ellency, and that it was the wish of the
House that Pierre Bedard, Esquire, Knight Representative for the County
of Surrey, might take his seat in the House. The vote in favor of the
resolutions was expressively large. There were twenty-five members
present, and twenty voted for the resolutions. Messrs. Bourdages,
Papineau, senior, Bellet, Papineau, junior, Debartch, Viger, Lee, and
Bruneau, were named a committee to present an address to the Governor,
founded on the resolutions, but they managed to escape that honor. When
it was moved to resolve that an enquiry be made as to the causes which
had prevented the messengers from presenting the address, as ordered by
the House, Mr. Papineau, senior, moved that nothing more should be said
about the address, and the motion was carried. Nor was anything more
said about the unfortunate gentleman who was imprisoned, as the
Governor himself afterwards stated, only as a measure of precaution,
not of punishment, until the close of the session, when he was
released. He was kept in Ham because he might have done mischief, on
the principle that prevention is better than cure, and, when Mr. Bedard
desired to know what was expected of him, the Governor sent for his
brother, the cure, and authorized him to tell Mr. Bedard that he had
been confined by government, "only looking to its security and the
public tranquillity," and that when Mr. Bedard expressed a sense of
that error, of which he was ignorant, he would be immediately enlarged.
Mr. Bedard replied courteously, but declined admitting any error, which
he had not made, or of confessing to any crime of which he was not
guilty. The Governor had heard of the resolutions of the House, and
expected the presentation of the address embodying them, when he
received an application from the elder Papineau, one of the committee,
requesting a private conference on the subject of the resolutions. That
conference only drew from His Excellency the remark that:--"No
consideration, Sir, shall induce me to consent to the liberation of Mr.
Bedard, at the instance of the House of Assembly, either as a matter of
right, or as a favor, nor will I now consent to his being enlarged on
any terms during the sitting of the present session, and I will not
hesitate to inform you of the motives by which I have been induced to
come to this resolution. I know that the general language of the
members, has encouraged the idea which universally prevails, that the
House