During the fall of this year, 1864, Montreal was the scene of the St. Alban’s Raid prosecutions. As already said, Canada and Montreal especially had sympathized with the Southerners. Many refugees had found a home here. Canada being so close to the frontier was, therefore, frequently used as the basis of southern plots. In the summer two vessels plying on Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, belonging to American merchants, had been seized and partially plundered by the southern refugees. In September St. Albans, a little town in Vermont, on the frontier, was raided by twenty-three southerners from Canada under the command of Bennett H. Young, an ex-Confederate soldier, who escaped to Canada on captured horses with $223,000 booty, after having plundered three local banks and shot one of the cashiers. Their excuse was that they were representatives of the Confederate States of America and they were there to retaliate the outrages committed by General Sherman. In November the trial of the captured rioters took place at Montreal and on March 30th they were discharged. Parliament met on the 19th of January. It was prorogued on the 18th of March. During the following month four of the administration, J.A. Macdonald, Cartier, Brown and Galt, proceeded to England to discuss with the imperial government the scheme of confederation. The delegates returned in time for the opening of the last session of the Canadian legislature at Quebec on the 8th of August. The premier, Sir E.P. Taché, had died full of honours on the 30th of July. He was succeeded by Sir N.F. Belleau. During this session the bill was passed to carry out the recommendation of the commissioners appointed in 1857 “to reduce into one code to be called the civil code of Lower Canada those provisions of the laws of Lower Canada which relate to civil matters and are of a general and permanent character.” Attorney-General Cartier who had introduced the bill appointing the commission in 1857 had the satisfaction of seeing its labours adopted in 1865. The code came into operation in 1866. This was welcomed by the jurists of Montreal and Quebec, as it simplified the law, reducing order out of chaos; the abolition of the seigneurial tenure act of 1854 had rendered the codification very necessary. Parliament closed on the 18th of September. The public offices were removed to Ottawa during the autumn, but for a time the cabinet meetings were held at Montreal.