essening such dangers.
The day was {149} piping hot and he had taken off his coat. He rushed
round the table and touched bells here and there, which caused gates to
close and open, semaphores to drop, and all sorts of things to happen.
As the ministers took their leave, Macdonald said to his companion,
'Well, Thompson, what do you think of that chap?' 'I think,' replied
Thompson with great energy, 'that he deserves to be killed on a level
crossing.'

Once, while Lord Aberdeen was governor-general, Sir John Thompson was
dining at Government House on an evening in June when the mosquitoes
were unusually troublesome. Lady Aberdeen suggested the shutting of
the windows. 'Oh! thank you,' replied Sir John, 'pray don't trouble; I
think they are all in now!'

Sir Alexander Campbell was from youth intimately connected with Sir
John Macdonald--as a fellow-citizen of Kingston, as law student and
subsequently as partner in a legal firm, as a colleague for many years
in the government of the old province of Canada and afterwards in that
of the Dominion. Yet the two were never kindred spirits. Sir
Alexander Campbell was a Tory aristocrat, a veritable grand seigneur,
of dignified bearing {150} and courtly mien. He made an excellent
minister of Justice, but he lacked that _bonhomie_ which so endeared
Sir John Macdonald to the multitude. I do not think that Sir John's
pre-eminence in that direction ever gave Sir Alexander much concern.
My impression is that he regarded the multitude as an assemblage of
more or less uninteresting persons, necessary only at election times;
and if Sir John could succeed in obtaining their votes, he was quite
welcome to any incidental advantages that he might extract from the
process. It was alleged by Sir Richard Cartwright that in the year
1864 a movement was started in the Conservative party with the object
of supplanting Macdonald and putting Campbell in his place, and that
Sir John never forgave Campbell for his part in this affair. Something
of the kind was talked about at the date mentioned, but the movement
proved a complete fiasco, and it is not at all clear that Campbell was
a consenting party to it. I doubt too the correctness of Sir Richard's
inference, for, leaving the 1864 incident out of account, there never
was the slightest political division between the two men. At the time
of the Pacific Scandal, Campbell behaved exceedingly {151} well to his
chief. Yet, speaking of the per