Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol I (1901).djvu/71

 second demand, that the assembly should dispose of all revenues independently of the executive, was to be accepted with a proviso which had reference to the civil list. But the ministerial plans were foiled by the king, who, before Gosford left England, said to him with passionate emphasis : 'Mind what you are about in Canada. By God, I will never consent to alienate the crown lands or make the council elective.'

Despite this warning Gosford set himself, on arriving in Quebec, the hopeless task of conciliating those whom he deemed the Canadian people. They suspected and declined his overtures. His attentions to Papineau and his friends excited much comment and not a little ridicule among the French Canadians. From the English community he held aloof, identifying them, in pursuance of the Irish analogy, with a small office-holding clique whose headquarters were at Quebec. The legislature met on 27 Oct. 1835, when the governor dwelt at length on the commission of inquiry, its scope, and the redress of grievances, but he met with a serious rebuff. The assembly declined to recognise the commission, and assuming a defiant attitude refused to grant the supplies which the governor demanded. With expressions of regret he prorogued the legislature. In transmitting to the king a petition from the assembly for redress of grievances he asked for additional powers.

Meantime mass-meetings after the Irish pattern were organised by 'the patriots' on a large scale ; Gosford's conciliation was denounced as machiavellian, and he was burnt in effigy. Riots took place in Montreal, which called for the intervention of the troops. But when the leading business men in the city petitioned the governor for leave to organise a rifle corps to preserve order, they received from Gosford a caustic reprimand.

The next session opened on 22 Sept. 1836. Gosford submitted new instructions from home in full, because garbled copies, he said, had got abroad. The new instructions differed from the old ones in that they set no limit to the commissioners' inquiries. The king had meanwhile warned the ministry at home that he would permit 'no modification of the constitution.' Relegating constitutional issues to the commissioners' report, Gosford now pressed the assembly to vote supply. But, after some abortive proceedings, the assembly, to quote Bibaud's summary, 'donne un conseil legislatif electif comme son ultimatum, une condition sine qua non, &c., en d'autres termes, se suicide.' Prorogation followed on 4 Oct.

About this time the commissioners finished their report. All its declarations were opposed to the agitators' claims. In accordance with one of them the House of Commons at Westminster passed resolutions on 6 March 1837 appropriating the Lower Canada revenues to the payment of existing arrears (142,000l.) Thereupon Papineau took a bolder stand and organised rebellion. Gosford, beyond issuing proclamations of warning 'to the misguided and inconsiderate,' took no steps to secure the public peace. But happily the Irish catholics declared against both Gosford and Papineau, who alike looked to them for aid ; they made common cause with the English, not with the official clique but with the constitutionalists of Montreal, Quebec, and the eastern townships, thus uniting the English-speaking population.

Reluctant to put the Westminster resolutions into force at the opening of the new reign of Queen Victoria, the English ministry and Gosford made one more effort to gain the assembly. It met on 25 Aug. 1837, the members appearing in homespun (étoffe du païs) as a protest against the importation of goods from abroad. They refused supply, repeated their ultimatum, and protested alike against the Canadian commissioners' recommendations and the resolutions of the English House of Commons. The legislature was dissolved, never to meet again. By 2 Sept. Gosford had become convinced that Papineau's object was 'separation from the mother country,' and suggested the expediency of suspending the constitution. Still trusting to the moral force of his proclamations, he took no active steps to dissipate the gathering storm, and, at the very moment when the Roman catholic bishop launched his mandement against civil war, and the French Canadian magistrates warned the people against the misrepresentations of the agitators, declined once more all voluntary assistance. At length, when in September 1837 the province was on the verge of anarchy, he intimated to the home government that they 'might feel disposed to entrust the execution of its plans to hands not pledged as mine to a mild and conciliatory policy.' The actual conduct of affairs passed into the hands of Sir John Colborne [q.v.], the lieutenant-governor of Upper Canada, who ultimately restored order. Gosford's resignation was accepted on 14 Nov., and he returned to England.

Gosford received the thanks of the ministry for his services (23 Jan. 1838), together with the honour of knight grand cross on the civil side (19 July). To the end he