ANADA, 1838

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_Jan. 20/38._--To-day there was a meeting on Canada at Sir R. Peel's.
There were present Duke of Wellington, Lords Aberdeen, Ripon,
Ellenborough, Stanley, Hardinge, and others.... Peel said he did not
object to throwing out the government provided it were done by us on our
own principles; but that to throw them out on radical principles would
be most unwise. He agreed that less might have been done, but was not
willing to take the responsibility of refusing what the government
asked. He thought that this rebellion had given a most convenient
opportunity for settling the question of the Canadian constitution,
which had long been a thorny one and inaccessible; that if we postponed
the settlement by giving the assembly another trial, the revolt would be
forgotten, and in colder blood the necessary powers might be refused. He
thought that when once you went into a measure of a despotic character,
it was well to err, if at all, on the side of sufficiency; Lord Ripon
strongly concurred. The duke sat with his hand to his ear, turning from
one towards another round the circle as they took up the conversation in
succession, and said nothing till directly and pressingly called upon by
Peel, a simple but striking example of the self-forgetfulness of a great
man.

_Jan. 26/38._--I was myself present at about eight hours [_i.e._ on
three occasions] of discussion in Peel's house upon the Canadian
question and bill, and there was one meeting held to which I was not
summoned. The conservative amendments were all adopted in the thoroughly
straightforward view of looking simply at the bill and not at the
government and the position of parties. Peel used these emphatic words:
'Depend upon it, our course is the direct one; don't do anything that is
wrong for the sake of putting them out; don't avoid anything that is
right for the sake of keeping them in.' Every one of these points has
now been carried without limitation or exception. For the opposition
party this is, in familiar language, a feather in its cap. The whole has
been carefully, thoroughly, and effectually done. Nothing since I have
been in parliament--not even the defeat of the Church Rate measure last
year--has been of a kind to tell so strikingly as regards appearances
upon the comparative credit of the two parties.

SIR ROBERT PEEL'S GOVERNMENT

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