Aylwin, Baldwin, and Girouard if he cared to take office, were to
enter, Draper, Davidson, Ogden and Sherwood passing out.
Unfortunately, since neither Ogden nor Sherwood happened to be {151}
present, Bagot had to accept their resignations on his own initiative,
and without previous consultation with them. Not even that dexterous
correspondent could quite disguise the awkwardness of his position when
he wrote to tell both men that they had ceased to be his ministers.[23]
So the crisis ended.

The address was carried by fifty-five votes to five, the malcontents
being MacNab, foiled once more in his ambitions; Moffat and Cartwright,
representing inflexible Toryism; Neilson, whose position as a
recognized opponent of the Union tied his hands, and Johnstone, a
disappointed place man. Peace ruled in the Assembly, and the battle
passed to the province, the newspapers, and most ominous of all for the
governor, to the cabinet and public in Britain. A storm of abuse,
criticism, and regrets broke over Bagot's devoted head. The opposition
press in Canada called him "a radical, a puppet, an old woman, an
apostate, a renegade descendant of old Colonel Bagot who fell at Naseby
fighting for his King."[24] MacNab, in the House, led a bitterly
personal opposition. At least one {152} cabinet meeting in England was
called specially to consider the incident, and for some months Stanley
tempered assurances that he and the government would support their
representative, with caustic expressions of regret. The necessity of
the change, he reiterated, had not been fully proven. The French
members and Baldwin were doubtful characters. If the worst must be
accepted, and a ministry constructed, containing both Baldwin and the
French, then Bagot had better obtain from the new cabinet some
assurance of "their intention of standing by the provisions of the Act
of Union, including the Civil List, and every other debatable
question." Then, fearing lest the very citadel of responsibility and
control should be surrendered, he set forth his theory of government in
an elaborate letter which revealed distinct distrust of his
correspondent's power of resistance. "Your position is different from
that of the Crown in England. The Crown acts avowedly and exclusively
on the advice of its ministers, and has no political opinions of its
own. You act in concert with your Executive Council, but the ultimate
decision rests with yourself, and you are recog