bably
be now impossible for anyone. I can only take a few hints from Sir Henry
Taylor and from my brother's account which will sufficiently illustrate
some of my father's characteristics.

'For a long period,' says Taylor,[32] 'Stephen might better have been
called the "Colonial Department" itself than "Counsel to the Colonial
Department."' During Lord Glenelg's tenure of office (1835-1839), and
for many years before and after, 'he literally ruled the Colonial
empire.'[33] This involved unremitting labour. Taylor observes that
Stephen 'had an enormous appetite for work,' and 'rather preferred not
to be helped. I,' he adds, humorously, 'could make him perfectly welcome
to any amount of it.' For years he never left London for a month, and,
though in the last five years preceding his retirement in 1847, he was
absent for rather longer periods, he took a clerk with him and did
business in the country as regularly as in town.

His duties were of the most various kind. The colonies, as my brother
observes, were a collection of states varying from youthful nations like
Canada down to a small settlement of Germans on the rock of Heligoland;
their populations differed in race, laws, religion, and languages; the
authority of the Crown varied from absolute power over an infant
settlement to supremacy over communities in some essential respects
independent. My father's duty was to be familiar with every detail of
these complicated relations, to know the state of parties and local
politics in each colony, and to be able to advise successive Secretaries
of State who came without special preparation to the task. He had to
prepare drafts of all important despatches and of the numerous Acts of
Parliament which were required during a period of rapid and important
changes. 'I have been told,' says my brother, elsewhere,[34] that 'he
was a perfectly admirable Under-Secretary of State, quick, firm,
courageous, and a perfect master of his profession and of all the
special knowledge which his position required, and which, I believe, no
other man in England possessed to anything like the same extent.'

A man of long experience, vast powers of work, and decided views
naturally obtained great influence with his superiors; and that such an
influence was potent became generally believed among persons interested
in and often aggrieved by the policy of the Government. Stephen was
nicknamed as 'King Stephen,' or 'Mr. Over-Secretary Stephen,' or 'Mr