nada [Ontario] and in all the
constituencies except Toronto, the battle will be between free trade
and a national policy.... It is really astonishing the feeling that
has grown up in the West [he is referring to Western Ontario] in favour
of encouragement of home manufactures.

In 1876 the time was opportune for promoting this policy. Trade was
depressed, manufactures languished, and the Canadian people as
producers only of raw material were fast becoming hewers of wood and
drawers of water for their more opulent neighbours in {114} the United
States. On March 10 of that year Sir John Macdonald propounded to the
House of Commons his scheme for improving the commerce of the country.
His proposals were contemptuously received by the Government. The
prime minister, while admitting the serious character of the depression
then prevailing, attributed the cause wholly to circumstances beyond
their control, and denied the power of any government to remove it by
legislation. They would have nothing to do with protection, which
Mackenzie ridiculed as an attempt to relieve distress by imposing
additional taxation.

Sir John thought differently. If he had done nothing else, his
'National Policy' campaign would have stamped him as a leader of men.
In the words of a political opponent of the time, 'he constructed with
consummate skill the engine which destroyed the Mackenzie
Administration. From the very first he saw what a tactician would do
with Protection, and in so masterly a manner did he cover his troops
with that rampart, that it was impossible for the Liberals to turn
their flank.'

His political picnics in 1876 and 1877, and the enthusiasm he
everywhere aroused, were long remembered, and are not forgotten to
{115} this day by older men. Everywhere crowds gathered to his
support, and the country impatiently waited the opportunity to restore
him to his old position at the head of affairs. At length the fateful
day arrived, and on September 17, 1878, the people of Canada declared
by an overwhelming majority for 'John A.' and protection. In the
preceding July Sir John had ventured a prophecy of the
result--something, by the way, he was extremely chary of doing. 'If we
do well we shall have a majority of sixty, if badly, thirty.' He had
eighty-six.

It was observed that as far as possible the new ministers in the
Cabinet formed by Macdonald were taken from the ranks of his old
colleagues, from those who had su