That is the confession of a man who has attempted the impossible, and who is being forced reluctantly to witness his own defeat. The ministry which he had created lacked the authority which can come only from the best political talent of a people acting in sympathy with the opinions of that people. He had, with great difficulty, found a House of Assembly willing by a narrow majority to support him, but personal support is not in itself a political programme, and the fallacy of his calculations appeared when work in detail had to be accomplished. He had reprobated party, and he found in a party--narrower in practice even than that which he had displaced--the only possible foundation for his authority. He had come to Canada to complete the reconciliation of opposing races within the colony, and, when he left, the French seemed once more about to retreat into their old position of invincible hostility to all things British. The governor-generalship of Lord Metcalfe is almost the clearest illustration in the nineteenth century of the weakness of the doctrinaire in practical politics. Unfortunately, the {186} doctrine which Metcalfe had strenuously enforced was backed by the highest of imperial authorities, and sanctioned by monarchy itself. In less than ten years after the Rebellion, the renovated theory of colonial autonomy had produced a new dilemma. It remained with Metcalfe's successor to decide whether Britain preferred a second rebellion and probable separation to a radical change of system. [1] Kaye, _Life of Lord Metcalfe_, revised edition, ii. p. 313. [2] _A View of Sir Charles Metcalfe's Government of Canada_, by a member of the Provincial Parliament, p. 29. [3] Baldwin Correspondence: La Fontaine to Baldwin, 26 July, 1845. [4] _Parliamentary Paper concerning the Canadian Civil List_ (1 April, 1844), p. 5. [5] Metcalfe to Stanley, 5 August, 1843. [6] Metcalfe to Stanley, 13 May, 1845. [7] Metcalfe to Stanley, 6 August, 1843. [8] Metcalfe to Stanley, 13 May, 1845. [9] Kaye, _Life of Lord Metcalfe_, ii. pp. 367-8. [10] _Ibid._ ii. p. 369. [11] See Hincks, _Lecture on the Political History of Canada_; and Dent, _The Last Forty Years_. The latter work was written under the influence of Sir Francis Hincks, whose comments on it are contained in the inter-leaved copy in the possession of the Canadian archives. [12] Metcalfe to Stanley, 26 December, 1843. [13] _A Letter on the Ministerial Crisis, by the old Montreal Correspondent of the Colonial Gazette_, Kingston, 1843. [14] Quoted from Ryerson, _Story of my Life_, pp. 332-3. [15] Ryerson, _op. cit._ p. 323. [16] See above, p. 116. [17] Viger was defeated in the election of 1844. [18] Kaye, _Papers and Correspondence of Lord Melcalfe_, p. 426. [19] See, for the whole intrigue, _Correspondence between the Hon. W. H. Draper and the Hon. B. E. Garon; and, between the Honbles. L. H. La Fontaine and A. N. Morin_, Montreal, 1840.