The fate of the ministry was quickly settled. Their candidate for the speakership of the Lower House was defeated by 54 votes to 19; a vote of no confidence was carried by 54 to 20; on March 23rd parliament was prorogued and a new administration, the first truly popular ministry in the history of Canada, accepted office, and the country, satisfied at last, was promised "various measures for developing the resources of the province, and promoting the social well-being of its inhabitants."[14] The change was the more decisive because it was made with the approval of the Whig government in England. "I can have no doubt," Grey wrote to Elgin on February 22nd, "that you must accept {200} such a council as the newly elected parliament will support, and that however unwise as relates to the real interests of Canada their measures may be, they must be acquiesced in, until it shall pretty clearly appear that public opinion will support a resistance to them. There is no middle course between this line of policy, and that which involves in the last resort an appeal to parliament to overrule the wishes of the Canadians, and this I agree with Gladstone and Stanley in thinking impracticable."[15] The only precaution he bade Elgin take was to register his dissent carefully in cases of disagreement. Having conceded the essential, it mattered little that Grey could not quite rid himself of doubts as to the consequences of his previous daring. The concession had come most opportunely, for Elgin, who feared greatly the disturbing influences of European revolutionism, Irish discontent, and American democracy in its cruder forms, believed that, had the change not taken place, "we should by this hour (November 30th, 1848) either have been ignominiously expelled from Canada, or our relations with the United States would have been in a most precarious condition." {201}