adicalism such as he
could not control. But in Ottawa there was an even more direct split.
There, conscriptionist Liberals called the Convention for the purpose
of proclaiming win-the-war independence of Laurier and considering
Coalition on its merits. But the western Liberal machine captured it
by a fluke. For a few days the old chief dreamed that the West had
rallied to his standards. Then he awoke to the reality that even in
the east he was head of a divided house.

The man who in 1916 had been painted as a ruler of men found in that
summer of 1917 the Win-the-War Liberals deserting him, some of them
with sobs. They loved him well. He was the old king. Conscription
was now the issue. The Government had decided upon it late in 1916.
In 1917 the Military Service Act was brought down in the House.
Laurier knew at what it was most directly aimed--Quebec. He fell back
on the ruse of invoking the Militia Act which called for defence only.
There was no defence. He knew it. He moved for a Referendum, knowing
that in the West, sore over the Wartime Elections Act, and in Quebec,
and in the absence of the soldier vote it might carry by a majority
sufficient to defeat the Government, to force an election and send him
back to power. He was beaten. Conscription became the law. To
enforce it came the Coalition. The election was held. The Liberals
were again beaten--partly by men from their own ranks.

Still the old king hung on. He was now too old to let go. Even the
Coalition might fail. Or the war might be ended And then----? The
last fighting act of his life was to call the Ottawa Liberal
Convention, of the men who had not abandoned his colours; the men for
whom he was not still holding the open door. But a few months before
he died here he was "up on his toes," as George Graham said of him,
sending out battle calls for some election that must come now. The war
was over; the army coming home. The Coalition's day was "done." Those
stalwarts must return to the fold.

But most of them came not. There was still work for them to do, and
surely no haste for an election.

What? No more elections for Laurier? Not one more chance, after all
the waiting, for him to finish his work? Poor old infatuate! splendid
even in his illusions. There was no work for Laurier to do now. There
was no room for him to do it if there had been. There were few to
follow him except in Quebec--for in his dotage he would not b