before he had L4,000; Sir
Robert Milnes, the Lieutenant Governor, also absent, had received the
salary above mentioned, while Mr. Dunn received L750, as a judge of the
King's Bench, L100 for his services as administrator of the government,
a pension of L500 sterling a year, on relinquishing the administration,
and an additional allowance of L1,500 a year while he had administered
the government. Beyond question their "Excellencies" and "His Honor,"
were amply remunerated. The Governor General and his Lieutenant were
absent on business. Indeed, while the Legislative Assembly, in defence
of imaginary privileges, were cutting such fantastic capers before high
heaven, the confidential secretary of Lord Dorchester and of his
successors so far, the Honorable Herman Witsius Ryland,--who, having
been Acting Paymaster General to His Majesty's Forces captured by the
Americans, went to England, when His Lordship, then General Sir Guy
Carleton, evacuated New York, and returned with him to Canada, when
that officer was appointed Governor-in-Chief in 1793, full of the
sympathie