Hearing on the 19th that Cartier and Taché were coming through Toronto the next night on their way to Niagara, our committee planned a hostile demonstration and were arranging to burn Cartier's effigy at the station. Something of this leaked out and Lieutenant-Colonel Durie, District Adjutant-General commanding in Toronto, attempted to arrange for a guard of honour to meet Cartier, who was Minister of Militia, in order to protect him. Lt.-Colonel Boxall, of the 10th Royals, who was spoken to on the subject, said he had an engagement for that evening near the station, of a nature that would make it impossible for him to appear in uniform. The information was brought to me. I was at that time out of the force, but I went to Lt.-Colonel Durie, who was the Deputy-Adjutant-General, and told him I had heard of the guard of honour business, and asked him if he thought he could intimidate us and I told him if we heard any more of it, we would take possession of the armoury that night, and that we would have ten men to his one, and if anyone in Toronto wanted to fight it out, we were ready to fight it out on the streets. He told me I was threatening revolution. I said, "Yes, I know I am, and we can make it one. A half continent is at stake, and it is a stake worth fighting for." Lt.-Colonel Durie telegraphed to Sir George Cartier not to come to Toronto by railway, and he and Bishop Taché got off the train at Kingston. Taché went to the Falls by way of the States. Cartier took the steamer for Toronto, arrived at the wharf in the morning, transferred to the Niagara boat, and crossed to the Falls. This secrecy was all we wanted. About the same time another formal protest was prepared and Dr. Lynch presented it to his Excellency the Governor-General:-- _To His Excellency_ SIR JOHN YOUNG, Bart., K.C.B., _&c., &c., Governor-General, &c., &c._ MAY IT PLEASE YOUR EXCELLENCY I have on several occasions had the honour of addressing Your Excellency on behalf of the loyal portion of the inhabitants of the Red River Settlement, and having heard that there is a possibility of the Government favouring the granting of an amnesty for all offences to the rebels of Red River, including Louis Riel, O'Donohue, Lepine and others of their leaders, I feel it to be my duty on behalf of the loyal people of the territory to protest most strongly against an act that would be unjust to them, and at the same time to place on record the reasons which we consider render such clemency not only unfair and cruel, but also injudicious, impolitic, and dangerous. I therefore beg most humbly and respectfully to lay before Your Excellency, on behalf of those whom I represent, the reasons which lead us to protest against the leaders of the rebellion being included in an amnesty and for which we claim that they should be excluded from its effects.