nothing by their motion. Had they succeeded, the advantage would only
have been temporary, and the reaction more terrible than it was. Having
failed in a design, which the word iniquitous is scarcely sufficient to
characterise, the House of Assembly decidedly assumed a progressive or
reform character. It was while this silly, as well as unjust measure
was being attempted to be carried that an attack of a novel kind was
made upon Mr. William Lyon Mackenzie. Mr. Mackenzie had some years
previously emigrated to Toronto, from Dundee, in Scotland, where he had
been engaged in business, as a merchant's clerk. An excellent
accountant, he was probably instrumental in causing it to be pointed
out to Sir Peregrine Maitland that the public accounts of Upper Canada
were not properly kept. He would have had at any rate no hesitation in
doing so. Very small in stature, he had a large head, ornamented with a
moderately sized and sparkling light blue eye, and with a nose
peculiarly short, and in comparison with his other features, altogether
ridiculously small. His nose was in wonderful contrast with a massive
fore-head and well-shaped mouth, which even when his tongue stood
still, rare as that occurrence was, ever moved. He was peculiarly
thin-skinned. The blue veins of his fair face made him seem to have
been tatooed. Mr. Mackenzie was then astonishingly active, persevering,
and intelligent, as he still is. A more able or a more indefatigable
exposer of colonial abuses could not have appeared at a more fitting
time. He was undoubtedly the right man in the right place. He had
engaged in business, and prospered, in York. He was, at this period,
the proprietor of a periodical called the _Colonial Advocate_,
wherein the corruptionists of the period were unmasked with very little
ceremony or consideration. The "corruptionists," very naturally,
desired to put him down. It was a matter, however, daily becoming more
difficult to put a man in prison and toss him out of the country on the
plea that he entertained opinions which he might give expression to,
and revolutionize the country. It was suspected, indeed, by the
magnates, that the state of feeling in the country was such that
prosecutions could not be maintained against Mr. Mackenzie. It was even
believed that they would increase his popularity. Mr. Mackenzie
travelled often to pick up information. He went about not so much to
create a public opinion as to ascertain it. He was at Niagar