During the eight months before parliament should reassemble Bagot wisely set about learning for himself the actual conditions of his new government. Like Sydenham, he was to act as his own prime minister, and {76} his initial difficulty was in forming a suitable Cabinet to act with him. He offered Hincks the post of inspector-general, corresponding in effect to minister of Finance, and Hincks accepted it. He offered the post of solicitor-general to Richard Cartwright (grandfather of the Sir Richard Cartwright of a later day), who refused it because Hincks was in the Cabinet. The position was finally filled by Henry Sherwood, who was, like Cartwright, a Conservative. To LaFontaine the governor offered the attorney-generalship in the most courteous terms, but, for a number of reasons, LaFontaine declined to accept it. Bagot's plan was to form a coalition government, which should embrace all interests; but the Reformers refused to take their place in a Cabinet which contained men of the opposite party. So William Henry Draper, who had acted under Sydenham, continued as leader of a composite Cabinet under Bagot. The House met at Kingston on September 8, 1842. In the game of Ins and Outs the debate on the Address is recognized as a trial of strength, as a method of ascertaining which party is in a majority. It was found that the Draper government did not command the confidence of the House; and, after a spirited {77} fight, Draper resigned and made way for a new ministry, led by LaFontaine and Baldwin. The principle involved, which seems now the merest common sense, was then scouted as government 'by dint of miserable majorities.' Sullivan was the senior member in the new ministry, though it is known by the names of its leaders. It included Hincks and five other members of the previous Cabinet.