e information received from
your Lordship's predecessor, with particular reference to the Despatches
noted in the margin, I have resolved to suspend any active measure on my
part, at least till the conclusion of the present session of the
Canadian Legislature, thinking it not improbable that the proceedings of
that body may tend to throw some light on the questions connected with
the College, by which I may be guided in the consideration of my own
course in this important matter."

As a result of the above despatch, Dr. Bethune retired from the
acting-Principalship in May following. On July 3rd he protested in a
memorial to the Colonial Office against the legality of the act of the
Home Government in the disallowing of his appointment, but no action was
taken by the authorities, and there the matter dropped.

Dr. Bethune did not give up the acting-Principalship, which he had
filled for eleven years, without the regrets and the tributes of men who
had been closely associated with him during his term of office. The
Chief Justice of Montreal, the Hon. James Reid, one of the Governors of
the College, had already written to him on February 13th, 1845, not long
before his death:

[Illustration: From Painting in McGill Library Photo Rice Studios
_Venerable Archdeacon Leach D.C.L., L.L.D. Vice-Principal of McGill
University_ 1846-1886]

"I am enabled to say that after your appointment as Principal the
interests of the College, which had previously been much obstructed and
delayed, were more closely pursued and attended to, principally by your
exertions, your declared object being to bring the College into
operation as soon as possible, and to render all the means belonging to
it available for this purpose."

On May 11th, 1846, after Mr. Gladstone's despatch had been received, and
Dr. Bethune was about to leave the College, the Rev. John Abbott, the
Vice-Principal and Secretary, and E. Chapman, formerly Lecturer in
Classical Literature, whose relations with the Principal had not always
been harmonious, wrote as follows:

"We, the undersigned Officers of the University of McGill College, from
our personal knowledge, as far as we have been respectively connected
with it, do hereby certify that the Reverend John Bethune, D.D., has
performed the duties of his Office of Principal of this Institution with
a zeal, ability, and moderation only equalled by his patient and
enduring perseverance, under circumstances of great and har