Well,
that set inquiries on foot, folks began to calculate--a tender was
made and accepted, and now steam across the Atlantic is a fixed fact,
and an old story. Our folks warn't over pleased about it, they
consaited I should have told them first, so they might have taken the
lead in it, as they like to go ahead of the British in all things, and
I wish to goodness I had, for thanks are better nor jeers at any time.
"Well, I was right there, you see. So on this subject I have told
Squire, and them who ought to know something of the colonies they
rule, over and over again, and warned government that something was
wanting to place these provinces on a proper permanent footing; that I
knew the temper of colony folks better than they did, and you will
find in my Journals the subject often mentioned. But no, a debate on a
beer bill, or a metropolitan bridge, or a constabulary act, is so
pressing, there is no time. Well, sure enough that's all come true.
First, the Canadian league started up, it was a feverish symptom, and
it subsided by good treatment, without letting blood. Last winter it
was debated in the Legislature here, and the best and ablest speeches
made on it ever heard in British America, and infinitely superior to
the great majority of those uttered in the House of Commons.1 Do you
suppose for a moment that proud-spirited, independent, able men like
those members, will long endure the control of a Colonial minister,
who, they feel, is as much below them in talent, as by accident he may
be above them in rank? No, Sir, the day is past.
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