TO the historian with a philosophical turn of mind, to the ethnologist, the political history of the Province of Quebec is a most interesting study. He cannot help noticing a strong resemblance, proceeding from an affinity of origin, between the Norman barons, who wrested Magna Charta from King John, the men who fought for the prerogatives of parliament against the privilege of the crown under George III., and the Norman-Canadian statesmen who conquered responsible government. Their minds seem to have come out of the same mould, so much alike are they in sagacity, moderation, and the instinct for liberty. Their sense of what a colonial government should be showed itself at a very early stage of our history and with surprising clearness in men born from parents brought up under the personal power of Louis XV.

Under the despotic rule of Governor Craig, who suppressed Le Canadien, the first French newspaper of Quebec, Panet, Bedard and Taschereau claim the liberty of the press like Junius, and the independence of parliament after the style of Wilkes, and for their bold stand are sent to jail. When

Craig orders his minions to set Bedard free, again with English-like sense of honour and respect for law, he refuses to take advantage of the governor's order until he is told under what authority he has been imprisoned, and until he has been regularly tried.

About the same time the members of the assembly, discerning that their control of the provincial finances would surely check the absolute power of the executive, claim from the imperial parliament the burden of supporting the expenses of government by levying taxes. This is granted in 1818. Up to that year it rested with the colonial office to supply the money necessary to defray the civil list of Canada.

As far back as 1808, Bedard had asked for ministerial responsibility, which Lord Durham at a later time declared in his celebrated report, would put an end to the existing troubles. Then came Papineau whose advocacy of reform was admirable so long as he kept himself within the limits of constitutional agitation, before he became a desperate agitator under the exasperating sting of redress of grievances oft promised but always deferred. When the Union Act of 1840 was imposed on Lower Canada, La Fontaine entered his protest against it with all his fellow-citizens, but instead of sulking under his tent in permanent opposition, as some less far-seeing Canadians desired to do, he at once strove to bring forth good results from a well-designed scheme to accomplish evil ends. This he achieved with the concurrence of that great reformer and good man, Robert Baldwin.

In the constitutional battle that ensued between Lord Sydenham and Lord Metcalfe on one side, and La Fontaine on the other, as to the meaning of ministerial responsibility, to an unprejudiced observer La Fontaine had the best of the argument. His opponent held views which would have been laughed out of discussion in England. Although the act of 1840 conceded ministerial responsibility to Canada, it was not the intention of these governors to grant it in its entirety. Even Lord John Russell was opposed to this reform, fearing that the advice which might be given to the representative of the crown in Canada would clash with the instructions from Downing street. Even as late as 1842, the Montreal Gazette, then a Tory organ of an antiquated type, denounced ministerial responsibility as a "pernicious and damnable heresy."

It was La Fontaine's and Baldwin's meritorious task to put an end to disputes on constitutional questions, and to that national antagonism which had arrayed one section of the population against the other. Party spirit has often been looked upon as the bane and curse of a country, but in Canada it has proved a blessing. When the Baldwin party joined the Liberal forces of Lower Canada under La Fontaine, to combat the Tory element, the dangerous strife of English against French began to abate. Efforts have occasionally been made to revive old national feuds, but the sound sense of our leading statesmen, backed by the conservative instinct of the people at large, has prevented the return of that undisguised evil.

After the constitutional battle had been won, when Lord Elgin, the most enlightened and most popular governor of Canada before confederation, had gracefully helped to carry on responsible government, as they understand it in England, Cartier took the helm in hand. Intelligence and talent are the requisites for success in politics as well as in the other ventures of life, but they must be applied at the proper time, when their powers are specially needed. No one in Canada did more than Cartier to free the country from dangerous influences by keeping the government on party lines with French and English on both sides. In his collected speeches, delivered on public occasions either in Quebec, Ontario or the Maritime Provinces, reference is always made to the importance of maintaining harmonious intercourse between the different nationalities, of cultivating sentiments of mutual forbearance; in his mind it was the statesman's duty to avoid any cause of friction between these antagonistic elements.

It was his constant aim to spread among certain classes of the Upper Canadian population correct notions concerning the French Canadians. He was the first of his nationality to meet the western farmers and make them feel that their unknown partners in the Union were not as black as they had been painted. The prejudices in Upper Canada, which he contributed largely to dispel, were so great about 1839, that the Toronto city council and the House of Assembly, as shown before, asked Governor Poulett Thomson to disenfranchise the French population of Lower Canada. Thanks to his liberal views Cartier ingratiated himself with the English and Protestant population of Lower Canada, whose confidence he never lost during his twenty-five years of public life. - His conduct, which should be that of every Canadian statesman, was not always well understood among his countrymen and some of his opponents were pleased to represent him as an anglomaniac, with an excessive fondness for everything British. This reproach is, however, one of those stock-in-trade attacks made against almost every minister bent on giving equal justice to all, without regard to church or flag. For the good of the country these two Norman-Canadians, La Fontaine and Cartier, almost ruled it from 1841 to 1867, during that régime which had been designed for the very purpose of keeping them and their friends out of power. La Fontaine with all Lower Canada at his back, joined hands with the small Liberal following of Baldwin. When he retired to private life, at the advent of the Reformers in Upper Canada, under George Brown, Morin, Taché and Cartier at the head of the Lower Canada Liberals, formed a new alliance with their old opponents, the Tories or Conservatives of the MacNab and Macdonald type. To sum up the part these two men played with their associates in our history, it may be said that La Fontaine with Baldwin fought and won the constitutional battle, whilst Cartier, with the help of Macdonald, contrived to establish the political union of the country, showing conclusively that in spite of the dissimilitudes of a mixed community, it can easily be governed and made prosperous.

Under the Cartier-Macdonald alliance, the country was again ruled by a party composed largely of Lower Canada members, thus giving the French leader a strong hold over the House. It was then that George Brown denounced what he was pleased to call the French domination, a war cry which would have been reasonable if Macdonald and Cartier could ever have been inspired by racial or religious prejudice, an hypothesis out of the question. The alliance of those two men was certainly beneficial to the country. After he had broken away—an early experience having shown him his initial error—from his first associations, John A. Macdonald aided his ally in removing existing prejudices in Upper Canada against the eastern province, and in establishing the principles which must govern public men in a community like ours composed of two separate and distinct races. Both, though differently gifted, were born leaders of men, Cartier with his imperative ways and Macdonald with his power of persuasion and cunning. The latter had a deep view of the human heart, a greater contempt for its secret impulses, and knew what spring must be touched to influence it. Cartier claimed the leadership because from his own conception it belonged to him on account of his superior qualification. He was the necessary man and the only one. A long use of power and blind obedience from his followers had developed within his mind peculiar ideas as to his position. He exacted from his friends absolute submission and when confronted with the remarks from members of parliament that such and such votes were difficult to give, he would bluntly reply: "I want your support during stormy times; don't claim credit for supporting me when it is all plain sailing."

Macdonald led his men with a wink and a smile; he fascinated them with a tap on the shoulder and they were pleased to take the password from such a clever and skilled leader. Amiable as he was with the rank and file, he was absolute in council. One of his colleagues, a prominent politician, often told me that his rule was personal power to its full extent. This absoluteness of mind in Macdonald, and equally strong conviction in Cartier, often brought these two men into antagonism. They were pleased, when addressing the masses, to eulogize each other, to praise their friendship, to refer to the popular saying that they were Siamese twins, but when looked at by the light of facts, this close amity has the character, to a great extent, of those numberless legends which makes Renan call history "that conjectural science." The truth is that numerous conflicts took place between them, and that the alliance was maintained only by mutual interests and a strong sense of public duty. The elements which made up their forces were so conflicting, so antagonistic, that they unavoidably fostered division between the leaders. Just imagine, Cartier whipping into line the most Catholic section of Lower Canada, and Macdonald supported by the Orange Order! It must have required no ordinary generalship on the part of these two men to marshal under one flag soldiers who rallied to symbols representing such antagonistic ideas.

It is generally believed that their most serious estrangement occurred in London, whilst the British North America Act was before parliament. John A. Macdonald desired, it is said, to have it modified so that a legislative union should be substituted for the proposed federation. To this, Cartier objected strongly and made no mystery of his intention to return to Canada, if his colleague persisted in his determination to alter the constitution as it was adopted in Quebec. It is also reported that he had warned the then Canadian premier, Sir N. F. Belleau, to be prepared to resign at a moment's notice, on receiving a cablegram to that effect. This statement has been given out without contradiction, in the Quebec press, by a distinguished French journalist, Oscar Dunn, and also by a very intimate friend of Cartier, Louis Archambault, for several years a member of the Quebec government. A gentleman now on the staff of an important paper in Montreal and once his confidential adviser, confirmed this statement to the writer. In spite of these very respectable witnesses we would hesitate to credit it. How could Macdonald have broken his pledged word of honour, his solemn declaration in the House at Quebec, with the hope of being sustained on his return to Canada ? Was he sure that even Ontario would have followed him, after having accepted confederation? Is it conceivable that after the labours and toils of three years, he would have thrown all results to the winds and begun anew to educate the people to another state of things? Still the evidence on the other side is very respectable and makes the solution difficult.