=Blake, Hon. Edward=, P.C., Q.C., Toronto, M.P. for West Durham,

Ontario, is by birth a Canadian, but by race an Irishman.[9] His father,

the Hon. William Hume Blake, was a Blake of Galway, and the son of a

rector of the Church of England in Ireland, Rev. Dominick Edward Blake

of Kiltegan. On the mother’s side he is descended from William Hume of

Wicklow, a representative of that county in parliament, who lost his

life as a loyalist in the Irish rising of 1798. “The descendant of an

Irishman myself,” Mr. Blake said in a notable speech upon a motion made

in the House of Commons, in 1882, for an address to the Queen on the

subject of Irish affairs, “my grandfather on the father’s side a rector

of the church to which I have referred, and sleeping in his parish

churchyard, and my ancestor on my mother’s side slain in conflict with

insurgents; while it might have been my misfortune, had I been born and

bred in the old land, to adopt, from prejudice, views very different

from those I have expressed this night; yet, it being my good fortune to

have been born and bred in the free air of Canada; and to have learned

those better, those wiser, those more Christian and just notions which

here prevail upon the subject of civil and religious liberty, class

legislation and home rule itself, I have always entertained, ever since

I have had an opportunity of thinking on this subject, the sentiments to

which I have given utterance this evening. I believe that these are the

sentiments native to our own sense of freedom and justice, and that we

wish to deal on this subject, as the hon. gentleman said who moved it,

in that spirit which says, ‘Do unto others as you would they should do

unto you.’” Mr. Blake’s pride of ancestry, so often evinced in

references to his father, may have led him, in the extract quoted, to

attach too great weight to the influence of environment upon his

character and opinions. Speaking on a recent occasion, he said: “I have

always discouraged and discountenanced, so far as I could, any appeal to

considerations of race or creed. My earnest desire has ever been that we

should mingle, irrespective of our origins, irrespective of our creeds,

as Canadian brethren, as Canadian fellow citizens, whether we be English

or French, Scotch, Irish or German, whether we be Protestant, Catholic

or Jew, sinking all these distinctions in the political arena, and

uniting and dividing, not upon questions of origin, not upon questions

of religion, but rather upon honest differences of opinion with

reference to the current politics of the country.” It is doubtful if,

under any circumstances or conditions, a man constituted as Mr. Blake

is, with a mind of large grasp and sensitive to jealousy of his honor,

could be ought else than the fair and liberal man he is known to be.

But, whatever views may have been held on state or church affairs by his

more remote ancestors, no one who knows the story of the life of William

Hume Blake can have reason to suspect that the son was subject to

prejudiced or narrowing influences. The elder Blake was a man of strong

but well matured convictions, and he uttered his thoughts with a

clearness and force which rarely, if ever, allowed of his being

understood in a double sense. He was also a man of tender and generous

sympathies, and by the members of his own family his memory is greatly

and deservedly revered. Indeed it may be said that Edward Blake never

strikes a merciless blow—and he has the skill and power to strike a

tremendous blow—excepting in the case of one who may speak offensively,

rudely or disrespectfully of his father. It ought not to be a matter of

surprise, perhaps, that politicians who came into collision with the

father in the stirring political times of forty years ago should retain

some of the feelings of those times; but the few who have revived the

old issues with a display of the old temper, in the presence of the son,

are not likely to reflect on the consequence to themselves with any

degree of pleasure. One of these occasions will be readily recalled by

frequenters of the House of Commons of thirteen or fourteen years ago,

when the house was kept at a white heat throughout a whole night’s

sitting. But when he has himself been the object of attack the

disposition to strike back has been carefully curbed. “Whatever I am,”

he said, in one of that remarkable series of speeches delivered in the

election campaign of 1886-7, “I stick by my friends, and that, too, even

after they have left me.” And, referring in particular to two gentlemen

whom he had befriended, who afterwards changed their views and attacked

him very bitterly and with great frequency, he said: “I have never

replied to them or retorted on them. I have preferred to remember the

old times when we worked together. I have preferred to remember, too,

that they were my fellow-countrymen, and I have borne in silence their

unjust attacks rather than retaliate. I have chosen to recollect their

acts of friendship and co-operation rather than those of hostility and

animosity. I have hoped that the day might come when they, or, if not

they, at any rate my fellow-countrymen of their race and creed, would do

me justice, and I wished to put no obstacle whatever in the way of a

reconciliation, in which I have nothing to withdraw, nothing to

apologise for, nothing to excuse.”—Edward Blake was born in the woods

of Middlesex in 1833, a year after his father and mother had left

Ireland. After two or three years’ experience of pioneer life the family

removed to Toronto, and the father began preparation for the profession

of law, upon which he entered in 1838, and in which he acquired great

distinction—for eleven years as a practising barrister, and afterwards

for thirteen years as chancellor or chief justice of the Court of

Equity. Edward’s education was looked after by his father and by private

tutors until he was old enough to enter Upper Canada College, and in

that school he was prepared for Toronto University. In the last year of

his course there (1854), his father was appointed chancellor of the

university, and had the gratification in that capacity of conferring the

B.A. degree upon his gifted son, who took first-class honors in classics

and was winner of a silver medal. This, however, was not with Edward

Blake as it has been with many graduates the closing event of his

connection with the university. He proceeded to the Master’s degree in

1858, and in 1873 he was elected chancellor by the graduates for a term

of three years, an honor which has now been bestowed on him five times

in succession. Some of Mr. Blake’s best speeches have been delivered in

his capacity as chancellor of the university. At the close of his

university career he commenced the study of the law, and in 1856 he

began practice in the Equity court. He worked hard, and, although there

were a number of excellent lawyers in the Chancery court at that time,

he attained the foremost place amongst them in less than ten years. He

was created a Q.C. in 1864, was elected a bencher of the Law Society in

1871, and was appointed treasurer of the society upon the death of the

Hon. John Hilyard Cameron, in 1879. The offer of the chancellorship of

the province by Sir John Macdonald in 1869, and the offer of the chief

justiceship of the Supreme Court of the Dominion by Mr. Mackenzie in

1875, were both declined.—Mr. Blake entered upon parliamentary life in

the confederation year, in a dual capacity, as member for West Durham in

the House of Commons, and member for South Bruce in the Ontario

legislature. In both bodies he ranked high as a debater from the first;

and although political subjects were new to him in a sense, he speedily

gained such familiarity with them that the leadership of the party

became his by right of pre-eminence. In the Ontario legislature, where

Mr. McKellar was leader during the first session, the place was forced

upon Mr. Blake (Mr. McKellar himself being the most urgent of the

Liberals in pressing for the change), but in the Commons he resolutely

refused to hold any position excepting in the ranks. The premier of

Ontario was an astute politician, and had many good qualities as a

public man; he was also an old Liberal and had a respectable following

of his party, although a majority of his supporters both in the house

and in the country were Conservatives. Mr. Blake had a difficult task in

hand, as leader of the Opposition, against a veteran politician like

John Sandfield Macdonald; but his forces were always marshalled with

consummate skill, and by the discussion of affairs and the formulating

of a well defined policy, in the line of the historic principles of the

Liberal party, the electors had clear issues placed before them when the

appeal was made in 1871, at the close of the first parliamentary term

after confederation. The actual result was in doubt until the new

legislature met in December, and a motion of want of confidence in the

government was keenly and brilliantly debated. But the Liberals

prevailed in the end; Mr. Blake was called upon to form a government,

and in the first session effect was given to the principles which had

won for the party the confidence of the people. From that time until now

the same principles have been maintained by the Liberals of Ontario,

with such expansion and development as circumstances have shown to be

desirable; and, measured by all the results, it may confidently be

affirmed that no other portion of America has in the same period been

governed so wisely or well. Owing to the abolition of dual

representation in 1872, both in the Provincial legislature and in the

Dominion parliament, Mr. Blake resigned the premiership so that he might

occupy the larger sphere at Ottawa, and upon his advice the office of

first minister of the province was committed to the Hon. Oliver Mowat.

Mr. Blake was re-elected to the Commons by acclamation for West Durham,

and was also returned for South Bruce, at the general election in 1872;

he sat in the house, however, as representative of the latter

constituency. The part he took in the overthrow of the Macdonald

government in 1873, both in the country and the house, secured for him

the highest position yet attained by a political leader and orator in

Canada. His career since that event, in office and out of it, is so

well-known that space need not be taken up with the recounting of it. It

has been largely the political history of the country, for on every

important question his voice has been heard, uttering the sentiments of

his party. He accepted the leadership in 1880, much against his own

will, and in discharging the duties of that office throughout the whole

time he held it he acted up to the full measure of his conviction, that

no abilities are too good to be given, and no effort too great to be

spent, for Canada.—Mr. Blake is not only the foremost of Canadian

parliamentary orators, but, had his lot been cast in the larger sphere

of Imperial or Republican politics, he would without doubt have attained

a place in the front rank of those great orators who have shed lustre on

the Anglo-Saxon race and helped to immortalize the English tongue. When

he was comparatively young in public life, a well-known Canadian writer,

who was by his previous experience exceptionally well qualified to

compare him with the greatest of English contemporary orators, thus

recorded the results of such a comparison after hearing Mr. Blake for

the first time, shortly after the writer’s arrival in Canada.—“The

present writer has often seen in the British House of Commons a debate

degenerate into a squabble, in which small passions and petty aims made

the moral atmosphere foul and fetid. Then Mr. Gladstone has risen up,

and immediately one felt raised into a high moral plane, with a wider

horizon and more pleasing intellectual prospect; the mere tone of his

voice—firm, sincere, truthful in its ring—acting as a spell to lay the

evil spirits which up to that time had it all their own way. Precisely a

similar effect was produced by Mr. Blake. Here was a sincere man who

‘dared not lie,’ who had principles to maintain, who was not a prey to

anxiety lest he might lose place and power, who was not driven like a

leaf in the fall wind by his own passions. His intellectual and moral

superiority was crushingly apparent. . . . Mr. Blake as an orator is

something of the same style as Lord Selborne (Sir Roundell Palmer), with

a dash of Sir J. D. Coleridge’s honeyed satire and Mr. Gladstone’s

earnestness of purpose.” A distinguished Canadian judge in a

conversation with the writer of this sketch gave an opinion of Mr.

Blake’s rank among the great English orators of the day; and, as it has

never been published before, it is perhaps worth quoting in the same

connection. When the eminent American statesman, Mr. Evarts, was in

Toronto a few years ago he was publicly welcomed by the Law Society of

Ontario at Osgoode Hall, and by members of the senate and faculty of

Toronto University, Mr. Blake being the principal officer to receive and

welcome him on both occasions. The late Chief Justice Moss, who was also

present, was afterwards asked how in his opinion Mr. Blake compared as a

speaker with Mr. Evarts, and his reply was that, so far as could be

judged by the opportunities afforded at these gatherings the Canadian

was unmistakably the superior of the American. He added that he had been

in the habit for a number of years of spending his holidays in England;

that while there he had met and heard many of the leading statesmen and

lawyers of that country; and his firm conviction was that in Mr. Blake,

Canada possessed a man who was intellectually and oratorically the equal

of any one of them and the superior of almost all. Perhaps no two

English-speaking public men of this generation have been so frequently

compared with each other in their style of oratory as Mr. Blake and his

great English prototype, Mr. Gladstone. It may be thought that the

resemblance said to exist between them is more fanciful than real; that

such comparisons have their origin in the pride—patriotic or

partisan—which Canadians feel in those of their countrymen who have

attained distinction; that Sir John Macdonald, for example, has often

been said to bear a close likeness to Mr. Gladstone’s old antagonist,

Earl Beaconsfield. In the case, however, of the two great Conservative

chieftains the likeness was supposed to be less discernible in their

oratory than in their personal appearance, and in the methods they

pursued as party leaders. But the more closely we study the speeches and

the public life of the two great Liberal leaders the more clearly will

it be seen that the resemblance between them has a far more substantial

foundation than any mere Canadian pride in a distinguished son of

Canada, although Canadians were well pleased to think that, side by side

with some of Britain’s greatest men, before a critical and cultured

Edinburgh audience a few years ago, Canada saw “her bairn respected like

the lave.” Wherein, then, does the resemblance consist, if such

resemblance there be? Does it lie in the similarity of their methods as

rhetoricians, or in qualities less superficial and less minutely

definable? The writer above quoted describes in a single phrase the

strong underlying points of resemblance between the Englishman and the

Canadian. The true secret of their power as orators lies in their

intellectual and moral superiority. Perhaps it lies even more in the

moral element than in the intellectual, though the fibres of mind and

character are so closely interwoven in the texture of their speeches

that it is difficult to decide in which quality lies their greatest

strength. True it is that the gifts and graces of rhetoric have been

bountifully bestowed upon both. Some of these they hold in common, and

in others each has been specially endowed. But to say that the

possession of these merely rhetorical accomplishments is what makes each

the greatest living orator of his country is to assign a wholly

inadequate cause for so large an effect. The fact that intellectually

they are giants, and that morally they are believed to be sincere,

high-minded, _sans peur et sans reproche_, is what largely gives them

their power as orators. Mr. Blake’s firm and comprehensive grasp of any

subject with which he grapples, the almost phenomenal way in which he

masters and then marshals all its facts, are qualities in which we doubt

if he is excelled by any living statesman. Not merely are the broad

outlines drawn with a strong hand, but, when necessary for his purpose,

the minutest details are filled in with the fidelity of a photograph. In

fact so thoroughly does he exhaust the details of his subject in some of

his more elaborate parliamentary speeches that the effect is to mar the

whole performance, viewed simply as an oratorical effect. Perhaps no one

knows this better than Mr. Blake himself, and the fact that he is thus

content to risk his reputation as an orator from the same high sense of

duty which has kept him in uncongenial public life for many years,

against his personal wishes and to the serious impairment of his health

and income, should be sufficient to secure him the indulgence of the

severest critic, for it is a failing which surely leans to virtue’s

side. His manner in speaking is earnest and forcible, such a manner as

befits an orator who seeks to convince his hearers through the medium of

their reason, and he never indulges in _ad captandum_ appeals. His

sentences, like his whole treatment of his subject, though they may be

somewhat involved, are always thoroughly in hand; he never loses himself

in a maze, seldom hesitates for the right word, and always appears to

have the whole plan of his speech before his mind’s eye. His language

unites the copiousness and variety of the accomplished scholar with the

clear cut precision of the lawyer; and the wealth of illustration with

which he adorns his best speeches, drawn as it is from every conceivable

source in life and literature, would in itself be regarded as wonderful

if it were not associated with intellectual powers which are all on an

equally high plane. He is perhaps at his best in the _rôle_ of satirist,

and herein he displays qualities in which he far excels the great

English statesman to whom it is no derogation to compare him. Earnest

and argumentative like Mr. Gladstone he habitually is, but when engaged

in thrust and parry with an opponent, wit and humor lend their aid, and

often with such merciless effect that they defeat the speaker’s purpose

by creating sympathy for his antagonist. The best specimen of Mr.

Blake’s style of oratory will be found in his shorter extemporaneous

speeches in parliament. In many of his longer speeches his best

qualities as an orator have been suppressed by too much elaborateness of

preparation. Able as they are as examples of clear consecutive

reasoning, they partake too much of the character of essays; wanting

spontaneity, they lack the fire and vim of his shorter speeches. As an

illustration of this view, take the short speech in which Mr. Blake

replied to the leader of the government in 1882, on the motion for the

second reading of the Redistribution Bill—better known as the

Gerrymander Bill. All the leading features of that measure were seized

and a complete criticism of them pronounced in the course of a twenty

minutes’ speech, with such telling force that no one on the ministerial

side dared offer a reply. It was as perfect a criticism of a large

subject as the far more elaborate speech on the bill in committee of the

whole a few days later, saving in matters of detail, and the verdict of

those who listened to both speeches doubtless was that the shorter one

was by large odds weightier and more convincing than the longer and

heavier one. There was material enough in the latter for half-a-dozen

first-class speeches, but it erred in leaving nothing for any other

member to say. Another of Mr. Blake’s speeches which showed his skill in

stating and discussing subjects tersely and vigorously is his speech at

London in January, 1886, in which he dealt with the execution of Riel

and presented a general review of the political situation. Such massing

of facts and arraying of reasons, conjoined with such judicial fairness

in balancing the weights of evidence, are rarely to be met with in the

records of political eloquence. “Though the skies be dark,” he said in

closing that speech, “yet trust we in the Supreme goodness. We believe

our cause is just and true. We believe that truth and justice shall in

God’s good time prevail. It may be soon; it may be late. His ways are

not our ways, and His unfathomable purposes we may not gauge. But this

we know, that in our efforts we are in the line of duty. We hope,

indeed, to make our cause prevail. But, win or lose to-day, we know that

we shall receive for the faithful discharge of duty an exceeding great

reward—the only reward which is worth attaining, the only reward which

is sure to last.”—Mr. Blake’s thorough honesty of purpose is one of his

most conspicuous qualities. Many proofs of this quality might be given

from his speeches, but one will suffice. In closing his speech on the

execution of Riel, in the House of Commons in March, 1886, he said: “I

know the atmosphere of prejudice and passion which surrounds this case.

I know how difficult it will be for years to come to penetrate that

dense atmosphere. I know how many people of my own race and of my own

creed entertain sentiments and feelings hostile to the conclusion to

which I have been driven. I know that many whom I esteem and in whose

judgment I have confidence, after examination of this case, have been

unable to reach my own conclusion. I blame no one. Each has the right

and duty to judge for himself. But cries have been raised on both sides

which are potent, most potent in preventing the public from coming to a

just conclusion; yet we must not by any such cries be deterred from

doing our duty. I have been threatened more than once by hon. gentlemen

opposite during this debate with political annihilation in consequence

of the attitude of the Liberal party which they projected on this

question; and I so far agree with them as to admit that the vote I am

about to give is an inexpedient vote, and that, if politics were a game,

I should be making a false move. I should be glad to be able to reach a

conclusion different from that which is said by hon. gentlemen opposite

to be likely to weaken my influence and imperil my position. But it can

be said of none of us, least of all of the humble individual who now

addresses you, that his continued possession of a share of public

confidence, of the lead of a party, or of a seat in parliament, is

essential or even highly important to the public interest; while for all

of us what is needful is not that we should retain, but that we should

deserve the public confidence; not that we should keep, but that while

we do keep we should honestly use our seats in parliament. To act

otherwise would be to grasp at the shadow and to lose the substance;

_propter vitam vivendi perdere causas_. We may be wrong; we must be

true. We should be ready to close, but resolved to keep unstained our

public careers. I am unable honestly to differ from the view that it is

deeply to be regretted that this execution should have been allowed to

take place, and therefore in favor of that view I must record my vote.”

This view of the exalted duties of a representative of the people must

commend itself to every man who esteems truth, honor and country; and it

is the knowledge of the holding of this and like views by Mr. Blake, not

less than his intellectual qualities, which secures for him the esteem

of the best men of all classes. “We are all proud of Edward Blake,”

Principal Grant of Queen’s University exclaimed when presenting him to

address a Queen’s convocation a few years ago. “Mr. Blake is a

distinguished man, a credit to any country from his ability and

eloquence and devotion to public matters,” Sir John Macdonald said when

referring to his absence from the house and country at the opening of

the 1888 session of parliament.—Many speeches delivered in the House of

Commons and out of it during the last twenty years attest Mr. Blake’s

ability and eloquence, but one extract will serve for illustration. It

is taken from the report of a speech delivered at Lindsay in 1887, on

the administration of the North-West. After sketching the principal

events leading up to the Half-breed rebellion down to the summer of

1884, he said: “The time, if ever there was a time, for conditions of

non-alienation passed away; the state of things changed, the discontent

grew, the demand became fixed and formulated for like treatment as the

Half-breeds of Manitoba, and its concession in this form was pressed on

the government by everyone in the North-West, including the council. But

all in vain! The government was deaf; the government was blind; the

government was dumb; indeed for all they did in this matter the

government might as well have been dead! Nay, better! for had they been

dead I do not believe another baker’s dozen of Tories could have been

found to succeed them who could have been as deaf, and dumb, and blind,

and dead as they; and Canada might have been saved the blow, the

dreadful blow, which they caused, if they did not actually inflict upon

their country! At length, in June, 1884, after five years of total, of

absolute inaction in this pressing matter, occurred an event so-marked

that it might have made the deaf to hear, the dumb to speak, the blind

to see, nay, might almost have waked the dead,—for then it happened

that these poor people, despairing at last of reaching otherwise the

ears of their rulers at Ottawa, sent a deputation on foot to tramp the

prairies, cross the rivers and penetrate the forests, seven hundred long

miles into Montana, to find and to counsel with their old chief and

leader, Louis Riel. They reached him; they invited his help; he agreed

to return in their company, to lead his people in an agitation for the

rights which they had so long asked in vain; he returned on this demand,

on this errand, in those relations to his kinsmen; and he was

triumphantly and enthusiastically received by a large assembly of the

Half-breeds on the banks of the Saskatchewan; and all these ominous and

portentous facts were known to the government! Now what at this juncture

was the relation of Louis Riel to the disturbed populations of the

North-West? That is a most important question to be answered when you

are measuring the situation and awarding its due responsibility to the

government. For I ask you, having asked that question, to decide, as I

believe you will unhesitatingly decide, I ask not you Liberals only, but

the most compassionate, the most faithful Tory, the blindest, the most

party-ridden Tory here, to decide,—even if he can find, what I cannot

find, in the loving kindness of his nature, in the softness of his

heart, some, I will not say justification, I will not say excuse, but

some palliation for that five long years of inaction,—yet I ask you

all, with absolute confidence, to agree with me that for the inaction

after June, 1884, there is, under heaven, no palliation whatever. What

was the relation of Riel to those amongst whom he came? I will not give

you my own comparisons; I will give you those of the first minister

himself, used in reply to me in parliament. He said that Riel was the El

Mahdi of the Metis! The El Mahdi—you know him—the Arabian priest, and

prophet, and usurping chief, who excited in the breasts of the wild

tribes of the desert such a convinced belief in his supernatural powers,

such a devoted and fanatic affection to his person, such a desperate

fidelity to his cause, that at his bidding, ill-armed and undisciplined

as they were, they flung their naked bodies in ferocious fight against

the better drilled and more numerous forces of their lawful sovereign,

the Khedive; nay, they hurled those naked bodies once and again against

the serried ranks of the British battalions; and boldly encountered at

once all the old British valor, and all the modern dreadful appliances

of war; and the sands of Africa were wet with brave English blood, and

English wives and mothers wept bitter tears for the deeds done under

these influences by the wild followers of El Mahdi. He said that Riel

was the La Rochejacquelin of the Metis! La Rochejacquelin, the young

French noble who, when all France almost beside had submitted to the

republic, raised again the white flag of the legitimate monarchy, roused

the peaceful peasantry of remote La Vendée, led them in successful

attack against strong places held by the forces of the republic, and by

virtue of the spirit he infused, the confidence they reposed, the

affection and fealty they bore towards their feudal chief, kept at bay

for a while the great enemies of the state. He said he was the Charles

Stuart, the Pretender, the leader of the lost cause of the Half-breeds!

‘Bonnie Prince Charlie, the king of the Hieland hearts,’ who, after the

lowlands of Scotland, after all England, after all Ireland had submitted

to the new rule, yet raised the clans; marched into Edinburgh; held

court at Holyrood; made a descent on England itself; and, when pressed

back into the north, fought with his irregular and ill-equipped liegemen

in unequal, but obstinate and glorious, and sometimes successful

conflict with the disciplined troops of the new dynasty! The Stuart, who

found and proved for the hundredth time the stern valor and the

enthusiastic love of his Highland followers; who found and proved it,

not only in the fleeting hour of victory, but in the dark season of

distress; when, with broken fortunes and a lost cause, with thirty

thousand pounds offered for his head, and death assigned as the penalty

for his harborer, he was safely guarded, and loved, and cherished, and

sheltered by his clansmen in the caves and glens and bothies of the

Highlands, as safe as if he had been in command in the centre of a

British square! Yes! They scorned the base reward; they contemned the

dreadful penalty; they kept him safe, and at length helped him to escape

to other climes, to wait for the better days that never came. Such were

the men to whom the first minister compared Riel, in his relation to the

Metis. And, such being his relation, I ask you was not his coming an

ominous and portentous event? He came, with all that power and influence

over that ill-educated, half-civilized, impulsive, yet proud and

sensitive people, living their lonely lives in that far land; he came

amongst them at their request; he who had led the Half-breeds of the

east in ’69, and had achieved for them a treaty and the recognition of

their rights; he came to lead his kinsmen of the west in the path by

which they were, as they hoped, to obtain their rights as well! Had the

government been diligent before, they should have been roused by this to

further zeal. But he came after five years of absolute lethargy on the

part of the government, when they knew that they had not been diligent,

and when, therefore, they had a double duty to repair, in the time God

gave them still, the consequences of their sloth. Surely, surely such a

coming should have made the deaf to hear, the blind to see, the dumb to

speak; surely it might almost have waked the dead!” This extract will

compare with the best effort of any modern parliamentary or platform

speaker, and the whole speech is probably the best specimen of moving

eloquence ever uttered by a public man in America.—The heavy and

prolonged strain of the election campaign of 1886-7 had a serious effect

on Mr. Blake’s health, and resulted in a nervous collapse which made a

holding of the position of leader of a parliamentary party no longer

possible to one of his sense of duty. He accordingly resigned the

leadership of the Liberals in the session of 1887, to the sincere regret

of his followers in the house and, it may be said, to the regret of the

whole country besides.

-----

[9] Mr. Blake’s great-grandfather was Andrew Blake, a gentleman of good

estate in the county of Galway. By his first marriage he had two

sons—Andrew, who inherited Castlegrove, and Netterville, who succeeded

to another estate close to Tuam. The latter had twenty-one children,

thirteen of whom were sons. The second wife of Andrew Blake was a

daughter of Sir Joseph Hoare, of Annabel, county Cork, by a daughter of

Sir Marcus Somerville. By this marriage he had four sons—Dominick

Edward, Joseph, Samuel and William. Dominick Edward was born at

Castlegrove in 1771; educated at Trinity College, Dublin, where he took

the degree of M.A.; presented to the livings of Kiltegan and

Loughbrickland, and appointed rural dean. He married Anne Margaret,

daughter of William Hume, M.P., who was shot by the rebels in 1798, and

they had for issue two sons and three daughters. His death occurred in

1823, and a tablet erected to his memory in Kiltegan church records that

during a period of nineteen years he was the beloved and venerated

rector of that parish: “His affectionate and afflicted parishioners have

erected this monument as a testimony of their deep sense of his worth

and of their grief at his loss.” The elder of the sons was Rev. Dominick

Edward Blake, for some time rector of Thornhill, north of Toronto, and

the younger was William Hume Blake, the chancellor. William Hume, M.P.,

mentioned above, left two sons—William Hoare Hume, who succeeded his

father in the representation of Wicklow in the Irish parliament, and

after the Union sat until his death in the Imperial parliament, and

Joseph Samuel Hume, who married Eliza, daughter of Rev. Charles Smyth,

of Smythfield and Charles Park, county Limerick. Being a younger son he

inherited only a small property in Wicklow; he died at an early age,

immediately after having received a government appointment in the castle

of Dublin. He left one son and three daughters, the eldest of the

daughters, Catharine, becoming the wife of Chancellor Blake, and the

youngest the wife of Justice George Skeffington Connor.

* * * * *

=Morison, Lewis Francis=, Advocate, St. Hyacinthe, was born in that

city, on the 30th January, 1842. His father, Donald George Morison, was

born at Sorel, P.Q., and was many years a notary. His grandfather, Allan

Morison, was born on Lewis Island, west coast of Scotland, and came to

Canada about 1770, settling in the district of Montreal. Mr. Morison’s

mother was Marie A. Rosalie Papineau, daughter of the Hon. D. B.

Papineau, and niece of the late Hon. Louis Joseph Papineau. Mr. Morison,

the subject of our sketch, was educated at the College of St. Hyacinthe,

and studied law with the late Hon. M. Laframboise and the Hon. Auguste

C. Papineau, now on the bench of the Superior Court of the province of

Quebec. He was admitted to the bar on the 2nd of February, 1863, and has

been in practice at St. Hyacinthe since that date. He does business in

all the courts, civil and criminal, and has a remunerative practice. Mr.

Morison served two years as councilman in the municipality of the city

of St. Hyacinthe, and in January, 1880, was elected, without opposition,

mayor, which office he held for two years. Being a native of the city,

and having grown with it, he naturally takes a pride in witnessing its

progress. Mr. Morison is president of the Granite Mill Company, which he

started in 1882, and which now turns out the finest quality of knitting

in Canada, and employs about six hundred hands. He was also one of the

original promoters, and is now a director, of the St. Hyacinthe,

Manufacturing Company. This concern only manufactures fine flannel,

which is in great demand, and is kept running full time all the year. He

constructed the first macadamized road in this section of the county.

The first section of five miles of this road connected St. Hyacinthe

with quarries, lime-kilns, and sand pits, greatly helping building

operations, and created a new source of wealth for its citizens. He is

also proprietor of two of the toll bridges built at St. Hyacinthe across

the Yamaska river, and has a large interest in the third one. These

bridges are built under private charters, and give more easy access to

the city. Mr. Morison is what may be called a live citizen, and he loses

no opportunity to advance the prosperity of his native place. In

politics, he is a Liberal, and in religion, a member of the Roman

Catholic church. He is a close student, and growing in reputation as a

lawyer who will add to the prestige of the profession of which he is

such a good representative.

* * * * *

=Fulton, Dr. John=, Toronto. The late Dr. Fulton was born in the

township of Southwold, Elgin county, Ontario, on the 12th February,

1837, and died at Toronto on the 15th June, 1887. The illness which

ended his useful life was the result of a severe cold, taken in the

course of ordinary professional duties. His father was a highly

respectable farmer of Irish origin. His mother’s family had originally

come from Scotland, and their son John very early showed all the

quickness of the one race and the shrewdness and perseverance of the

other. He began his early education when very young, and continued for

several years at school, always one of the best behaved and most

advanced of the scholars. He continued at home on the farm till he was

eighteen years of age, when his health, never robust, although as a rule

good, was such as to warrant him in seeking a less laborious and more

congenial occupation. He became a school teacher, having obtained

successively several certificates, and was, as usual, not very long

before reaching the highest grade. As a teacher he was, wherever he

taught, most successful—seeing clearly himself every point he desired

to teach others, he had the somewhat rare but invaluable power of making

it clear and simple to every pupil—a power which characterized him all

through life in his subsequent career as a prominent professor of

various branches of medical science. He began his medical studies under

the supervision of Dr. J. H. Wilson, of St. Thomas, a highly respected

medical man, still engaged actively in his profession. From the moment

of his entrance on his professional studies he was characterized by

unremitting zeal—never being idle, doing as much work in the way of

study in a week as would take most young men a month to master. In due

course he entered the medical school so long and so successfully carried

on by by the late Dr. Rolph; and here he at once ranked as one of the

best men of his year. He was ever most ambitious, and was not content

with matriculating as usual in medicine alone, but also matriculated in

arts at the University of Toronto, taking a high position in this

examination. After completing his course he graduated at Victoria

University, of which at that time Dr. Rolph’s school was the medical

department. He also went up for his examination and graduated in

medicine at the University of Toronto. He had hardly taken his degree in

Canada, when he went to New York and spent some time attending, with his

customary regularity, Bellevue Hospital, in that city, and very shortly

left for England, where he spent all the time at his disposal in the

hospital wards and at his studies. He successfully went up before the

Royal College of Physicians of London, and the Royal College of Surgeons

of England, and obtained the license of the one and the membership of

the other. He then visited Paris and Berlin for a brief space, and as

usual was found following the great masters of these capitals around the

hospitals, never losing sight of his great aim—the increasing of his

already large store of professional knowledge. Shortly after his return

to Canada he was married, January, 1864, to Isabella Campbell, of

Yarmouth, Ontario, whose premature decease, in October, 1884, all but

crushed his heart, and who was deservedly loved and respected by all who

knew her. Dr. Fulton settled in Fingal, Ontario, for the practice of his

profession, and had not been there long before he was tendered by the

late Dr. Rolph and accepted the professorship in anatomy, in the medical

school of which he had so recently been a distinguished student. His

duties as a professor were begun with enthusiasm, and as a medical

teacher he was a success from the very first. Not content, as most men

of his early age would have been, with the high position he had already

reached, he attended University College classes in arts, with the

intention of graduating in arts at the provincial university. This

intention, owing to constantly increasing duties, he had most

reluctantly to abandon; for he greatly disliked to give up any plan on

which he had deliberately set his heart. In addition to his professional

and professorial duties, in 1867 he began and shortly completed his work

on “Physiology,” which was for years highly prized by successive classes

of students, as giving a clear and succinct epitome of that subject in

the briefest possible compass, and which he subsequently re-wrote and

enlarged for a second edition. In 1869-70 he lectured on physiology and

botany with the same acceptance as had characterized his lectures on

anatomy. In 1870 he busied himself, in addition to other duties, in

writing a work on Materia Medica which, however, from stress of other

labors, was never completed. This year he sent in his resignation of his

chair in the college, owing to difficulties which had arisen, and in

consequence of which Drs. Rolph, Geikie, and Fulton resigned together.

Dr. Fulton consented, however, on being requested to do so, to withdraw

his letter of resignation. In August, 1870, he bought from its then

proprietor the _Dominion Medical Journal_, which had been carried on for

a short time, and into which Dr. Fulton at once infused life and vigor.

He changed its name to the _Canada Lancet_, under which title it

appeared for the first time in September, 1870, and under Dr. Fulton’s

indefatigable editorship has been continued ever since; the _Lancet_

having in that time risen from having hardly any influence and a very

small circulation, to the position it now holds, of being the most

influential and widely-circulated medical journal in the Dominion of

Canada, a change effected by its proprietor’s amazing and continuous

industry, aided by his great business tact. In March, 1871, Dr. Fulton

finally resigned his chair in Victoria College Medical School, and was

offered and accepted the professorship of physiology in Trinity Medical

College. This he continued to hold, and to discharge its duties with

distinguished ability and satisfaction to all concerned, until a few

years ago, when he succeeded his colleague, Dr. Bethune, on that

gentleman retiring from the chair of surgery. This chair he filled ably

and well till his death, and in connection with it, he was also one of

the surgeons to the Toronto General Hospital, which institution has in

his death sustained a severe loss. As an editor of a medical journal,

Dr. Fulton was earnest, painstaking, and thorough in an unusual degree.

The same, too, may be said of him as a medical teacher, and indeed in

every other relation in life where he had duties to perform. He was for

nearly twenty years before his death a member of Knox Church, Toronto,

and one of the trustees of that church. Here his advice and

clear-headedness will be much missed. His memory will be long cherished,

and his example it is to be hoped will be followed by not a few of our

young medical men. For as Dr. Fulton made himself what he was, by his

persevering efforts, for he was essentially a self-made man, they too,

by doing and working as he did, may come to occupy the highest positions

in public and professional influence and respect. He left behind him a

son and three daughters.

* * * * *

=Binney, Right Rev. Hibbert=, D.D., Bishop of Nova Scotia. The late

Bishop Binney was born at Sydney, Cape Breton, on the 12th August, 1819.

His father, the Rev. Hibbert Binney, D.C.L., was for some time rector of

Sydney, and afterwards removing to England, he became rector of Newbury,

Bucks. The future bishop was educated at King’s College, London, and in

due time proceeded to Worcester College, Oxford. He took his degree of

B.A. in 1842, and was elected fellow of his college, holding for some

years in addition the position of tutor and bursar. His career at Oxford

was a highly honorable one, he having taken a first-class in

mathematical honors, and a second-class in classical honors, thus very

nearly attaining the very high distinction of a double first. On the

bishopric of Nova Scotia becoming vacant by the death of Dr. John

Inglis, third occupant of that see, the Rev. Mr. Binney was appointed by

the Crown, at the unusually early age of thirty-one. It is said that

while the question of the appointment was engaging the attention of the

crown officers, there being several names mentioned for the vacant see,

the Hon. Joseph Howe, then in London, was consulted as to the probable

wishes of the diocese, when he at once said: “Give it to the Nova

Scotian”—which decided the matter. Mr. Binney received the degree of

D.D. from his _alma mater_, and was consecrated in Lambeth Chapel, March

25th, 1851. On his arrival in Nova Scotia, he found things not as

satisfactory as he desired; but he set to work with characteristic

vigor, and in a few years had more than doubled the number of clergy and

stations occupied by the Church of England. His greatest efforts were

directed towards the establishment of a synod or legislative body of

clergy and laity, which he finally accomplished in the face of much

opposition, and the wisdom of his action has been since amply justified.

As visitor of King’s College, the Church University at Windsor, he ever

took a deep interest in its welfare, giving ungrudging attention to all

meetings of the board of governors of which he was president. The

difficulties of his arduous post became in his later years too great for

even his iron frame and will, and after gradually failing for a few

months, he died quite suddenly in New York, where he had gone for

medical advice, on April 30, 1887, in the thirty-seventh year of his

episcopal, and the sixty-eighth of his age. The bishop was a very

strong-minded man, his views were high church, and during his long

episcopate he had moulded most of his clergy to his own ideas. He

married in 1854, Mary, daughter of the Hon. William B. Bliss, judge of

the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia, by whom he had two sons and three

daughters.

* * * * *

=Tooke, Benjamin=, Manufacturer, Montreal, was born in Montreal, on the

12th November, 1848. His father, Thomas Tooke, was a well-known citizen,

and for forty years occupied a responsible position in the Bank of

Montreal. Benjamin, the subject of our sketch, was educated at the High

School of his native city, and secured a classical and commercial

education. Shortly after leaving school he entered the establishment of

Gault Brothers, wholesale dry goods merchants, as a junior clerk, and

gradually worked his way up until he became the confidential clerk and

had the fixing of the prices of all the goods coming into the

establishment. After a period of ten years with Gault Brothers, he found

himself master of all the details of business, and otherwise fully

equipped to face the world of commerce. Therefore, in 1871, he severed

his connection with the above firm, and commenced the manufacture of

shirts and collars, conducting his operations under the name of the

Mount Royal Manufacturing Company. Business prospered, and in 1873 had

grown to such an extent, that he found himself unable to attend to all

its details, and took in as a working partner Leslie Skelton. In the

fall of 1878, Mr. Skelton having retired from the firm, Mr. Tooke

entered into a partnership with his brother, R. J. Tooke, who up to this

time had been carrying on a retail trade in gentlemen’s furnishing

goods. This partnership lasted for four years,—R. J. Tooke retiring to

take up his old trade,—and since then he has conducted his business

alone. In 1884, finding his already extensive premises in Montreal too

cramped for his steadily increasing business, he selected a building

site in St. Laurent, a few miles from the city, erected a factory

sixty-five feet by forty feet, three stories high, and put into it the

most improved machinery. This factory has proved a great success,

produces excellent goods, and finds employment for about eight hundred

and fifty hands. Mr. Tooke is highly respected by his numerous

workpeople, and the utmost harmony and good feeling pervades his

establishment. In politics he is a Conservative, and in religion belongs

to the Episcopal church. On the 5th December, 1872, he was married to

Elizabeth Eastty, daughter of W. E. Eastty, of London, England.

* * * * *

=Scott, Captain Peter Astle=, R.N., Commander of the Squadron employed

for the Protection of the Fisheries, and Chairman of the Board of

Examiners of Masters and Mates of Canada, was born on the 25th of

February, 1816, at Gillingham, Kent, England. His father, James Scott, a

paymaster in the Royal navy, was born in Virginia, and left it with his

father, a captain of the Royal army during the Revolution. Captain Scott

received his education at the Rochester and Chatham Classical and

Mathematical School, at Rochester, county of Kent. He joined the navy as

a volunteer of the first class, on board the _Basilisk_ cutter, ten

guns, at the Nore, on the 14th of February, 1829; removed to the _Prince

Regent_, 120 guns, in August, 1830, spent part of his time in the

Channel with the flag of Rear Admiral Sir William Parker, and also on

the _Scout_, eighteen guns, in the North Sea. He then joined the

_Thunderer_, eighty-four guns, and passed his examination for

lieutenant, 1st September, 1835. While returning to England in November

of that year in a merchantman, she capsized while crossing the Bay of

Biscay, but righting again, her crew were fortunate enough to get her

safely into Bristol with the loss of bulwarks, boats, and a few spars.

He next joined the _Asia_, eighty-four guns, in 1836, and proceeded to

the Mediterranean, and after serving a short time in the _Blazer_ steam

vessel, returned to England in the _Barham_, fifty guns, and was paid

off at Sheerness in January, 1839. In April, 1839, he joined the

_Terror_, under Captain F. R. M. Crozier, her consort, the _Erebus_,

being under the charge of Captain James Clark Ross. After spending a

winter at Desolation Island (Kerguelans Land), these vessels reached

Hobartown, Van Diemen’s Land, in August, 1840. It being necessary to

have magnetic observations taken at that place in connection with those

established by the various foreign governments all over the world, an

observatory was erected at the expense of the Admiralty, and Lieutenant

Jos. Kay was placed in charge, Captain Scott being first assistant, and

placed under the orders of Sir John Franklin, who was then

lieutenant-governor of Tasmania. Captain Scott, having some knowledge of

naval architecture, built a yacht for the lieutenant-governor, of about

180 tons, and two gunboats of about 100 tons each, for the defence of

the colony. He was relieved at the observatory by Lieutenant Smith in

the autumn of 1844, and returned to England in May, 1845, only a few

days too late to join the _Erebus_, of the Arctic expedition, as second

lieutenant, under the command of his old friend, Sir John Franklin. In

August, 1845, he was appointed to the _Columbia_ steam vessel, Captain

W. Owen, who was then surveying the Bay of Fundy. In 1848 the _Columbia_

was paid off at Chatham, Kent, England. Captain Scott then joined the

coast guard for six months, and in May, 1849, was reappointed to the

_Columbia_, under Commander Shortland, R.N., as assistant surveyor, to

continue the North American survey. In 1857 the _Columbia_ was condemned

and sold out of the service, and the survey was continued in hired

vessels. In January, 1862, Mr. Scott was promoted to the rank of

commander, and in 1865, on Captain Shortland retiring from the command,

he assumed the charge of the survey, and returned to England in May,

1866. In September of that year he retired with the rank of captain, and

in April, 1869, having been invited to return to Canada, he took command

of the Dominion steamship _Druid_, then employed protecting the

fisheries. In the spring of 1870, he removed to the government

steamship, _Lady Head_, and took charge of the vessels employed in the

fisheries protection service. In 1871, in addition to the above duties,

he was appointed chairman of the Board of Examiners of Masters and Mates

for Canada, which office he still holds. In November, 1879, Captain

Scott was directed to proceed to England, to bring out the corvette

_Charybdis_, of about 2,000 tons, to be employed as a training ship. As

the vessel could not be got ready until late in the winter, Captain

Scott concluded to lay her up and return for her in the following

spring. In May, 1880, he sailed her across the Atlantic, and moored her

in St. John, in July of the same year. In February, 1886, on the United

States government giving notice that the fishery clauses of the Treaty

of Washington had terminated, Canada fitted out a small squadron to

protect her fisheries; and Captain Scott again assumed the command,

embarking on the government steamer _Lansdowne_, with two guns and

thirty-three men. In August he took command of the government steamer

_Acadia_, with one gun and thirty-three men, and is still in the service

of the Canadian government. In March, 1847, he married M. A. Hobbs,

daughter of George Hobbs, a merchant in Eastport, Maine, United States.

* * * * *

=La Rocque, Rev. Paul S.=, St. Hyacinthe, Canon and Rector of St.

Hyacinthe Cathedral, Doctor of Theology and Canon Law, was born at St.

Marie de Monnoir, province of Quebec, on the 28th October, 1846. His

father was Albert La Rocque, and mother, Genevieve Daigneault. His

brother, the Rev. Charles La Rocque, is chaplain of the Good Shepherd

Convent, at Montreal; and the Right Rev. Joseph La Rocque, and the Right

Rev. Charles La Rocque, the first and second bishops of St. Hyacinthe,

were his cousins. The Rev. Father La Rocque received his education at

St. Theresa and St. Hyacinthe Colleges. He was ordained a priest on the

9th May, 1869, and from that time until 1880, was a missionary in

Florida, United States. Without any official connection during his stay

at Key West he acted as chaplain to the United States troops stationed

there. He then returned to St. Hyacinthe, and the following year, 1881,

he went to Rome, and pursued his studies in the Gregorian and the

Appolinaire Universities. He remained in the Eternal City for two years

and a half, and then made a tour of the principal cities of Europe. He

also travelled to the Holy Land, and visited Jerusalem, Nazareth, etc.

This journey was undertaken with the view of gaining all the information

possible with regard to Bible history, and to put him in a position to

communicate the most accurate information to his flock, with regard to

that far-off country. As a linguist, Rev. Canon La Rocque has few, if

any, equals in Canada, being able to speak five different languages. He

is a great favorite with his parishioners, takes a deep interest in

their material and spiritual affairs, and is very kind and attentive to

the sick and needy. The degree of doctor of theology and canon law was

conferred upon him at Rome.

* * * * *

=Bowell, Hon. Mackenzie=, Minister of Customs of the Dominion of Canada,

M.P. for North Hastings, Ontario, was born at Rickinghall, Suffolk,

England, on the 27th December, 1823, and when about ten years of age

accompanied his parents to Canada. Mr. Bowell, in early youth, exhibited

much courage and enterprise, and one is not surprised to see what he has

achieved when looking back at his career. He had a quick eye for

business, and was seldom astray in judging what sort of enterprise was

profitable, and what had better be avoided. He had also a military

enthusiasm, and assisted in 1857, in raising and organizing a rifle

company of sixty-five men, in what was known at that time as class B, to

which no assistance was given by the government, beyond furnishing the

rifles. He served on the frontier in the winter of 1864-5, during the

American rebellion, and again during the Fenian troubles of 1866. He

entered a printing office as an apprentice in 1834, and during his whole

life up to the time when heavy political responsibilities fell upon his

shoulders, he was connected with the newspaper press of Canada. He was

editor and proprietor of the Belleville _Daily_ and _Weekly

Intelligencer_ newspaper for a number of years, and at one time

president of the Dominion Editors and Reporters’ Association. In

education he has taken considerable interest, as is evidenced by the

fact that he held for eleven years the chairmanship of the Board of

School Trustees, of Belleville. He has always been a prominent

Orangeman, and was for eight years grand master of the Provincial Orange

Grand Lodge of Ontario East, which position he resigned, when in 1870 he

was elected most worshipful grand master and sovereign of the Orange

Association of British America. This office he continued to hold until

he resigned in June, 1878. He was likewise president of the Triennial

Council of Orangeism of the world, having been elected to that position

at the council held in Derry, Ireland, in 1876. From Mr. Bowell’s

connection with important public enterprises is gathered his connection

with industrial and commercial movements. He was, for many years,

president of the West Hastings Agricultural Society, and vice-president

of the Agricultural and Arts Association of Ontario; president of the

Hastings Mutual Fire Insurance Company, the Farren Manufacturing

Company, and the Dominion Safe-Gas Company, and president of the

Belleville and North Hastings Railway; and was captain of No. 1 company

of the 15th battalion while on service during the Fenian troubles, and

subsequently major in the 49th battalion of Volunteer Rifles. In 1863

Mr. Bowell contested the north riding of the county of Hastings for

parliamentary honors, as the nominee of the Conservative convention, but

refusing to join in the cries against the incorporation of Roman

Catholic institutions, and what was then termed French domination, which

were made test questions at the time, he was defeated. In 1867 he again

presented himself to the electors of North Hastings, and having stated

his views with that calm reasonableness which has always characterized

his utterances, he was elected. He entered parliament therefore at

confederation, but took no very prominent part in the debates of the

house for the first two or three years. His first success in parliament

was in his criticism of a measure introduced by the late Sir George E.

Cartier, then minister of militia, for the purpose of reorganizing the

militia force of Canada. Upon this occasion his practical experience and

knowledge of the requirements of the volunteer force had its effect upon

the house, and he succeeded in helping to defeat the government upon the

details of the bill three times during one sitting of the house. Being

an independent thinker, he was not always in accord with the leaders of

his party, having voted against them upon many important measures,

notably the Nova Scotia better terms resolutions, and upon the motion

for the ratification of the Washington treaty. He was re-elected in

1872, and, consequently, in parliament, when the Macdonald government

fell, and the Hon. Alexander Mackenzie succeeded to power. It was in

opposition that Mr. Bowell took a leading part, not only in the business

of the house, but upon the most important committees. He inaugurated and

conducted the proceedings in the House of Commons which resulted in his

moving the motion for the expulsion of Louis David Riel, member elect

for Provencher, Manitoba, for the part he, Riel, had taken in ordering

the shooting of Scott, a prisoner of his during the revolt in Manitoba

in 1879. He also took an active part in bringing before the house the

question of the violation of the provisions of the Independence of

Parliament Act, by its speaker, and by a number of its members. The

motion which he made upon this question, though defeated, led

subsequently to the resignation of Mr. Speaker Anglin, one member of the

cabinet, and four members of the house. He did not make many speeches,

but whenever he spoke, the members always listened to him, for he had

gained the reputation of being a man who had, first, something to say,

and, second, a reasonable and a satisfactory way of saying it. He has

been successful at every election since. On the 19th of October, 1878,

upon the resumption of power by the Conservative party, Mr. Bowell was

called to the Privy Council, and sworn in minister of customs, and that

office he still holds. The member for North Hastings is level-headed,

and possessed of a sound judgment. It is pleasing sometimes to sit in

the gallery of the House of Commons and watch him answer questions or

reply to allegations waged against the administration of his department.

Under no circumstances, nor by any pressure or irritation, can he be

moved to haste or ill-temper; but he sits there, disregarding feeling,

and doing what he considers to be his duty as a minister of the Crown.

Mr. Bowell married in 1847; Harriet Louise, eldest daughter of the late

Jacob G. Moore, of Belleville, by whom he has nine children, five of

whom are living.

* * * * *

=Ritchie, Hon. Robert J.=, Solicitor-General of the Province of New

Brunswick, M.P.P. for the county of St. John, was born in St. John, and

educated in the city of his birth. Having studied and adopted law as a

profession, he was called to the bar on the 16th of October, 1867. Since

then he has worked up an extensive and prosperous practice. He has for

many years taken a great interest in politics, and was first nominated

for a seat in the House of Assembly just previous to the general

election in 1878. He won his seat, and at once took a prominent part in

the debates in the house. Having offered again in 1882, he was a second

time successful. Again, at the general election on 26th April, 1886, he

scored a great victory, standing second among the fortunate candidates.

The vote was, Hon. D. McLellan, 2943; R. J. Ritchie, 2570; W. A.

Quintin, 2531; A. A. Stockton, 2531; defeating James Rourke, 2188; J. A.

Chesley, 1834; G. G. Gilbert, 1645; John Connor, 1468; A. T. Armstrong,

1823. In Nova Scotia, since confederation, the legal affairs of the

local administration have been attended to by the attorney-general

exclusively; but in New Brunswick they still keep up the office of

solicitor-general as well. The talented premier, Hon. A. G. Blair, took

the position of attorney-general when he formed his cabinet on the 3rd

March, 1883, and another lawyer of excellent standing being wanted to

complete the _personnel_ of the cabinet, the gentleman who forms the

subject of this sketch was fitly selected as the best man for the

position of solicitor-general. His appointment to the executive council

necessitated his again going to the country and he was re-elected by

acclamation. As a member of the government, he has taken an active part

in all the measures which have been presented to the house, and has well

sustained his prominent position. In addition to his duties, as an

active and leading politician, Hon. Mr. Ritchie is connected with

several of the local corporations of St. John, and his influence is felt

in social and professional circles. Although, having suffered great

losses by fire, the people of St. John have a spirit of business

enterprise which has risen superior to their reverses. The shipping and

lumbering business through which the money of her merchants was chiefly

accumulated have languished of late years, and no compensating trade has

sprung up to take their place. But the manufacturing activity of the

inhabitants has proved successful, and the population of the city has

not declined. The yield of the fisheries, as elsewhere down in the

maritime provinces during the summer of 1887, was enormous. If St. John

is favored by the Canadian Pacific Railway Company as regards making it

a winter port, the outlook for the city’s future is good. The bar of St.

John is rich in forensic talent. The head-quarters of the legal

fraternity centres in Ritchie’s and Palmer’s blocks. The nearness of the

lawyers’ quarters to one another enables the members of the bar to

obtain counsel and intercommunication which is very advantageous and

helpful. When the whirligig of politics brings the Liberals into power

again in Dominion affairs there is probably no man in the opposition

camp whose prospects of succeeding to a position on the bench are better

than those of Hon. R. J. Ritchie. His talents peculiarly fit him for the

position of one of Her Majesty’s judges.

* * * * *

=McLelan, Hon. Archibald Woodbury=, Postmaster-General for the Dominion

of Canada, M.P. for Colchester, Nova Scotia, was born at Londonderry,

N.S., on the 24th December, 1824. He is descended from a family that

emigrated from Londonderry, Ireland, during the last century, and

settled in the province of Nova Scotia. His father, the late G. W.

McLelan, during his lifetime sat for a long period of years in the Nova

Scotia legislature. The future postmaster-general received his primary

education in the schools of his native parish, and finished his

classical course at Mount Allison Wesleyan Academy. In early life, he

engaged in a mercantile line of life, and continued in it for a

considerable term, but in later years became an extensive ship-builder

and ship-owner. He began to take an interest in politics when

comparatively a young man, and represented Colchester in the Legislative

Assembly of Nova Scotia from 1858 to 1863; then North Colchester in the

same legislature from the latter year up to confederation; and

Colchester, in the House of Commons, at Ottawa, until called to the

Senate of Canada on the 21st June, 1869. In 1881, he resigned his seat

in the Senate, and on an appeal to his old friends in Colchester, they

returned him again as their representative in the House of Commons. On

his return to Ottawa, he was sworn in a member of the Privy Council, and

made president of the council on the 20th May of the same year. On the

10th July, 1882, he was appointed minister of marine and fisheries; on

the 10th December, 1885, minister of finance; and on the 27th January,

1887, postmaster-general, the office he now so ably fills. Hon. Mr.

McLelan is a director of the Cobequid Marine Insurance Company. In 1869

he was appointed one of the commissioners for the construction of the

Intercolonial Railway; and in 1883, was a commissioner from Canada to

the Intercolonial Fisheries Exhibition held in London. As a recognition

of his valuable services on this occasion, he was presented with a

diploma of honor. He is a Conservative in politics. In 1854 he was

married to Caroline Metzler, of Halifax.

* * * * *

=Reesor, Hon. David=, Rosedale, Toronto, Senator of the Dominion of

Canada, is a descendant of a German family. His great-grandfather,

Christian Reesor, who was a Mennonite minister, emigrated from Mannheim

to Pennsylvania about 1737, having under his charge a small colony, and

settled in Lancaster county, where some of the family still reside. The

original homestead, a splendid farm of three hundred acres, is still in

their possession. The first settlement of this family in the township of

Markham took place as early in its history as 1801, when Christian

Reesor, the grandfather of the senator, his father, Abraham Reesor,

together with three uncles, located in that section of the country. Here

David Reesor was born on the 18th January, 1823. His, mother Anna

Dettiwiler, was also from Lancaster county, Pennsylvania. She died in

Markham in 1857, her husband having died in 1832. The early education of

Senator Reesor was obtained in the common school of the township, but

previous to his being put to any work he received three years private

tuition from a competent instructor, which helped him considerably. His

father’s farm was the first stage on which he enacted his part in the

drama of life; then he became a merchant and manufacturer, and continued

business in these lines for five years. In 1856 he published the first

copy of the _Markham Economist_, a journal of strong Reform

proclivities, which he edited and conducted with considerable skill for

several years, and sold the business out about 1868. He has been a

magistrate since 1848, a notary public since 1862, and for a long time

was secretary and treasurer of the Markham Agricultural Society. When

the counties of York, Ontario and Peel were united in 1850, he became a

member of the county council and served several years, being warden in

1860. His career as a school trustee will not soon be forgotten, as it

was chiefly through his exertions that Markham secured a grammar school.

He has long been connected with the militia, and has held the rank of

lieutenant-colonel of the reserve since 1866. He was appointed returning

officer for the East Riding of York, July, 1854. In the more extensive

region of politics Senator Reesor has not been less true to his

principles, or less active as a general advocate of measures that tend

to the public good, than when in the limited sphere of township

councillor he supported and directed local improvements. He represented

King’s division in the Legislative Council of Canada from 1860 until the

confederation of the provinces, when he was called to the Senate by

royal proclamation, October 23, 1867. At the time when the confederation

scheme was under discussion in the Legislative Council, he moved a

resolution, which, had it been passed, would have made the office of

senator elective; but it was defeated on a division. He is a Liberal in

politics. Senator Reesor is a member of the Methodist church, and every

good cause obtains from him a hearty and willing support. He was for

many years president of the Markham Bible Society. In February, 1848, he

married Emily, eldest daughter of Daniel McDougall, of St. Marys,

Ontario, and sister of Hon. William McDougall, C.B. They have five

children, four daughters and one son, two of the former being married.

Marion Augusta, the eldest daughter, is the wife of Dr. Colburn, of

Oshawa, and Jessie Adelaide, the wife of John Holmes, of Toronto.

* * * * *

=Read, Rev. Philip Chesshyre=, M.A., Professor of Classics, Bishop’s

College, Lennoxville, Quebec province, was born on the 4th March, 1850,

at Woodend, Hyde, Cheshire, England. His father, Rev. Alexander Read,

B.A., late scholar of Trinity College, Dublin, was a descendant of an

old Scotch family from Ayrshire, who settled in North of Ireland, in

1600. His mother, Anne Whiteway, is descended from a Devonshire family

from Kingsteignton and Whiteway, and was a daughter of Philip Whiteway,

J.P., of Runcorn, Cheshire, and Anne Chesshyre, of Rock Savage, his

wife. Professor Read received his education in Manchester Grammar School

from 1861 to 1867—being captain of the school in 1866. He then attended

Lincoln College, Oxford, where he secured a brilliant record, and in

1872 was assistant lecturer in the college. In 1873 he was ordained by

his lordship the Bishop of Salisbury. In 1872 he was appointed assistant

master at Marlborough College; in 1874, secretary of the Church Council

and examiner of schools under government in Barbadoes; in 1876, head

master of the school at Newton, Lancashire; in 1877, rector of Bishop’s

College, Lennoxville; in 1882, professor of Classics and Philosophy in

Bishop’s College, Lennoxville; and in 1887 examiner to the Medical Board

of the province of Quebec. In early life Professor Read began to take an

interest in the volunteer movement, and was sub-lieutenant in the Oxford

Rifle Volunteers. He is now captain of the school corps at Lennoxville.

In 1886 and 1888 he occupied the position of chaplain in the Independent

Order of Foresters. He has travelled a good deal, and found time to

visit the West Indies, Spain, and several other foreign countries. In

religion the professor belongs to the Episcopal church, and holds

moderately broad views. On the 28th June, 1879, he was united in

marriage to Helen Rosina, daughter of John W. McCallum, of Quebec, and

Annie S. Brown, of Halifax, his wife. Mrs. Read is a lineal descendant

of an old Scotch manufacturer who settled in Quebec shortly after the

conquest of Canada. The fruit of the above union has been two promising

children, Alexander Cuthbert Read, and Philip Austin Ottley Read.

* * * * *

=Sterling, Alexander Addison=, Fredericton, N.B., High Sheriff of the

county of York, New Brunswick, was born on the 22nd of August, 1838, at

St. Marys, York county. He is the third son of George Henly Sterling,

and his wife Susan Elizabeth McLean, and grandson of Captain John

Sterling and Captain Archibald McLean, who were both loyalists and

served in the war of the American revolution, but eventually settled in

New Brunswick. He was brought up on his father’s farm at St. Marys, and

commenced his education at the local school, finishing his course of

study at the Fredericton Grammar School. He has been engaged in farming

and mercantile pursuits all his life, commencing his commercial career

as clerk in a store at Fredericton, in 1852, where he remained until

1856. In 1857 he removed to Toronto, Ontario, being employed by Paterson

& Sons, hardware merchants of that city. Relinquishing this position in

1858, he returned to New Brunswick, and commenced farming at

Maugerville, Sunbury county, in partnership with his brother, the late

George A. Sterling (who was elected a member of the Provincial

legislature for the county of Sunbury, at the general election of 1882,

but who died in October, 1883.) From 1864 to 1867 he represented the

parish of Maugerville in the municipal council of the county of Sunbury,

but during the latter year he removed to Fredericton, where he opened a

general store, which was carried on for fifteen years, and in the year

1883 this was merged into a wholesale flour business, in which trade he

is now successfully employed. He was married on the 12th of August,

1869, to Sarah Haws, daughter of John Haws, ship-builder, of Portland,

St. John, N.B., and there have been six children issue of this marriage.

Living in the cathedral city of his province he is a staunch member of

the Episcopal church. He has been an energetic worker in the

educational, parochial and municipal affairs, having been appointed a

member of the Board of School Trustees for the city of Fredericton, in

1875, and also high sheriff for the county of York, in 1883, both of

which offices he now holds. For a number of years he was connected with

the temperance movement, and was an active member of the Order of the

Sons of Temperance, and held the office of grand worthy patriarch for

the province of New Brunswick, in 1876.

* * * * *

=Torey, Edgar J.=, formerly Principal of the Hants County Academy at

Windsor, N.S., is a native of Guysborough, N.S., where he was born about

twenty-seven years ago. He attended the grammar school in his native

town and studied with such diligence that at a very early age he passed

the examination held under the Council of Public Instruction for grade

B, or first-class male teacher’s diploma. He began to teach at the age

of fifteen, and has since, with intervals of study, pursued that

employment. He has taught in Amherst town, Hantsport, Hants Co., and in

various other important schools in the province. Feeling the need of a

thorough classical education, Mr. Torey availed himself of the

advantages offered to gentlemen in the teaching profession by Dalhousie

College, Halifax, N.S. He, like many other teachers, taught during the

summer months and attended lectures in Dalhousie during the winter term,

lasting from November to April. Pursuing this course for some years with

success he took his degree of B.A. in 1882. He then took charge of the

Victoria County Academy for one year, at the end of which period he

resigned the principalship to accept a similar position in Guysborough,

and won the encomiums of all with whom he came into contact, for careful

and thorough teaching. In October, in the year 1884, the position of

Principal in the Hants County Academy at Windsor, worth $850 a year,

falling vacant, Mr. Torey applied for the situation and was selected

from among a number of other applicants. The public schools were

established in Windsor in the autumn of 1866, and now number eight

departments. The position of Principal has been held by such

educationists as S. S. Fisk; James Forrest, M.A.; J. L. Brown; Dr. Emdon

Fritz; John F. Godfrey, B.A., and H. Elliott. The schools are thoroughly

graded from the primary department and kindergarten up to the academy,

which draws a special government allowance. A three years’ course is

followed in the academy, embracing the classics and French, physics and

the higher mathematics, and chemistry. The Principal, in addition to his

labors in these branches and in preparing students for the matriculation

examinations at the various provincial colleges, has a great deal of

work to do in preparing and discussing questions for examination in the

grading of all the schools. He also has a general supervision of the

schools. The school is periodically visited by the county inspector, C.

W. Roscoe, an experienced teacher, and also by Dr. David Allison,

superintendent of education. Mr. Torey conducted the school with much

success, and has fitted several students for college. After holding the

position of Principal for three years he decided to adopt the profession

of medicine as a permanent employment. His pupils heard of his

approaching resignation with regret, and presented him with a valuable

and handsome gold-headed cane, accompanied with an address. He resigned

his position in October, 1887, and repaired to the University of New

York, in the medical department of which he is preparing himself for his

life work in the healing profession. He has the advantage of studying in

one of the best equipped medical colleges in America, and one from which

have graduated some of our best provincial medicos. He is pursuing his

studies with great success and is very popular among his

fellow-students.

* * * * *

=Blackadar, Hugh William=, Postmaster of the City of Halifax, Nova

Scotia, was born at Halifax, March 4th, 1843. He is son of Hugh William

Blackadar, proprietor and publisher of the _Acadian Recorder_, and

Sophia Coleman. Educated under George Munro (now millionaire publisher

of New York), then rector of the Free Church Academy, Halifax. He early

in life took an active part in the conduct of the _Acadian Recorder_,

and on the death of his father, June 13th, 1863, assumed the management

of that journal, which he enlarged from a weekly to a tri-weekly, and

subsequently to a daily. In 1864 Mr. Blackadar joined the volunteers,

and subsequently held the rank of lieutenant in the third brigade

Halifax artillery. He is a member of the Halifax Yacht Club. He was

elected an alderman for Ward 4 in 1867, and was re-elected in 1870,

serving altogether six years. Represented the city of Halifax as

co-delegate with Mayor Stephen Tobin at the railroad convention held at

Portland, Me., in 1868, and was one of the secretaries of the

convention. In 1869 he was made magistrate for the city and county of

Halifax; was a member of the Halifax Board of School Commissioners for

five years from the reconstruction of that body in 1868; was appointed

Queen’s printer of the province in 1869, and held that position under

the Vail-Annand and Hill administrations till 1875. He was appointed

postmaster of the city of Halifax Nov. 5th, 1874, by the Dominion

government, which office he now holds. In religion he belongs to the

Baptist denomination. He married, May 29th, 1866, Rachel Saxton, of

Halifax.

* * * * *

=Plumb, Hon. Josiah Burr=, Speaker of the Senate of Canada. The country

lost, by the sudden death of Senator Plumb, at Niagara, on the 12th of

March, 1888, a gentleman possessed of excellent qualities as a man and

as a politician. He was born on the 25th March, 1816, at East Haven,

Connecticut, United States, where his father, an Episcopal clergyman,

had charge of a parish. In 1845 he came to Canada, married a daughter of

the late Samuel Street, and took up his residence at Niagara. For many

years he lived in retirement, ample means rendering it unnecessary that

he should take part in business, and it was not until 1874 that he

turned his attention actively to politics. At that time Sir John

Macdonald was passing through he darkest period of his political career,

and it was more out of a chivalrous regard for the fallen leader than

from any desire to achieve honors for himself that Mr. Plumb threw

himself into the fight. In parliament and on the platform he was a most

effective worker. He never for a moment spared himself, nor did he

despair of success, though the outlook for his party and his leader up

to the very day of the election in 1878 was never very bright. After

that victory it was thought the indefatigable member for Niagara would

receive for his services some recognition; but at that time this was not

to be. Mr. Plumb continued to serve as a follower, and even consented in

1882 to the extinction, under the Redistribution Act, of the borough for

which he sat. Having thus been legislated out of Niagara, he ran at the

general election in the same year for North Wellington in the

Conservative interest; but owing in part to the late hour at which he

accepted the candidature, and in part to the personal popularity of his

opponent, he suffered defeat. In the following year he was called to the

Senate. As a senator he certainly made his mark. He brought to his task

in that body a ripe parliamentary experience, a well-stored mind, and

great fluency of speech. So highly appreciated was he by the

ministerialists in the Senate and by the government that on the occasion

of the withdrawal of Sir Alexander Campbell from the government, and

pending the selection of a successor, he was asked to take charge of

government measures in that chamber. The duty imposed upon him, it is

hardly necessary to say, was performed most acceptably. Mr. Plumb’s

elevation to the speakership of the Senate took place immediately after

the general election of 1887. His wide information, dignified bearing,

and fine social qualities made him a model president of the Upper House.

Yet he has departed, as he might well have wished to do, full of years

and honors. [For a more extended record of Mr. Plumb’s career, see the

first series of this work.]

* * * * *

=Peterson, Peter Alexander=, Civil Engineer, Montreal, member of the

Institution of Civil Engineers, member of the American Society Civil

Engineers, and member of the Council Canadian Society Civil Engineers,

was born on 8th November, 1839, at Niagara Falls, province of Ontario.

He is the eldest son of William Lounsberry Peterson and Susan

Macmicking. Both his parents were descended from United Empire loyalist

families who came to Canada on the conclusion of the American war,

having sacrificed their property in the cause of the mother country, and

were granted large tracts of land in Upper Canada. His maternal

grandfather, the late Major John Macmicking, descended from the old

Scotch family of Macmicking, of Miltonise and Killanbrougham, in the

county of Wigton, was an ultra loyalist of the old Tory school. He

fought in all the battles of 1812 on the Niagara frontier, and was

wounded at Lundy’s Lane and Chippewa, and carried two bullets in his

body till his death in 1863. He was out again in 1837, on the Tory side,

raising a troop of cavalry which he commanded. Mr. Peterson was educated

partly at a common school in Stamford, and partly by private tuition,

preparatory to entering the Toronto University in the engineering

course. He was articled, in 1859, to Mr. Thomas C. Keefer, C.M.G.,

member of the Institution of Civil Engineers, and remained with him as a

student and assistant till May, 1867, during which time he was engaged

upon the Hamilton & Port Dover Railway, the Hamilton waterworks, a

survey for the Georgian Bay Canal through the county of Ontario, and

upon the construction of several large dams upon the Grand River at

Paris and Brantford, besides having charge of the Toronto office, doing

a general consulting engineering practice. In the spring of 1867 he

accepted a position on the Great Western Railway of Canada, and in the

autumn of the same year was offered the position of resident engineer on

the New York, Oswego and Midland Railway, with charge from Oswego to

Oneida, where he remained till March, 1868, when he was offered a

position on the Intercolonial Railway surveys. He was appointed resident

on construction of this railway for contract number 15 at Bathurst,

where he remained till September, 1872, when he resigned to accept the

position of chief engineer of the Toronto waterworks, to carry out the

scheme recommended by Messrs. T. C. Keefer and E. S. Chesborough, the

consulting engineers for these works. In September, 1875, before the

water-works were completed, Mr. Peterson was offered by the

DeBoucherville government, who had undertaken the construction of the

railways from Quebec to Montreal and from Montreal to Ottawa, the

position of chief engineer of these lines, which offer he accepted,

arranging with the Toronto water-works commissioners to retain charge of

the works till their completion, and with the government to hold the two

positions conjointly. Mr. Peterson removed to Montreal in October, 1875,

but retained charge of the water-works in Toronto till the end of 1877,

when the works were completed, $2,000,000 having been expended upon

them. Mr. Peterson had to encounter more than the usual amount of

criticism during the early days of his official service in Toronto, but

after the election of January, 1874, when his principal opponents were

defeated, the hostile criticism ceased, and the general opinion

prevailed that he had carried out the duties entrusted to him in a

faithful, efficient and satisfactory manner. His career in the service

of the Quebec government, terminated in September, 1881, when he

resigned to accept the position of chief engineer of the St. Lawrence

bridge, which was about to be built by the Canadian Pacific Railway

Company. During the debate in the Legislative Assembly of Quebec on the

bill to authorize the construction of the Chaudière Bridge, the premier,

the Hon. Mr. Chapleau, in moving the second reading of the measure,

asked the house to let it go through without opposition, on account of

the extreme urgency of at once letting the contract. The government had

had great difficulty in making a choice between the three lowest

bidders. Each of the contractors had offered advantages, and their

offers had been most carefully weighed from every point of view, and

from an engineering point as well, and Clarke, Reeves & Co.’s had been

found the most advantageous. In this opinion he was confirmed by Mr.

Peterson, chief engineer, to whose character, carefulness and skill he

was bound to testify most fully; and that his opinion of Mr. Peterson’s

engineering reputation was further confirmed by the fact that his

original estimates for the cost of the whole bridge had been in every

case reduced instead of, as is usual in such cases, largely exceeded.

Hon. Mr. Joly consented most willingly to the second reading of the

bill, and complimented the premier on his frankness. He alluded to the

current rumor of favoritism in awarding the contract to Clarke, Reeves &

Co., but he declined to entertain the idea that the government was

actuated by any improper motives in awarding the contract to this firm,

although their tender was not the lowest. He then instanced the

excellent character and rapid construction of their work, and the

special advantages they were ready to afford; and said he had every

confidence in Mr. Peterson, and endorsed all the Hon. Mr. Chapleau had

said respecting him. Hon. Mr. Chapleau then thanked Hon. Mr. Joly, and

promised that the tenders would be submitted at once to the house. In

considering the letting of the contract he had, most fortunately, had a

professional adviser, upon whom he could rely—Mr. Peterson being, in

fact, the strictest and most rigid of engineers. During his engagement

with the Quebec government, he served under the DeBoucherville, the Joly

and the Chapleau administrations, and gained the good will and

confidence of them all, no party ever venturing to criticise his

conduct, which, however, was furiously assailed by the contractor and

his allies. On sending in his resignation to the government he was asked

to withdraw it. The line between Montreal and Quebec was to be completed

in October, 1877, and handed over to the government, but the contractor

refused to give it up and continued to run it for his own benefit,

keeping all the earnings. Two attempts were made to take possession of

it, but failed. In the summer of 1878, Mr. Peterson offered to take

possession of it for the government, which offer being accepted, a full

power of attorney was given him to act for the Quebec government in the

matter. The late Edward Carter, Q.C., was engaged with him for a

considerable time in perfecting the case, and in August, Mr. Peterson,

with the Hon. P. J. O. Chauveau, sheriff of Montreal, took possession of

the Montreal district against a large force of men who were placed in

charge of the Hochelaga and Mile End stations by the contractor, and

alone retained possession against heavy odds and in spite of an

injunction obtained by the contractor, which was served upon him the day

before the seizure, and again while at Mile End holding a train against

the will of the passengers on board of it, and the employees of the late

contractor. He held the stations from noon till 10 p.m., when troops

were obtained from the Dominion government to keep what had been gained.

The government was so satisfied with the manner in which Mr. Peterson

obtained and held possession of the railway, that he was appointed

general manager. The contractor attempted through the courts, as well as

by force on several other occasions, to regain possession of the line,

but was defeated at every point. For taking possession of the railway in

defiance of the injunction, Mr. Peterson was tried for contempt of court

and found guilty, but was only required to give bail not to do so again.

Between this time and his resignation, Mr. Peterson built the Chaudière

bridge over the Ottawa river, just above the Chaudière rapids. He also

strongly advocated the eastern entrance of the Quebec, Montreal, Ottawa

& Ontario Railway into the Quebec gate barracks, as against the proposed

site at the Papineau road, which had been commenced under the

DeBoucherville government; and having shewed the Joly government how

cheaply it could be built, got it adopted by that government, and

carried it out under the Chapleau government. On entering the services

of the Canadian Pacific Railway, in connection with the construction of

the St. Lawrence bridge, he made surveys of various sites, and among

them that recommended by the late Col. Roberts, president of the

American Society of Civil Engineers, near the Lachine Rapids at Heron

Island, but finally reported in favor of the Caughnawaga line, which was

adopted in the winter of 1882; but nothing was done till the autumn of

1885, when contracts were let. This work was successfully carried out

under Mr. Peterson’s direction during the summer of 1886, and in

addition he built the St. Anne’s and Vaudreuil bridges over the Ottawa

river, on the Ontario and Quebec section of the Canadian Pacific

Railway. The Sault Ste. Marie Bridge was built during the summer of

1887, under Mr. Peterson’s direction, for the Sault Ste. Marie Bridge

Company, which is composed of the C. P. R, the Duluth, South Shore and

Atlantic R’y, and the Minneapolis, Sault Ste. Marie and Atlantic

Railways. Mr. Peterson is now engineer of the Canadian Pacific Railway,

in charge of the lines east of Port Arthur.

* * * * *

=Costigan, Hon. John=, Ottawa, Minister of Inland Revenue for the

Dominion of Canada, M.P. for Victoria, New Brunswick, was born at St.

Nicholas, in the province of Quebec, on February 1st, 1835, and received

a sound education at the College of St. Anne’s. When his education was

completed, he moved to New Brunswick, and thereafter for many years was

connected with various pursuits, being at one time registrar of deeds

for Victoria county, and a judge of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas

for New Brunswick. At a very early age Mr. Costigan gave evidence of the

solid intellectual qualities which were to become so conspicuous in

after years. Above all, those who watched him closely perceived an

unvarying persistency in any course which he marked out for himself.

Towards 1861 several of the leading inhabitants of Victoria county

decided that they would ask Mr. Costigan to offer himself as a candidate

for the legislature, and he consenting to do so, was elected, and sat in

the New Brunswick Legislative Assembly until 1866, when on again

appealing to his constituents he failed to secure his re-election. He

was during that period regarded as one of the ablest men in the house,

both sides paying great deference to his opinions. At the general

election after confederation he was returned to the House of Commons,

and has held his seat uninterruptedly for Victoria county ever since. On

May 23rd, 1882, he was sworn in a member of the Privy Council, and made

minister of inland revenue, and still occupies that position. On the

20th May, 1872, Mr. Costigan moved an address in the House of Commons,

praying his Excellency the Governor-General to disallow the New

Brunswick School Act, on the ground “that said law is unjust and causes

much uneasiness among the Roman Catholic population.” Some time before

the introduction of Mr. Costigan’s resolutions, persons had gone up and

down through New Brunswick declaring that the province must have a

system of free, non-sectarian public schools, and children of every

denomination must attend these schools, and that one and all, according

to his real or personal property, would be taxed to maintain the

educational system. So far this was good. The province had for many

years previously made liberal grants for education, but the schools were

under denominational control; there was no thorough system of

inspection; no uniform course of instruction, and subjects were taught

on the old fashioned parrot plan, an old teacher standing behind the

educational bulwark, driving education home with a birch rod. Therefore

it was a wise and progressive movement that some one set on foot to

reduce this chaos of catechism and birch, and arithmetic and letters,

into one harmonious, efficient and enlightened system. The new idea

carried the province by storm, and then there was appointed a chief

superintendent of education. To this gentleman was assigned the task of

drawing up an educational chart, outlining courses of instruction, and

prescribing texts. He had just the qualifications needed to carry out

the will of the narrow politicians with respect to education and the

Roman Catholics, and so rancorously was he disposed towards Catholicism

that, it is averred, when writing a letter, he carried his hatred so far

as to avoid crossing his t’s. He imagined that all priests and lay

brothers were bad men, and all nuns wicked women, not fit in character

or garb to teach in the public schools, therefore he drew up a

regulation making it unlawful for any teacher employed in the public

schools to wear any badge, garb or emblem distinctive of any

denominational sect or order. This, of course, excluded nuns, lay

brothers, and people of a like ecclesiastical fashion, and the liberal

and high-minded proviso was characterized as “the government’s infamous

millinery regulation.” Holy Church had no cause for panic when the idea

of free, non-sectarian schools was at first broached, although it

fidgetted and fretted itself almost out of its vestments; now it had a

genuine grievance. It was when this narrow regulation had been put upon

the statute-book that Mr. Costigan, a Roman Catholic, raised his voice

in the House of Commons and besought parliament to interpose its hand in

justice to the minority in his province. He was ably seconded by the

Hon. Timothy Warren Anglin, who pleaded until he became pathetic for

justice to his co-religionists. Mr. Anglin’s newspaper, the _Freeman_,

week after week, was laden with complainings against the injustice of

the New Brunswick legislature. It declared it was the duty of Sir John

A. Macdonald’s government to interfere its authority and maintain right.

Then Sir John fell under his Pacific scandal load, and the Reformers

returned to power, bringing with them Mr. Anglin, whom they put in the

speaker’s chair. During the first session of the new parliament, Mr.

Costigan again arose and moved his resolution, which ended in these

words: “That the government should advise his Excellency to disallow the

Act passed by the New Brunswick legislature.” In this case Mr. Speaker

Anglin’s support ended with putting the resolution. The whole country

knew how he had the Roman Catholic interests at heart, but it was

inexpedient now to press the matter—inexpedient of course to embarrass

his government, though this was the very course that his great store of

wisdom had suggested when Sir John was in office. So Mr. Costigan had to

fight the battle alone. To dispose of the matter, the governor-general

did not disallow the New Brunswick School Act, and it would have been a

constitutional crime had he done so. Nor did Mr. Costigan desire the

repeal of such portions of the law as were just; he merely sought to

remove the intolerance and bigotry that disgraced the Act in the

“millinery regulations.” Although the Act was not repealed, Mr.

Costigan’s exertions were not without fruit, for Dr. Rand’s

anti-Catholic provision was expunged, and the doctor himself, as

political decency in New Brunswick increased, began to totter in his

chair. At last Mr. Blair asked him to resign, and he is now back in the

province, where we hope a career of usefulness shall always be open to

him. Mr. Costigan’s other great act in parliament was the submission, in

1882, of “The Costigan Irish resolution,” praying that Her Majesty might

grant Home Rule government to Ireland on the self-government colonial

plan, likewise praying for the relief of “suspects,” and asking other

ameliorations. In so far as these resolutions addressed themselves to

the question of Home Rule for Ireland, history shall always applaud

their author, for he was only asking for a country, dear to him by ties

of race, a political condition, the success of which he has tested. But

it was a pity, a sad pity, that he, and parliament behind him, should

have so far forgotten themselves as to advise another country as to what

she should do to offenders against her own laws. Mr. Costigan’s career

has been a very able one. He is a clear-headed, firm-handed

administrator, and has his department thoroughly under control. His

admirers a few years ago presented him with a splendid residence in

Ottawa. Mr. Costigan in politics is a Conservative, and in religion a

Roman Catholic. He married, in 1855, Harriet, daughter of John Ryan, of

Grand Falls, New Brunswick.

* * * * *

=Barnard, Edmund=, Advocate, Montreal, Quebec, was born at Three Rivers,

on 23rd January, 1831. He is a son of Edward Barnard, for many years

prothonotary of Three Rivers, whose family was originally from

Yorkshire, England, settled at an early day in the history of the

colonies, at Deerfield, Mass., and immigrated thence into Canada. Mr.

Barnard received his education in the Colleges of St. Hyacinthe, Nicolet

and Montreal, and took his degrees of B.A. and M.A. at St. John’s

College, Fordham, N.Y. He studied law in the office of Judge Polette, in

Three Rivers; also with Sir John Rose and the present Mr. Justice Monk,

of the Court of Appeals, and was admitted to the bar on the 23rd of

October, 1853. Mr. Barnard is known as one of the most studious,

painstaking and successful lawyers in Montreal. He has made a specialty

of certain branches, such as real estate, French law, municipal law, and

law of banks and corporations, he having a very extensive _clientèle_ in

those several departments. He often visits England to attend to Canadian

cases before the judicial committee of the Privy Council. A fellow

member of the Montreal bar gives Mr. Barnard credit for having a very

keen perception of the old French law—second to that of no other lawyer

in the province—for being a very indefatigable worker in preparing his

wises, and for being a fluent and strong advocate, equally good in the

French and English languages. In 1858 Mr. Barnard was married to Ellen

King, daughter of the Hon. C. L. Austin, recorder of the city of Albany,

N.Y., and they have had issue of ten children.

* * * * *

=Moodie, Mrs. Susanna=, was the sixth daughter of the late Thomas

Strickland, of Reydon Hall, Suffolk, England, and was born on the 6th of

December, 1803. This Strickland family was certainly one of the most

remarkable known in England, since the famous “Nest of Nightingales,”

five out of the six daughters having made themselves more or less

celebrated in the realm of letters. At the age of thirteen, Susanna

Moodie lost her father, at whose hands she had received her education.

Mr. Strickland was a man of considerable wealth, highly cultured, and

much devoted to literature, so he spent much of his means upon his

library, and instilled into his family the same love for _belles

lettres_ that he felt himself. Many have regretted that the excellent

man did not live to see the fruition of his care. Susanna, it is said,

began to write when in her sixteenth year, her early productions being

poems and tales for children. In 1829-30, she put out a volume entitled,

“Enthusiasm, and other Poems.” In the same year, during a visit to

London, she met Lieutenant J. W. Dunbar Moodie, the fourth son of the

late James Moodie, of Melsetter, Orkney Islands, to whom she was married

on the 4th of April, 1831. Lieutenant Moodie belonged to the 21st

Fusiliers, and was then on half pay. They left England in the following

year for Canada, settling at Cobourg for a few months, thence proceeding

to the township of Hamilton, eight miles from Cobourg, where they took a

farm, and remained a year, after which they permitted themselves,

unwisely, to be persuaded to settle in the backwoods, ten miles north of

Peterborough. This region was then a perfect wilderness. There was no

church, no school, no refined society, and very little cleared land near

where they took up their abode. Here, struggling with all the privations

belonging to life in the woods, they lived for eight years, in the

meantime spending all their available money in the purchase of wild

lands, and in the operation of the farm, an occupation for which the

family, gentle bred, and unaccustomed and unsuited to labour, were

singularly unfit. When, in 1837, the rebellion broke out, Lieutenant

Moodie, who, from his birth and military training was a devoted

loyalist, hastened away to Toronto, leaving his wife and four little

children, the eldest only in her fifth year, behind him in the bush. The

summer following, he remained absent, and much of the crops were lost,

because there was no help to harvest it. All this Mrs. Moodie vividly

and feelingly describes in her delightful book, “Roughing it in the

Bush.” This was the first ambitious literary effort of Mrs. Moodie, and

it attracted wide attention. The style was simple, limpid and

picturesque: it was full of movement, and contained pen portraits, which

were true to the life, of the hardships of the family’s wilderness life;

of the character of the neighbours with whom she was thrown in contact,

and of her alternating hopes and disappointments. When the book came

out, the Canadians who were pictured in it were terribly wroth, and

probably it was the sex of the author that saved her from maltreatment.

But she never once exceeded the bounds of truth in her delineations, and

invariably pictured the good traits as well as the bad ones, of the

ordinary Canadian backwoods family. The book was brought out in England

in 1850, but the greatest portion of its contents had already been

published in the _Literary Garland_, Montreal. Encouraged by the success

of this book, Mrs. Moodie afterwards brought out in quick succession,

through her London publishers, the Messrs. Bentley, “Life in the

Clearings,” “Flora Lindsay,” “Mark Hurdleston,” “The World Before them,”

“Matrimonial Speculation,” and other works of a more or less fictitious

character. It may be said here that after eight years of travail in the

woods, Mrs. Moodie received the glad tidings that her husband had been

appointed sheriff of the county of Hastings. In a late edition of

“Roughing it in the Bush,” brought out by Hunter, Rose & Co.,

Publishers, of Toronto, Mrs. Moodie writes a preface recounting the

social, industrial, educational and moral progress of Canada, since the

time of her landing. After Sheriff Moodie’s death at Belleville, in

1869, Mrs. Moodie made her home in Toronto with her younger son, R. B.

Moodie; but on his removal to a new residence out of town, she remained

with her daughter, Mrs. J. J. Vickers, and passed peacefully away on the

afternoon of April 8th, 1885, surrounded by her children and

grandchildren. Her aged sister, Mrs. Traill, was beside her at the last.

Mrs. Moodie’s often expressed wish to be laid beside her beloved husband

at Belleville, where the happiest part of her years were spent, was

carried out, and her remains were followed to their last resting-place,

close to the beautiful Bay of Quinté, by a large number of dear friends.

* * * * *

=McMillan, John=, M.D., Pictou, Nova Scotia, was born in London,

Ontario, 18th January, 1834. His parents were William McMillan and Anne

McKenzie. He received his early education at the schools of his native

place, and afterward attended McGill University, Montreal, where he

graduated in May, 1857. He then removed to Nova Scotia, and began the

practice of his profession in Wallace, Cumberland county. After

remaining there for some time he removed to Sherbrooke, Guysborough

county, then to New Glasgow, and finally to Pictou, Pictou county, where

for the last thirteen years he practised, and has succeeded in building

up a good business. He is quarantine officer for the port of Pictou. He

belongs to the Masonic order, and is a past master of Caledonia lodge.

He was married on 11th June, 1868, to Annie, youngest daughter of the

late Senator Holmes, of Pictou, N.S.

* * * * *

=Larocque, Rt. Reverend Bishop Joseph=, was born at St. Joseph, Chambly,

the 28th August, 1808, of one of the most respectable families in that

place, and from his earliest years gave evidence of unusual piety and

talent. It was no doubt owing to this fact that in 1821 he, with his

cousin Charles, who afterwards succeeded him as bishop, upon the

recommendation of Mr. Mignault, was educated at the expense of Mr. de

St. Ours, and other true friends of education, at the College of St.

Hyacinthe, then in its infancy. Young Joseph Larocque was a model

scholar, always first in his studies, and practising those virtues which

distinguished him in all the varied phases of his after life. In 1829,

after having terminated a very brilliant classical course, he entered

the ecclesiastical state, and until 1847 we find him working zealously

to conquer all difficulties and gain for the St. Hyacinthe Seminary the

great renown which it now enjoys. He received the order of priesthood at

the hands of his Lordship J. J. Lartigue, on the 15th of March, 1835,

and occupied with distinction successively the posts of professor,

director, and superior of the institution to which he owed so much. A

priest of the merit of Abbé Larocque could not long remain without

attracting the attention of Bishop Bourget, who at this time occupied

the episcopal seat at Montreal. The eminent prelate summoned him, and

conferred upon him the canonship, thereby procuring a most valuable

auxiliary in the administration of his diocese, one who, in his manifold

duties and work, exercised his natural talent, profound science, and

indefatigable zeal. He was entrusted with the editing of _Religious

Miscellany_, published under the auspices of Bishop Bourget. Mgr.

Prince, then coadjutor bishop of Montreal, being delegated to take to

the Holy Father at Rome the decree of the first council at Quebec, Canon

Larocque received orders to accompany him as secretary. During his

sojourn in the Holy City he was named Bishop of Cydonia, by his Holiness

Pope Pius IX., and coadjutor of Montreal, in place of his Lordship J. C.

Prince, promoted to the new bishopric of St. Hyacinthe. On the 28th of

the following October he was consecrated in his native parish (Chambly)

by Bishop Bourget, assisted by their Lordships Guigues, bishop of

Ottawa, and Cooke, bishop of Three Rivers. During the next eight years

Bishop Larocque fulfilled his numerous duties in a most exemplary

manner, to the detriment of his health. In June, 1860, he was

transferred to the bishopric of St. Hyacinthe, but owing to his constant

suffering and infirmities, he asked the permission of the Pope to

abdicate his charge, which was granted by a Papal decree, dated August

17th, 1865. In July, 1866, Mgr. Larocque was nominated by his Holiness

Pope Pius IX., bishop of Germanicopolis. The principal work of the pious

prelate during his short term as head of the diocese, was the founding

of the Community of the Precious Blood, which in a few years became

renowned for piety and virtue. This community owe to the venerable and

devoted father the constitution which governs them, and several

spiritual works, among others, “Manner of Devotion to the Precious

Blood,” and “Meditations for each Month of the Year;” also, “The

Liturgical Year,” comprising meditations for Sundays and all the notable

feasts of the year. The Lord remembered this faithful and earnest worker

in permitting him to see the success which crowned his many efforts, for

which the diocese of St. Hyacinthe owes him a debt of gratitude, only to

be repaid by continuing in the noble work so ably mapped out for them.

Bishop Joseph Larocque died November 18th, 1887.

* * * * *

=McDonald, Hon. James=, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Nova

Scotia, was born at East River, Pictou county, N.S., 1st July, 1828. His

family were among the first Scotch Highlanders who came to Nova Scotia

one hundred years ago. They established at Pictou a thoroughly Scottish

community which bears their impress legibly to this day. The chief

justice had very few educational or inherited advantages to help him in

his early days, but he possessed a splendid physique, unfailing

good-temper and kindliness, great shrewdness and common sense, and

laudable ambition. He obtained his preliminary education at New Glasgow,

the second town in Pictou county, being the seat of valuable collieries,

glass-works and other manufactories, and one of the most flourishing and

progressive spots in the province. After completing his course, he

studied law and was admitted to the bar in 1851. He at once obtained a

good practice, and gained a considerable reputation as a platform

speaker. He always took a great interest in politics, being a staunch

Conservative. He first came to the front as a political candidate in

1859 when he successfully contested Pictou county in the general

election of that year. The Conservative party were fast gaining strength

and bidding again for the political supremacy which had been denied them

for many years. Among the rising men was Dr. Charles Tupper, a bold and

fluent orator, and a man of great administrative force and tact. Hon. J.

W. Johnson, attorney-general and _facile princeps_ in his party for so

many years, was getting old and unfit for a hard campaign. Sir William

Young had been made chief justice, and other prominent Liberals were

dropping out of the ranks. Railways were building and there was an

impetus thereby given to the general hopefulness of the country. There

were hot debates in the House of Assembly where such men as A. G.

Archibald, Thomas Morrison, and Jonathan McCully strove for the reins of

power. Hon. Mr. McDonald again offered, in 1863, when his party achieved

a great victory at the polls. He was appointed by Dr. Tupper, provincial

secretary and premier, to the position of chief railway commissioner for

Nova Scotia, in June, 1863, and held this office until December, 1864.

In December, 1864, he was appointed to a seat in the government with the

portfolio of financial secretary. The celebrated conferences of

Charlottetown and Quebec were held in the summer of 1864. There the

preliminaries of confederation were discussed. At the latter conference

Nova Scotia was represented by Dr. Tupper, Hon. W. A. Henry, now of the

Supreme Court of Canada, Jonathan (afterwards Judge) McCully, and Hon.

R. B. Dickey, senator. The next few months were times of fierce

political debate in the maritime provinces. Confederation was

consummated 1st July, 1867, and was shortly afterwards followed by

general elections in the provinces and in the Dominion. The

Conservatives were routed at the polls. Dr. Tupper won his election in

Cumberland county, defeating Hon. William Annand by the narrow majority

of 66. Not a single Conservative member followed him to Ottawa on his

first appearance there. Among the defeated was the subject of this

sketch, who stood for Pictou. But previous to this time, and during 1865

and 1866, he had been appointed a commissioner, representing his native

province, to negotiate towards opening trade relations between the West

Indies, Mexico and Brazil and the British American provinces. In

prosecution of this mission he did some travelling in the Antilles. In

1867 he was made a Queen’s counsel. During the last years of his

residence and practice at the bar in Halifax, the city barristers, on

his attaining to the twenty-fifth year of his practice presented him

with a silk gown accompanied by an appreciative and friendly address. In

thanking the gentlemen of the long robe for their courtesy, he remarked

that he was much touched by their kindness, but that the incident

carried with it one element of regret in that it reminded him that he

was growing old. The chief justice, however, enjoys robust health, and

has probably many years before him. During these times he was working up

one of the best-known practices in Nova Scotia. He had become associated

in Pictou with Samuel G. Rigby (since Judge of the Supreme Court, a man

who died two years ago greatly regretted while yet little over forty

years of age), and removed to Halifax, establishing the firm of McDonald

& Rigby. They generally had in their office six students and copyists,

and their practice extended throughout the province. S. G. Rigby is

believed to have been the peer of any _nisi prius_ lawyer who ever held

a brief in Nova Scotia. James McDonald was skilled in all the arts of a

cross-examiner and jury lawyer, whilst as a chambers counsel he was

unsurpassed by any. Mr. Rigby generally went the Midland and Eastern

circuits, where he never wanted a client. At the general election held

in the summer of 1872, Hon. Mr. McDonald again contested Pictou for the

House of Commons, and this time successfully. He was a strong supporter

of Sir John A. Macdonald. The Pacific Scandal burst out in 1873, and in

the debate in the Commons he made one of the strongest defences of the

government. He was defeated at the general election of 1874, when the

Reform government seized the reins of power, but fought a hard campaign

in Pictou. At the general election in 1878 he returned with his party to

power, and was made minister of justice. This appointment he held with

credit until 20th May, 1881, when the late Sir William Young having

resigned, he was appointed chief justice of the Supreme Court of Nova

Scotia. He is also judge of the Vice-Admiralty Court. He resides at a

pretty villa on the North-West Arm, Halifax, called “Blink Bonnie.” He

is a member of the Halifax Club, the town resort of the _elite_ of Nova

Scotia. He married in 1856, Jane, daughter of the late William Mortimer,

of Pictou, by whom he has a large family of children. One of his sons is

in the North-West. Two are practising law in Halifax. Two of his

daughters married sons of Sir Charles Tupper, viz., Charles H. Tupper,

M.P. for Pictou county, and William J. Tupper, who saw service with the

Halifax battalion during the North-West rebellion. The Chief Justice

resides chiefly in Halifax but occasionally goes on circuit. His

judgments are marked by great liberality and breadth of view. He has

befriended many young men in their struggles to get a profession, and is

an openhearted, openhanded man. No finer specimen of the Pictou

Scotchman could be picked out than “Jim McDonald,” as he was familiarly,

though respectfully called, during his long career, at the bar and in

politics. Hon. Mr. McDonald is a member of St. Matthew’s Presbyterian

Church, Halifax.

* * * * *

=Merritt, Jedediah Prendergast=, St. Catharines, Ontario. The subject of

this biographical sketch is the eldest son of the late Hon. William

Hamilton Merritt, the well-known pioneer of the most prominent part of

the peninsula of western Canada, and the originator and principal actor

in obtaining the completion of the Welland and St. Lawrence canals, now

connecting the upper lakes with the Atlantic ocean. Mr. Merritt was born

at St. Catharines, county of Lincoln, on the 1st of June, 1820, and the

whole of his life has been devoted to the material and æsthetical

occupations which make history for the western hemisphere. At an early

period he represented his native country as a student at Cambridge,

England, and upon his return his further representation consisted in

being familiar with English and continental society as it was associated

with scholastic and political economy. His father, by the force of daily

events, was engaged in promoting public important Canadian interests,

whether included in commercial, political, or educational enterprises;

and his son, being well qualified by natural and acquired attainments,

gave these enterprises the advantage of his presence both at the desk

and by his advice in the halls of the legislature. In 1860 he was

appointed by a vote of parliament to a position now known as archivist.

He collected the ten thousand folio pages of historical matter as put

upon record by the lives of pioneers in Canada prior and subsequent to

the revolutionary war. Whether, accordingly, information of large or

small moment to families of the United Empire class or its government,

or to families generally of Canada or the United States be required, it

is derivable through the labors of the gentleman whose name is before

us. Such a task as this brought into requisition varied talents and an

unceasing industry for a number of years, and so suggestive of utility

was his report that parliament renewed an engagement with him. The

qualities of patriotism and generosity characterised his proceedings,

for he not only gave his assistant the appropriation made for the

purpose, but without opposition he permitted the adoption of a title

which directs a searcher after knowledge formulated under his guidance

to go to the Coventry Documents. On the 1st of May, 1845, he was

appointed postmaster at St. Catharines, an office which he retained for

a period of eighteen years. Mr. Merritt has distinguished himself both

in poetry and prose. At an early age, and while at school, a taste for

literature and science distinctly spoke out. And subsequently his

poetical genius shone out in many effusions relating to his own and

other countries, and in such as passed fitting encomiums upon the noble

qualities of patriotism and valor. A poem written as a memento of the

visit of the Duke of Kent to Canada received a distinguished

acknowledgment from the Prince of Wales, his Grace the Duke of

Newcastle, and the Earl of St. Germans. Many odes are also well known;

among them may be found that “On the Opening of Victoria Bridge” by the

Prince of Wales; “Ho, for Manitoba;” “Ontario;” those on the battles of

“Lundy’s Lane”—“Crook’s Mills”—“River Rasin;”—that read by the Loyal

Canadian Society at its anniversary picnic at Queenston Heights; “The

rise and progress of St. Catharines,” in prose, and concluded in verse.

Besides others in number to fill a volume, which fail to receive a

notice here. The public journals of the day, for many years past,

evidence by their columns that Mr. Merritt’s study and influence upon

subjects of administrative policy and scientific economy have given to

the public as much of instruction as of entertainment. An ingenious

historical chart published by Mr. Merritt met with the approval of the

British North American Historical Society, and commendation from the

Prince of Wales, who sent him an appropriate medal. When decimal

currency was introduced into Canada, Mr. Merritt brought before the

legislature a system of weights and measures known as the “metric.” With

these it is as easy of calculation as that of by tens with money. The

government voted in its favor $50,000 to be used if necessary. Mr.

Merritt’s life has been an unceasing application of advantages derivable

from a patrimony, for the promotion of plans equal to the dignity and

character of Canada; and his family promise to wear his mantle. He

married on the 17th of August, 1864, the eldest daughter of the late

George Prescott, for many years secretary and treasurer of the Welland

canal, by whom he has six sons and two daughters.

* * * * *