The administration of Bagot occupied a single year, and its more important episodes were crowded into a few weeks in the autumn of 1842. Yet there have been few years of equal significance in the history of Canadian political development. There were intervals in which Bagot had time to reveal to Canada his genius for making friends; and the foundation of a provincial university in Toronto deeply interested one who had something of {137} Canning's wit and literary inclinations. But politics usually claimed all his attention. The Union of the Provinces, and the Imperial supremacy, had to be defended against their assailants; the vacant places in the Executive Council had to be filled, as nearly as was possible in harmony with the wishes of the community; and whatever the character of that council might be, it would have to face the test of criticism from an Assembly, which had already striven not unsuccessfully with Sydenham. In his attempt to answer these various problems, Bagot was at his worst in finance. He had not the requisite business training, and entirely lacked Sydenham's knowledge, boldness, and precision. In the correspondence over the mode in which the province should dispose of the British loan of L1,500,000, Stanley's views show a clearness and force, lacking in those of Bagot; and in the one really unfortunate episode of the year, his want of financial skill drew on the governor-general's head the remonstrances of both Stanley and the Treasury authorities. To escape financial difficulties in Canada, Bagot had anticipated the loan, by drawing on British funds for L100,000, and the Treasury did not spare him. "He ought," wrote the Chancellor of the Exchequer, "to have {138} considered those (difficulties) which must arise here from the presentation of large drafts at the Treasury, for which Parliament had made no provision; and for which, as Parliament was not sitting, no regular provision could be made. The situation to which the Treasury is reduced is this: either to protest the bills for want of funds, or to accept the bills, and find within thirty days the means of paying them."[11] This incident furnished to Stanley fresh proof, if any were needed, of Bagot's inexperience. An anxious and mistrustful temper appears in all his despatches to Bagot; but, in fact, with little justification. He never learned how completely the governor for whom he trembled was his master in the art of governing a half-autonomous colony.