e Elgin take was to register his dissent
carefully in cases of disagreement. Having conceded the essential, it
mattered little that Grey could not quite rid himself of doubts as to
the consequences of his previous daring. The concession had come most
opportunely, for Elgin, who feared greatly the disturbing influences of
European revolutionism, Irish discontent, and American democracy in its
cruder forms, believed that, had the change not taken place, "we should
by this hour (November 30th, 1848) either have been ignominiously
expelled from Canada, or our relations with the United States would
have been in a most precarious condition."

{201}

It is not necessary to follow Elgin through all the details of more
than seven busy years. It will suffice to watch him at work on the
three great allied problems which combined to form the constitutional
question in Canada; the character of the government to be conceded to,
and worked along with, the colonists; the recognition to be given to
French nationalist feeling; and the nature of the connection between
Britain and Canada which would exist after concessions had been made on
these points. The significance of his policy is the greater, because
the example of Canada was certain, _mutatis mutandis_, to be followed
by the other greater colonies. Elgin's solution of the question of
responsible government was so natural and easy that the reader of his
despatches forgets how completely his task had baffled all his
predecessors, and that several generations of colonial secretaries had
refused to admit what in his hands seemed a self-evident truth. At the
outset Elgin's own mind had not been free from serious doubt. He had
come to Canada with a traditional suspicion of the French Canadians and
the progressives of Upper Canada; yet within a year, since the country
so willed it, he had accepted a cabinet, composed entirely of these two
sections. On his {202} way to the formation of that cabinet he not
only brushed aside old suspicions, but he refused to surrender to the
seductions of the eclectic principle, which allowed his predecessors to
evade the force of popular opinion by selecting representatives of all
shades of that opinion. He saw the danger of allowing responsible
government to remain a party cry, and he removed "that most delicate
and debatable subject" from party politics by conceding the whole
position. The defects of the Canadian party system never found a
se