at his not doing
so in person would be misconstrued by his enemies, and that he would be
branded by them with that most galling of all accusations to a noble
heart--cowardice. With a high-minded sense of duty, he put all such
personal considerations aside. There were two courses open to him: one,
to call out the military, and in their safe keeping dissolve the
Assembly; the other, to depute the Commander of the Forces to perform
that duty. The former must have produced a collision with the populace,
and the blood of many whom he believed to be as loyal as he knew they
were misguided and excited would have flowed freely; the latter, he
foresaw, would be misconstrued into an act of personal cowardice, but he
knew it would prevent a flow of blood, the remembrance of which would
keep alive the bitterest elements of political animosity for years to
come. With true patriotism, he sacrificed himself at the shrine of the
country he was sent to govern, preferring to be the subject of the most
galling accusations rather than shed unnecessarily one drop of the blood
of those committed to his rule.

During the whole of Lord Elgin's able and prosperous administration, I
can scarcely conceive any one act of his to which he can look back with
more satisfaction, than this triumph of his judgment over his feelings,
when he offered up just pride and dignity on the altar of mercy, and
retired to Quebec. A shallow-pated fellow, who had probably figured
personally in the outrages of that period, in talking to me on the
subject, thus described it,--"he bolted off in a funk to Quebec;" and
doubtless hundreds of others, as shallow-pated as himself, had been made
to believe such was the case, and vituperation being the easiest of all
ignoble occupations, they had probably done their best to circulate the
paltry slander. Lord Elgin, however, needs no goose-quill defender; the
unprecedented increasing prosperity of the colony under his
administration is the most valuable testimony he could desire. It is not
every governor who, on his arrival, finding a colony in confusion and
rebellion, has the satisfaction, on his resignation of office, of
leaving harmony and loyalty in their place, and the revenue during the
same period increased from 400,000l. to 1,500,000l.: and if any
doubt ever rested upon his mind as to whether his services were approved
of and appreciated at home, it must have been removed in the most
gratifying manner, when, upon a publi