Though no one in Parliament dared to openly advocate disintegration, there was a settled policy on the part of a secret clique, whose headquarters were in the Colonial Office, to drive the colonies out of the Empire by systematic snubbing, injustice and neglect. This infamous state of things, of which all classes of Englishmen profess now to be ashamed, was made apparent when Judge Haliburton moved in the House of Commons that some months’ notice should be given of the Act to throw open British markets to Baltic timber, a measure which, if suddenly put in operation, would seriously injure New Brunswick merchants; and he urged as a reason for due consideration for that interest, that it was not represented in Parliament. Mr. Gladstone did not condescend to give any explanation or reply, but led his willing majority to the vote, and the Bill was passed. People sometimes cite what occurred at this debate as a proof that “Judge Haliburton was not a success in the House of Commons;” but it is difficult to imagine a more uncongenial audience for an advocate of Imperial Unity. Gladstone, as if to remove any doubt as to his animus in these proceedings, sent a singularly insolent reply to a letter written to him by a New Brunswick timber merchant protesting against this unexpected measure. “You protest, as well as remonstrate. Were I to critically examine your language, I could not admit your right, even individually, to protest against any legislation which Parliament may think fit to adopt on this matter.” Had the protest only been in the form of dynamite he would have submissively bowed down at the sound of that “chapel bell” which has since then from time to time called him and his cabinets to repentance. His two attempts to destroy the Empire, first by attacking its extremities through Imperial disintegration, and, next, its heart by Home Rule, alike failed; and he has retired from public life, leaving behind him the fragments, not of a great Empire, but of a shattered party. Though a majority of both parties, Conservatives as well as Liberals, agreed with their two leaders in their wish to get rid of the Colonies, (for Disraeli, as far back as 1852, wrote, “These wretched Colonies will all be independent in a few years, and are a millstone around our neck”), the people were wiser and more patriotic than their politicians; and in 1869 (only four years after Judge Haliburton’s death) over one hundred and four thousand workingmen of London signed an address to the Queen protesting against any attempt to get rid of that heritage of the people of England—the Colonial Empire. This memorial was not considered worthy of any reply or acknowledgment.[8] At that time, when the fate of England as a first-class power was in the balance, there was no need for the masses to be “educated up” to the subject; it was rather their statesmen and politicians that required to be _educated down_—down to the common sense of the common people.