The clue to this puzzle is easily found. Sir Francis had conceived an utter distaste for the persons and political principles of the Reformers of Upper Canada. There was an inherent antagonism between the nature of this shallow, feather-brained sketcher by the wayside and the natures of men like Rolph, Bidwell and the Baldwins, whose quiet earnestness and fixity of purpose had been intensified by the long course of injustice to which they, in common with their party, had been subjected. The earnestness of these gentlemen presented itself to him in the light of importunity, if not of impertinence. He could hardly be expected to sympathize very strongly with their unconquerable zeal for principles which he did not understand: which he was perhaps incapable of understanding. Then, Sir Francis was an eminently social personage, and the social qualities of the leaders of Upper Canadian Reform were not of a high order. To them, small talk across the walnuts and the wine seemed utterly incongruous in view of the momentous public questions which were urgently pressing for a solution. In this particular they presented a marked contrast to the leading spirits of the Compact. The Robinsons, Hagermans and Sherwoods, one and all, could not only advise the Lieutenant-Governor on the affairs of the Province, but could be pleasant and entertaining companions. They were not very different from the county magistrates and other officials with whom he had been accustomed to confer in his capacity of a poor-law commissioner. They were moreover exceedingly diplomatic. They saw the importance of winning him to their side, and governed themselves accordingly. They lost no opportunity of making themselves agreeable to him. Instead of boring him with what, to his understanding, seemed abstruse speculations on executive responsibility and an elective Legislative Council, they scouted such doctrines as myths begotten in the moody brains of unpractical and discontented men. The wide knowledge, long experience and specious eloquence of the Chief Justice enabled him to present the Tory side of these arguments with much plausibility. Sir Francis soon became convinced that the issue was not merely between two sides of colonial politics, but between monarchy and republicanism, between loyalty and disloyalty, between Great Britain and the United States. As he afterwards declared, he believed that he was "sentenced to contend on the soil of America with Democracy,[228]" and that if he did not overpower it, he would himself be compelled to succumb. Having brought himself to this conclusion, he not unnaturally preferred the _role_ of the hammer to that of the anvil. It was surely better to strike than to be struck. Acting on this principle, he made a complete surrender of himself to the Family Compact, and from that time forward was in all essential respects guided by their counsels. His rashness and impetuosity sometimes led him to act on his own motion, and without