The Canadian Portrait Gallery - Volume 3 (of 4). Dent John Charles

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СКАЧАТЬ given to the world in the Journal of Sacred Literature, published in London, England. During his residence at Brockville he interested himself actively in various local matters, sectarian and non-sectarian, and contributed to build up several important public institutions. He lectured before the Brockville Library Association and Mechanics' Institute, and did much to extend its membership and beneficial influence.

      The territorial division of the Diocese of Toronto was a project which began to take shape about the time when the subject of this sketch first arrived in this country. Up to that time the Diocese of Toronto comprehended the whole extent of Upper Canada, and was altogether too large to permit of one man's discharging the duties of the Bishopric with perfect efficiency, even though that man were endowed with the tremendous energy and vitality of the late Bishop Strachan. The Diocese of Huron was in due time set apart and the late Rev. Dr. Benjamin Cronyn was elected to the Bishopric. In 1861 the eastern division was also set apart as the Diocese of Ontario, and at the meeting of the Synod held at Kingston in the summer of that year Mr. Lewis was elected to the office of Bishop. He was then only thirty-six years of age, and was probably the youngest Prelate in America. He soon afterwards removed to Kingston, and thence to Ottawa, where he now resides.

      It will thus be seen that the Bishop has had a remarkably successful career since his arrival in Canada. He devotes himself assiduously to his official labours, and is held in high veneration by many of the clergymen of his Diocese. He has a numerous family, and a large circle of attached friends. His pulpit oratory is marked by fluency and smoothness of rhetoric, as well as by much learning and depth of thought.

      CHARLES, LORD METCALFE

      In former sketches we have seen how Responsible Government, after being strenuously contended for during many years in this country, and after its adoption had been vigorously recommended by Lord Durham, finally became an accomplished fact. We have seen how Lord Sydenham was sent over here as Governor-General for the purpose of carrying out the new order of things, and how, during his administration of affairs, the Union of the Provinces was finally effected in 1841. The Canadian Administration was carried on by both Lord Sydenham and his successor, Sir Charles Bagot, in accordance with the spirit of our new Constitution. In 1841 the Imperial Ministry, under whose auspices this Constitution had been framed, was deposed, and a Tory Government succeeded to power. In this Government the late Lord Derby, then Lord Stanley, held the portfolio appertaining to the office of Colonial Secretary. Soon after Sir Charles Bagot's resignation of the post of Governor-General, in the winter of 1842, Sir Charles Metcalfe was selected as his successor. The selection was made at the instance of Lord Stanley, who had all along been inimical to the scheme of Responsible Government in Canada, and there is reason for believing that he entertained the design of subverting it. His selection of Sir Charles Metcalfe, and his subsequent instructions and general policy, certainly lend colour to such a belief. The new Governor was a man of excellent intentions, and of more than average ability, but his previous training and experience had been such as to render him totally unfit for the post of a Constitutional Governor.

      We can only afford space for a brief glance at his previous career, but even that brief glance will be sufficient to show how little sympathy he could be expected to have in colonial schemes of Responsible Government. He was born at Calcutta, on Sunday, the 30th of January, 1785, a few days before Warren Hastings ceased to be Governor-General of India. His father, Major Theophilus Metcalfe, of the Bengal army, was a gentleman of ample fortune, and a Director in the East India Company. Charles was the second son of his parents, and was destined at an early age for the Company's service. He was educated first at a private school at Bromley, in Middlesex, and afterwards at Eton College, where he remained until he had entered upon his sixteenth year, when he returned to India. He was appointed to a writership in the service of the Company, wherein for seven years he filled various offices, and in 1808 was selected by Lord Minto to take charge of a difficult mission to the Court of Lahore, the object of which was to secure the Sikh States, between the Sutlej and Jumna Rivers, from the grasp of Runjeet Singh. In this mission he fully succeeded, the treaty being concluded in 1809. He subsequently filled several other high offices of trust, and in 1827 took his seat as a member of the Supreme Council of India. Both his father and elder brother had meanwhile died, and he had become Sir Charles Metcalfe.

      In 1835, upon Lord W. Bentinck's resignation, Sir Charles Metcalfe was provisionally appointed Governor-General, which office he held until Lord Auckland's arrival in the year following. During this short period he effected many bold and popular reforms, not the least of which was the liberation of the press of India from all restrictions. Under his immediate predecessor, Lord William Bentinck, the press had been as free as it is in England; but there were still certain laws or orders of a severe character, which at the pleasure of any future Governor might be called into operation. These Sir Charles Metcalfe repealed. His doing so gave umbrage to the Directors, and caused his resignation and return to Europe, when he was appointed Governor of Jamaica. The difficult duties of this position — the emancipation of the negroes having but recently occurred — were discharged by him to the satisfaction of the Government and the colonists. After over two years' residence the climate proved so unfavourable to his health that he was compelled to resign. The painful disease of which he afterwards died — cancer of the cheek — had seized him in a firm grip. Years before this time, when residing at Calcutta, a friend had one day noticed a red spot upon his cheek, and underneath it a single drop of blood. The blood was wiped away; the red spot remained. For a long while it occasioned neither pain nor anxiety. A little time after his departure from India, disquieting symptoms appeared, and on his arrival in England he had consulted Sir Benjamin Brodie; but it was not till his return from Jamaica that it received the attention it really demanded. Then consultations of the most eminent surgeons and physicians were held, and the application of a severe caustic was determined on. When told that it would probably "destroy the cheek through and through," he only answered, "What you determine shall be done at once;" and the same afternoon the painful remedy was applied. The physicians and surgeons of London did what they could for him, and he retired into the country. The disorder had not been eradicated, but merely checked. About this time the ill-health of Sir Charles Bagot had rendered that gentleman's resignation necessary, and the post of Governor-General of Canada thus became vacant. It was offered to, and accepted by, Sir Charles Metcalfe. No appointment could have been found for him at that moment in the whole political world the duties of which were more difficult, when the nature of his instructions and the peculiar position of the colony are taken into consideration. Add to this that his whole life had hitherto been passed in administering governments which were largely despotic in their character. Responsible Government, as we have seen, had been conceded to Canada. Sir Charles professed to approve of this concession, but his conduct throughout the whole course of his administration was at variance with his professions, and showed that his sympathies were not on the side of popular rights. He came over in the month of March, 1843, and on the following day took charge of the Administration. For the composition of the Government and an account of the situation of affairs in Canada at this time the reader is referred to the life of Robert Baldwin which has already appeared in these pages. The circumstances under which the Governor contrived to embroil himself with the leading members of the Administration are there given in sufficient detail, and there is no necessity for repeating them at length in this place. Sir Charles chose his associates and advisers from among the members of the defunct Family Compact. He endeavoured to circumscribe the power of the Executive Council, which demanded that no office should be filled, no appointment made, without its sanction. We are, argued the members of Council, in the same relation to the House of Assembly as Ministers in England to the English Parliament. We are responsible to it for the acts of Government; these acts must be ours, or the result of our advice, otherwise we cannot be responsible for them. Unless our demand is complied with, there is no such thing as Responsible Government. On the other hand, Sir Charles contended that by relinquishing his patronage he should be surrendering the prerogatives of the Crown, and should also incapacitate himself and all future Governors from acting as moderator between opposite factions. It was not long before an appointment, made by Sir Charles, brought the contest to an issue. Messrs. Baldwin and Lafontaine, the two leading members of the Executive Council, urged СКАЧАТЬ