England, where he received much sympathy, even in conservative circles. In a new legislature, where the "compact" were in a minority, he obtained a committee to consider the condition of provincial affairs. The result was a famous report on grievances which set forth in a conclusive and able manner the constitutional difficulties under which the country laboured, and laid down clearly the necessity for responsible government. It would have been fortunate both for Upper Canada and Mackenzie himself at this juncture, had he and his followers confined themselves to a constitutional agitation on the lines set forth in this report. By this time Robert Baldwin and Egerton Ryerson, discreet and prominent reformers, had much influence, and were quite unwilling to follow Mackenzie in the extreme course on which he had clearly entered. He lost ground rapidly from the time of his indiscreet publication of a letter from Joseph Hume, the English radical, who had expressed the opinion that the improper proceedings of the legislature, especially in expelling Mackenzie, "must hasten the crisis that was fast approaching in the affairs of Canada, and which would terminate in independence and freedom from the baneful domination of the mother-country." Probably even Mackenzie and his friends might have been conciliated and satisfied at the last moment had the imperial government been served by an able and discreet lieutenant-governor. But never did the imperial authorities make a greater mistake than {351} when they sent out Sir Francis Bond Head, who had no political experience whatever. From the beginning to the end of his administration he did nothing but blunder. He alienated even the confidence of the moderate element of the Reformers, and literally threw himself into the arms of the "family compact," and assisted them at the elections of the spring of 1836, which rejected all the leading men of the extreme wing of the Reform party. Mackenzie was deeply mortified at the result, and determined from that moment to rebel against the government which, in his opinion, had no intention of remedying public grievances. At the same time Papineau, with whom he was in communication, had made up his mind to establish a republic, _une nation Canadienne_, on the banks of the St. Lawrence.