This union of the two provinces, pushing with equal zeal the most extreme measures, brought affairs into a somewhat hazardous position. When Lord Gosford and the commissioners were sent to Lower Canada, the ministry placed the upper province under Sir Francis Head, a man of literary talent, and of peculiar firmness, shrewdness, and energy of character. Having arrived early in 1836, as already related, he took the straightforward course of at once publishing the extent and limits of his instructions; at the same time assuring the people of his most zealous efforts to remove every practical grievance. The Assembly, however, were by no means satisfied; and another ground of contest soon arose. Sir Francis added to the executive three members, whose appointment was highly satisfactory to the popular party; but, as several weeks elapsed without their having been consulted on any subject, they stated in a letter that they considered themselves thus rendered responsible for measures in which they were allowed no share, and therefore tendered their resignation. While accepting it with regret, he maintained that he lay under no obligation to consult them on every measure; but was at perfect liberty to judge of the occasions on which the public interest might require their aid. The House of Assembly immediately took up the affair, and having, agreeably to request, been furnished with a copy of the correspondence, drew up a report, and afterwards a long address to the King, strenuously controverting the governor’s doctrine; and, in the course of it, broadly charging him with “deviations from truth and candour.” Proceeding in the same hostile spirit, they, for the first time, stopped the supplies; in consequence of which Sir Francis reserved all their money bills for his Majesty’s decision, and rejected the application for payment of their incidental expenses. All hopes of accommodation being thus closed, he determined, on the 28th of May, to make an appeal to the people by a new election. It was contested by an extraordinary ardour; and a war of manifestos, proclamations, and addresses was forthwith waged between the parties. Perhaps no ruler ever effected more by writing than Sir Francis. The frank, energetic, and popular style in which his addresses were penned, produced an extraordinary effect; and already the peaceable inhabitants had begun to shrink from the extremes into which the popular leaders were hurrying them. These several causes produced the important result, that, in the new Assembly, a decided majority supported the constitutional side. The demagogues complained to the ministry that this effect had been produced by illegal means—by extraordinary grants of land, and even by violence and bribery. The Assembly, however, after strict inquiry by a committee, declared these allegations to be utterly false, expressing, at the same time, the strongest attachment to the mother country and to the governor.