editors of newspapers under the patronage and pay of the Government were permitted to pursue a deliberate system of malicious vilification with impunity. The latter were allowed to publicly malign not only individual members of the Opposition, but to circulate the grossest libels upon the House of Assembly itself. With these offences the Attorney-General did not think fit to meddle. They were committed by his personal and political friends, and, unless common rumour seriously belied him, were not seldom committed at his own instigation. At any rate he maintained the most amicable relations with the libellers, and allowed no opportunity of serving their material interests to pass unimproved. Such inconsistency forced itself upon public attention. People who up to that time had supported the official party began to ask where this one-sidedness was to end. The Attorney-General had no right, it was said, to reward his friends for doing precisely the same things as those for which he punished and imprisoned his enemies. It was remembered against him how, when disputing with Judge Willis as to the nature of his official duties, he had with scorn repudiated the suggestion that he should proceed in the absence of instructions, even against notorious evil-doers. It was remembered that he had declined to take any official cognizance of so serious an offence against the public peace as the type-riot, which had been committed by his own friends and proteges. Yet he had here gone out of his way to prosecute to his ruin a poor wretch who, certainly not without great provocation, had merely accused him of falsehood and native malignancy. A man who accommodated his conduct to his inclinations in this way might perhaps be much beloved by his friends, but he certainly had no claim to be considered either good or great. The faction, from Dr. Strachan downwards, had for years been holding up John Beverley Robinson to the admiration of Upper Canadians. By many he had been accepted at their valuation. The Selkirk and Gourlay episodes, together with a score of others less noteworthy, had been slurred over. As the worst of these had occurred some years before, they had been partly forgotten by the existing generation. But the remorseless vindictiveness and cruelty displayed throughout the Collins prosecution were patent to everybody. They did much to lower the Attorney-General in popular estimation, and to destroy public confidence in the integrity of the Judges. They gave rise to an uneasy feeling of discontent, and doubtless had their share in bringing about the troubles of 1837-38.