I> 4r ~ri —.~~~ ~.~ "..r I:~*.5~~~. ~;;~~~' ' '',I.~i-, i;; ~~!:C:t.i ~-~~ B.ii:c: -~~tl U 4.:-:: % ~'~ 2,i; P: ~E,.~r '~~n;f: ': I;.. ~J "" % ~-~""' ~~ 1: I P : %O 1J:: r H Z Cr ~, 1 r A $: I '''.. O 1~i ~~" s -~-~ ~;;t;VI CY U... r~. '''' L' B::i U; ~d.,,I.~~ "a, ~":lr:;1 '' Cr! r a;:~ -I; ~~~11 -~~~.,..::~ '~ "; '-"~;:~'~' s -~.,r ~~.i. -'"";' "'~" ~~~: d 1 9 '11i- - 0 " i I — -j ,c <*C..-J, 1-0 - \ 4 7).. i.. - - - - - e i '.v.. I (I: __ r" ".-..i. r I- y - 'It, '7 -r -i 7, 1, / -1 -e - -.1 1. - ---- I,.,\, > t I, 1:' 'I 7 / * 9 '7 1- — -, -,,- I - I. I.., I. ".. I r,.. 1-.-,,, I 1, 17........ 7 4.,,. I. " I I I. I,. i - I.,, -,, '.. _.,.-., /. I 1,,, I. -. I.. 7 * I 7' I I. I - " I I APR 61925 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON (" SAM SLICK " ) A Study in Provincial Toryism BY V. L. O. CHITTICK Professor in the Division of Literature and Language at Reed College SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY, IN THE FACULTY OF PHILOSOPHY, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY New York COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS 1924 I s ke \cE 3 C Se COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY STUDIES IN ENGLISH AND COMPARATIVE LITERATURE THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY NEW YORK SALES AGENTS HUMPHREY MILFORD AMEN CORNER, E.C. LONDON EDWARD EVANS & SONS, LTD. 30 NORTH SZECHUEN ROAD SHANGHAI THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON IN HIS OFFICIAL ROBES AS JUDGE OF THE SUPREME COURT OF NOVA SCOTIA From, the original portrait, painted by Beatham, in the Legislative Council Chamber, Halifax, N. S. Photographed by Gauvin and Gentzil. THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ( SAM SLICK" ) A Study in Provincial Toryism '... BY V. L. OF CHITTICK Professor in the Division of Literature and Language at Reed College SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY, IN THE FACULTY OF PHILOSOPHY, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY New. York COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS 1924 1i 11ai 6C, — //-/I2 JCopyright, 1924 BY COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS All rights reserved Printed from type. Published November, 1924 THE PLIMPTON PRESS NORWOOD MASS * ' * A To CARL VAN DOREN I:i PREFACE SIGNS have not been wanting of late that the extended period during which Haliburton has been more talked about than read has come to at least a temporary close. Witness the publication within the current twelvemonth of two volumes of selections from his writings, and the increasing amount of attention recently being paid to The Clockmaker and its sequels in college courses in colonial literature. The present would seem, then, an opportune time for the appearance of a definitive account of his life and works. In the hope that it will be accepted as such, this study, originally written and approved some years ago in partial fulfillment of the doctoral requirements at Columbia University, is now offered to the public. If the conclusions which it reaches concerning the private character, the official services, or the literary merits of its subject, who for nearly a century has been generally regarded as worthy of high respect as one of the first. as well as one of the foremost, of Canada's men of letters, should prove in several ways disappointing to the patriotic pride of those of my fellow Canadians who may also become my readers, I can only state in defense of my findings that they are not other than what an impartial examination of all the evidence in the case has rendered inevitable. If the truth about Haliburton is not stranger than the fiction, it is decidedly more irresistible, and I have been constrained to pursue it even to an end that to some may look not a little bitter. This is far from being an anticipatory admission, however, that Haliburton as either the man or the writer is undeserving of a place of high honor in the annals of authorship in the British vii Viii PREFACE colonies. It is simply a candid warning, posted in advance, that in neither of the aspects specified does he emerge from the pages that follow in any such likeness to a national idol for school-boy worship as that in which, with all too frequent iteration and all too monotonous consistency, he has hitherto been represented. And if for having aspired, as I confess I have, to correct an egregiously false and unnecessarily long-continued impression of one of the more interesting and more colorful personalities of Canada's pre-Confederation era I should be charged with a wanton and ill-advised, not to say a disloyal, iconoclasm, I shall have to seek both my vindication and my complacency in whatever inferred, abetment of my efforts there still remains in a remark made to me by an eminent student of Canadian history and literature on an occasion when I was rather more apprehensive of where my investigation of the Haliburton legend was leading me than I am now that I have found out: "The day has since passed when Canadians need feel obliged to base their satisfaction in their country's literary achievement on anything but the facts." My endeavor has been merely to ascertain and to bring together all the facts available relevant to Haliburton and his contribution to colonial letters. Those who are disposed to reject the corollary must be prepared to challenge the authenticity of my data. In my treatment of matters so controversial as those involved in a study of Haliburton and his times are bound to be I have deemed it only fair to allow the witnesses I have examined to speak for themselves whenever possible; that is, I have in numerous instances presented their testimony in their own words, and often in extenso, exactly as it stands in the record. This procedure has imposed upon my readers a work of undue length, I know, but no process of abridgment or of paraphrase promised PREFACE ix to secure the unprejudiced hearing for my thesis which its implications demand. The quotations from Haliburton I have desired to reproduce with the utmost fidelity to the originals, including even their author's, or his printers', inconsistencies and idiosyncrasies in respect to spelling and pointing. But preparing my copy for the press at a distance of a continent's width from my sources I have more than likely fallen short of so meticulous a standard of accuracy. In quoting from Haliburton's contemporaries I have presumed on infrequent occasions to alter slightly the form, though never the meaning, of the text utilized. Obviously the task I have attempted has not been performed without the kindly help of others. Acknowledgment of much of the assistance I have received has been made as opportunity occurred throughout the course of my various chapters. I am under certain further obligations that call for particular mention here. To Carl Van Doren, of the editorial staff of The Century Magazine, and of the Department of English and Comparative Literature in Columbia University, I am indebted for his enthusiastic endorsement of my choice of a somewhat unconventional subject for an academic dissertation, and for the contagious interest with which he has followed and directed its development. To Professors W. P. Trent and G. P. Krapp, also of Columbia, my thanks are due for needed information, criticism, and advice. Professor Trent, moreover, has been dauntless enough to read through my proofs. My indulgent colleague at Reed College, Professor Barry Cerf, has rendered me the same arduous service. Between them they have caught, I trust, the worst of my " howlers ". Dr. A. W. H. Eaton, of Boston, and A. H. O'Brien, Esq., of Toronto, have placed at my disposal the indispensable results of their diligent questing in the fields, respectively, of Haliburton genealogy and of Haliburton bibliography. Without the freedom of the extensive Edwards collection X PREFACE of Canadiana in the library of my alma mater, Acadia College, Wolfville, N. S., granted me by former President G. B. Cutten and the librarian, Mrs. Mary K. Ingraham, most of my plans for research would have been brought to an abrupt and fruitless termination. Judge J. A. Chisholm, G. E. E. Nichols, Esq., and Mrs. Harry Piers, of Halifax, N. S., and Mrs. Laura Haliburton Moore, of Wolfville, have allowed me to make transcriptions from their invaluable possessions of manuscript material. Miss Annie F. Donohoe of the Legislative Library, Halifax, has courteously inducted me into the mysteries of the cataloguing and shelving of the special treasures entrusted to her keeping. The editors of the Halifax Acadian Recorder have admitted me to the rare and unusual privilege of being suffered to consult the complete early files of their unique newspaper. And R. L. Reid, Esq., K. C., of Vancouver, B. C., has been most generous in giving me access to his excellent private library of Canadian literature. More than to any or to all of these named I owe a debt of gratitude to Edna Whitman Chittick, my wife. Without her willing sacrifices in time. labor, and money, the writing of this book would never have been undertaken, much less carried to completion. At every stage of its progress, from beginning to end, she has been its soundest and most unrelenting critic. If the tardily finished product displays an appreciable competency of workmanship, something in excess of a wife's legal share of the credit belongs to her. For its shortcomings of whatever nature I alone am responsible. Doubtless they would have been fewer had I always submitted to uxorial suggestion as humbly as an indigent, and married, scholar probably should. V. L. O. C. July, 1924 CONTENTS CHAPTER I. II. III. IV. V. VI. VII. VIII. IX. X. XI. XII. XIII. XIV. XV. XVI. XVII. XVIII. XIX. XX. XXI. XXII. XXIII. XXIV. PREFACE................ ANCESTRY............... WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE.......... ANNAPOLIS ROYAL............... The General Description............. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY......... An Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS........... PROVINCIAL POLITICS.............. The Clockmaker, First Series........... The Clockmaker, Second Series.......... The Bubbles of Canada and the Reply to Durham The Letter-Bag and The Clockmaker, Third Series THE GEN-U-INE YANKEE............ "THE FATHER OF AMERICAN HUMOR".... PAGE vii 1 17 41 56 72 119 146 161 179 213 236 287 326 358 385 414 436 481 506 533 544 565 603 645 HALIBURTON AND HOWE.. ON THE SUPREME COURT BENCH SAM SLICK ABROAD...... The Old Judge......... The English in America... TALL TALES OF AMERICAN LIFE THE LAST OF THE CLOCKMAKING HOME TO ENGLAND...... MEMBER OF PARLIAMENT.... CONCLUSION.......................................................................................... BIBLIOGRAPHY - A. Haliburton's Works..... B. Reviews of Individual Works.......... 655......... 665 C. Biographical Sketches and Critical Articles... 667 D. Other Works Consulted............ 672 INDEX...................... xi.. 687 Thomas Chandler Haliburton CHAPTER I ANCESTRY FROM the time of its permanent occupation by the British, Nova Scotia has been more truly New England than New Scotland. Long before the founding of Halifax, which may be accepted as Great Britain's first serious attempt at colonization in Nova Scotia, the New Englanders had begun to play their part as moulders of the destiny of the peninsular province, and with raid and siege had interrupted and finally overwhelmed the rule of its French settlers. The idea of an English fortified port upon the present site of Halifax was itself of New England origin,1 having had its inception in the deeply felt need of the colonists of Massachusetts Bay and vicinity for an outlying naval base to the northward, of a strength sufficient to challenge and offset the menace of the French "Dunkirk of America" at Louisburg, an idea that was quickly forced into accomplishment following the return of Louisburg, previously captured by the New Englanders, to the control of France by the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. Even at the settlement of Halifax, in 1749, New Englanders were present,2 and within a year were numerous enough at the new provincial capital to call forth special 1 T. B. Akins, History of Halifax, 4. 2 A. W. H. Eaton, " Chapters in the History of Halifax," Americana, X, 276, 280, 281. 1 2 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON comment from one of the earliest memorialists of the city's beginnings.3 Thereafter their participation in Nova Scotian affairs became increasingly common, culminating, when measured in terms of dramatic and immediate result, in the thorough-going, though clumsily executed and inglorious, expulsion of the Acadians, in 1755. Then occurred, in the early sixties, as the result of the complete downfall of French power in northeastern America, what was in all probability the most important of New England's contributions to Nova Scotia's development,4 the coming of the New England planters, at the invitation of Governor Lawrence and his Council, to take possession of expropriated and vacant lands of the exiled Acadians. It was these New Englanders who, by their occupation of the French farms and townsites, first brought the country as a whole thoroughly under the domination of English colonial rule, and confirmed to its future inhabitants the enjoyment of those institutions and rights long recognized as the peculiar heritage of the British born, representative government and freedom of worship. From the time of this pre-Loyalist migration, despite the later addition of English, Scotch, Irish, German, and Acadian elements to its population, Nova Scotia has been the child of New England, and to this day the New England origin of a large portion of its people declares itself in their speech and manners, and in their very appearance, as well as in their religious and social customs, and their domestic and 8 W. C. Murray, "History of St. Matthew's Church, Halifax, N. S.," Transactions of the Nova Scotia Historical Society, XVI, 148, quoting Akins, History of Halifax, in reference to Rev. William Tutty. 4 A. W. H. Eaton, "Rhode Island Settlers.. in Nova Scotia...," Americana, X, 2, 3; Rev. W. O. Raymond, "PreLoyalist Settlements of Nova Scotia," Transactions, Royal Society of Canada, 1911, Sec. II, 36, 37. ANCESTRY 3 ecclesiastical architecture.5 The final stage in what may be termed the New Englandization of Nova Scotia was reached with the inflow of Loyalist refugees from the revolting colonies, during and at the close of the American War of Independence. The New England element among the newcomers was, of course, largely qualified by people from other sections, particularly from New York. Nevertheless the Loyalist migration to Nova Scotia served to strengthen to a marked degree an influence which was already strong there, though, to be sure, the New England Loyalists differed from the pre-Loyalists in disclosing monarchical rather than republican sympathies. The net result of the successive arrivals of New Englanders in Nova Scotia was that the province speedily became what it still remains-a new New England. Altogether, then, it was perfectly natural that the person most generally called the father of American humor6 should have been born at Windsor, Nova Scotia, rather than at, say, Windsor, Connecticut; and there is no occasion for wonder that the most popular delineator of the comic Yankee should have been himself a Bluenose. Thomas Chandler Haliburton's great-grandfather was one Andrew Haliburton, an obscure wig-maker of Edinburgh, Scotland.7 Beyond this Andrew Haliburton the 6 Archibald MacMechan, University Magazine, XVI, 574; A. W. H. Eaton, History of King's County, Nova Scotia, 207; James F. W. Johnstone, Notes on North America, I, 32; George Head, Forest Scenes and Incidents in the Wilds of North America, 22-24. 6 See below, 358 ff. 7 For this and many of the subsequent facts relating to the Haliburton family I am indebted to the kindness of Dr. A. W. H. Eaton of Boston, Mass. For the results of his exhaustive and accurate researches into the genealogy of the Haliburtons see his History of King's County, No a Scotia, 676-679, and The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, LXXI, 57-74. 4 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON family cannot with any certainty be traced.8 Early in life Andrew Haliburton emigrated to Boston, Massachusetts, and there on February 23, 1719, married Naomi, or Amy, Figg, who was probably the widow of John Figg. On De8 There is current, however, a persistent belief that the Haliburtons from whom Thomas Chandler Haliburton was descended were in turn descended from the Haliburtons of Newmains and Mertoun, a Scotch border family to which belonged Barbara Haliburton of Newmains, the maternal grandmother of Sir Walter Scott. (See H. J. Morgan, Bibliotheca Canadensis, 166; R. G. Haliburton, Haliburton: A Centenary Chaplet, 13, 14; Encyclopedia Britannica, 9th. ed., XI, 383, foot-note.; J. B. Atley, Lord Haliburton, 3; J. F. Freeman, The Canadian Academy, I, nos. 1, 2; etc., etc.) Positive evidence in support of such a connection is, nevertheless, strikingly lacking. William Haliburton, of Windsor, Nova Scotia, the grandfather of Thomas Chandler Haliburton, entertained this belief, and entered into correspondence with Walter Scott, "Writer to the Signet," the father of Sir Walter, with a view to investigating its validity, and also, doubtless, with a view to laying claim to certain Scottish property. The Memorials of the Haliburtons, drawn up by Walter Scott, "in answer to the inquiries of Mr. William Haliburton of Halifax [sic], Nova Scotia, who claimed a descent from the Haliburtons of Haddon " (head-note, p. 57), contains, however, not a word in confirmation of the wished-for relationship. Thomas Chandler Haliburton himself, so far as it is known, made no definite claim to the distinguished, or at least profitable, connection desired by his grandfather, though his fondness for allusion to his Scottish ancestors may have lent some color to the prevalent assurance concerning his descent. In The Attache, first series, II, 267, he speaks, indeed, of having visited "the residence of my forefathers" in Scotland, but in the same volume he presents the ridiculous figure of Sam Slick's father in search of a title, a serio-comic sketch that may very well have owed its suggestion to the disappointed antiquarian researches of his grandfather. Yet the fact that he shared his grandfather's conviction respecting his rights to a Scottish inheritance is pretty well established by a comment in his handwriting pencilled in the margin of a family copy of Sir David Erskine's Annals and Antiquities of Dryburgh at the point where mention is made of the ANCESTRY 5 cember 18, 1730, he married as his second wife, Abigail, daughter of Job and Mary (Little) Otis, of Scituate, a sister of Dr. Ephraim Otis, whose wife was a Rachel uncertainty as to what had become of one John Haliburton, his son George, and their posterity, whose fate it was necessary to learn before he could hope to be seriously considered as a possible heir to the coveted property: " It was known and purposely and intentionally misstated.-T. C. Haliburton." (Manuscript account of the Haliburton family, by Miss Georgina Haliburton, now in the possession of Mrs. Laura Haliburton Moore, Wolfville, Nova Scotia.) The common acceptance of the Newmains and Mertoun descent of the Nova Scotian Haliburtons seems to have been given its chief currency, however, by Thomas Chandler Haliburton's second youngest son, R. G. Haliburton, with whom the desire for illustrious ancestry was an obsession. But R. G. Haliburton never made good his pretensions to the descent referred to, although at one time he had in his possession documents that might have finally settled the matter, as appears in a letter of his written to the Rev. G. W. Hill, and printed in the Appendix of the latter's Memoir of Sir Brenton Halliburton: "'The Memorials' were commenced (Sir Walter says) by his father, in reply to some inquiries made by Mr. W. Haliburton, of Halifax, N. S. (my great-grandfather) about the year 1793. I had in my possession all the original correspondence, relating to a claim to property made by Mr. W. Haliburton, as the nearest heir to his uncle... and I can remember that the title to the property claimed turned upon a dispute as to an Elizabeth Davidson, who had been in possession of property claimed by Mr. W. Haliburton, somewhere on 'the Borders.' Sir Walter sent a copy of the 'Memorials' to Mr. Alexander Haliburton, the father of my brother-in-law, Alexander F. Haliburton; and some old relatives of theirs pointed out that there was a mistake as to the account of Elizabeth Davidson. They were not aware that she had been a subject of controversy between old Walter Scott and my great-grandfather-and of a correspondence which led to the commencement of the 'Memorials'." The fact that the results of the correspondence here mentioned were never made public seems sufficient confirmation of the futility of any claim to a traceable Scottish ancestry for Thomas Chandler Haliburton reaching farther back than his greatgrandfather, Andrew, the wig-maker of Edinburgh. 6 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Hersey, of Hingham. It was through this second marriage of Andrew Haliburton, and through that of his son William to his first cousin, Susanna Otis, that the Nova Scotian Haliburtons became related to the well-known James Otis of Massachusetts.9 Having acquired some property in Boston, Andrew Haliburton emigrated once more, this time to Jamaica, British West Indies. There he died, shortly after his arrival. His widow, who was now the mother of four children, returned to Boston, where she opened an inn or boarding-house, which before long was destroyed by fire. Undismayed, she went with her family, then consisting, it is said, "of her own four children, a daughter of her late husband by a former wife, and a daughter of that wife by a former husband,"10 to Narragansett, Rhode Island, and there made a second attempt at inn-keeping. At Narragansett, in the parish of St. Paul, she became, on October 18, 1756, the second wife of Edward Ellis, M. D., to whose children of his first marriage she had already been something of a step-mother, since they had been for some years members of her household. Of this remarkable woman, who had now added another to the triple-family group for whose upbringing she was responsible, the few intimate glimpses we possess deserve to be recorded, for it was in all probability to her that her numerous descendants owe their endowment of Yankee shrewdness and self-reliance, which is their most pronounced characteristic. " She was," writes 11 Mrs. Harriet Prescott, widow of William P. Prescott, " as I have heard, a smart, sensible, capable woman, well calculated to have the care and training of young people at that day "; 9 R. G. Haliburton, Haliburton: a Centenary Chaplet, 14. 10 Eaton, Hist. King's Co., 676. 11 In a letter quoted by Sarah E. Titcomb, Early New England People, 26. ANCESTRY 7 and again,12 " She made a good wife, and was generally considered to be a good mother to his [Edward Ellis's] children; that is, she was careful that they should learn all good housewifery, and be careful, industrious and exceeding neat. She held, as I have heard, a 'tight rein' over them,- showing no partiality to her own children,...." Of Dr. Ellis, her second husband, we know only that he had served as Surgeon-General to the Massachusetts troops at the first capture of Louisburg, and after the return of the Rhode Islanders' committees of investigation, sent to Nova Scotia as the result of Governor Lawrence's offer of the Acadian farms, had become interested in lands there near Windsor. Thither the Ellises removed in 1760 or 1761,13 taking part in the preLoyalist migration then in full flood from the eastern parts of Connecticut and Rhode Island, and settled in the township of Newport, between the Kennetcook and St. Croix rivers, where, by a grant issued in 1761, 58,000 acres were assigned to Edward Ellis "and others," 14 of which Ellis's share was 500 acres.15 Dr. Ellis received a further grant of 1000 acres in Horton in 1763.16 He died while on a business trip to Amsterdam shortly before 1769.17 Among the " and others " associated with Edward Ellis in the Newport grant was his step-son, William Halyburton,l8 who had followed his mother to Nova Scotia shortly 12 Ibid., 36, 37. s1 A daughter of Dr. Ellis had previously removed to Nova Scotia as the wife of a British officer. Titcomb, Early N. E. People, 27, 28. 14 Records, Crown Lands Office, Halifax, N. S. 15 Eaton, Hist. King's Co., 676. 16 Records, Crown Lands Office, Halifax, N. S. 17 Eaton, N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., LXXI, 61. 18 So the Crown Lands and other records consistently spell the name. It was this William Haliburton who corresponded with Walter Scott. See above, foot-note 8. 8 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON after his marriage to his first cousin, Susanna Otis. Of William Haliburton we have some interesting account, written by a relative, Miss Georgina Haliburton, in a manuscript now preserved in the library of the New England Historical and Genealogical Society in Boston. " William," she states, "was a boy of fine intellectual promise, but showed no special inclination to any one pursuit. He was fond of adventure, and a pioneer's life would have suited him well. He began the study of medicine and surgery; but when he was nineteen an expedition was formed against the Indians, and throwing aside his studies he went as a volunteer surgeon with a company of young men and joined the expedition. After some months campaigning he returned unhurt, and his mother, feeling great anxiety lest his love of adventure should increase, strongly encouraged his early attachment to his cousin Susanna Otis.... At last the marriage took place, and the couple had a long and happy married life." 19 The same manuscript records also a tradition concerning the coming of William Haliburton and his bride to their new home, and of the hardships to be endured before they had established themselves: "Landing at Halifax, probably from Boston, the young husband on horseback and his wife on a pillion behind him made the long journey to Newport over the rough forest road, and for eighteen months after.they reached Falmouth [i.e., East Falmouth, as Newport was originally called], with their two Negro servants from the household of Mrs. Haliburton's father, Ephraim Otis of Scituate, lived in tents. At last, however, they built a good two-story frame house, the foundations and posts of which were logs, the outside being clapboarded. They had brought with them 'eighteen months' provisions, tents, furniture, spinning wheels, a' loom, and farm implements,' to serve them on their plantation; but after enduring the hardships and trials of farm life as long as they could, the couple gave farming up and moved into the village of Windsor, where Mr. Haliburton entered on the more congenial study of law." 20 19 As quoted, Eaton, N. E. Hist. and Genecd. Reg., LXXI, 63. 20 As retold, Eaton, Hist. King's Co., 68, 69. ANCESTRY 9 Picturesque as is this account of the "long journey" from Halifax to Newport, it must be regarded as highly improbable. The condition of the provincial roads made such a ride almost an impossibility. It seems far more likely that the Haliburtons, like many of their fellow emigrants from Rhode Island, came by vessel direct to Windsor,21 or at least to some convenient landing place on the shores of Minas Basin. The removal of William Haliburton from Newport to what is now Windsor took place probably in 1763, for on May I of that year "William Hallyburton, Gentleman, exchanges his farm lot on 'the River Kennetcook, Letter F, number 3, the 2nd Division, with the Marsh and Dyke with the same' for the 'Farm lot, on the River Pisiquid, Letter A, No. 3 in the second Division, exclusive of the Dyke, Marsh and Village Lot drawn with the same' belonging to Jonathan Babcock." 22 The village of Windsor, in or near which William Haliburton now made his home, became the birthplace of three successive generations of Haliburtons. It was already a settled district of respectable antiquity, having been early occupied by the Acadians,23 who were quick to see its advantages, and to discover the fertility of the surrounding river lands. Very early, too, had the colonial officials at Halifax turned their envious eyes upon the locality, and before the arrival of the New Englanders had issued to themselves grants to the Frenchmen's lands. Following closely upon the final departure of the Acadians, the townsite, already including a military reservation and fortified post, was appropriated by those in convenient authority at Halifax.24 21 Eaton, N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., LXXI, 64. 22 Rev. H. Y. Hind, The Old Parish Burying Ground, 91, 92. 23 By whom it was known as Piziquid. 24 By the so-called " Councillors' Grant," 1759, and others. Eaton, "Rhode Island Settlers... in Nova Scotia...," Americana, X, 86, 10 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON It was the holding by a favored few of large areas of unoccupied land in Windsor that deterred for years the normal progress of its growth.25 William Haliburton was one of the first of the newcomers to gain a foothold in the community by taking advantage of the breaking up of these estates through the natural processes of sale, exchange, and escheat. In 1771, and again in 1772, he himself obtained grants, but only of i acre each, within the township limits, and much later, in 1814, held, in trusteeship with others, even the site of Fort Edward itself as a public market-place.2 In Windsor he practised law and there became eventually a Justice of the Peace,27 and Judge of Probate, the latter of which offices he held until his death, in 1817.28 He appears to have been a man true to his New England origin, keen and enterprising in business and an adept at inventing mechanical contrivances. But he was meditative as well as practical, taking a decided interest in abstruse scientific speculations and writing frequently, it is said, in both prose and verse, though with what success not a line of either remains to tell.29 William Haliburton was followed in his profession by his third child, William Hersey Otis Haliburton, born at Windsor, September 3, 1767. W. H. 0. Haliburton studied law in Halifax in the office of William Steam, Esquire, and soon became known as a lawyer of very considerable ability. He was appointed Clerk of the Peace for his native county of Hants in 1786, was made one of the two 25 Haliburton, Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia, II, 101. 26 Records, Crown Lands Office, Halifax, N. S. 27 See signature as such, collection of Beckles Willson, Windsor, N. S. 28 Eaton, N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., LXXI, 63. 29 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. ANCESTRY 11 pioneer King's Counsellors in Nova Scotia in 1817,80 and became a judge of the Inferior Courts of Common Pleas in 1824. From 1806 to 1824 he served with distinction as representative, first of his township and later of his county, in the provincial House of Assembly. Of his career as a legislator it has been said that he " exhibited statesmanlike ideas, a power of subtle reasoning and much eloquence." 31 The records in the office of the Registry of Deeds in Windsor and the Crown Lands Office in Halifax reveal the fact that as a man of business he was aggressive and successful in the accumulation of property. His public utterances and the measures he supported in the House of Assembly show him to have been a strict constitutionalist and a stickler for the letter of the law. " He would, he declared, never consent to deviate from the constitutional forms of the House,"32 and he held himself uncompromisingly to a similar rule of conduct in matters beyond the control of committees on parliamentary usage. He consistently differed from an increasing number of his colleagues throughout his twenty-four years in the House of Assembly in his attitude toward Nova Scotia's "Family Compact," the old Council of Twelve, in whose hands as the upper branch of the legislature there reposed a well-nigh tyrannical power. A staunch Tory, he made little or no concession to the party of reform, then beginning to challenge with some insistence the Council's abuse of privilege. W. H. 0. Haliburton was, however, far from an unenlightened legislator. He opposed a Governor's unwarranted proposal to increase the salary of the Provincial Treasurer, objected to giving the Council more power in the matter of appointing road com30 Israel Longworth, "Honorable Judge Robie," Acadiensis, I, 80. 81 Beamish Murdoch, History of Nova Scotia, III, 439. 82 Murdoch, Hist. N. S., III, 433, 434. 12 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON missioners, condemned the excessive taxes laid on the coasting trade of the province, protested against forcing the militia to travel long distances to drill, and, though arguing the legality of restricting marriage licensing to the Anglican clergy, expressed a desire for a law relieving dissenters from what he admitted was an unfair restriction. If he opposed the local assessment plan for the support of schools, it was because he knew his province too well to have any confidence in the successful working of the measure, and not through any lack of interest in the matter of popular education. And it was only his Tory devotion to the rights of property, the Church, and the King, that led to his, by no means unjustifiable, resistance to legislation intended for the relief of debtors, or for the support of a Presbyterian Academy, or for the admission of a Catholic to the House without oath.33 Despite what he, no doubt, considered a conscientious adherence, if not to duty, then to rights, W. H. 0. Haliburton left the House of Assembly as anything but a popular legislator. The session of 1824 was the scene of a bitter contest of words and ballots over a recommendation for improving the administration of justice in the Inferior Courts of Common Pleas, which as then constituted were composed of men other than professional lawyers, who served without pay. The proposal under discussion called for the division of the province into three districts, in each of which an attorney of at least ten years' standing was to be appointed at a salary of ~450 annually to preside over all sessions of the Common Pleas therein. The measure passed by the narrow majority of one vote. Three of its most determined supporters, of whom W. H. 33 For details of W. H. O. Haliburton's career in the Nova Scotian House of Assembly, see Murdoch, Hist. of N. S., III, and the Journal of the House of Assembly, 1806-1824. ANCESTRY 13 O. Haliburton was one, were immediately elevated to the newly created judgeships. Their opponents at once pointed to the fact that had the new judges not voted for the measure it would have failed, and the charge of selfish motives was made freely and openly. So unpopular was the result of this attempt to reform the courts that in the ensuing elections to fill the places in the Assembly left vacant by the new appointments not a lawyer was returned for any one of the three seats. The people of Nova Scotia never quite forgot their resentment against the reconstituted Inferior Courts of Common Pleas until their abolition by an act of the legislature in 1841. At Windsor the prevalent indignation vented itself in "great applause and a public dinner" given in honor of the member for the county of Lunenburg in the House of Assembly, Mr. Lot Church, "who had earnestly opposed the Judge bill." 34 W. H. O. Haliburton married, in 1794, Miss Lucy Chandler Grant. Three years later his wife, then a young woman of twenty-three, died, leaving an only child, Thomas Chandler Haliburton, born December 17, 1796. In this boy was mingled the blood of both Loyalist and pre-Loyalist forefathers. His New England descent has been traced. His mother was the daughter of a Loyalist officer, Major Alexander Grant, a Scotchman who had served under Wolfe at the siege of Quebec, and who had met his death fighting gallantly with the New York Volunteers at the storming of Fort Montgomery. The wife of Major Grant was a Miss Kent, of the family of the famous Chancellor Kent of New York. In an hour of war-time need, presumably coincident with the beginning of her widowhood, she and her family, a son and three daughters, had been taken under the protection of Colonel Joshua Chandler, a prominent Loyalist lawyer of New Haven, 34 Murdoch, Hist. N. S., III, 517. 14 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Connecticut, and a close friend of her husband. After the assault upon New Haven, in 1779, Colonel Chandler was forced to abandon his home there precipitately, and in 1783, with his own family and that of Mrs. Grant, sailed, probably from New York, for Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, where both families intended to settle. In March, 1787, they were summoned to attend the sittings of a commission on Loyalist claims at St. John, New Brunswick, and on board a schooner belonging to Colonel Chandler attempted to cross the Bay of Fundy. In a blinding snowstorm they were cast away on Partridge Island at the very entrance to St. John harbor. The rest of the story is told most graphically in the words of two inscriptions on a monument in the rural cemetery at St. John: "Here lyeth the Bodies of Col. Joshua Chandler, aged 61 years and William Chandler His Son aged 29 years who were shipwrecked on their passage from Digby to St. John on the Night of the 9th of March, 1787, and perished in the woods on the 11th of said month." "Here lyeth the Bodies of Mrs. Sarah Grant, aged 38 years, Widow of the late Major Alex'r Grant; and Miss Elizabeth Chandler, aged 27 years, who were shipwrecked on their passage from Digby to St. John on the 9th day of March, 1787, and Perished in the Woods on the 11th of said month." The suffering that Lucy Grant and her sisters experienced in such an ordeal as is here disclosed is fairly typical of much that the Loyalists who fled to Nova Scotia had to endure. It is little wonder that there remained with her son to the end of his life some marked, though varying, degree of animosity towards the American people.35 35 For details of the account of the Grant family here presented see Eaton, N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., LXXI, 66; Lorenzo Sabine, The Loyalists of the American Revolution, I, 308; W. A. Calnek-A. W. Savary, History of the County of Annapolis, 418, ANCESTRY 15 Six years after the death of his first wife W. H. 0. Haliburton married Susanna (Francklin) Davis, the widow of Benjamin Davis of Pennsylvania, and daughter of one of the wealthiest and most prominent early Nova Scotian officials. The Hon. Michael Francklin, Esquire, her father, was for years a member of His Majesty's Council, and from 1766 to 1776 served as Lieutenant-Governor of his province. At Windsor, Nova Scotia, he maintained one of his extensive estates, and there, from time to time, made his home.86 Upon the daughter of this influential occupant of high provincial offices, in all probability, devolved the duty of bringing up her young step-son. From what we can learn of her she was well fitted for the task. "A dear good woman," is the name she bore among the people of her second husband, who recalled her as one charitable to a fault and beloved of her friends and neighbors.37 From his father, a reasoned theory of Tory principle and practice, adhered to through a life-long professional career; from his mother, or rather from the associations connected with her, an unreasoning but cruelly implanted Tory prejudice and passion, doubtless accentuated by the training given him by his aristocratically bred step-mother, - such was the political heritage Thomas Chandler Haliburton received from his ancestry. Whatever came to him with his mother's memory in the way of political bias ran true to the traditional type of Loyalist politics, for the Loyalists were a specially selected group of Tory sympa419; W. C. Milner, "Records of Chignecto," Trans. N. S. Hist. Soc., XV, 77; R. G. Haliburton, Past aud Future of Nova Scotia, 38. 36 Eaton, "Chapters in the History of Halifax," Americana, XII, 68; "Rhode Island Settlers... in Nova Scotia...," Americana, X, 91; J. S. MacDonald, "Lieutenant Governor Francklin," Trans. N. S. Hist. Soc., XVI, 7 ff. 87 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 16 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON thizers. The bequest of party creed which he had from his father was something of an anomaly in a legacy left by the descendant of a thoroughly New England provincial family, since the pre-Loyalist New Englanders of Nova Scotia were generally of decided democratic tendencies. But there can be no doubt of W. H. O. Haliburton's complete acceptance of Tory principles, or of his undeviating adherence to them. They are proclaimed in his every act and utterance of which we have record. Toryism indeed came honestly enough into the possession of the young Haliburton. Were anything needed to intensify an innate disposition to accept his inheritance it was to be found in the social environment of his birthplace and boyhood home, and the peculiarly exclusive atmosphere of the schooling afforded him there. CHAPTER II WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE HALIBURTON and his father were born, so the former is reported, as having delighted to say, in the same house, twenty miles apart. The common explanation given to this enigmatic statement is that the house in which the two first saw the light was originally a settler's cottage built, "like a Norwegian lodge, of solid timber covered with boards," on the family grant at Douglas, Hants County, and later floated down the St. Croix river to Windsor, an explanation which must be rejected, however, owing to the simple geographical fact that the St. Croix does not flow to Windsor from Douglas. The enigma frequently attributed to Haliburton consequently falls under suspicion as apocryphal. But another story 2 concerning the events it refers to, still current at Windsor, makes it possible to believe the jest really his. According to this local tradition the house of Haliburton's father had its original site at " Red Bank," on the Avon river, below the present village of Avondale, where the Haliburtons held land, and from there was floated to a new location near the water's edge at Windsor. There it served as the family home for some years until abandoned for a larger and more comfortable dwelling across the street, which later became the old Victoria Hotel standing on the ground occupied by the present public-house of that name. This story is 1 R. G. Haliburton in Haliburton: A Centenary Chaplet, 15. 2 Reported by H. P. Scott, Esq., Windsor, N. S. 17 18 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON entirely credible, as the transportation of a wooden building from one point on the banks of the Avon to another would not be a task of much difficulty if undertaken in conjunction with the extraordinarily high spring tides of that river. The original log-built structure is said to have remained where it was in Haliburton's boyhood until 1897, when it, with its successor opposite, was destroyed by the fire that temporarily laid low his native town. The Windsor of Haliburton's youth was an inconsiderable community of not more than 1500 inhabitants, but, owing to its advantageous position at the junction of the St. Croix and Avon rivers, practically at the head of navigation on the latter, and to its location on one of the few highways leading from the country to the capital, it was already well on its way to becoming the prosperous countytown of more recent times. It lay clustering along the Avon between Fort Edward and Ferry Hill, or straggling loosely on either side of the roads to Halifax and Martock. Across the river, and to the north and south, stretched wide expanses of Acadian dyke-lands, long famous for their fertility. Immediately behind the town, and even within its limits, rose deeply pitted chalk hills interspersed and overlaid with carefully cultivated farms. And well beyond, encircling all, curved unevenly a chain of low lying, heavily wooded mountain slopes. Twice daily this varied scene was animated by the turbulent swirls of the incoming Fundy tides, and as regularly desolated by the mud flats left bare in their retirement. Of this tidal phenomenon, the most distinctive feature of the landscape, an English visitor to Windsor in the twenties 8 has written most agreeably: "Those whose olfactory nerves have experienced during the recess (of tide) the charms of Southend, Lymington, or the banks 3 Capt. W. Moorsam, 52nd Light Infantry, Letters from Nova Scotia, 216, 217. WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 19 of the Medway, will readily apprehend all the different stages of fever and ague to be the necessary consequence of a residence at Windsor. Such apprehensions are groundless; the mud of the Avon and St. Croix is the most genteel mud imaginable; it is, in fact, a solution of sand and clay, with a complexion surpassing that of the most vivid red-brick tenement inhabited by would-be-rural disciple of St. Dunstan's.....The mean rise of tide at Windsor is about thirty feet.... The consequence is, that rivers, appearing like arms of the sea at noon, are mere streamlets in the evening, and your horse will not wet his knees in crossing the brook where, a few hours previously, a frigate might have passed in safety." The town itself the same visitor describes as " pretty," an opinion which is corroborated frequently enough to make it certain that the place was early regarded as one of unusual comeliness. Another visitor of about the same time has written thus rhapsodically a description of Windsor that, in its way, conveys some idea of what the charms of the town must have been in the antecedent period of Haliburton's boyhood: "Windsor is really a sweet place, and would elicit admiration from one travelling in search of the picturesque through the glorious lands of roses.... The houses are built with much elegance and taste, many of them are embowered in trees, and several gardens neatly laid out filled up the intervals between, giving the whole a sweet, rich, and rural effect.... Grass fields were succeeded by grain, the fences were overhung with rows of willows, the farm houses were beset with orchards,...This is as fine a view as I would wish to cast eyes upon, and I was so charmed by it that (seized with a fit of rhyming) I sat down on my return, and by heaven I poetized a song to celebrate its powers...." 4 Ibid., 220, 221. 6 See R. M. Martin, History of Nova Scotia.., 37, 38; Lieut. E. T. Coke, Subaltern's Furlough, II, 113; A General Description of Nova Scotia, 72, 73; Haliburton, An Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia, II, 103, etc., etc. 6 "A Ride from Halifax to Windsor. From Captain Fotheringay to his friend Charles Escalon, Esquire." The Novascotian, Oct. 4, 1827. 20 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Comeliness, however, was not the only virtue upon which Windsor prided itself. The nearness of the place to Halifax, combined with its natural attractiveness and its obvious agricultural and commercial possibilities, quickly made it what it long remained, the resort of persons of wealth and official connection. "Seventy-five years ago the town of Windsor boasted that it had, on the whole, the most aristocratic society outside of England,"7 and earlier its society, less diluted by laboring and trading elements, though perhaps less self-conscious, must have been even more exclusively aristocratic. The town's reputation for carrying invidious social distinction to absurd lengths, and for displaying unwarranted affectation, is fairly set forth in the following amusing account of what is not denied to be the prevailing, though its writer protests it is an undeserved, opinion: "You must know then that the Windsorians are said to be ineffably polite -monstrously uncivil - and would sooner see the face of the old Gentleman with the cloven foot, than that of a town acquaintance, unless he be ' a diamond of the first water.'... In short discun4 illi, without the wealth of the city they have a mighty desire to ape its customs and manners, and... are said to overdo the thing quite. To ask a friend in a quiet way to take a mutton-chop is voted as quite unfashionable, and hence whenever you receive there a card with 'honour to dine, etc.' place it down as an offering to your station, & prepare yourself with silk stockings, and a cambric rag sprinkled with 'l'eau de cologne.' Every young fellow is starched to buckram- every Miss' attitude is screwed into gentility; and a dinner of pork and peas is followed in the evening with a display of plate and crystal, decorated with whips, flowing with custard or loaded with blamange swelling in alto relievo; if (be it fairly understood) they have invited a few youngsters to tea, and asked an Honourable's son or daughter to a quadrille. I was told that they measure rank to a hair's breadth, 7 Eaton, " Rhode Island Settlers... in Nova Scotia...." Americana, X, 83. WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 21 and that a shop-keeper's daughter would toss her head over the tailor's niece..."8 But Windsor's society was not merely one of frivolous entertainments and pretended superiorities. Among its residents were included families of solid fortune and good breeding, besides a very considerable element of genuine tone and culture which had been attracted to, and had continued in, the town by the establishment there of the first British colonial university, King's College, founded in 1789 and confirmed by Royal Charter in 1802, and of its forerunner by one year, the affiliated Grammar School, now the Collegiate School. But even this desirable addition to what was best in local society only tended to emphasize the original class differences and exclusions. For King's was both Tory and Anglican. It had been the gift to Nova Scotia, partly of the Loyalists, partly of the earlier Church of England colonists. The New York exiles of the American Revolution had brought with them to the province a desire to perpetuate upon British soil the old King's College, now Columbia, and had found there, on the part of the local Anglicans, a felt need for an institution of higher learning to train their sons at home, and a plan, dating back to 1768,9 for fulfilling that need. The mingled purposes of the two groups had resulted in the University of King's College at Windsor. It had been the hope of the most enlightened of its sponsors, Bishop Charles Inglis, formerly rector of Trinity Church, New York, that King's, as the only degree-granting institution in Nova Scotia, might serve as the university of the whole province, but his far-seeing plans were frustrated by the 8 " A Ride from Halifax to Windsor," The Novascotian, Nov. 1, 1827. 9 Akins, A Brief Account... of King's College, 5; Rev. Canon C. W. Vernon, Bicentenary Sketches, 121. 22 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON unyielding opposition of Chief Justice Blowers and the Judge of Vice-Admiralty, Sir Alexander Croke, bitter Tories, who would hear to nothing hut a strictly orthodox Anglican college, after the model of Oxford, and insisted on a statute requiring all matriculants to sign the Thirtynine Articles of the Church of England. It was a measure stupid beyond belief. It cut off King's College at the very beginning of its long record of usefulness from the support of the dissenting majority of Nova Scotians, and from all possibility of the larger service to the whole people then so badly needed, and committed Nova Scotia irrevocably to sectarian control of its higher education. But the King's of narrow sectarianism fitted well into the exclusiveness of Windsor. It brought with it, of course, besides an atmosphere of study and learning, limited to the favored few, the usual academic occasions for display and gaiety. "The College Encaenia, which always took place in June, was attended with great eclat. Thither came, in state, from Halifax the Governor and his staff, the Chief Justice, the Attorney General, the Bishop, and often distinguished army officers and their wives." 10 Even before the era of fully developed Encaenia brilliancies the examinations of the candidates for degrees and prizes were famous as proceedings of much dignity and distinguished attendance. Tom Moore, the Irish poet, was present in company with the Governor, Sir John Wentworth, at the first examination ever held at King's and wrote from Windsor "an ecstatic letter" giving an account of the affair.ll At the Grammar School 12 and later at King's College, 10 Eaton, " Rhode Island Settlers.. in Nova Scotia...," Americana, X, 85, foot-note. 11 Archibald MacMechan, "Halifax in Books," Acadiensis, VI, 109. See also Acadian Magazine, May, 1826, 245. 12 Which retained, " as late at least as 1845, that venerable heirloom, 'Lilly's Latin Grammar,' which had not a word of English WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 23 with the strictly applied religious tests and the political traditions of its old world prototype,13 Haliburton received his formal education. His ensuing professional career and the careers of most of his contemporaries at college, in the service of Church and State, reveal how thoroughly the doctrines of his alma mater were taught during the period of his attendance there, and how closely King's was at that time connected with its constituency of officialdom. Out of a student body, which in all his four years as an undergraduate taken together never numbered more than twentyfive, seven became clergymen of the Anglican Church,14 and counting twice those who held more than one office, one became a Chief Justice,15 five became Supreme Court Judges,16 one a Commissioner of Crown Lands,17 three Solicitor Generals,18 two Attorney Generals,19 and one a Master of the Rolls.20 Truly a course at King's was the highway to official preferment! Conspicuous among the cultural additions which the establishment of this Church of England college brought to Windsor's society was its faculty of two, to whom such an array of future achievefrom cover to cover and which was a familiar ordeal to boys long before Shakespeare was born."-R. G. Haliburton in Haliburton: A Centenary Chaplct, 15. 13 ".. it [King's College] remained out and out Tory in politics, and continued unchanged even after Oxford itself had long felt the influence of modern ideas." Ibid., 15. 14 Hibbert Binney, J. C. Cochran, J. T. Twining, G. F. W. Morris, Edwin Gilpin, J. W. D. Gray, and R. F. Uniacke. 15 Robert Parker in New Brunswick. 16 T. C. Haliburton, L. M. Wilkins, W. B. Bliss in Nova Scotia, and Robert and Neville Parker in New Brunswick. 17 S. P. Fairbanks, in Nova Scotia. 18 John Lawson, in Prince Edward Island, William End and Robert Parker in New Brunswick. 19 J. B. Uniacke and L. M. Wilkins in Nova Scotia. 20 Neville Parker in New Brunswick. 24 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ment 21 was indebted for its entire academic training and instruction. The President, who was also Professor of Divinity, Hebrew, and Mathematics, was the Rev. Dr. Charles Porter, an Englishman and an Oxford graduate, who spent thirty years at King's in heroic service to the cause of colonial education. Haliburton in an affectionate reference to him in The Old Judge said 22 that he educated "nearly all the clergy of this and the adjoining colony of New Brunswick, many of the judges, and most of the conspicuous lawyers of both provinces, besides many others, who are filling offices of importance, here and elsewhere, with credit to themselves and advantage to the public," and that he left Nova Scotia " carrying with him the respect and esteem of a people upon whom he had conferred the most incalculable benefit." The influence of Dr. Porter was ably supplemented by that of his colleague, the Vice-President of King's, the Rev. Dr. William Cochran, Professor of Grammar, Rhetoric and Logic, and lecturer on the Moral Sciences and Metaphysics, a native of Ireland who had taken his bachelor's degree at Trinity College, Dublin, and had taught at Columbia College, New York, before coming to Nova Scotia for ordination at the hands of a British Bishop in 1788. He held his appointment at King's from 1790 until 1831, during which time he "not only won for himself the esteem of the governors and officers of the College; but also the respect 21 Another prominent student of King's, Sir John Inglis, famous as the defender of Lucknow, has often been named among the contemporaries of Haliburton at College. (See Morgan, Bibliotheca Canadensis, 166.) Inglis left King's in 1833, eighteen years after Haliburton. Other authorities give James (later Sir James) Cochrane, who became Chief Justice at Gibraltar, and S. R. Fairbanks, a Master of the Rolls in Nova Scotia, as at college with Haliburton. Both were pre-charter students at King's. 22 I, 99, foot-note. WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 25 and love of the young men under his care, by whom he was regarded more in the light of a kind parent than a stern professor." 23 Haliburton matriculated at King's in 1810.24 In his previous attendance at the preparatory Grammar School,25 23 Akins, A Brief Account... of King's College, 59, 60. 24 The Calendar of King's College, 1871-72, 69. 25 To which period of Haliburton's life there may be unhesitatingly assigned the youthful pleasures described in the following interesting and evidently autobiographical passage set down as among Sam Slick's school-boy recollections in The Attache, second series, II, 112-114: "... don't the old schoolmaster rise up before you as nateral as if it was only yesterday? And the schoolroom, and the noisy, larkin' happy holidays, and you boys let out racin', yelpin', hollerin', and whoopin' like mad with pleasure, and the play-ground, and the games as base in the fields, or hurly on the long pond on the ice, or campin' out a-night at Chester lakes to fish- catchin' no trout, gettin' wet thro' and thro' with rain like a drown'd rat, —eat up body and bones by black flies and muschetoes, returnin' tired to death, and callin' it a party of pleasure; or riggin' out in pumps for dancin' schools, and the little first loves for the pretty little gals there, when the heart was romantic and looked away ahead into an avenue of years, and seed you and your little tiny partner at the head of it, driven in a tandem sleigh of your own, and a grand house to live in, and she your partner through life; or else you in the grove back o' the school away up in a beech tree, settin' straddle-legged on a limb with a jack-knife in your hand cuttin' into it the two first letters of her name-F. L., first love; never dreamin' the bark would grow over them in time on the tree, and the world, the flesh, and the devil rub them out of the heart in arter years also. Then comes robbin' orchards and fetchin' home nasty puckery apples to eat, as sour as Greek, that stealin' made sweet; or gettin' out o' windows at night, goin' down to old Ross's, orderin' a supper and pocketin' your —first whole bottle of wine-ohl that first whole bottle christened the man, and you woke up sober next mornin', and got the first taste o' the world, -sour in the mouth —sour in the stomach -sour in the temper, and sour all over; - yes, that's the world." 26 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON which was housed under the same roof as the college during part at least of his period as a schoolboy, he, no doubt, had become well acquainted with the devious ways of its then unfinished interior, a knowledge that possibly stood him in good stead during the games of hide-andgo-seek about the big chimneys which the students were not above playing with the president during the dark hours of the night.26 The college building in Haliburton's day had not even the few graces that later gave it some measure of attractiveness.7 Three long rows of uniform square windows and five plain doorways were regularly spaced across its otherwise unbroken front. The familiar portico and pillars were lacking. From the roof, which was perfectly flat, and a constant source of annoyance because of its leaking propensities, rose six large chimneys and a tall " pepper box" 28 cupola. The whole structure was indeed a good deal of a monstrosity and exhibited, as one who observed it remarked, "a strange architectural taste." 29 In fact it so much resembled a barracks that, as early visitors to Windsor amused themselves in telling, a young subaltern once marched his foot-weary command up to an entrance and demanded the orderly-room sergeant, only to be discomfited by the appearance of a dignified figure in cap and gown.30 It stood, however, in the centre of what was, but for itself, an altogether pleasing countryside, 26 Canon F. W. Vroom, "King's College a Retrospect," King's College Record, March, 1903, 69. 27 The original structure, commenced in 1790, still stood and still did duty as the main college building until Feb. 5, 1920, when it was completely destroyed by fire, with a resultant loss to the cause of Anglican education in Nova Scotia, and to the provincial heritage of historic landmarks, that is truly incalculable. 28 The phrase is Canon Vroom's, and apt. See article cited, 69. 29 Lieut. E. T. Coke, Subaltern's Furlough, II, 112. 80 Moorsam, Letters from Nova Scotia, 213. WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 27 a situation which Haliburton himself described 81 as " extremely pleasant, and the most eligible that could be selected... commanding in front a delightful view of the most improved and best cultivated parts of Nova Scotia," and in the rear, scenery " equally fine, the landscape being much embel[l]ished by the meanderings of the Avon and St. Croix." The interior of the college edifice must have been as inconvenient in its arrangement as its exterior was unprepossessing in appearance. Five " bays," virtually five entirely distinct wooden buildings, without the connecting corridor which in recent years extended along the rear, were covered by the one defective roof. In one of these non-intercommunicating compartments, the president maintained his private household. About the others were variously distributed quarters for the steward and his family, class-rooms, a library, a commons hall, that was utilized for various purposes besides that of a diningroom,32 and accommodation by way of "sitters" and "bedders" for forty-three students, the sitting-rooms being warmed by large open fire-places, for which the students had to provide their own fuel.33 As required by statute, Haliburton lived in college. Throughout his residence he occupied the suite that became, within the memory of Kingsmen now living, the long single room,34 on the first floor, just to the right of the entrance to the then newly completed middle bay, sufficiently near the ground outside, if one might conjecture, to enable him by the exercise of a little agility to evade the penalty of being 81 An Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia, II, 107. 82 See below, 31. 83 Minutes of the Governors of King's College, Book I, Sept. 14, 1807. 34 For many years used as the meeting-place of The Haliburton Club, a college literary society. 28 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON " gated." During at least part of his last year at King's Haliburton had for his room-mate Lewis Morris Wilkins, then and for long afterwards his fellow townsman in Windsor, and finally his successor on the Nova Scotian Supreme Court Bench."5 Despite the somewhat formidable list of colonial distinctions and official appointments which maturer years held in store for them, Haliburton's fellow Kingsmen were, we may be sure, as little concerned with their futures as high-spirited undergraduates of other times, and as little mindful of law and order. Like later students they did damage to doors and walls, and, also like later students, were assessed for it in equal proportions by the faculty.36 Though it was required that " The dress of all the Members of the University shall be plain, decent, and cleanly without lace, or other expensive or coxcombical ornaments,"37 a visitor to Windsor in the early days could report, as he might in these, that " but little attention appears to be paid in this respect to the rules of the college," and that he " saw some very unacademically dressed young men in green shooting jackets, standing at the hotel door smoking cigars and surveying each passenger as he stepped out of the coach." 38 But it must not be supposed that the rules were always held in disregard. Indeed Dr. Cochran was able to report in the temporary absence of Dr. Porter that "... everything has proceeded peaceably & well since the departure of the President the young 35 See below, 568. Since the date of Wilkins' matriculation is given as 1815 in the King's College calendars, he must have had merely a sub-Freshman standing during the time he shared Haliburton's rooms at college. 36 Minutes of the Governors of King's College, Book I, Sept. 14, 1813. 37 Statutes of King's College, 26. 38 Coke, Subaltern's Furlough, II, 113. WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 29 men have been respectful and regular in their behaviour and remarkably attentive without one exception to their studies; " whereupon the Governors resolved that the VicePresident should communicate to the students the very great pleasure " that their attention to their studies, and good behaviour have afforded." 39 Another rule less likely honored in the breach than the regulation respecting student dress declared that, " No member of the University shall frequent the Romish mass, or the meeting houses of Presbyterians, Baptists, or Methodists, or the Conventicles, or places of Worship of any other dissenters from the Church of England, or where Divine Service shall not be performed according to the Liturgy of the Church of England, or shall be present at any seditious or rebellious meetings." 40 Something of the same austere paternalism that characterised the restrictions formerly placed about religious worship at King's characterized also other features of life there, which was subject to strict regulation in even the minutest details. " The students," we read in the minutes book of the Governors,41 " shall provide their own tea and sugar for breakfast and the steward' is to provide them with Bread and Butter and Milk in their own rooms. The steward is also to provide the students in the College with dinner every day at 3 o'clock. The Steward is also to provide the students with supper in the College Hall which is to consist of Bread and Milk, or Bread & Cheese and spruce beer;... The Steward is to provide sufficient fuel and candles for the College Hall he shall not be bound to keep a fire latter [sic] than 9 o'clock," at which hour, or at 8:30 from October 39 Minutes of the Governors of King's College, Book I, Dec. 17, 1814. 40 Statutes, 29. 41 Entry of Sept. 14, 1807. 30 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON to April, the bell rang for roll-call. Immediately after dismissal the students were required to go to their rooms and to bed, " having first extinguished their candles, and secured their fires." 42 Failure to obey this rule must have met with prompt discovery since the President was directed to make a round of inspection "a half hour later to see that all was well.."42 Another indication of oldfashioned rigor of control, mingled in this case with evidence that the college man's present-day easy acceptance of superiority was not unknown in former times, is revealed in the decree that, "The President will regulate what allowance shall be made by the students to the steward for making their fires cleaning their shoes carrying water &c.&c." 43 Further details of King's College life are afforded by the same pleasant source which has already given us two intimate glimpses into Windsor's early manners and customs.44 Though the picture here presented is actually of a date later than Haliburton's day at King's, changes came so slowly there that the conditions it discloses can hardly have been different from those but slightly anterior: "You and I, mon ami, who have dipped into the waters of the Isis know what it is to be a Cantab, but by Jupiter, & every other of the Dei majores who sat upon Olympus, our rooms were nothing to those of the Oxford of Windsor. On entering the great hall and advancing up stairs, the most curious daubs met the eye, & would have set as wise a lad as Moses Primrose a gaping. The walls were literally covered with hieroglyphics-figures executed after the rudest fashion-scraps of rhyme fit for love or war42 Vroom, "King's College: A Retrospect." King's College Record, Feb. 1903, 50. 43 Minutes of the Governors of King's College, Book 1, Sept. 14, 1807. 44 "A Ride from Halifax to Windsor," The Novascotian, Oct. 4, 1827. WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 31 or morceaux of humour- after a fashion The stairs were sadly dilapidated; the lads' chambers showed both a want of plastering and paint, and to crown all they swear that they are sometimes driven from their studies by the rain dripping on their heads. Demosthenes' cave was a palace to it. Pope was right after all -in these elaborate letters of his he tells you that the pursuit of learning is suffering in the flesh. When introduced into the great hall, I was somewhat surprised when informed that it served at once for a dining room, lecture hall and chapel.46 The Professors read here both prayers and plays —sermons and satires-The Bible and Horace; and the lads after having a hash of theology sit down very leisurely to discuss a round of beef —all of which appeared to me thrice wonderful indeedI The library is extensive, and contains the standard works of English literature. Gray the poet who thought that paradise consisted in 'reclining on a sofa, and reading novels,' could catch here no glimpse of heaven; but the student who wishes to improve himself, and to store his mind from the golden heaps of history & science, would find ample supplies to gratify his taste. But will you believe it-the rules are so exclusive-that no student can procure free admittance to the library, and the use of the countless volumes, till he has taken his degree.46 For three years after matriculation no lad can touch a volume unless he apply personally to the President-and although they all say that the Rev. Gentleman is more than kind when waited upon, yet they do not like to draw upon his kindness by applying too often. There is also a very fine assortment of philosophical apparatus,-but it is at present, something like the gold bags of Moliere's miser (an old simile this to be sure) 'shining and useless.'...47 The courses here are copied in some degree from those of Oxford 45 And in Haliburton's day as Convocation Hall as well. 46 Actually true in Haliburton's time at King's. See Vroom, "King's College: A Retrospect," King's College Record, March, 1903, 69. 47 An editorial foot-note appended at this point in the article here quoted indignantly denies the lack of scientific instruction at King's and probably is right about the matter since the Governor's minutes contain this entry for Sept. 11, 1815: "Resolved that, a small philosophical apparatus is necessary for the present use of the students..."-just too late to be of any benefit to Haliburtonl 32 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON and Cambridge. The attention of the students is chiefly directed to the acquisition of a perfect and intimate acquaintance with the classics, and of course with classical learning —they eat logic from some old worthy, who wrote a hundred years ago, take morals from Cicero, and are well drilled in Euclid.48. "These studies are not 48 The sort of training King's provided is exemplified by this list of books, "read under the two learned doctors" of the faculty in Haliburton's fourth year at college: "Curriculum or Course of study at King's College, Windsor, in 1814. First Class Works Read Under the President Greek Testament, Grotius, Holy Bible, Euclid, Algebra, Xenophon, Cicero's Orations et de Amicitia et Senectute, Horace, Virgil's Georgics, Sophocles. Books Read Under Dr. Cochran Sophocles, Longinus, Horace's Art of Poetry, Virgil's Georgics, Logic, Cicero de Officiis, Cicero de Oratore, Burlemaque on Natural Law. Second Class Greek Testament, Grotius, Homer, Horace, Xenophon's Memorabilia, Demosthenes, Cicero's Orations and de Amicitia, etc. Logic, Cicero de Oratore, Cicero de Officiis, Xenophon's Cyr., Juvenal. Euclid, Wood's Algebra. Third Class Logic, Cicero de Oratore and de Officiis. Fourth Class Sophocles. Homer, Horace, Logic, Cicero de Oratore. Quintilian added by order of the governors, to be read by Dr. Cochran in future as an introductory book to rhetoric." (Akins, A Brief Account... of King's College, 73.) When one considers this list in'connection with the fact that the lectures of Dr. Cochran, for a time at least, were delivered in Latin, one can only express surprise that the soundness of Hali WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 33 such as I should approve of for my children, and I should say that like the manners of a stiff old buckram country squire, they are behind the age —but let me do justice to this seat of learning- it furnishes admirable scholars, and makes superb gentlemen. D —n me, they do pick up the air of the tonthey twirl a ratan with as graceful an air as a Bond-street lounger, take snuff so as to display a cornelian, tie a neckcloth which would charm even Mr. C- of Hyde Park Alley himself, and come into the room with a Oh-I-know-who-I-am sort of air that would electrify any Miss in her teens...." Haliburton graduated from King's in 1815.49 The reputation which, according to authorities of a much later date, he is said to have borne at college for excellence in scholarship finds no confirmation in any contemporary report. The usually accepted account of his academic successes represents him as having secured " various prizes, and different marks of esteem from his professors," and of having graduated with distinguished honors, and concludes: "At an early period of his studies he evinced a taste for the pursuit of literature. In a closely contested trial for the prize for an English essay, 'On the Advantages derived from a knowledge of the Classics '- in which competition many were engaged -Mr. H. came off victorious. Besides this prize, he obtained other honours for his skill in composition." 50 No official record of these prizes remains. It is true that a prize for composition in English on the subject "The Utility of Classical Learning," was burton's Latinity could ever have been called in question (as it was in The Literary Gazette, XXXVII, 344). There is less reason for wonder that he made his Sam Slick slightly contemptuous of instruction in the dead languagesl 49 Morgan, Bibliotheca Canadensis, 166, is in error in giving the date 1824. See King's College calendars. 50 Morgan, Bibliotheca Canadensis, 166. See also Duncan Camp bell, Nova Scotia in its Historical Mercantile and Industrial Relations, 334. 34 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBTRTON offered by the Governors of King's during Haliburton's residence, but apparently for competition at the Grammar School, although, since the entry in the minutes book is confused, it may have been meant for the college. The winner is not named. As it seems to have been a custom to repeat essay competitions on the same subject from time to time at the Grammar School, it may be that Haliburton wrote a successful essay on the subject named, when a student there. If so, he" as too young to warrant any special significance being attac as an indication of either his inclinations or ability. Haliburton did, however, carry off a prize for proficiency in Greek.51 What the other marks of esteem he received from his professors were we are at a loss to know. It is certain that he received none at all from the Governors. Their record as to scholarship awards is clear beyond possibility of mistake. Haliburton competed on two occasions for vacant appointments, and on each occasion failed.52 If he ever graduated with honors, no positive evidence of the fact now exists. There is every probability, then, that Haliburton as a student followed the well-established tradition of genius at school by failing to distinguish himself for over-brilliance in scholarship. The reputation which he is said to have borne as a college wit, however, and which he carried with him into later years,53 one may be confident from his subsequent career, was altogether merited. We know, too, that he carried away from his alma mater sufficient of the love of learning to be eager to pursue his college studies beyond graduation, since on 51 A four-volume edition of Homer, illustrated by Flaxman. Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 62 Minutes of the Governors of King's College, Book I, Sept. 9, 1811, and Sept. 10, 1812. 63 See F. B. Crofton in Haliburton: a Centenary Chaplet, 89. WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 35 September 24, 1816, the Governors' minutes 5 record that, "The Secretary read a Petition from Mr. Thomas Haliburton A.B. praying that he might be permitted to keep his terms for his Master's degree without residing in College," a laudable ambition which the Governors unceremoniously thwarted by resolving, " That the Secretary do inform Mr. Haliburton that the prayer of his petition cannot be granted as he has assigned no reason why that indulgence should be extended to him."55 Although from Haliburton himself there have come down to us no intimate personal recollections of his term-time activities at King's, there has been several times reprinted 56 one of his letters, written at a date near the close of his life and giving an account of a memorable experience, recalled from the summer vacation of his third college year. Its interest lies not merely in its connection with a spectacular though unimportant event of the War of 1812, but in the light it throws upon the inquisitive enterprise and venturesomeness of Haliburton the youth. GORDON HOUSE, Isleworth, June 1st, 1864. My dear Sir George, [Broke-Middleton] 57 I have received your note requesting me to state my reminiscences of the arrival at Halifax (Nova Scotia) of H. M. S. the 54 Book II. 65 A peremptory refusal tardily made up to Haliburton in 1851 when King's College awarded him the honorary degree of M.A. 6B See J. G. Brighton's Admiral Sir P. V. B. Broke, a Memoir, 225-233; the same author's Admiral of the Fleet, Sir Provo W. P. Wallis, 103 ff; Murdock's Hist. of N. S., III, 354 (in part copied from a review of Brighton's Broke in the Pall Mall Gazette); and the Halifax Acadian Recorder, Centennial Number, Jan. 16, 1913. 67 At. the time this letter was written sole surviving son of Sir P. V. B. Broke, commander of the Shannon when she fought her famous duel with the Chesapeake off Boston Harbor. 36 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Shannon with her prize the Chesapeake. I have much pleasure in complying with your wishes; but more than fifty years having elapsed since that event, I can now only recall to my mind some few of the leading incidents that at that time impressed themselves strongly on my youthful imagination. The action was fought on the 1st of June, 1813, and on the Sunday following the ships reached the harbour of Halifax. I was attending divine service in St. Paul's church at that time, when a person was seen to enter hurriedly, whisper something to a friend in the garrison pew, and as hastily withdraw. The effect was electrical, for, whatever the news was it flew from pew to pew, and one by one the congregation left the church. My own impression was that there was a fire in the immediate vicinity of St. Paul's; and the movement soon became so general that I, too, left the building to inquire into the cause of the commotion. I was informed by a person in the crowd that " an English man-of-war was coming up the harbour with an American frigate as her prize." By that time the ships were in full view, near George's Island, and slowly moving through the water. Every housetop and every wharf was crowded with groups of excited people, and, as the ships successively passed, they were greeted with vociferous cheers. Halifax was never in such a state of excitement before or since. It had witnessed in former days, the departure of General Wolfe for the attack on Louisburg, with a fleet of 140 sail, and also his triumphant return. In later years the people had assisted in fitting out the expedition, under Sir George Provost, for the capture of Martinique and Guadaloupe, but nothing ever excited the Haligonians like the arrival of these frigates.... It soon became known in Halifax that the ships now approaching were the Shannon and the Chesapeake, and that the former was in charge of Lieutenant Provo Wallis, a native of Halifax, who was in temporary command in consequence of the severe and dangerous wounds of her gallant captain. This circumstance naturally added to the enthusiasm of the citizens, for they felt that through him they had some share in the honour of the achievement. No one could have supposed that these ships had been so recently engaged in mortal combat, for, as they slowly passed up to the dockyard, they appeared as if they had just returned from a cruise-their rigging being all standing and wholly uninjured.... As soon as possible after the vessels had anchored near the WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 37 dockyard there, a young friend and myself procured a boat and pushed off, to endeavour to obtain permission to visit them. We were refused admission to the Shannon, in consequence of Captain Broke requiring quiet and repose on account of his severe wounds; but we were more fortunate in obtaining access to the Chesapeake. Externally she looked, as I have already said, as if just returned from a cruise; but internally the scene was one never to be forgotten by a landsman. The deck had not been cleared (for reasons of necessity that were obvious enough) and the coils and folds of rope were steeped in gore as if in a slaughter-house. She was a fir-built ship, and her splinters had wounded nearly as many men as the Shannon's shot. Pieces of skin with dependent hair, were adhering to the sides of the ship; and in one place I noticed portions of fingers protruding, as if thrust through the outer wall of the frigate; while several of the sailors, to whom liquor had evidently been handed through the portholes by visitors in boats, were lying asleep on the bloody floor as if they had fallen in action and had expired where they lay. Altogether, it was a scene of devastation as difficult to forget as to describe. It was one of the most painful reminiscences of my youth, for I was but seventeen years of age, and it made upon me a mournful impression that, even now, after a lapse of half a century, remains as vivid as ever.... I observed on the quarter-deck the figure of a large man wrapped up in the American flag. I was told it was the corpse of the gallant Captain Lawrence, who fell in the discharge of his duty, and whose last words are reported to have been, 'Don't give up the ship.' He was buried at Halifax, with all respect due to his bravery and his misfortune. With the subsequent history of the Chesapeake you are better acquainted than myself. She remained a long time in the harbour of Halifax, and finally proceeded to England, where she was broken up.... The name of Broke will ever be regarded with pride and pleasure by that service of which he was so distinguished a member; and it must be a great gratification to his family and friends to know that feeling is fully participated in by a grateful country. I am, my dear Sir George, Yours always Th. C. Haliburton. 38 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON What occasioned the youthful Haliburton's presence in Halifax at the time of the dramatic happenings narrated in this letter was, in all probability, the necessity of his being there to await the departure of H. M. S. Buffalo, aboard which he was then about to take passage for England. Almost immediately after the commencement of this, the first of his many voyages across the Atlantic, there occurred an incident en route concerning which Haliburton afterwards related one of those stories possibly too good to be true, but -always good enough to repeat. Whether based on any substantial amount of fact or not, however, it demonstrates that the eager I-want-to-know inclination which had impelled him to examine the grewsome sights on the deck of the Chesapeake with such keen-eyed observation as a boy, and which was to be his most distinguishing trait throughout his entire career as a man, was not the only Yankee characteristic to which he might properly lay claim as the lineal descendent of his New England forebears: In the year one thousand eight hundred and fourteen, I embarked at Halifax on board the Buffalo store-ship for England. She was a noble teak-built ship of twelve or thirteen hundred tons burden, had excellent accommodation, and carried over to merry Old England a very merry party of passengers, quorum parva. pars fui, a youngster just emerged from college. On the banks of Newfoundland we were becalmed, and the passengers amused themselves by throwing overboard a bottle, and shooting at it with ball. The guns used for this occasion, were the King's muskets, taken from the arms-chest on the quarter-deck. The shooting was execrable. It was hard to say which were worse marksmen, the officers of the ship, or the passengers. Not a bottle was hit: many reasons were offered for this failure, but the two principal ones were, that the muskets were bad, and that it required great skill to overcome the difficulty occasioned by both the vessel and the bottle being in motion at the same time, and that motion dissimilar. I lost my patience. I had never practised shooting with ball; WINDSOR AND KING'S COLLEGE 39 I had frightened a few snipe, and wounded a few partridges, but that was the extent of my experience. I knew, however, that I could not by any possibility shoot worse than everybody else had done, and might by accident shoot better. "Give me a gun, Captain," said I, "and I will show you how to uncork that bottle." I took the musket, but its weight was beyond my strength of arm. I was afraid that I could not hold it out steadily, even for a moment, it was so very heavy —I threw it up with a desperate effort and fired. The neck of the bottle flew up in the air a full yard, and then disappeared. I was amazed myself at my success. Everybody was surprised, but as everybody attributed it to long practice, they were not so much astonished as I was, who knew it was wholly owing to chance. It was a lucky hit, and I made the most of it; success made me arrogant, and boy-like, I became a boaster. "Ah," said I coolly, "you must be born with a rifle in your hand, Captain, to shoot well. Everybody shoots well in America. I do not call myself a good shot. I have not had the requisite experience; but there are those who can take out the eye of a squirrel at a hundred yards." "Can you see the eye of a squirrel at that distance?" said the Captain, with a knowing wink of his own little ferret eye. That question, which raised a general laugh at my expense, was a puzzler. The absurdity of the story, which I had heard a thousand times, never struck me more forcibly. But I was not to be put down so easily. "See itI" said I, "why not? Try it and you will find your sight improve with your shooting. Now, I can't boast of being a good marksman myself; my studies" (and here I looked big, for I doubted if he could even read, much less construe a chapter in the Greek Testament) "did not leave me much time. A squirrel is too small an object for all but an experienced man, but a large mark like a quart bottle can easily be hit at a hundred yards- that is nothing." I will take you a bet," said he, "of a doubloon, you do not do it again." "Thank you," I replied with great indifference; "I never bet, and besides, that gun has so injured my shoulder, that I could not, if I would." 58 58 The Attache, first series, I, 3-7. 40 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON And so by the exercise of his rightfully inherited gift of prudence Haliburton was enabled to retain for the rest of the voyage the reputation he had come by largely as the result of his similarly acquired gift of effrontery. With these two opposing qualities, as surprisingly commingled as here, and in about the same proportions, he went through life. CHAPTER III ANNAPOLIS ROYAL THE rebuff which Haliburton received at the hands of the Governors of King's College in the matter of his request to be permitted to qualify for a master's degree out of residence probably had no other effect than to hurry him the sooner into the study of his future profession. His initial period of law training, received in his father's office at Windsor,l was interrupted, however, shortly after it began, by another voyage across the Atlantic. It may have been with some idea of continuing his law studies in the old country, following the example of his college friend, later his colleague on the Nova Scotian Supreme Court Bench, Judge William Blowers Bliss,2 that Haliburton made his second journey to England; but if so, he was soon involved there in affairs that must have pretty effectually precluded study of whatever sort. By the summer of 1816 he had met, wooed, and won for himself a wife, and, while still a minor, had returned with her to Windsor. The account of Haliburton's marriage as given by his son3 points to the event as an incident singularly romantic. His bride, Miss Louisa Neville, was the orphaned daughter of Captain Lawrence Neville of the Second Life Guards and Nineteenth Light Dragoons. On the death of her father she had been taken into the home of a certain Captain Piercy, an entire stranger to her, to whom her father had written from his 1 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 2 Trans. N. S. Hist. Soc., XVII, 24. 3 R. G. Haliburton, in Haliburton: A Centenary Chaplet, 18, 19. 41 42 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON death-bed, under the impression that he was writing to an old friend of the same name, asking that he accept his,daughter as a temporary ward until the return of her brother from India. As it chanced, this Captain Piercy was a relative of Haliburton's, and while visiting him it was that Haliburton had made Miss Neville's acquaintance, and, with characteristic impetuosity, became engaged to and married her. He must have accepted his youthfully undertaken responsibilities with becoming seriousness, however, and upon his return to Windsor have applied himself studiously to completing his professional qualifications, for we find that by 1820 he had been admitted to the Bar, and shortly after had begun his law practice at Annapolis Royal.4 In his new environment Haliburton found a social atmosphere and a political tradition precisely calculated to continue the influence of Windsor and King's College. As the former capital of the province, Annapolis Royal still clung to something of its old-time air of superiority. "In the earlier days of the century," writes one of its local historians,5 "the town presented the appearance of an aristocratic, and conservative community. The leading residents were descendants of former provincial officials, either military or civil, and occupied a high place in provincial society." The predominating element among the influential residents of the town was Loyalist, or of Loyalist descent, an element which in the case of Annapolis Royal included men who had been "of high social and 4 Calnek-Savary, Hist. of the Co. of Annapolis, 419. There is some uncertainty as to the exact date of Haliburton's removal to Annapolis Royal. Calnek-Savary (work cited, 419) give the date as July, 1821, but Eaton, N. E. Hist. and Geneal. Reg., LXXI, 70, points out that Haliburton's children continued to be baptized at Windsor until July, 1823. 6 W. M. MacVicar, in A Short History of Annapolis Royal, 109. ANNAPOLIS ROYAL 43 official rank and importance," 6 and who had early been forced into an arrogant and haughty class-solidarity by a peculiarly bitter hostility on the part of the pre-Loyalist minority.7 The Toryism of the town found its counterpart in that of the surrounding country, particularly towards the westward as far as Digby, where the population was almost exclusively Loyalist. More important as a formative influence upon Haliburton than the conservatism of its society and politics were the romantic and historic associations of the place, the ancient Port Royal of their most Christian Majesties, the Kings of France. It was the oldest town save one in North America, and had probably passed through more momentous changes of fortune than any other in the New World. On every side were mementoes of its earlier importance as the site of a pivotal fortress, and of the successive investments it had withstood. The scene of nearly every event of military consequence in Nova Scotia, and the seat of its former government under both French and English rule, it was the one place in which the future historian of the province needed to find himself. Nor, as we shall see, was Haliburton long in responding to its spell. Very soon after his arrival in Annapolis he had begun to manifest that interest in the romantic and the picturesque which became so strongly developed a characteristic of his later manhood, and to busy himself with researches into the history and resources of his province to an extent that must have interfered seriously with the successful establishment of his law practice. Though favorably situated 8 at the head of the beauti6 Savary, History of the County of Annapolis Supplement, 37. 7 Ibid., 37, 38. 8 A provincial poet of the time speaks of Annapolis Royal as a "Delicious spot, by Nature wholly blest." "Western Scenes," Acadian Magazine, Jan. 1826, 242. 44 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ful basin which bears its name, the town during the period of Haliburton's residence is spoken of in a contemporary description 9 as a place of little importance. Possibly the population included as many as a thousand people, but business was not thriving, and the houses were generally old and decayed.l0 One faded survival of its former color and animation persisted in the custom of ringing the courthouse bell during the session of the circuit court, when the sheriff and his constables headed a sort of procession which escorted the presiding judge to the court-room on each day of the sitting.10 Life in such an atmosphere must have been placid in the extreme. The only connections with the outside world which disturbed its general air of sleepiness were with Digby, and St. John, New Brunswick, by weekly packet. A post ran regularly as often to Halifax, but until the establishment of a tri-weekly stage line to the capital in 1828, Annapolis was pretty well isolated from the rest of the province. One would hardly expect this to have been the place to present any very favorable opportunity to a struggling young lawyer, yet we are informed that Haliburton had not long been settled there before he had acquired an extensive and lucrative practice and become a popular advocate.n In the course of his busy life at Annapolis Royal as a rising attorney and an eager inquirer into provincial history, he succeeded in establishing cordial relationships with various persons throughout the countryside, some of which in time developed into delightful intimacies. Particularly fortunate, in respect to its results upon his literary work, then about beginning, was his friendship with Judge Peleg Wiswall of Digby, an Associate Justice of 9 A General Description of Nova Scotia, 85. 10 Acadian Magazine, Jan. 1826, 243. 11 Calnek-Savary, Hist. of Co. of Annapolis, 419. ANNAPOLIS ROYAL 45 the Supreme Court and Master in Chancery. To him Haliburton owed not only much badly needed information, but inspiration, sound advice, and generous assistance as well. As a young man Judge Wiswall had come with the Loyalist refugees into what later became Digby County, and so had been able to observe and share in what was practically the beginning of its history. Though an ardent Loyalist partisan, he had won his place on the Bench by sheer ability demonstrated both as a lawyer and a legislator. He was a man of keen practical common sense, whose advice upon the most diversified matters was sought by his colleagues, and others, and accepted as that of a shrewd man of affairs who delighted in the careful consideration of every one of the innumerable questions propounded to him. Not a detail of the social and industrial progress of his county seems to have escaped either his notice or his comment. Happily, along with the habit of close observation, he had formed the habit of preserving every scrap of writing that fell to his hands. Among what still exists of these manuscript treasures 12 are a number of letters written by Haliburton, from which may be gleaned some slight and scattered revelations of the latter's activities and opinions at the outset of his professional career. Many of Haliburton's letters came into Judge Wiswall's possession through being addressed to G. K. Nichols, Mrs. Wiswall's nephew, who as a boy had been brought to Digby from his home in Connecticut, and had grown up as a son in the Wiswall household. One of these under date of March 30, 1826 [?] contains, besides some trifling law matters, Haliburton's private confession in regard to a distressing aspect of Nova Scotia's climate, which in public 12 Now in the possession of G. E. E. Nichols, Esq., Halifax, N. S. 46 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON he never ceased to defend against the prevailing notion,13 though that, so it happened, corresponded very closely to his own, as here revealed! After expressing pleasure that Judge Wiswall had decided not to undergo the discomfort of a month of March trip across the Bay of Fundy to St. John, Haliburton continues with his admission, the perennial truth of which any Nova Scotian will appreciate: "...the season of the year is too far advanced, to render a voyage either safe or pleasant, and I believe after 25 every body more or less feels the effect of our Springs. I do not mind the winter but really I dread the Spring, the cold is so raw & damp, so penetrating, & yet heavy on the nerves, the ground so wet & chill, and the weather so variable, that I swear I feel in a shiver from 10th March to 10th May." In the same letter Haliburton makes interesting mention of one of his neighbors at Annapolis, Judge Thomas Ritchie, who had been associated with W. H. O. Haliburton in the Assembly in the defense of the detested Judges Bill of 1824,14 and had been another of the three to accept appointment under the provisions of that bill. Judge Ritchie, like Haliburton's father, had served a long and honorable term in the Assembly, and was, it is said, ambitious of election to the speaker's chair.15 His acceptance of office in the Courts of Inferior Pleas had, probably to his disappointment, cut him off from all possibility of obtaining what in those days was a coveted honor. Haliburton's comment is much in the manner of his soon to be freely talked about House of Assembly oratory: "Ritchie," he writes, "has not yet returned, that unfortunate man has his heart lodged in the house, it was the temple in which 13 See Hist. & Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 352, 353. 14 See above, 12. 15 He was defeated by Simon Bradstreet Robie in a contest for the Speakership in 1817. Israel Longworth, "Honorable Judge Robie," Acadiensis, April, 1901, 74. ANNAPOLIS ROYAL 47 he worshipped the Speaker's chair, the idol of his ambition, and now that he has lost his cast, he wanders through the gallerys [sic], and strays in the porticoes, & lingers on the steps, as if loth to lose sight of an object, which is perhaps dearer to him, in proportion as it is unattainable. I believe he is to be pitied, for he is far from being a happy man, therefore like a true christian I will pray for a herd of swine, to receive the seven devils with which he is possessed - " Towards his neighbor it is scarcely probable that Haliburton had always felt quite the same pious charity, since some time before Judge Ritchie's disappointment had moved him to pity he had written to Nichols: 2 Jany. 1822. "My dear Sir Coming away sooner than I expected I forgot to return your silver pencil case & knife which I will send by some safe conveyance at my return. I wrote to Mr. Ritchie stateing [sic] to him that the language he had made use of was of a nature impossible to be passed over, and that I required him to retract his words as fully and as amply as he had made them. He answers that he has no recollection of having made use of the expressions, but that if he had it was unintentional and he was sorry to have occasioned me any uneasiness on that account. Adieux, Yrs. Thos. C. Haliburton" Please to present for me the compliments of this season to Mrs. Nichols." Something more than the square-jawed aggressiveness Haliburton must have shown in the incident here referred to is displayed in the peremptory tone of this note to one Asa Porter, accused of unlawfully harboring another man's wife, a tone well known in later years when Haliburton's word had become a terror to evil-doers: 48 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Annapolis, 11th Jany. 1822. "SirI understand that you have not sent home Specht's wife and children, under the pretense that you wont turn them out of your house. Now Sir unless you immediately cease to harbour them I will give yourself and wife a trip to Halifax for your amusement under a writ of habeas corpus. Tho. C. Haliburton." Further evidence that the youthful barrister was the father of the mature judge-for Haliburton had another reputation on the Bench besides that of a jovial jester —is afforded in the impatience of the last sentence of another letter to Nichols, dated March [?] 22, 1829, "Do for gods sake get Judge Uniacke to settle that affair of Hoyts," and in the irascibility of, "...Look into the Mondays paper and you will see an advertisement of John Lawsons, which of all the damn foolishness of that damn foolish man is the most foolish." 16 The letter referring to Judge Ritchie and the Speakership concludes with some further comment on local politics and on the provincial legislature in which Haliburton was soon to play so prominent a part: "There is very little doing here just nothing —By the byeElection. Poor Annapolis County, how fallen, when John Bath, Wm. Daveis [?], William Roachl7 &c. &c. are to be candidates. They may talk as they will of Nova Scotia but it is deteriorating — the assembly is not to be compared with what it was, the bar 16 From an undated letter. A John Lawson had been a fellow matr'culant with Haliburton at King's. 17 William Roach was elected to the House of Assembly as a colleague of Haliburton in 1827 from Annapolis County. Previously he had served a term as member for Digby township, and was again member for the county from 1830-1836. He was an earnest reformer. ANNAPOLIS ROYAL 49 not to be named with the old one, for law, sense, manner, liberality, or anything good, and the state of society, I mean in the Country, will not be so good these 100 years to come, ask the Judge if he does not think so. Remember me most kindly to him, & Mrs. Wiswall... In haste sincerely yours, T. C. Haliburton." To Judge Wiswall, Haliburton, upon his return from attending court in Halifax in 1825,18 gossips entertainingly upon various court-room dignitaries then and afterwards occupying prominent places in Nova Scotia's judicial history: "... There was but little to do at the January Term- but 4 trials I think two only of which had anything of Interest — Forresters & Cross —The latter notwithstanding all that has appeared in the papers was a very mysterious affair, and the Judge Hal[l]iburton 19 when he discharged Mr. Cross told him 'he returned to an honorable profession an unspotted man & free from suspicion' I confess, (and I took down for amusement every tittle of evidence) that I could see nothing to remove the suspicion arising from the blood traced to Cross' door from the body (which was distinctly proved) nor the suspicion arising from the declaration of two surgeons that the wound exactly corresponded to that made by a regulation sword —nor could I see any contradiction in the Testimony-tho there was nothing to convict there was much to induce suspicion and many think the officers saw what they deponed to 1st turning away of deceased-the Black-woman what she swore to the 2nd thrusting out of the house and that the unfortunate man returned a third time & received his death when no human eye witnessed it-His bloody cloaths were an appalling spectacle - 18 The letter is undated but endorsed 1825 in Judge Wiswall's handwriting. 19 Brenton, later Sir Brenton, Halliburton, Judge of the Supreme Court, afterwards Chief Justice. A famous namesake, but not a relative of Thomas Chandler Haliburton's with whom he was often confused. See below, 415, foot-note. 50 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Of news there is but little -Government have given to Newfoundland a constitution —Sir Thomas Cochran (formerly a Captain in the navy at Halifax to the leniency of whose command 7 Gibbets at Maugers beech [beach] bore testimony) goes out Governor, and Mr. Brenton whom you know a relative of Judge Stewart 20 Secretary with salary of 600 a year-the office of Atty General was offered to him but declined on account of poor health, or disinclination for the fag of office -that place is still vacant, and might it is thought be obtained by some of the Seniors of the bar of N. S. if aided by Sir James Kempt 21- Mr Archibald 22 is speaker elect, the others having withdrawn their pretensions to the chair, he has returned in good health and spirits, has many anecdotes of the old world, seen much of it as Sadler crossed the English channel in a balloon - He saw Paris, touched at Brussels, spoke Strasburg, provisioned at Whitehall, &c. He seems to feel some uneasiness from the dissatisfaction felt at the Island of St. John 23 on the score of non residence, which his natural affability and knowledge of men & manners has not been sufficient to allay. There is an apparent jealousy also among his fellows at the bar at Halifax of his continuing in practice, and he will hereafter hear some wag inform their honors on the bench that his Lordship the Chief Justice of Edward Island is wrong in Law &c. &c. I saw Mr. Fitzgerald Uniacke24 who informed me he saw Robie 25 who was all delight at what he saw, he had been in Loc-Katrine with the Lady of the Lake, in Rob Roy cave with Scotts novel in his hand, had viewed Melrose by moonlight with Marmion &c. 20 James J. Stewart, formerly Solicitor-General, then Judge of the Supreme Court and member of His Majesty's Council. 21 Governor of Nova Scotia, 1820-1828. 22 S. G. W. Archibald, who by a curious legal anomaly had been elected to the Speakership of the House of Assembly in Nova Scotia while still holding the Chief Justiceship of Prince Edward Island. 23 The name given by the French to Prince Edward Island. 24 Rev. G. F. Uniacke, rector of St. George's church, Halifax, N. S., fellow student of Haliburton's at King's. 25 Simon Bradstreet Robie, then Solicitor-General, later the first Master of the Rolls in Nova Scotia and Judge in Chancery. An eminent jurist and a particularly intimate friend of both Judge Wiswall and Haliburton. ANNAPOLIS ROYAL 51 Everything he saw increased his wonder and avidity to travel, and he intends not to return until the latest period of the Autumn. There is a report in town which I hear Judge Hal[l]iburton takes much pains to contradict & which all his friends deny, that at Liverpool while in the presence of Adl Murray, he was as usual exalting the American navy & publishing the disgrace of the british, when he was roughly handled by the admiral, and taught to know the difference between being in the great world and a little circle of friends like Lawson and Maynard at Halifax. It is characteristic of the paradox of the one & the violent temper of the other I cannot help thinking there is some truth in it. The big [?] subjects-Bank -Subenacadie Canal- & Schools will occupy the house this winter. Some people anticipate a stormy session, but I think it will pass over with a little scolding. The two alterations of the Halifax Road- that from finerty's to fulton['s] avoiding the Hills by Mitchell['s], and that by Shaw's tavern are two of the best ever made in this province. A rout [sic] has been explored to avoid Ardoise and the great hill 7 miles from Windsor which will be effected next summer, when there will be no hill except at Mount Uniacke between Halifax & Falmouth Bridge. With best respects to Mrs. Wiswall & Miss Wiswall in which Mrs. H. begs to join I am Dear Sir Yours very truly, Tho. C. Haliburton." Upon the question of immigration to Nova Scotia, an important matter in the early years of the last century, and upon the perversity of what he pleased to term "the mob," Haliburton had already at Annapolis Royal reached an opinion that differed in no essential from that which he held afterwards; 26 but his opinion at that time as to the future relations between Nova Scotia and the United States can be regarded as nothing short of sheer apostasy in the light of his later pronouncements of the same subject. There are Nova Scotians still, however, who would 26 See Hist. & Stat. Acct. of N. S., 11, 359, 360. 52 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON endorse his earlier views as the sounder. Writing to Judge Wiswall on January 7, 1824, he says: "Upon the subject of Emigration I agree perfectly with you that we are ourselves too poor to maintain or receive the paupers of other Countries, and that Low Irish —disbanded Soldiershungry adventurers, & Chesapeake blacks 27 are not the class of emigrants we want, and that so far from courting their approach to our shores we have already many who could be spared from among us. But I conceive that a limited emigration of mechanicks & practical farmers possessing a property of from 500 to 1500 pounds each would be of infinite service to us. Such is the feeling of the mob of all countries, that if we wanted Emigrants, the proper method to obtain them would be instead of courting them & holding out alluring prospects, to circulate through Great Britain Printed Copies of a Law forbidding any access of strangers as settlers to our shores. I am of opinion that such a law (not enforced) would soon people our wilderness with Inhabitants. There is an event (if a politician I could calculate its approach with as much exactness as an astronomer fixes the period of an eclipse) which we all know must happen. I mean the conquest or purchase of all the colonies by the United States (I am only expressing thoughts not wishes). Till then no great change will take place in Nova Scotia, however much people may flatter themselves. But the day of our transfer marks the moment of our manhood. We shall then become an Integral part of a large nation, and start in life with an immense estate entailed by nature on our posterity. I question whether our iron, lead, manganese, ochre, lime, grindstone, sulphur, slate, coal, plaster & freestone, our healthy climate, capacious and numerous harbours, situation amid the fishing &c will not then render us the most popular part of America. We have everything that America wants & we want all it raises. Till that period all these resources must inevitably be idle." In Abbe Jean-Mande Segogne, cure of the French Acadians in the district of Clare at the extreme western 27 All of which classes were already represented among Nova Scotia's immigrant population. ANNAPOLIS ROYAL 53 end of Digby county, Haliburton had another close friend,28 to whose influence must be attributed much of his sympathy and enlightened attitude towards the unfortunate first settlers of Nova Scotia. Abbe Segogne was in a very real sense the father-confessor of his people. He was their priest, law-giver, notary, and judge. It was he who preserved their memorials, wrote their deeds and contracts, and taught them to avoid litigation and strife among themselves, and to live at peace with their English neighbors. He had been driven out of France by the revolutionary excesses of 1790, and had taken refuge in England, where he learned to admire English laws and customs.29 Coming to Clare in 1799, he remained among his charges there until his death in 1844, exemplifying not only the piety and good cheer which he taught but also the urbanity and polished manners of a gentleman of the old French school which continued to distinguish him even in the backwoods of Nova Scotia. In the House of Assembly Haliburton paid a generous, if somewhat declamatory, tribute to the labors of this gracious and devoted leader of the French Acadian people.30 By a stroke of good for28 "L'auteur de Sam Slick prenait un interet infini a la conversation de ce pretre frangais, dont la vie, les idees, les habitudes contrastaient si singulierement avec tout ce qui l'entourait. De son cote le cure de Sainte-Marie [Abb6 Segogne] estimait et aimait ce protestant convaincu, eclaire, libre de prejuges, cet esprit fin, sarcastique, d'une gaiete toute gauloise." H. R. Casgrain, Un Pelerinage au pays d'Evangeline, 354, 355. 29 "N'en soyons pas surpris, le Pere avait conserve de l'hospitalite recue en Angleterre un souvenir imperissable, et il disait a un de ses amis, avec un tressaillement de bonheur: 'J'aime beaucoup le peuple anglais,' et il le disait dans la langue de ses bienfaiteurs...." P. M. Dagnaud, Los Frangais du Sud-Ouest de la Nouvelle tcosse, 169, 170. 30 See below, 87-92. 54 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON tune a letter 31 has recently come to light which discloses the felicitous relationship between the two men. It has a further interest in that it discloses also a principle of professional conduct greatly to the credit of the younger. [To the Abbe Segogne] "My dear SirI had the pleasure to receive your letter respecting the suit between Davourt and Loucette. Since then one of the Robisheaux has come to me for a writ. It is not however by any means proper for me to hurry these poor people into a law suit, without a more intimate knowledge of their case, an inspection of their titles, and a sight of the award & bond of Reference. Law is extremely expensive, whoever loses the suit will lose much money, and as they look to me for candid advice, I think I should be deficient in that candour, if I encouraged a precipitancy in the plaintiff to rush into a costly suit, before I can well understand the grounds of his claim. Much will depend upon his tittle [sic] being definite, including the spot in question without reservation, and much more on the length of the possession. As neighbours I could wish they will do me the justice to suppose that this delay originates in a sincere desire, to serve them effectually and not in any negligence of their interest. Will you do me the favour, my dear Sir, to convey this my opinion to them, and at the same time to explain to them that the expense of bringing witnesses from so great a distance32 will make the suit more expensive to the losing party than they have any idea of, and in short more than the land is worth. I wish to see the plaintiff at Digby Court and hope he will bring me all the papers, when I will give him a writ for next Supreme Court, which will decide the affair before the period of mowing. 31 Accidentally found between the pages of a volume in the Edwards Collection of Canadiana, Acadia College Library, Wolfville, N. S., by the librarian, Mrs. Mary K. Ingraham. The letter is printed here with the permission of Major J. P. Edwards, Halifax, N. S. 82 From Clare to Annapolis, since the Supreme Court at this date did not sit at Digby. Novascotian, Feb. 26, 1829. ANNAPOLIS ROYAL 55 When I was last in Town33 I saw some of your friends there who were making enquiries after your health- the book you saw advertised in the papers, is strange to say, nothing more than a reprinted copy of the old one, which an unprincipled bookseller has pirated from me, thinking [it] no doubt a very clever thing to avail himself of the profits of my labour. I knew nothing of it till I saw it advertised. The second edition which I am preparing will take nearly a year to complete in a way to satisfy myself, as soon as it is printed I will send you a copy. Mrs. Haliburton desires to unite with me in begging you to accept the assurance of very great esteem Yours most truly, Tho. C. Haliburton. 5th Sepr. [?] 1825." 33 I.e., Halifax. CHAPTER IV THE. GENERAL DESCRIPTION AN interest other than that arising from its revelation of the mutual cordiality existing between Haliburton and the Abbe Segogne attaches itself to the letter which closes the last chapter, - an interest occasioned by its connection with a problem of previously undetermined authorship. To one not knowing when this letter was written, its reference to the book, " advertised in the papers," could suggest only the well-known incident of Bentley's pirating the first series of The Clockmaker in 1836.1 The parallel between the established facts of the one and the apparent facts of the other is perfect. Yet the date of the letter, 1825, prevents our regarding the two as identical. What is really puzzling about the bibliographical information contained in this letter, however, is that, so far as has been admitted, heretofore at least, the earliest date of any of Haliburton's works is that of his History of Nova Scotia, 1829. Unless, then, one can believe that Haliburton made the almost incredible mistake of misdating his communication to the Abbe by not less than four years, we are forced back upon the necessity of finding a hitherto unacknowledged work of his to square with the closing remarks of the letter. The earliest fairly complete bibliography of Haliburton, published by Henry J. Morgan in his Bibliotheca Canadensis in 1867, furnishes the most obvious clue upon which to begin one's search. First among its 1 See below, 200ff. 56 THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 57 items is listed a pamphlet, since repeatedly denied to be by Haliburton, "A General Description of Nova Scotia. New ed. Halifax, 1825." This pamphlet, which may be fairly enough described as a handbook of information concerning Nova Scotia's history and geography for intending immigrants, is almost as familiar to students of Canadiana in its first edition, dated Halifax, 1823, as is that of 1825, which Morgan records. That the second of the two editions was pirated may be conjectured from the fact that some of the less obvious revisions on the errata sheet of the first were missed in the reprinting, something that should not have happened if the author had supervised or controlled the republication. The dates of the two editions, then, and the possibility of the second being pirated, make it a natural assumption that the General Description was the work Haliburton was referring to in his letter. If one may add to this the further assumption that the revision upon which Haliburton informed the Abbe Segogne he was at work eventually appeared as the former's Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia in 1829, then the General Description needs only to have been advertised in the press previous to September, 1825, to meet the test of the data which Haliburton's letter sets forth in respect to his unnamed work. On July 16, 1825, the Halifax Acadian Recorder displayed the following announcement: "This day is published in 8vo. price five shillings, a new edition of a General Description of Nova Scotia, illustrated by a new & correct Map. Printed at the Royal Acadian School in 1823 -reprinted for & sold by C. H. Belcher...."2 2 This identical announcement appears also in the Halifax Free Press for September 13, 1825 (the only number available for examination), dated, like that of the Acadian Recorder, July 16, 1825. 58 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON An easy solution of our problem of authorship would seem to be, therefore, the acceptance of Morgan's entry at its face value and the General Description as actually Haliburton's. Unfortunately, the value of Morgan's entry is completely vitiated by the fact that he also credits the General Description to Walter Bromley, a retired British officer of Halifax, Nova Scotia, favorably known there as the founder and headmaster of the Royal Acadian School. This double entry in the Bibliotheca Canadensis,3 coupled with the inclusion in the list of Haliburton's works of a book unquestionably not his,4 has so discredited Morgan as a trustworthy bibliographer, that, while the suspicion that Haliburton might have written the General Description has perhaps never wholly disappeared,5 the pamphlet was not again seriously considered as his until it was once more assigned to him in the bibliography of his works prepared by John Parker Anderson of the British Museum for the memorial volume, Haliburton: A Centenary Chaplet, published by the Haliburton Club of King's College, in 1897, under the editorship of A. B. de Mille. This reassignment of the General Description to Haliburton led Professor de Mille to investigate the reopened question of its authorship, with the result that the new bibliography appeared in print with the following note appended to its entry of the two editions of the pamphlet: "This work is wrongly ascribed to Haliburton in Morgan's Bibliotheca Canadensis, where it is also assigned to its real author - Walter Bromley, Master of the Royal Acadian School, Halifax, 8 47. 4 " Kentucky: a tale, London, 1834, 2 vols.," a London edition of The Harpe's Head, a Legend of Kentucky, Philadelphia, 1833, by James. Hall, a Judge in the Circuit Court of Illinois. 5 See Acadian Magazine, May, 1827, 434; Justin H. Winsor's Narrative and Critical History of America, VIII, 176. THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 59 N. S. The book was published anonymously, but bears marked internal evidence of its authorship. —A. B. de M." 6 Up to the present de Mille's correction of Anderson has been held, without a sign of dissent, to have definitely settled the question of who wrote the General Description. In reality, the " marked internal evidence " upon which Professor de Mille relied in naming Bromley the author of the work in question is of the slightest sort: the statement on the title page of each edition of the pamphlet that it was printed at the Royal Acadian School, and, in the preface to each, a reference by the author to his " residence of more than fifteen years in the country " (presumably taken as about corresponding to the length of Bromley's sojourn in Nova Scotia up to 1823 7) and to his "repeated journeys into the interior," introduced as a warrant for his undertaking, which he tells us was "to dispel the errors which have been circulated about the province, and to give a true description of its climate and productions, its agriculture and trade, its public institutions and laws, etc., etc." 8 As a fair set-off to these statements, the General Description contains two other passages which may be adduced 6 Reproduced in A. H. O'Brien's "Haliburton, A Sketch and Bibliography," Trans. Royal Soc. Can., 1909, III (sec. II), 62. Reprint of same, 1910, 22. 7 The General Description, 160, foot-note, gives 1813 as the date of the establishment of the Royal Acadian School. Murdoch, Hist. N. S. III, 347, states that Bromley had been in the country previously "as a captain and paymaster of the 23rd regiment." This previous residence with that which followed 1813, might have amounted to more than fifteen years by 1823, though George Mullane, Esq., of Halifax, N. S., supplies the information that the actual date of Bromley's first arrival in Halifax was 1809. 8 Gen'l Descrp. 5, Edition of 1823. Other references to the Gen'l Descrp. are also to the first edition. 60 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON as "internal evidence" equally "marked," and pointing to precisely the opposite conclusion: (1) "Attempts have been made by one or two individuals to excite an interest in the public in behalf of these people [the Nova Scotian Indians], but they have not been as successful as could be wished. Walter Bromley, Esq., has taken a very active part in their favour, and has made several appeals to the humanity of the public, but he has had a strong prejudice to contend with." 9 (2) "Beside private establishments Halifax contains a very respectable Grammar School, a large school for the Catholics, one on Bell's and another on Lancaster's System of education. The latter is extremely flourishing, being under the active superintendence of Walter Bromley, Esquire, on the half pay of the 23d Regiment of foot. The unwearied and disinterested attention of this Gentleman, to the arduous duties of a large public School, principally composed of young children, the neatness, regularity and order he has introduced in the establishment, the interest and paternal care he manifests for the morals and education of his scholars, and the immense number of children he has taught the rudiments of education, entitle him to the highest credit and respect." 10 Whoever else it may have been, it was certainly not Walter Bromley who wrote the second of these passages. Upon internal evidence alone, then, the authorship of the General Description remains as undecided as ever. Fortunately, it can be decided on evidence of another sort. Haliburton's correspondence with Judge Wiswall furnishes the desired key to the riddle. Writing from Annapolis Royal under date of January 7, 1824, Haliburton lays before his friend the plans for his History of Nova Scotia, then well under way. In the course of his explanation he says, concerning that portion of the projected work which finally became volume two of the History: 9 Ibid., 56. 10 Ibid., 160. THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 61 "The Last chapter will be a completion of the 11th in the Pamphlet and is intended to answer a double purpose. First it shews the manner in which our little Colonial machine is put into motion, the objects that attract the attention of its Government the mode of conducting Public business and the gradual and progressive Improvement of the Colony. Secondly it shews the actual state of the Country its revenue and the purpose to which it is applied together with the Customs feelings and habits of the people and admits room for the introduction of such general remarks and observations as may not so properly be given under any of the preceding Chapters."11 An examination of the eleventh chapter of the General Description shows it to contain a brief discussion of the development of Nova Scotia, particularly under its last four governors, mention of the building of roads, the increase of revenue, and the general advance of prosperity and well-being in the colony, as well as information respecting various customs connected with settling and earning a living there, and the steps being taken to promote agriculture and manufacturing. Evidently, here is material that lends itself perfectly to the " completion " which Haliburton had in mind in outlining his History to Judge Wiswall. There is, of course, no hint in Haliburton's disclosure that "the Pamphlet" mentioned is his own, nor in the remark, made later in the same letter, that " the new will embrace most of the old work." Still later in this letter, however, occurs another statement in obvious reference to " the Pamphlet" in which Haliburton declares to the Judge: "Indeed you are almost the only person, Goldsmith 12 11 The full context of the excerpts from the Haliburton-Wiswall correspondence presented in this chapter may be found below, 126 ff. 12 This may have been any one of three grand-nephews of the Irish poet, Oliver Goldsmith, Henry, Oliver, and Benjamin M., all of whom were at various times residents of Annapolis Royal. The namesake of the elder Oliver had something of his grand 62 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON excepted, who knows who the author of that work is, or that I am still employed on the same subject." This, indeed, is ground for strong presumption that "the Pamphlet" is really Haliburton's, though it falls just short of the explicit assurance needed to justify an unqualified assertion to that effect. Taken in conjunction with the information afforded by the letter to Abbe Segogne, however, it is clear proof that before 1824 Haliburton had written a work on the history of his native province. And since we have just seen that the General Description contains material that could well have made it the very pamphlet of which the eleventh chapter was to be carried to completion in the Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia, there is also ground for an equally strong presumption that the General Description, "the Pamphlet," and Haliburton's early work on the history of his province were one and the same. Evidence that puts the matter beyond the possibility of a doubt is forthcoming in another letter from Haliburton to Judge Wiswall, written in December, 1824. Speaking still of the plans for his History, Haliburton makes this statement: " I have in the old-work a chapter entitled 'Sketch of the administration of Sir Geo. Prevost-Sherbrooke-Dalhousie and Kempt."' A glance at the heading of the eleventh chapter of the General Description shows that it reads: "A brief Sketch of the State of the Province during the Administration of Sir George Prevost, Sir John Sherbrooke, and Earl of Dalhousie, and Sir James Kempt." With the discovery of this agreement between the actual and quoted title, the identity of the General Description, "the Pamphlet," and Haliburton's "old-work" is established, and the question uncle's genius, and is well-known among the earliest Canadian poets for his "The Rising Village," a creditable emulation of the more inspired "Deserted Village" of his famous relative. THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 63 of their authorship settled beyond the possibility of a doubt. Were further evidence needed to support this conclusion, it could be found in the complete or partial resemblance existing between various passages of the General Description and the Historical and Statistical Account. Considered by themselves, it might be argued that these merely prove Haliburton to have been little more than an industrious plagiarist, but in the light of his own statements they must be accepted as proof that in the preparation of his History he made a perfectly natural and commendable use of an earlier work also his. The material from the one falls too naturally into place in the other to afford any evidence of plagiarism. What could not possibly be explained as mere ingenuity of arrangement, appears simple enough as the result of expanding a slight and immature work into one projected on a much larger scale, and worked out to a considerable degree of completeness. Quite as conclusive evidence that both are by the same hand is afforded by the variations in the borrowings as by their resemblances. In every case the changes made, when not demanded by the new context, reveal the author correcting, or attempting to improve upon, his original expression. Upon this point the testimony of a single pair of parallel passages will suffice: 13 13 For convenience of those who may care to investigate this matter further the following reference list to the other parallel readings in the General Description (edition of 1823) and the Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia (edition of 1829) is appended: Gen. Descrp. Hist. N. S. p. 11, 11. 2-19 I, p. 78, 1. 30-p. 79, 1. 16 p. 43, 11. 14-36 II, p. 295, 1. 11-p. 296, 1. 2 p. 43, 1. 42-p. 44, 1. 2 II, p. 301, 11. 28-31 p. 62, 11. 4-19 II, p. 11, 1. 31-p. 12, 1. 15 64 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON In 1696 Col. Church, who will long be remembered in Massachusetts for his exploits against the celebrated Indian Chief Philip, being entrusted with a force to visit Nova Scotia, sailed directly to Chignecto or Beau Basin. Upon the discovery of the English forces, most of the French inhabitants left their houses and fled into the woods. The English pursued and soon met Bourgeois, a principal inhabitant, coming to ask quarter for himself and family, which was readily granted. Upon his examination it appeared that there were Indians mixed with the French in the woods, and orders were thereupon given to renew the pursuit, and to offer quarter to all the French, but to give none to the Indians. Bourgeois was desired also to give notice to all his countrymen, who would come in, that they should be received. Many of the inhabitants surrendered p. 63, 11. 6-37 p. 63, 1. 38-p. 64, 1. 13 p. 65, 1. 14-p. 66, 1. 27 p. 67, 11. 2-40 p. 68, 11. 14-17 p. 68, 1. 17-p. 69, 1. 28 p. 70, 11. 1-3 p. 70, 11. 5, 6 p. 70, 11. 11-18 p. 70, 1. 18-p. 71, 1. 40 p. 71, 1. 41-p. 72, 1. 11 p 72, 11. 34, 35 Measures of retaliation were immediately determined upon, and Colonel Church, with 500 men, was ordered to embark at Portsmouth and visit Nova Scotia. He sailed direct to Beau Basin and ravaged that country, which has subsequently received the name of Cumberland. Upon discovering the English forces, most of the inhabitants abandoned their houses and fled to the woods. During the pursuit of the fugitives, Burgeois, one of the most respectable Acadians, surrendered, and demanded protection for himself and family, which was readily granted. On his examination, it appeared that there were savages mingled with the inhabitants in the woods, and orders were therefore issued to renew the pursuit, and to offer quarter to all the French, but to give none to the Indians. Burgeois was desired also to I, p. 136, 1. 20-p. 138, 1. 16 I, p. 140, 1. 20-p. 141, 1. 20 I, p. 158, 1. 19-p. 160, 1. 14 I, p. 167, 1. 4-p. 168, 1. 14 I, p. 203, 11. 22-25 I, p. 206, 1. 1-p. 208, 1. 8 II, p. 15, 11. 9-11 II, p. 15, 11. 14, 15 II, p. 15, 11. 19-30 II, p. 15, 1. 30-p. 17, 1. 17 II, p. 18, 1. 20-p. 19, 1. 4 II, p. 14, 11. 15, 16 THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 65 and it was proposed to them to join with the English in pursuing the Indians, that upon their compliance their houses should be spared, such of their goods as had been taken should be restored, and the rest of their property preserved. This was a hard condition, and in effect obliging them to quit their country, for otherwise, as soon as the English had left them without sufficient protection, the incensed Indians would have fallen upon them without mercy. They therefore refused to comply, and their houses were thereupon burned, their cattle, sheep, etc. destroyed, and their goods became plunder for the army. Charlevoix says, that Bourgeois produced a writing, by which Sir William Phipps had given assurance of protection to the inhabitants of Chignecto, while they remained faithful subjects of King William; and that Church gave orders that nothp. 75, 1. 41-p. 76, 1. 25 p. 78, 11. 8-23 p. 78, 11. 26-32 p. 80, 11. 17-33 p. 81, 1. 25-p. 83, 1. 18 p. 83, 1. 38-p. 84, 1. 15 p. 84, 1. 34-p. 85, 1. 20 p. 85, 11. 2231 p. 85, 1. 37-p. 86, 1. 10 p. 90, 11. 8-12 p. 94, I. 9-16 p. 97, 11. 7-11 p. 97, 1. 31-p. 98, 1. 1 give notice to all his countrymen to return, and that they should be well received. Many of them submitted, and it was proposed to them to join with the English in pursuit of the Indians- an ungenerous request, to which it was impossible to accede, though the restoration of their property, which had been already taken, and the preservation of the rest, was held out to them as an inducement. On their refusing to domply, their houses were burned - their dykes broken down-their cattle and sheep destroyed, and their effects plundered by the soldiers. Charlevoix informs us, that Burgeois produced a proclamation of Sir William Phipps, in which assurances of protection were given to the inhabitants of Chignecto, so long as they remained faithful subjects of King William, and that Church being made acquainted with it, II, p. 25, 1. 21-p. 26, 1. 17 II, p. 115, 11. 7-24 II, p. 157, 1. 28-p. 158, 1. 2 I, p. 84, 11. 18-22 I, p. 85, 1. 4-p. 88, 1. 4 I, p. 90, 1. 24-p. 91, 1. 15 I, p. 127, 1. 13-p. 128, 1. 9 I, p. 129, 1. 33-p. 130, 1. 13 II, p. 167, 1. 28-p. 168, 1. 7 II, p. 128, 1. 33-p. 129, 1. 5 II, p. 102, 1. 23-32 II, p. 363, 11. 5-8 n, p. 362, 1. 14-p. 363, 1. 4 66 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ing in their houses etc. should be touched; but whilst he was entertained by Bourgeois, together with the principal officers, the rest of the army dispersed themselves, and behaved as if they had been in a conquered country. He also adds that many of the inhabitants, not trusting to the promises of the Colonel, refused to come in, and that it was fortunate they did so; for soon after, he broke through all bounds, and left only the church and a few houses and barns standing; and having discovered posted up in the church, an order of Frontenac, the Governor of Canada, for the regulation of trade, he threatened to treat them as rebels, set fire to the church and the houses which he had before spared, and which were now all reduced to ashes. The condition of the Acadians was truly deplorable. Their natural attachment was to the French. For a whole century, together, p. 100, 11. 24-37 p. 102, 1. 40-p. 103, 1. 1 p. 105, 11. 13-19 p. 105, 1. 25 p. 110, 11. 12-19 p. 115, 11. 23, 24 p. 115, 1. 42-p. 116, 1. 7 p. 116, 11. 16-32 p. 141, 1. 10-p. 142, 1. 24 p. 142, 1. 11-p. 143, 1. 31 p. 144, 11. 18-27 had ordered their property to be respected, but that while he and his officers were entertained by Bourgeois, the soldiers who were dispersed among the inhabitants, conducted themselves as if they had been in a conquered country. He also adds, that many of the people, distrusting his promises, refused to surrender, and that it was fortunate they did so, for an order of Frontenac, the governor of Canada, for the regulation of trade, having been soon after discovered posted up in the chapel, the English treated them as rebels - set fire to the church, and reduced to ashes the few houses which they had previously spared. The condition of these Acadians was truly deplorable. Their natural attachment was to the French. During more than a century they were constantly changing masters, and had no sooner acknowledged themselves the subjects of one crown, than they II, p. 361, 1. 29-p. 362, 1. 10 II, p. 365, 11. 29-32 [20-24 II, p. 363, 11. 19-24, p. 366, 11. II, p. 366, 11. 15, 16 II, p. 366, 1. 32-p. 367, 1. 2 II, p. 373, 11. 23-25 II, p. 373, 1. 27-p. 374, 1. 2 II, p. 374, 11. 2-16 II, p. 310, 1. 1-p. 311, 1. 23 II, p. 313, 1. 12-p. 315, 1. 8 II, p. 332, 11. 16-45 THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 67 they were once in a few years, were suffered to pass again changing their masters; and no under the power of the other. sooner had owned themselves Where protection was thus rethe subjects of one crown, but fused or neglected, it was unthey were left to fall again reasonable to charge them under the power of the other. with being traitors and rebels. It was hardly reasonable, where (Hist. I, 76-78.) protection was refused or neglected, to charge them with being traitors and rebels. (G. D. 91, 92.) There is little in this display that reveals the plagiarist, but evidence in plenty to show an author reworking his old material. If this matter of comparison between the General Description and the Historical and Statistical Account were to be pushed beyond the textual parallelism of numerous passages from each, still further proof of the workmanship of one writer for both would be discovered in the identity of their sources and in the purpose and point of view of the discussion they offer on such various subjects as the treatment of the Acadians, the uselessness of Dalhousie College, and the need of reform in the provincial courts of probate.14 In the development of this proof that it was Haliburton who wrote the General Description, three questions that demand and deserve an answer may have suggested p. 145, 11. 19-26 II, p. 337, 1. 32-p. 338, 1. 3 p. 146, 11. 5-21 II, p. 338, 11. 8-26 p. 148, 11. 32-40 H, p. 302, 11. 1-11 p. 153, 1. 32-p. 156, 1. 41 II, p. 104, 1. 6-p. 106, 1. 7 p. 157, 11. 6-10 II, p. 107, 11. 1-5 p. 157, 11. 22-33 II, p. 107, 11. 5-12 p. 158, 11. 20-34 II, p. 107, 1. 25-p. 108, 1. 6 p. 159, 1. 36-p. 160, 1. 27 II, p. 17, 1. 18-p. 18, 1. 10 14 See Gen. Descrp. 5, 6, 92, 145, 159, 160; Hist. and Stat. Acct. I, VI, VII, 176-198, II, 18, 19, 337, 338; and below, 188, 189. 68 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON themselves, especially to those loath to deprive Walter Bromley of the authorship with which he has so long been credited. First, is there any reason, apart from the titlepage announcement that the book was printed at the Royal Acadian School, why the General Description should have been so persistently connected with Bromley's name? One very probable reason is to be found in the nature and amount of the information contained in the fifth chapter, concerning the Micmacs, the Nova Scotian Indians. Haliburton, so far as is known, was not particularly interested in the Indians nor particularly well-informed about them. Bromley was. He had familiarized himself with their customs and language, and had endeavored to improve their conditions of living. He had even been active enough in their cause to issue An Appeal to the Virtue and Good Sense of Inhabitants of Great Britain, etc., in behalf of the Indians of North America,15 and was, apparently, as earnest a worker for Indian welfare as any among the English-speaking settlers of Nova Scotia. He was, in short, the sort of person to whom Haliburton, following his habit of laying local experts under contribution for his " statistical " information 16 would have been most likely to turn in his search for data regarding the Micmacs. Indeed, it is just possible that Bromley wrote out what was a first draft of the General Description's account of the Indians for him. Some slight color of probability is lent to this conjecture from the fact that this section closes with a paradigm of the Micmac verb Amalki (=I dance), and a foot-note stating that the Micmac verb inflexion is similar to that of the Delawares, both of which are taken word for word from Bromley's Appeal. Whoever supplied it, the information which the fifth chapter of the General Description contains is such as to naturally con 15 Halifax, 1820. 16 See below, 141, 142. THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 69 nect Bromley's name with the book, while it could hardly have suggested Haliburton's.17 But apart from the suggestion of this chapter, there is, as has been pointed out, no evidence worth considering that Bromley had any share whatever in the writing of the General Description, though in fairness to him it should be pointed out also that he had no share whatever in pirating the book. The second, or pirated, edition was indeed marked as issuing from the press of his school, but this, it appears, was merely a judicious repetition from the original edition to give to stolen goods a needed touch of authorization. The real printer of the second edition is disclosed on the obverse of the title page as Edmund Ward, publisher and proprietor of the Halifax Free Press, in whose paper the revised pamphlet was advertised when first issued.18 The blame for the theft, then, lies between Ward and Belcher, the " unprincipled bookseller" of Haliburton's letter to the Abbe Segogne, though the statement on the title-page, " Reprinted for and sold by Clement H. Belcher," seems to fix the fault more clearly upon the latter. Walter Bromley, we may be sure, had no discreditable connection with the pamphlet in either edition.'9 Second, why should Haliburton, who had spent almost the whole of his twentyseven years in Nova Scotia, refer to his residence there, in 1823, as one of "more than fifteen years"? Obviously, because "more than fifteen years" would include 17 In this connection it is interesting to note that the General Description contains considerably more data about the Micmacs than the Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia. 18 See above, 57, foot-note. 19 " He was," says Murdoch, Hist. N. S. mI, 348, "an enthusiast in his pursuit [school-mastering], and made friends and created opposition, but his sole aim was the improvement of human beings; and he was himself a fine specimen of the earnestness, industry, and singleness of heart and purpose of the English race." 70 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON accurately enough such of his life-time as could in any way contribute authority to his undertaking.20 Moreover, since Haliburton evidently did not propose to reveal the fact of his authorship, "more than fifteen years" was sufficiently suggestive of a residence shorter than his actual life-time to afford the desired anonymity. To prefer anonymity to publicity seems always to have been one of his capricious inclinations,21 and even where there was no possible doubt concerning his authorship, he chose at times any means of admitting it except the simplest one of signing his name.22 Indeed it appears that only the wise intervention of Judge Wiswall induced him to place his name on the title-page of his History of Nova Scotia, since in discussing plans for its publication Haliburton protested to his friend: "Whoever is known in this province as the author of any publication must consider that he has voluntarily brought himself to the stake to be baited by the empty barking of some and the stings and bites of others."23 But his preference for anonymity demonstrated, there still remains the question, why did Haliburton never publicly acknowledge the General Description as his? More than likely because of the unhoped-for favorable reception of his Historical and Statistical Account. Though Haliburton may not have courted publicity, he was, however, not the man to deny himself credit for any achievement that brought him either popularity or fame. Through the publication of his History he won public approval as a pioneer historian, who had attained success with what was thought to be his very first ven20 See above, 13. 21 Witness his Clockmaker, Bubbles of Canada, and Reply to Lord Durham. 22 See the title-pages of any of his humorous works published later than The Clockmaker. 23 See below, 127. THE GENERAL DESCRIPTION 71 ture. Why should he seek to change so flattering an opinion of his genius? The General Description, while by no means a negligible, was a decidedly inferior, piece of work which had excited no great amount of interest or gratitude among the people about whom it presented its information. To confess it his was, therefore, to gain nothing desirable, while by remaining silent about it he retained a reputation which doubtless meant much to him. For this reason it was, in all probability, that he remained indifferent about claiming to have written the pamphlet. Upon this point, as upon those of a similar nature which precede it, only conjecture is possible, of course, and may lead one to entirely erroneous conclusions. But whether these speculative endeavors to answer such pertinent questions as this discussion has provoked come wide of the truth or not, the validity of the argument which has led to them is not affected. The General Description is unquestionably Haliburton's. As his own Sam Slick would say, "That's a fact! "24 24 Since this chapter was written its findings have been corroborated in an interesting manner by the information contained in the following note appended to the Bromley entry in Robert J. Long's Nova Scotian Authors and Their Work-A Bibliography of the Province, the advance sheets of which have but recently been printed: "The author of this book [Mr. Long] has in his library a small volume, 210 pages, " Printed at the Royal Acadian School, Halifax," in 1823, entitled "General Description of Nova Scotia," and dedicated to Richard John Uniacke. On the fly-leaf is written 'James Putnam, Esq., from his friend S. W. Deblois.' There are a number of corrections in ink on the margins, among others, 'Col. Balknap' for 'Col. Kidnap' in several places; 'expedition' for 'expectation,' etc. These corrections are in the handwriting of T. C. Haliburton and the book is the first edition of his 'History of Nova Scotia."' CHAPTER V IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY BY 1826 Haliburton was sufficiently well established at Annapolis Royal to be brought forward in the general election of that year as a candidate for one of the county seats 1 in the provincial House of Assembly. His candidacy fully justified the expectations of his friends and secured his return with a fair majority.2 By a kindly irony he found himself, as a result of the poll, a colleague of the same William Roach of whom as a political possibility he had, five years previously, entertained so poor an opinion 3; and also, in the ensuing sessions of the legislature, one of a small group of able members destined to contribute much to the rehabilitation of the fame and brilliancy of that very body of whose future he had, at the same time, so thoroughly despaired.4 Haliburton, indeed, assisted in many ways to make the period of his legislative service a memorable one. The House of Assembly was to him an important opportunity, and he made the most of it. Before his short career as a law-maker was over he had won for himself a conspicuous place among 1 Not for the district of Clare, as sometimes stated. 2 Calnek-Savary, Hist. Co. Annapolis, 419. 3 See above, 48. 4 J. B. Calkin, History and Geography of Nova Scotia, 60; Israel Longworth, Life of S. G. W. Archibald, 45, 46. "A Ride from Halifax to Windsor," Novascotian, Oct. 4, 1827, says of Haliburton during his first session in the House that he " fairly charmed the town [Halifax] with the champagne and the rosy sparkling of his eloquent wit." 72 IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 73 Nova Scotia's parliamentary wits and orators, and established an enduring reputation for audacious political belligerency. The atmosphere he found awaiting him in the Province Building at Halifax was one of mutual hostility and challenge between the upper and lower branches of the legislature, and he lost no time in getting into the thick of the fray, manifesting from the first almost as much relish for the fighting as for the side he fought on. The opposition between the two Houses had begun as far back as 1775.5 In the beginning it was merely a manifestation of rivalry between the Loyalists, rapidly gaining control in the lower House, and the pre-Loyalists, still out-numbering the newcomers in the upper. Then with the eventual predominance of the former group in both Houses it had, for a time, disappeared, and during the long period of the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812 had been held in check through the combined influence of common prosperity and a common enemy. On its reappearance with the financial depression and readjustment consequent upon the return of peace, however, it was no longer an indication of a temporary misunderstanding between rival groups of settlers. The old lines of differing origin had been to a large extent obliterated. It was now a contest in dead earnest between the rights of the people, as represented by the House of Assembly, and those of the Crown, as embodied in His Majesty's Council. In the personnel of the latter body there was alone sufficient cause for the people's opposition. It included, besides the Governor, as ex-officio members, the Bishop of the Church of England, the Chief Justice, the Provincial Treasurer, and the Collector of His Majesty's Customs, and among the rest of the twelve who composed it were the Attorney-General, the Surveyor-General, and 5 Murdoch, Hist. N. S. II, 542, 543. 74 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON three associate judges of the Supreme Court. Nearly all of them were members of the Anglican Church, though four-fifths of the people of Nova Scotia were dissenters. All but one were from the city of Halifax, and belonged to the same exclusive social set. Five were said to be connected by blood or marriage with one family. Those who were not judges or lawyers were capitalists or merchants. Of the eight directors of the solitary bank that the province then had, practically a government-guaranteed monopoly, it has been stated that at one time five belonged to the Council!6 In short, in spite of its ability, which was unquestioned, His Majesty's Council was as unrepresentative a body of men as could well have been found in Nova Scotia. And it was as irresponsible as it was unrepresentative. Its powers and privileges were an outrage to even an elementary sense of justice. Since the Councillors held their appointments at the pleasure of the English Crown, exercised through the Governor, they had practically a life tenure of their offices. As law-makers, they sat behind closed doors as the upper branch of the legislature, claiming and exercising the right to amend or reject all bills, including appropriations. As an executive, they met in secret session, advising the Governor as to legislation and making all provincial appointments from sheriffs and militia officers to coroners and school commissioners. In the same capacity they became practically self-perpetuating. As a judicial body, they gave final decisions in the matter of divorce, and of course, those members who had also seats on the Supreme Court Bench had final local jurisdiction in all other legal cases, interpreting the very laws which as a cabinet they had recommended, and as legislators had helped to pass. The honesty of these men 6 Rev. R. M. Grant, "The Late Hon. Joseph Howe," The Canadian Monthly, May, 1875, 504. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 75 was not impeached. What was humanly possible in the just performance of their duty they accomplished. But obviously mere human endeavor simply could not control such a plethora of power. And the people at large were becoming restless under the risks to which this potential tyranny constantly exposed them. But the final cause for the steadily gathering opposition against the Council lay in the fact that as the representative of the Imperial authority it was called upon to administer the old Colonial System, one of the few remaining vestiges of an out-worn mercantilism, that had for its watchword, "English monopoly of colonial trade." Not even the lessons of the American Revolution had taught the English government that some sounder policy must be inaugurated if the greatest prosperity of the homeland and the wisest development of the dependencies were to be attained. The period of peace that followed the Treaty of Ghent, however, had opened the eyes of the North American colonies to the handicap which the English trade restrictions placed them under in their commercial competition with the United States. As the result of continued protests from the colonies, the president of the Board of Trade, the Hon. William Huskisson, in 1825, had recommended the removal of most of the objectionable restrictions, and his recommendation had been carried into effect by legal enactment, although the Imperial government had maintained an effectual control upon colonial trade by the retention of the right to impose and collect duties on foreign commerce. Nevertheless the Huskisson concessions were the beginning of the end of Imperial domination in colonial affairs. What was meant to lull the people of British America into contentment served only to stimulate their desire for complete control of their own concerns. And the struggle which they began for freedom of trade was not abandoned 76 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON until more than twenty years later, when they had won not only their initial objective, but complete self-sufficiency in matters of purely colonial interest and a thoroughly democratic system of government as well. The representatives of the people in the House of Assembly as Haliburton found it at the beginning of this final struggle were, of course, far from constituting the triumphant branch of the legislature. They had the right to talk and vote, and theoretical control of the public purse, but little more. Yet the Assembly, fully alive to its humiliating status, was in no temper to avoid challenge of the Council's prerogatives when they plainly conflicted with the people's desires. The relations between the previous Assembly and Council had been anything but harmonious, and the recently returned House was not in the least disposed to be more conciliating than its predecessor. Many of its members had come from the people strongly resolved upon resistance to the further exercise of certain colonial rights by the Imperial authorities, and to press through certain reformative legislation in the face of the Council's well-known hostility. To oppose the Council was generally supposed to mean political suicide, for the upper House through its control of the patronage was able to block at will all progress towards official appointment. Nevertheless there were men in the new Assembly not to be intimidated,-men prepared, if necessary, to sacrifice career for country. Into this unequal contest Haliburton brought his still developing Toryism. That before long he was conspicuous for his advocacy of various measures of reform is not strange, however, for in contrast to the illiberality of His Majesty's Council even an orthodox Tory would have looked a radical. Haliburton was too thorough a consti tutionalist not to perceive the absurd contradiction be IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 77 tween the unwarranted powers of the upper branch of the legislature and the vaunted rights of a British subject. Yet his opposition to the Council was never consistent. He came to the Assembly as a popular representative, and undoubtedly he desired to stand well with his constituents, but by both inheritance and training his sympathies were with what was to him the ultimate authority, the British government, symbolized in the colonies by the Governor and Council. To support the one brought him into inevitable conflict with the other. What appeared to him as properly within the law, was often the very thing against which as the people's representative he was bound to protest, and what he was not afraid to denounce as unconstitutional was unfortunately ordained by the very government in whose beneficence he gloried. He desired to be at the same time both Imperialist and colonist. While he exulted in being British, he could not forget that he was also British North American. His misfortune was that he never advocated changes fundamental enough to justify his pride in being both. His conception of what would set things right carried him no farther than the point from which the real reformers began their advance. Long before he had completed his term in the Assembly, he must have recognized, as did both his friends and political foes, his inconsistency.7 He occupied, in short, an impossible position in a sort of NoMan's Land, across which he scurried with disconcerting frequency, attacking now this side, now that, each dashing assault being accompanied by a spectacular discharge of oratorical star-shells. Haliburton's first important address in the Assembly 7 See Novascotian, April 24, 1828, letter signed "Amicus," ad for May 21, 1829, "The Club." See also Report of Mr. Bull's Jury.... (a pamphlet), 2nd. ed. Halifax, 1829, 43. 78 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON contained his declaration of allegiance to Imperial interests. A motion had been made for the appointment of one or more agents, to be resident in London, for the promotion of colonial trade and interests while the old Colonial System was undergoing a process of change.8 Haliburton resented the proposal as indicative of an unbecoming want of faith in the good intentions of the Imperial authorities. The House ought to rely, he said, upon the goodness of the King's ministers, and upon their power and eagerness to serve the Colonies. "Look at what had already been L done. Look at that magnificent change in the colonial trade which they had lately introduced.9 See its principles developing in a more extended commerce and in streams refluent with wealth. These were a proof of the profound intelligence which her ministers possessed, and the benevolent views which actuated them towards the colonies-a proof that they were not guided by narrow or superficial, but by liberal and matured views." 10 Of the " profound intelligence" of these ministers Haliburton felt compelled to express a vastly different opinion some years later.1l Haliburton was almost as prompt to show his devotion to the more pressing needs of the colony as a whole as to defend the Imperial ministry, announcing in a debate on road appropriations that, though he represented an agricultural community, he would vote for the smaller of the two amounts under discussion, because the province needed to conserve its funds to provide bounties for the fishermen and grants for common schools. But the first 8 Journal and Proceedings of the House of Assembly, 1827, Feb. 13. 9 Huskisson's concessions. See above, 75. Io Novascotian, Feb. 15, 1827. 1 See below, 229 ff., 306, 311 ff., 318 ff., 459 ff., 502, 549 ff., 555 ff. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 79 extended display of his powers, called forth when the matter of the Royal government's right to fix Customs House salaries was broached, revealed again his constitutionalist tendencies. In the last session of the previous House, the Lords of the Treasury had declared their intention of appropriating a large share of the Nova Scotian revenue for the payment of a retiring allowance for the Naval Officer of the country, and for the regular salaries of the Customs House officials. The House had immediately remonstrated against what it deemed an infringement upon its privileges. In reply a communication had been sent out from England with the announcement that their Lordships had abandoned the intention of pensioning the Naval Officer from the provincial funds but would adhere to the plan to authorize the officers of the Customs to retain their salaries from the duties they collected. This dispatch had, been laid before the new House early in its first session. Mr. Charles R. Fairbanks, member for Halifax, appeared as leader of the opposition against this latest violation of colonial rights with a set of resolutions containing a moderate assertion of what those rights were, and a proposal to introduce a bill effecting a permanent settlement of the difficulty by providing for the payment of the Customs officers on condition that the entire amount of the duties collected were first paid into the provincial treasury. Haliburton's protest against these resolutions was thoroughly characteristic: "Mr. Speaker, I rise to oppose these resolutions, which have just been introduced, by the learned gentleman from Halifax. I have listened, Sir, with due and deliberate attention to the arguments which he has urged in defense of his opinions-but I can neither agree to their purport, nor can I approve of the temper in which they are conceived. Sir, I do agree with him in this 80 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON that the question is one of commanding importance- that it becomes us to meet it in an open, candid and manly manner —but I cannot view it in the light of a question between a tyrannical government and an oppressed colony. I view it as a question between two people who have sprung from a common stock, who speak the same language, who are endowed with the same feeling, who are creatures of the same customs and habits. It is a question, in short, between the parent and the child; and in its discussion there ought to be intermingled the same affection, the same amenity of language, which would be used in discussing between relatives in private life their conflicting interests. Sir, I see no necessity for raising the tocsin of alarm in this colony that the Maternal Government are invading our liberties —our birthright. On the contrary, I see her extending to us a boon, so liberal and magnificent that I never believed, nay, that I never dreamt, although I am but a young man, I could have ever lived to witness it. Sir, she has broken down the fetters of that colonial monopoly, which has hitherto been regarded as the source of her power, her greatness, her glory, and by which our energies have been so long bound and repressed. I see our ports thrown open to the trade of the world -our ships beating a pathway in every ocean, and spreading their canvas to every breeze - our merchants engaging in a variety of new enterprises, and the commerce of the provinces enriching the country with its streams of wealth. I am not of a temper to look at these benefits and to forget them. They produce an indelible impression —they remain an enduring memorial in the mind. And at what a time is this boon conferred Is it when the colonies have grown to such maturity and confidence of strength as both to assert their rights and be able to maintain them? Is it when a republican navy is at the mouth of our harbour and their splendid but unsubstantial visions are held out to us of liberty, and of equality? Is it at a time when she is leading her legions forth to battle single-handed with all the world? No, it is in a period of profound repose, when peace is on earth, and the natural energies, the giant power of England are in their prime. They come, too, unsolicited by us. Sir, I cannot forget the hand that has struck off our chains. The trammels have been taken from our limbs-the fetters from our feet-but, Sir, she does not mean them to be flung away, but to be interwoven around our hearts, and to render our allegiance one founded in affection and gratitude. It is with these feelings I come to the IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 81 consideration of this important question - it is under these impressions that I frankly state I can discover no attempt to invade our privileges —it is under this persuasion that I condemn the odious name of 'Tax Gatherers' which I heard applied on this floor to the officers of His Majesty's Customs.... Now, Sir, what is all this clamour raised about? What have the British government done? They have swept off all the fees formerly exacted on our trade -these fees, Mr. Speaker, which as you must recollect, were in a former session represented in this Assembly as onerous and offensive, as ruinous to our coasting trade, as subtracting from the provincial wealth annually ~16,000, and which occasioned in this Assembly one of the most animated and eloquent debates ever heard in this province. These, I say, are swept away —they are gone. But in their stead the government have determined to support their Custom House out of duties collected in the colony. They demand even a less sum -and the question now is whether they have the right of so appropriating our funds. This is the point which is to be met and grappled with. Sir, I am but a young member in this Assembly, I am a young lawyer, I am but a young man-but I feel myself called upon to express my honest opinions, without fear and without restraint. I ask you, Sir, you who have reached and merited such distinction in your profession [as] to enjoy a high situation in another colony 12 and one of the most important in this, to point out to me the volume, the statute, in which the rights of the colonies are defined. Blackstone, he who is first put into the hands of the student, and who constitutes the corner stone of all legal learning, passed this subject over. Christian, who seems to have read his work for no other purpose than to detect his errors and to supply his deficiencies, touches it not. Where, then, is it found? It must be sought for in principle, in analogy in the natural rights of man, it must be gleaned from the wide and boundless field of colonial history. But I am told they are embodied and expressed in the 18th. Geo. III 13-that act which is called the charter of our liberties. What, Sir, were the circumstances that created that act? Previous 12 See above, 50, foot-note. 13 An act renouncing the right of the British Parliament to levy taxes or duties in the colonies, except those regulating foreign commerce. 82 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON to the American Revolution, Mr. Grenville, a minister of the English crown, conceived that those colonies which had been established and maintained at such an expense, which possessed so large a population and had such valuable resources, ought to contribute to the revenue of the parent state. 'No! ' answered the colonies, it is contrary to the principles of our constitution. The British parliament cannot tax us, we have no voice in its councils, we are not represented in it! Burke, Chatham, and other great men who figured in the annals of that period, defended them on principle. The taxes were imposed, the colonies took to arms, and the result is known. During the time of that struggle the act above alluded to was passed, and secured to the colonies, who still maintained their allegiance to the parent state, the net proceeds of duties to be in future imposed, except those which existed previous to that period, and which were necessary for the regulation of foreign commerce. Now, Sir, while I read that act, and see all the privileges it confers upon us, as an honest man I say at the same time I am bound not to interfere with the rights it reserves to them. What! Sir, is it contended that we have the power of regulating our. foreign commerce, and that we are to have the payment of the officers? Sir, it is absurd. There must be a supreme power somewhere-it is as necessary for the unanimity as for the safety and strength of the kingdom. That power must be in the centre —in the heart of the empire —in Great Britain. There, a perfect acquaintance must exist of the trade and the resources of those numerous dependencies, which are so wide and expansive, that the sun never sets upon them, that the commerce of the kingdom may be regulated on one extensive and general scale. To us belongs the right of regulating all internal affairs -but to that power belongs the right of regulating our foreign relations.... What then, Sir, has been really done? We paid before ~16,000 per annum in the shape of fees; we are now to pay only ~7,000 in the shape of salaries. And is it this, Sir, which the learned gentleman represents as so intolerable a grievance? Is it for this that he would desire to arouse us against the parent state? This! which is not the imposition of a new tax, but the modification of an old one, and a modification which materially operates to our benefit.... You complained of your fees, and they removed the Naval Officer. You complained of the Fat Porter at the Customs House, and they have relieved you of his exactions also; but IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 83 surely this House will not contend that we are not bound to support him; and that in future he must depend for his living, his salary, from England, the owner of our highway of commerce. But, Mr. Speaker, while we bluster about our rights and cry up this imposition of the Custom House salaries as an evil not to be endured, proclaim this fact aloud, tell it on the house tops, and let the people of Nova Scotia pause, consider upon and revolve it. Our imports at the present moment exceed our imports in the vast sum of ~280,000. How, Sir, is this vast debt paid?... Whence, I ask, Sir, does this province derive it? From the expenditure of the government; from the pay of the troops and officers; from the salaries of your bishop and clergy; from the drafts of charitable institutions. But, Mr. Speaker, allow me to illustrate this by a plain, simple allegory. Here I am settled in Nova Scotia. Well, there is a fine strong-hearted old buck, called John Bull, comes across the water to pay me a visit. He walks across my field, knocks at my door, and I receive him into my house. He takes a fancy to me and gives me ~280,000. What an enormous sum, thinks I-how grateful I must be to my old, generous, good, kind benefactor. However, I chance to go to a lawyer in Halifax and he tells me that the old gentleman had committed a trespass upon me-he had no right to cross my field - the field was mine and it was a trespass vi et armis- a trespass quare clausam fregit. When I next meet the old gentleman I tell him, 'Sir, I am much obliged to you for your gift, I feel truly grateful, indeed I do, but you had no right to cross my field.' I compliment him on his good looks — tell him he has a powerful arm —the arm of a giant —and a marvellous constitution, the best constitution in the whole world. 'But still you have not the right to cross my field. Truly, Mr. Bull '- he was well called John Bull -' You are a salacious old man, and you do get children prodigiously fast, faster than you can maintain them. They come here half fed, half clothed, and your good old lady, God bless herl She wears well, but she is very prolific. She breeds fast; she has had an immense family. How many brats she has to suckle! With so many children, so involved as you are, so much in debt, ~280,000 is a monstrous sum to give me, indeed it is - But mind you had no right to cross my field, and next time you do, I'll go to law with you. I am grateful, however, indeed I am. Walk in, my secretary Mr. Assembly shall give you a receipt-He is a troublesome fellow. 84 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON I dismiss him every seven years regularly, often in less time. He has 41 different tempers. He will give you a receipt —~280,000 is a great sum, but you had no right to cross that field, you should have knocked at the gate and asked leave. Now we who have crossed the Atlantic have many of your good qualities, but we want your generosity. There was now your oldest son, our brother Jonathan, a long, tall, rigular Yankee, who after he came of age lifted his hand and struck you. We know you have the power, and we trust some day you will be willing to punish him for his impunity, but in the meantime we resolve that we feel particularly grateful for your kindness-but then you have no right to cross our field. You ought to have come to the gate first and asked permission; but we'll remember your kindness-till death -not till death-till- till- till- the next time. (During the delivery of this paragraph the House was convulsed with laughter.) 14 Now, Mr. Speaker, this is just the question before the House. Allowing the government to have the right of regulating our foreign commerce, as is granted in our charter, is it right, is it honest, to attempt to wrest it from them. Sir, it may be advocated to please a popular whim; but I shall never trim my ship in pursuit of so vacillating a possession. I come here to legislate upon constitutional principles, and if we adopted the resolution before the House, I should regard my conduct as ungrateful, unmanly, and base!.." 15 Haliburton's levity, and its resultant disastrous effect on the,gravity of the House, did not pass uncriticized. Mr. Alexander Stewart, member from Cumberland, who on other occasions also was ready to take Haliburton to task, was moved to remark that "he could not hope to deliver himself... in the lively manner of his learned friend from Annapolis - but he could not help saying that he had never seen a greater perversion of eminent talents than had been displayed by the latter [Haliburton], for 14 Beamish Murdoch, Haliburton's colleague in the House, corroborates this interpolation of the reporter. See his Hist. N. S., III, 569. 15 Novascotian, Feb. 24, and Supplement dated March 1, 1827. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 85 he had seemed to think that a grave constitutional question in which their dearest rights and interests were involved was not to be settled by reasoning, but by fun and jocularity." 16 Nor did the more serious portions of this speech escape correction. Mr. Fairbanks, and Mr. William Lawson, another member from Halifax, were quick to detect errors in Haliburton's figures, and their combined attack put him upon the defensive. His attempt to retrieve himself is no longer of particular interest save for its exhibition of a regrettable and frequently recurring tendency to depreciate Nova Scotia, and to rhapsodize unduly over whatever was English, a tendency of Haliburton's then and later, distasteful to his fellow colonials: "It would be well [he said] to consider who we were and where we were. We were the little people of the little province of Nova Scotia; with a little legislature to govern us. We had a little limited jurisdiction, and if we kept within our proper bounds we might be rendered a useful and even respectable body; 17 but if we went beyond those limits and attempted to infringe upon the rights of Parliament or the Royal prerogative, we should render ourselves ridiculous and contemptible, and thus defeat the purposes for which we were assembled. [Here followed a humorous illustration of the effects produced on strangers by the French peasant's habit of walking on stilts.] The learned gentleman [Mr. Fairbanks] had got on stilts also; and he hoped he might reach the ground on his feet without a fall. Did he think the thunder of his voice was to reach across the Atlantic, strike terror into the Treasury Bench, and that a Cabinet council would be called to take steps to defend the nation. For his own part, he knew when they saw these high flown resolutions, and heard the great stand the Nova Scotia Hampdens were making, they would be convulsed with laughter... they would say the good people of Nova Scotia had got their heads turned —that, in fact, they had mounted the stilts also. 16 Novascotian, Supplement Mar. 1, 1827. 17 This passage was used in a jest at Haliburton's expense in "The Club," Novascotian, Aug. 11, 1831. 86 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON He had heard, for the first time, a distinction drawn between a native and an Englishman, in the allusion to the member from Sydney.'8 It was the first time that the name of Englishman had been cast back as a reproach. He was sorry to hear it —it was a sign that boded no good. So far from entertaining such a feeling, he was proud to see that gentleman, who was a scholar and a man of integrity, in that Assembly. He wished to God that a few more such Englishmen would emigrate here, and some of our would-be patriots transported in their room. The learned gentleman had stated that he had no relations in England, had no ties to it, no friends in office. He too, could say that he had no relations there, but when he touched its shores he felt he had arrived at his father's house, at the cradle and grave of his ancestors, at the old mansion which with the honours had descended to the oldest brother; and he could feel a generous pride that all the great men assembled at last side by side in the great monumental Abbey of Westminster, that the glorious and immortal band of heroes, poets, orators, statesmen, patriots, had all sprung from the same family, and although a colonist, that the splendour of their flame cast a ray over him.... The Honorable Collector's sin and offence at Halifax it appeared was that he was a foreigner and an Englishman. We have been told that the appointment should be given to a native. What a popular theme, what a delightful idea, to a native! "19 Mr. Stewart, with better reason for resentment than before, rose to reply: "...he would indeed be thankful to Heaven if the powers of eloquence which had just been displayed had been bestowed upon him; but he thanked God he had not the prostrate spirit which seemed to animate the speaker. ' Where, Sir,' the learned gentleman continued, 'has he been taught the slavish principles which he has this day advocated, with a zeal and energy and eloquence worthy of a better cause. I ask him to tell me if he is prepared to teach his children, as their opening faculties enable them to 1B Both members from Sydney, Messrs. Thomas Dickson and John Young, had opposed the resolution. Haliburton's allusion was probably to the latter. 19 Novascotian Supplement, Mar. 1, 1827. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 87 appreciate the sentiments, that in truth they are but the bastards of Englishmen. Will he so tell his constituents, who sent him here not to betray but to support their rights and privileges?... Sir, when the emigrants from Massachusetts came to this country they were promised by Governor Lawrence's proclamation, that the political privileges which belonged to the New England colonies should be assured to them. Sir, this was published in 1758, and I am surprised that in the honourable gentleman's historical researches this has escaped him! " After a four days' debate the following Haliburton was able to muster in opposition to the Customs remonstrance was outvoted. Mr. Fairbanks' resolution passed, and another address went forward to Downing Street to swell the accumulation of unheeded evidence there as to the true state of colonial feeling. The Novascotian's comment on this extravagant waste of oratory is worth recording, though not because it reveals any appreciation of the true significance of the incident: "...but this we will say, that the question was nobly argued; and that many of the speeches, in the elegant and animated manner in which they were delivered, and in the historical research and power of reasoning which they exhibited, would have done honor to any Legislative Assembly." Nova Scotia's " Thunderer " had yet to report much " elegant and animated" legislative speech-making before it awakened to its purpose of reform. The next occasion on which Haliburton addressed the House at length found him as eloquent in the cause of popular rights as he had been before in defense of the Royal prerogative. A petition from the Catholics of Nova Scotia had been presented asking for the removal of the declaration against popery and trans-substantiation from the Assembly oath, an unjust disability under which they still labored. Mr. R. J. Uniacke, Jr., one of Haliburton's contemporaries at King's, then member from Cape Breton, 88 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON took advantage of the opportunity thus presented to move for an address to the Throne praying that the request of the petitioners be granted. Haliburton in seconding the motion delivered what is probably his most famous oration, a brilliant outburst of rhetoric, said to have so enthralled Joseph Howe, then reporting in the House for The Novascotian, that he forgot his note-taking and gave himself up wholly to the joy of listening.20 It was, of course, like most oratory of the day, a product of the inflated school, but compared with some of the less mature efforts of much better known orators of the time it holds its own very well as a beginner's declamation. Unhappily for Haliburton's reputation, he set for himself a standard at the commencement of his oratorical career, as he did at the outset of various others of his ventures, upon which he rarely, if ever, improved. As a piece of elocution his plea for the repeal of the Test Act may yet have its interest, but apart from its historic significance as marking a step towards religious liberty taken in a colony two years in advance of the motherland, its worth as a parliamentary address is now negligible. Its tribute to Abbe Segogne makes it, of course, a valued memorial to that estimable man, and because of that tribute, to Haliburton himself. And its earnest championing of Catholic claims was unquestionably generous, though, to be frank, Haliburton does not altogether escape the suspicion that he was inspired quite as much by the votes as by the interests of his French Acadian constituents. The more memorable parts of the speech have long been familiar in the form preserved by Murdoch: 21 Mr. Haliburton said that he seconded the resolution which had just been read; but before he entered into the discussion, he 20 Campbell, Nova Scotia, 334. 21 Hist. N. S., III, 573 ff. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 89 begged leave to remark upon the peculiar and delicate manner in which the petition had been introduced into the house. Although he was the representative of a very numerous body of catholicshad been in habits of intimacy for many years with their venerable and respectable pastor the Abbe Segogne, yet neither he or they had ever intimated their wishes to him; and that his old friend Mr. Carroll, whose name stood at the head of the petition, had also left him to the unbiassed exercise of his own judgment. He had never seen or heard of the petition which had been presented, until he saw it in that house. This delicate treatment made a strong impression on his mind, and he declared before God and that house, that he verily believed if his religious prejudices had prevented him from voting in favor of the resolution, Mr. Segogne would, on his return, receive him with the same friendly feeling and the same affection with which he had always honored him. He was proud to make the acknowledgement, for he stood there the unsolicited and voluntary friend and advocate of the catholics. In considering this question he should set out with stating that every man had a right to participate in the civil government of that country of which he was a member, without the imposition of any test oath, unless such restriction was necessary to the safety of that government; and if that was conceded, it would follow they should be removed from the catholics, unless their necessity could be proved as it applied to them. He stated that the religion which they profess was called catholic, because it was at one time the universal religion of the christian world, and that the bishop of Rome, from being the spiritual head of it, was called pope, which signified father. (He here entered into a minute examination of the origin of the temporal power of the popeshewed its connection with the feudal system, and traced it to the time of Henry 8th, who severed the temporal and spiritual power from foreign Prelates.) He said that in subsequent times it had been thought necessary to impose test oaths, lest the catholics, who were the most numerous body, might restore the ancient order of things, and particularly as there was danger of a catholic succession; but when the Stuart race became extinct, the test oaths should have been buried with the last of that unfortunate family. Whatever might be the effect of emancipation in Great Britain, here there was not the slightest pretension for continuing restrictions; for if the whole house and all the council were catholics, it would be impossible to alter the constitution-the 90 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON governor was appointed by the King, and not by the people, and no act could pass without his consent. What was the reason that protestants and catholics in this country mingled in the same social circle and lived in such perfect harmony? How was it that the catholic mourned his protestant friend in death, whom he had loved in life - put his hand to the bier —followed his mortal remains to their last abode, and mingled his tears with the dust that covered him? While in Great Britain there was an evident hostility of feeling, and the cause must be sought in something beyond the mere difference of religion. The state of Ireland afforded a most melancholy spectacle: the catholic, while he was bound in duty —while he was led by inclination, to support his priest, was compelled by law to pay tythes to the protestant rector; there were churches without congregations- pastors without flocks, and bishops with immense revenues without any duty to perform; they must be something more or less than men to bear all this unmoved-they felt and they murmured; while on the other hand the protestants kept up an incessant clamor against them that they were bad people. The property of the catholic church had passed into the hands of the protestant clergy-the glebes —the tythes -the domains of the monasteries- who could behold those monasteries still venerable in their ruins, without regret? The abodes of science-of charity and hospitality, where the wayworn pilgrim and the weary traveller reposed their limbs, and partook of the hospitable cheer; where the poor received their daily food, and in the gratitude of their hearts implored blessings on the good and pious men who fed them; where learning held its court, and science waved its torch amid the gloom of barbarity and ignorance. Allow me, Mr. Speaker, to stray, as I have often done, in years gone by, for hours and for days amidst those ruins, and tell me (for you, too, have paused to view the desolate scene), did you not, as you passed through those tesselated courts and grass-grown pavements, catch the faint sounds of the slow and solemn march of the holy procession? Did you not seem to hear the evening chime fling its soft and melancholy music o'er the still sequestered vale, or hear the seraph choir pour its full tide of song through the long protracted aisle, or along the high and arched roof? Did not the mouldering column —the Gothic arch-the riven wall and the ivied turret, while they drew the unbidden sigh at the work of the spoiler, claim the tribute of a tear to the memory of the great and good men who founded IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 91 them? It was said that catholics were unfriendly to civil liberty; but that, like many other aspersions cast upon them, was false! Who created magna charta? Who established judges, trial by jury, magistrates, sheriffs. &c.? Catholicsl To that caluminated people we were indebted for all that we most boasted of. Were they not brave and loyal? Ask the verdant sods of Chrystler's farm, ask Chateauguay, ask Queenston heights, and they will tell you they cover catholic valor and catholic loyalty-the heroes who fell in the cause of their country Here, where there was no cause of division-no property in dispute, their feelings had full scope. We found them good subjects and good friends. Friendship was natural to the heart of man, as the ivy seeks the oak and clings to its stalk, and embraces its stem, and encircles its limbs in beautiful festoons, and wild luxuriance; and aspires to its top, and waves its tendrils above it as a banner, in triumph of having conquered the king of the forest. Look at the township of Clare; -it was a beautiful sight; a whole people having the same customs, speaking the same language, and uniting in the same religion. It was a sight worthy the admiration of man and the approbation of God. Look at their worthy pastor, the Abbe Segogne: see him at sunrise, with his little flock around him, returning thanks to the giver of all good things; follow him to the bed of sickness: see him pouring the balm of consolation into the wounds of the afflicted,- into his field, where he was setting an example of industry to his people, - into his closet, where he was instructing the innocence of youth, -into the chapel, and you would see the savage, rushing from the wilderness with all his wild and ungovernable passions upon him, standing subdued and awed in the presence of the holy man! You would hear him tell him to discern his God in the stillness and solitude of the forest-in the roar of the cataract-in the order and splendor of the planetary system, and in the diurnal change of night and day. That savage forgets not to thank his God that the white man has taught him the light of revelation in the dialect of the Indian. (He then entered into a detailed account of the removal of the French Acadians, too lengthy for insertion), and continued, as the representative of the descendants of these people, he asked not for the removal of the restrictions as a favour; he would not accept it from their commiseration -he demanded it from their justice. He concluded by saying —" Every man who lays his hand on the New Testament, and says that it is his book of faith, whether he be catholic or 92 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON protestant, churchman or dissenter, baptist or methodist, however much we may differ in doctrinal points, he is my brother, and I embrace him. We all travel by different roads to the same God. In that path which I pursue, should I meet a catholic, I salute him-I journey with him; and when we shall arrive at the flammantia limina mundi-when that time shall come, as come it must-when the tongue that now speaks shall moulder and decay -when the lungs that now breathe the genial air of Heaven shall refuse me their office-when these earthly vestments shall sink into the bosom of their mother earth, and be ready to mingle with the clods of the valley, I will, with that catholic, take a longing, lingering, retrospective view. I will kneel with him; and instead of saying, in the words of the presumptuous Pharisee, 'thank God I am not like this papist,' I will pray that, as kindred, we may be equally forgiven: that as'brothers, we may be both received." Though the motion which Haliburton thus lengthily seconded passed the House unanimously, neither the good cause which the address defended nor its grandiloquent flights served to protect it from the strictures of Mr. Stewart who objected to its " ill timed zeal and injudicious observations." 22 A defender was not lacking to Haliburton on this occasion, however, for Beamish Murdoch, the historian, then member for Halifax, responded that, "..he deemed it no loss of time to sit and hear the two eloquent addresses which had been delivered by the learned gentlemen from Cape Breton and from Annapolis. The latter he always listened to with peculiar pleasure, for he had at once instructed and charmed him. His speech of that day, however, was surprisingly beautiful, for it had exhibited a mind stored with the treasures of history... it breathed an eloquence which came from the heart, and it contained sentiments, so just and honour22 A charge repeated in part by Sir Charles Townshend, "Life of Honorable Alexander Stewart," Trans. N. S. Hist. Soc., XV, 21. The portions objected to occur in the passage on the expulsion of the Acadians, omitted by Murdoch, but in effect given by Haliburton in his History of Nova Scotia. See below, 137-139. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 93 able in themselves, that while they whispered a caution to the young, they were capable of imparting a lesson to the old." 23 And Murdoch, writing forty years later, recalled this speech as " the most splendid piece of declamation that it has ever been my fortune to listen to." He also recorded at the same time the impressions made upon him by Haliburton as a member of the House of Assembly, and further recollections of this famous effort: "Mr. Haliburton was then in the prime of life and vigour, both mental and physical. The healthy air of country life in his native Windsor had given him a robust appearance, though his figure was yet slender and graceful. He had, in addition, all the advantages that an education at King's College could bestow, or the society and training of his highly intelligent parent gave him.... As an orator, his attitude and manner were extremely impressive, earnest and dignified; and although the strong propensity of his mind to wit and humor were often apparent, they seldom detracted from the seriousness of his language when the subject under discussion was important. Although he sometimes exhibited rather more hauteur in his tone than was agreeable, yet his wit was usually kind and playful. On this occasion he absolutely entranced his audience with the corruscations of genius playing with the classic and historic imagery, and appealing to the kindest feelings of humanity. He was not remarkable for readiness of reply in debate; but when he had time to prepare his ideas and language, he was almost always sure to make an impression on his hearers." 24 It is probable that Murdoch's statements in regard to Haliburton's lack of readiness in debate stand in need of revision. Certainly Haliburton was ready enough with impromptu eloquence and jest, both in the House and afterwards on the Bench. Less than two weeks after his eloquent support of Mr. Uniacke, in defense of popular rights, Haliburton was 23 Novascotian, Supplement, Mar. 1, 1827. 24 Hist. N. S., III, 577, 578. 94 THOMAS CHANDLEB HALIBURTON again before the House equally eloquent in opposing his colleague, and in denial of popular rights. The member from Cape Breton had introduced a bill for relieving debtors from unjust arrest and imprisonment. Haliburton in announcing his intention to vote against it declared, "....that if the House would pass that bill it would break down the pillar of good faith upon which society rested. There was one grand distinction which had formed itself in his own mind, and by which he intended to regulate his legislative conduct, that all the minor features of the laws, such as those that were intended for the erection of schools, for the encouragement of agriculture, &c., and for the regulation of commerce might be modified according to circumstances; but those great leading principles of the law which had come down to us from remote antiquity, and which were stamped with the sacred seal of experience ought never to be touched. The system of English jurisdiction was one of the noblest structures which the wisdom of man had ever been able to rear, and when he looked at its beautiful proportions and recollected that our forefathers lived and flurished under it, he did not like to see its foundations shaken..."25 Even his best friends were disappointed at his stand against this measure, Mr. Murdoch saying on the floor of the House that though he had listened ".. with delight to the highly adorned eloquence with which his learned friend from Annapolis had on a former day defended the rights and stated the sufferings of his fellow men, he regretted to see that eloquence, which like a polished sword might have its keen edge used for good or ill, now brought into the lists to support principles at variance with humanity.... 25 But Haliburton had by no means abandoned the cause of the masses. Within a week he was defying the venerables of Halifax who had petitioned for an act for the 25 Novascotian, Mar. 8, 1827. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 95 better observance of the Sabbath and the prevention of the sale of all articles on the Lord's day, except milk and fish. "It is aimed," Haliburton dared say of the petition, "at the poor and helpless. The rich have always advocates. They are freeholders, they own the property and soil of the country-it was they who had sent them there-the poor were not represented, but while he had the honour of a seat in that Assembly he should ever raise his voice against any measure which would tend to their oppression. The purchasing of vegetables and meat on the morning of the Lord's day, by a labourer who perhaps had not received his earnings till late on Saturday evening, was not Sabbath breaking. Let them adjourn to St. Paul's in the course of the forenoon, and they would perceive the reality of Sabbath breaking, by those who were crowding to Church. There they would see the stately equipage, with the pampered menial, dashing to the door of the House of God in all the mock majesty of earthly greatness. Names were to him no authority-he cared not who signed the petition, he read and judged for himself. If the rich wished a reformation to be made, they began at the wrong end. Let them walk to church and leave their carriages at home; let them set no joints down to roast; let retrenchment and a cessation from labour be the order of the day in the culinary part of their own establishments before they took high-handed measures against the poor. He looked upon it as a petition from the saints, and he might be esteemed a sinner for opposing it, but still he must do his duty..." 26 By his resistance, a week later, to the appointment of an inspecting field officer for Cape Breton, and his characterization of the whole militia system as a humbug, Haliburton went still further in his defiance of the provincial pillars of society and, besides putting himself squarely in opposition to even so autocratic an authority as that of the allpowerful Council, threatened by his stand thus taken to deprive that arbitrary body of some of its most esteemed 26 Ibid. Mar. 15, 1827. 96 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON bits of patronage. What made his fault the more unforgiveable was that he not only employed ridicule in making his points, but, when scored for its use, defended it, asserting that the mock-gravity of his opponents was the more ridiculous.27 But Haliburton's first really sensational opposition to the Council grew out of its disallowance of a bill for the support of common schools, reported to the House by a committee on which he served as the chairman. The school question dispute, like the debate on Custom House salaries, had had its origin in the preceding House of Assembly. In accordance with the expressed or understood desires of the Governor and Council that House had enacted legislation providing by direct taxation for a system of common schools. It was a measure wise enough in its theory, but thirty years in advance of any possible practical application. Its result upon provincial education had been so negligible, and its provisions so unpopular with the people generally, that Haliburton and many of his fellow members had come to the new Assembly resolved on its repeal, and on the reenactment of a system of local voluntary contribution in support of schools, supplemented by provincial aid. As chairman of the committee appointed to draw up the necessary bill, he had introduced a measure calling, among other items, for the appropriation of ~3000 annually, to be given in varying amounts from ~5 to ~20 to districts unable to support schools from their own funds.28 Haliburton's bill had promptly passed the House only to meet with a summary rejection by the Council. With the announcement of its rejection there came a request for the concurrence of the Assembly to two bills originated in the upper House, one for the regulation of juries, the other for the regulation 27 Ibid., Supplement, Mar. 15 1827. 28 Ibid., Mar. 22, 1827. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 97 of contested elections, matters which the lower House felt were its own particular concern. "When the title of the latter bill was read, a very warm and violent debate followed. Charges were distinctly made by Messrs. Uniacke, Haliburton, and Murdoch, against the Council both of a wish to insult the House, and to encroach upon their privileges. The two important bills to which they had expressed their dissent 29 had only been sent up that morning, and could not have remained with them above two hours. No conference had been asked, no explanations demanded. The rejection of the school bill in this abrupt manner-a bill which the House had prepared with so much care, and upon which they had spent so much time - was a violation of all the courtesy due from one branch of the Legislature to the other, and showed an evident disregard to the wishes of the House. A motion was pressed by Messrs. Uniacke and Murdoch that the bill sent down to repeal the law of elections should be instantly thrown under the table; but milder and more moderate counsels prevailed." 0 But upon the matter of the school bill Haliburton was not to be denied. Word of its disallowance had been received in the House on a Saturday. On the following Monday he was ready in his place with another, practically a duplicate of the one just refused. In the course of his remarks introducing his new bill he delivered himself of his most scornful attack on the Council, and attained a notoriety compared with which any degree of publicity he may have won previously was mild indeed: "I rise, Sir, to request leave to introduce a bill entitled, -'An act to aid the exertions of poor people in supporting Common Schools.' It is very similar to the one which I introduced on a former day, and which was rejected by His Majesty's Council. 29 The second bill dissented to was one to incorporate the proprietors of the new public school house at Kentville. Assembly Journals, Mar. 24, 1827. 30 Novascotian, Mar. 29, 1827. 98 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON It differs only in title, and in its term of duration, which is for three, instead of five years, but in other respects is substantially the same. As it is probable it will pass without discussion, I wish the indulgence of the House, while I make a few remarks on this interesting subject,-I cannot, Sir, find language to express the regret I feel at the failure of that bill, and that regret is still further increased, and my sorrow rendered more poignant, by the uncourteous and uncivil manner in which it has been returned to us. It has always been customary, on bills of importance or of interest to request a conference, and to state the grounds of objection, previous to their disallowance,-a practice tending to promote harmony and good feeling between the different branches of the Legislature, legitimate as respects Parliamentary usage, and founded on those courtesies which regulate the intercourse of gentlemen in society. In this case it has been omitted, and I must say I think it a mark of disrespect. We are now totally at a loss to conjecture whether they disapprove of the principle of the bill, of the scale of appropriation, or of its various provisions. They have retained it hardly long enough to read it, and it has returned on the very heels of the clerk who took it up to them. The voice of the people on this subject was loud and plain, from one end of the Province to the other —the experiment of assessment had been tried and wholly failed and they asked for pecuniary aid. They are entitled to be heard and as long as I have a seat in this House I will never cease td enforce their claims. They are the consumers of dutiable articles, they pay the taxes, they furnish the revenue, and they have a right to an appropriation for their benefit. It is a source of grief, to think how often they have been refused.-They have again and again supplicated aid and have been uniformly denied.-They have preferred their petitions to this House, and their prayer to Heaven that they might be answered, but they have always met with a cold unfeeling refusal. It is astonishing to all how unceremoniously they have been denied this little paltry pittance of ~3,000 while large sums of money are constantly spent upon subjects of little or no importance-to me it is particularly painful, for it is a subject which I have nearest to my heart, and am deeply interested in. I have been born and brought up in the country, am intimately acquainted with the wants of the people, and am solicitous of rendering them all the assistance in my power. If sighs were not unavailing and tears unmanly, I could positively weep over this IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 99 deceased bill, as the clerk carries it out to bury it among the records of the House. There is however a spirit more becoming, and I trust more availing-a spirit of resistance, a determination not to be put down, which if persisted in, must succeed. The people have a right to be heard and they shall be heard. We have this year unfortunately passed our revenue bills, but never again will I consent to them without a clause providing for schools, and if they must fall, let them fall together.31 Let us alter its title and call it a bill to raise a revenue for schools, and let it contain a specific provision for them. We may be baffled this session, but never, never shall we be baffled again. I find it difficult to repress my feeling into decorum on this subject. I will now relate to you a most singular and extraordinary incident which befell this bill. You may think I am borrowing from my imagination, you may think the scene I am going to describe is drawn from fancy, you may, however, place that credence in it you think proper —I shall not indulge in personalities, I shall name no one, but if there be one out of this House, who upon drawing upon his head the cap, thinks it was intended for him, and that it is well fitted, he is at liberty to wear it -' qui vult capere, capiat' I shall merely relate the fact and then tell me if it is not a strange and wonderful coincidence. There is, Sir, a small circle of respectable people in this place, who assemble every year to converse upon politics. They move in a fashionable circle, they are looked up to with deference and respect, and their opinions carry great weight.- How justly you shall judge. They consist of twelve dignified, deep read, pensioned, old ladies, but filled with prejudices and whims like all other antiquated spinsters. 31 It was Haliburton's contention that an appropriation bill could not be accepted by the Council in part, but must be approved or rejected as a whole. Upon this point of constitutionality a pamphlet was written in reply to his view entitled, ObservationsUpon... His Majesty's Council... with a few remarks upon... Pictou Academy, Halifax, 1828. The pamphleteer, now known to be Sir Brenton Halliburton (see above, 49), besides giving a serious consideration to the question at issue, ridicules and parodies the manner of oratory used in the Assembly to uphold the popular side of the controversy, and clearly has Haliburton himself in mind when he says, "Othello himself could not spout more finely." (17) 100 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON They are the Sybilline oracles of Nova Scotia, and as everyone consults them, I too went to their board of green cloth, to ask their opinion of my school bill. Two thirds of them have never been beyond Sackville Bridge,32 and think all the world is contained within the narrow precincts of Halifax. Two or three of the younger sisters indulge in a ride on the post road every summer, into the country, and have acquired the names of the villages and the inn-keepers, but that is the extent of their knowledge. They then return to town, talk sagely of roads and bridges, agriculture, rural affairs and common schools. They are looked upon as walking gazetteers, and living directories. I found them all assembled in state, looking so solemn, so wise, and so important, that I was struck with awe at so much female wisdom. I showed them the school bill and asked their opinion and advice-Judge of my astonishment when they refused to read it and rejected it upon reading its title. One of the old ladies who was dressed in black, whom the rest called their 'Learned Friend' tho' not very conversant with her Bible, told me she had read of 'the blind leading the blind' and saw no objection to the ' poor teaching the poor,' or in other words the poor being taxed for the support of the destitute-that if education was not worth purchasing it was not worth having, and that the poor would never know its value until they had ascertained its price. Another had the modesty to say she had heard that Nova Scotia had a fertile soil and a beautiful climate, and that it was impossible there could be any poor in the country, that if there were any, there was a poor house at Halifax where they might be sent, where they would not long continue a burden, for a sort of jail-fever had broken out there, which was daily diminishing their numbers-and a third said that tho' it was forty years since she had visited the country, yet she had learned enough to know that to educate the lower orders, was to injure their morals and manners, that the people should be divided into two classes the high and the low, and that it reminded her of two birds in the West Indies the booby and the fish-hawk: that the booby was a plodding, laborious bird, answering to our poor, that it went off to sea in search for food, and that the fish-hawk, a superior bird, answering to our rich people, sat quietly on the shore, watching its neighbour's progress; and as soon as it saw the booby returning with a fish 32 The northern limits of Halifax. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 101 it pounced on it, took it away, and eat it up - that this was pure nature, and offered a good lesson to mankind. Many similar observations were offered by others-two ladies did ask to hear the bill read, and observed that it might contain some good -but their voices were lost amidst the coughs and uproar of the rest. When I complained of this extraordinary conduct, they threw the bill in my face, and shut the door upon me. Such, Sir, was my reception, at what I call the hospital of invalids. I never liked petticoat government, and this completed my distaste to it. I must say I have a poor opinion of their good breeding, their good sense and their humanity.-I mention this, Sir, to show you what a wonderful coincidence there was between the rejection it was honored with from these old women of Halifax, and the hasty dissent it received from the upper House. Let no one suppose that anything disrespectful is intended by the allusion, or that 'Tabulis mutatis de te fabula narratur.' I am wholly at a loss to know upon what ground His Majesty's Council dissented to this bill; and I must again repeat my regret that there was no conference- was it that they thought we could not afford the sum required —that it could not be.... I must suppose that it arose from their belief that assessment was a preferable mode.... On this subject I am anxious to reconvey to them our sentiments, to assure them assessment is impracticable, opposite to the feelings of the people, and ill suited to the state of the country. We are in duty bound to make the attempt a second time. I am convinced the appeal will not be made in vain, and whatever determination they may make, it will at all events be satisfactory to us to know we have done our duty to our constituents. Let us try it again and hope for the best, and if we shall fail, if this bill come back again disagreed to, we shall know what course to take next winter, and I trust we shall not be wanting in firmness to carry our determination into effect."33 Four days later the full report of this speech appeared in The Novascotian. The Council was scandalized. Dignified indifference was impossible. With what promptness was fitting, six ponderous and unanimous resolutions citing many "gross misstatements" were drawn up and sent to the House 88 Novascotian, Supplement, Mar. 29, 1827. 102 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON with a " solemn message "84 pointing out that if the printer of The Novascotian had misreported the debates on the school bill he was amenable to both Houses, but that "if the expressions reported were actually uttered in the course of the debate;... the member who uttered them could only be called to account for his conduct in the House of Assembly by the House itself," and that it was both due to the Council and incumbent upon the House to proceed accordingly.35 Upon the delivery of these pronouncements to the Assembly, Haliburton admitted that the speech as it appeared in print was essentially the same as delivered, and assumed the entire responsibility arising from both its delivery and publication. A committee having been appointed by the House to investigate the affair and bring in a report, a series of resolutions were submitted, expressing regret " that any publication of their debates should have appeared, which His Majesty's Council conceived a gross misstatement of their proceedings, or reflecting in gross terms on that Honorable Board," and stating "that on enquiry into the debates on the school bill, and from an explanation given by the party, the House were fully satisfied that no disrespect was intended, or wilful statements made." 36 The resolutions were subsequently passed and transmitted to the Council. But the Council reported back a "unanimous regret" that the Assembly's resolutions were deemed unsatisfactory, " because they neither disowned the indecorum complained of, nor expressed any disapprobation of it."37 Interest in the final outcome of this difference between the two branches of the legislature reached its height when 34 Murdoch, Hist. N. S., III, 579. 35 Assembly Journals, Mar. 31, 1827. 36 Ibid., Apr. 2, 1827. 37 Ibid., Apr. 4, 1827. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 103 it became known that Haliburton had peremptorily refused to make any apology.38 The difficulty was finally resolved, however, with the unanimous adoption of another set of resolutions by the Assembly, characterizing Haliburton's conduct as highly reprehensible, and ordering the Speaker to publicly reprimand him.39 Haliburton was accordingly called to the Bar of the House and properly censured, and the Council having been notified of the accomplishment of its desires resolved, once again "unanimously," that it would have great pleasure in resuming the business of the session.40 Prorogation took place shortly afterwards without further prominent participation by Haliburton in the Assembly's deliberations. As usually related, this incident of Haliburton's public humiliation concludes with the statement that he took so to heart the chagrin and mortification of the affair as to at once abandon his efforts in behalf of popular education, and seek the speediest possible escape from political life.41 Nothing could be further from the truth. The session of 1828 was barely well under way when Haliburton moved a resolution to the effect that "a committee be appointed to prepare a bill to provide for common schools; and that 38 Novascotian, Apr. 12, 1827. 39 Murdoch affirms of these resolutions that they "were not in harmony with the opinion of the House, but a tribute to expediency." Hist. N. S. III, 580. "On that occasion [when Haliburton was censured at the Bar of House] the House was forced ['by the power' the Council 'possessed over the revenue and supplies'] to do an act which the learned member from Cumberland declared the other day he would cut his hand off rather than do again." Joseph Howe, Speeches & Letters, I, 144. 40 Assembly Journals, Apr. 4, 1827. 41 F. B. Crofton, in Canada: an Encyclopedia of the Country, edited by J. Castell Hopkins, V, 177, 178; Marquis, Canada and its Provinces, XII, 539, 542; etc. 104 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON the committee be instructed to frame it upon the principle of voluntary contribution, and not on that of assessment." 42 The resolution carried, and the committee it provided for was appointed with Haliburton himself as chairman, as in the case of a similar committee in the last session. Once more he introduced a school bill, substantially the same as that reported in 1827, only to have it, like its predecessors, rejected by the Council, although not until it had been made the subject of several conferences between the two Houses. Thereupon for the fourth time Haliburton brought in a school bill, and by compromising to the extent of naming each school section to be assisted, and specifying the amount to be granted to each, was able at last to force upon the Council an acceptance of what was virtually the principle for which he had so ardently contended.43 Meantime he had by no means forsworn his devotion to the constitutional rights of the mother country. During the session of 1828 the Assembly took occasion to protest to the Imperial government against the further imposition of quit rents. These were nominal fees payable to the King by grantees of Crown lands. For years,.because their imposition would have been an unreasonable hardship upon the settlers of a new country, their collection had been remitted. But during this session a proposal had been made for their revival. An address to the home government had thereupon been prepared asking for permanent relief from quit rents, on the ground of the inability of the colonists to pay them, though the true ground for the request would have been the inability of the officials to collect them. Haliburton, though he had 42 Novascotian, Feb. 14, 1828. 43 The bill is printed entire in the Nova Scotia Royal Gazette, Apr. 30, 1828. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 105 no more desire to pay quit rent to the Imperial government than the rest of the Nova Scotians, objected to the reason given for the desired relief and vehemently defended the legality of the royal claim. As as amendment to the adoption of the proposed address he moved that since Nova Scotia was able to pay from the provincial funds what the officials could not collect from the people, the government should offer to effect the commutation of all quit rents liable on lots of lands under 1000 acres, and that holders of larger areas should pay their fees of this sort into the colonial rather than into the Imperial treasury. Naturally the amendment failed.44 Haliburton in supporting it had indulged in a flight of his over-ornate adulation of the munificence and liberality of the imperial authorities, and so had given to his rival, Mr. Stewart, who had proposed the address under consideration, an opportunity to turn the laughter of the House against its then acknowledged chief wit. "I will endeavor," said Mr. Stewart quietly in reply to Haliburton, " to make my way through the beautiful branches, and foliage, and shade, and oaks, and temples, and tombs, of my learned friend, to the question before the House." 4 The culmination of Haliburton's audacity in legislative warfare during his second session in the Assembly came about in the course of a debate on a bill to permanently endow Pictou Academy.46 On this occasion he was once more on the side of the people. Pictou Academy had been founded in 1817 by the dissenters of eastern Nova Scotia 44 See "The Club," Novascotian June 5, 1828 for Haliburton's fun with those who outvoted him. 45 Novascotian, Feb. 28, 1828. 46 It has been often erroneously stated that it was in defense of Pictou Academy that Haliburton called down upon his head the reprimand that followed his speech for the support of common schools in 1827. 106 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON as a protest against the exclusion of their children from degree-taking privileges at King's College. It was free from religious tests of any kind, although the Council as a condition of its first grant of public aid to the school had insisted that the trustees should be either Anglicans or Presbyterians, and that their appointment should be subject to its approval. From the beginning the academy had struggled along under the devoted guidance of its founder, the Rev. Dr. Thomas McCulloch, petitioning from time to time for permanent government endowment, to which its friends felt it had quite as much right as the Church of England college at Windsor. To each petition the Assembly had responded by passing a bill in accordance with its request. The Council, however, had persistently refused to make more than annual grants, although in 1826 the bill for permanent assistance had only failed in the upper House by one vote, which, it is said, was cast by the Bishop.47 As a result of this policy of determined opposition the principal and trustees of the academy had each year to go through the humiliating ordeal of waiting upon the Council to determine the fate of their enterprise. Finally, dissensions over the control of the school between the Free Kirk Seceders and the Church of Scotland sects of Pictou County Presbyterians, gave the Council its desired opportunity to say, as an additional reason for withholding permanent aid, that the academy was not wanted even by its own constituency. From the time of his King's College days Haliburton had seen the evil effects of the ambition of a few narrow-minded Anglicans to control the higher education of his province, and he threw himself with ardor into the cause of Pictou Academy as the most effective manner in which to register his con47 Rev. George Paterson, A History of the County of Pictou, Nova Scotia, 340. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 107 tempt for their bigoted interference with an educational experiment undertaken solely to rescue the country from the results of the stupid policy of their predecessors. During the session of 1828 the usual measure for the permanent support of Pictou Academy was reported by the House committee on bills, and Mr. Stewart, leading an anticipatory action48 for the Council, moved for its rejection in the Assembly. It was then that Haliburton, aroused to the danger threatened by this advance attack, directed as he knew from the upper House, made his still unforgotten and outrageously bold attack on the most sacred personage of His Majesty's Council, the Lord Bishop himself: 49 "There is much to regret, Sir, in the state of public affairs in this province, and there are few colonies which present such a singular spectacle. There are a few individuals in Halifax, who direct public opinion, and who not only influence but control all public measures. Seated in the capital, they govern the movements of all the different parts; as they touch the springs, the wires move, and simultaneously arise the puppets in the different counties and towns, play the part assigned to them, and re-echo the sounds which have been breathed into them. The smiles of Episcopacy, the frowns of the Treasury, and the patronage of official interest, have a powerful effect, when brought to bear upon any one object. There is also a wide difference between the success of any measure, when called for by the people, and when advocated by this party; any project, however absurd or extravagant, when required by the latter, to be carried into effect, has friends without number, but if the people solicit, it is viewed with caution; you hear it whispered on all sides, it will offend such a person, it will not be acceptable in a certain quarter, and you are advised to be silent, as it may affect your personal interests, or draw down upon you a displeasure, which may retard your own 48 Assembly Journals, Feb. 1828. 49 The Rev. John Inglis, son of Charles Inglis (see above, 21), the first Bishop of Nova Scotia. 108 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON advancement. The war cry of church and state has been raised against this persecuted institution, and it is said on all sides it will militate against the interests of the established church and of King's College at Windsor. If it was founded on hostility to them, I would pause before I gave it my support. I am a member of the Church of England, and admire and revere it, I shall continue so and though I disapprove of the intemperate zeal of some of its friends, I shall live and die a member of that church. I have also the honor of being a graduate of King's College, and am a warm friend of that invaluable establishment.- As such, Sir, if there were any prejudices among the members of either, against the Pictou Academy because it is the resort of the children of dissenters; or if it was viewed by those with distrust, as a sectarian institution, I ought to know something of those prejudices. It is the misfortune of the Church and we all deeply lament it, that one or two unworthy members of it, have sought promotion through the paths of slander, and political intrigue, and have constantly represented dissenters as disloyal and disaffected people. The value of these gentlemen has unfortunately been estimated on the other side of the water, by their zeal; and as they have uniformly reported sectarianism, as they are pleased to call it, synonymous with revolt and rebellion, the dependence of the colony has been absurdly thought to be alone supported, by these staunch friends; and honor and promotion await their laudable exertions. Sir, the members of the Church of England and of the College disclaim any such opinion; the promulgation of it has libelled their good sense as much as it has misrepresented the good feeling of dissenters.- We know, and any man of common sense must know, that we have less, infinitely less to apprehend from the knowledge and enlightened views of dissenters, than from their ignorance and bigotry. It would be saying little either in behalf of education, or of the College, if they dreaded an overthrow, by the diffusion of knowledge, and derived their strength and respectability from the weakness and ignorance of those who were not admitted to a participation of these benefits. Sir, if I were upon terms with the Bishop of Nova Scotia, that would warrant me in offering unsolicited advice upon these subjects, I would address him thus-' My Lord, as the head of the Church of England, it is your duty, as it ought to be your pride, to promote a friendly and Christian feeling between your flock and dissenters. Seek not any odious distinctions —throw away the contemptible IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 109 bone of contention, the paltry advantage of marrying by licence,50 consent, advise, nay, insist upon their being addressed to ministers of all persuasions. Seek not to be established by law, but to be established in the affections, in the hearts of the people. Suspend such of your clergy as may disgrace the pulpit by open or covert attacks on dissenters. If you wish that the Church of England should be pre-eminent, let your clergy enter into an honorable competition with the ministers of dissenters; let them run the good race and contend for the prize; let them be pre-eminent in virtue- pre-eminent in piety -pre-eminent in learning, and preeminent in the discharge of all those christian charities which adorn and dignify the character of a teacher of the gospel; you will then have an established Church of England, which, instead of being viewed with distrust and jealousy, on account of its political advantages, will be honored by the respect and admiration of all classes and sects of people, on account of its christian excellence.' This, Sir, is the uniform opinion of every liberal-minded man, who belongs to the Church, and I will never consent that this seminary of education for dissenters, shall be crushed to gratify the bigotry of a few individuals in this town, who have originated, fostered, and supported, all the opposition to Pictou Academy. I do not mean to say, that they directly influence those members in this House, who oppose this bill, but their influence reaches to people who are not conscious of it themselves. They are in a situation to give a tone to public opinion; few men take the trouble of forming just conclusions on any subject, and adopt the sentiments of those whose judgments they respect. In this manner they hint, 'ambitious Scotchmen at Pictou,' 'sour sectarians,' 'disloyal people,' 'opposed to church and state'; their hints circulate from one to another- men hear it, they know not where, adopt it, they know not how, and finally give it as their own opinion, until you 50 The sole right to issue marriage licences in Nova Scotia was at this date still retained by the Anglican clergy, as it had been when Haliburton's father was a member of the House. (See above, 12.) During the discussion of legislation abrogating this right, introduced and passed in the Assembly later in the session of 1828, only to be defeated in the Council, Haliburton supported the cause of the dissenters. Equal privileges in the matter of marriage licensing were not finally secured by all denominations in Nova Scotia until 1834. 110 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON find honest and honorable men, as you have heard to-day, pronouncing a judgment, evidently tinctured by the breath of poison, which they themselves are wholly unconscious of having inhaled. Now, Sir, let us turn our attention to the arguments which have been used by the adversaries of the bill; the hon. member who spoke last, observed, that, because the hon. Speaker addressed you in favor of the measure, in an eloquent and able speech, there must be something wrong. I too, Sir, say, that when I hear opposition so warm and heated to a literary institution, and when I find personal ridicule thrown upon the head of it, and the title of Archdeacon applied to Dr. McCulloch, I also think there is something wrong; I hear arguments wholly addressed to our prejudices. We are asked, will you endow an Academy, when there is no provision for common schools; will you educate the children of the rich and abandon the poor? How very kind and considerate I I answer, there is provision for common schools. There is a bill on the table, which I introduced for the purpose by which 4 or 5000 pounds will be appropriated for that purpose. Why did not these gentlemen use the same argument, when the government required the support of inspecting field-officers? Did they tell you then there was no support for common schools? When 5000 pounds were granted to Dalhousie College,61 did they tell you then, provide first for common schools? Why did not patriotism rise up then and denounce them because this great object was neglected? We are also told that the institution is ruined, because the tutors refuse to admit children who have not read Dilworth and that of course the poor are not benefited by it. Sir, I am surprised to hear this language from some gentlemen who have used it, but I am not at all astonished to hear it from the hon. member from Barrington [Mr Homer]. When a boy I had acquired a smattering of Greek and flattered myself I could read Homer, and understand him, without the aid of Pope or Dacier, but I perceive, Sir, that as I grow old, I grow rusty, I find it difficult to make him out, and am obliged to have frequent recourse to translations and commentaries. But 51 Founded, in 1821, by the Earl of Dalhousie, Governor of Nova Scotia, as another protest against the attempted monopoly of degree-giving powers by King's College. Situated at Halifax, it was favored by the Council as the lesser of the two dissenting evils when public opinion finally compelled some support of a nonAnglican College. Classes were not commenced at Dalhousie until 1838. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 111 if this ancient author is becoming obscure, the modern Homer is wholly unintelligible; he is so impracticable, that he is altogether beyond my comprehension; he professes himself attached in an extraordinary degree to two objects, 1st. advancement of education, 2nd. encouragement of fisheries, and constantly and uniformly votes against every bill embracing those objects.-The hon. member from Cumberland52 has made a serious charge against the Trustees, he says they have departed from the original design of this institution, that they stated themselves at first to be emigrants from Scotland, desirous of establishing a seminary in which they could educate their children, on the religious principles of their forefathers, but that they now affect to make common cause with dissenters. This, Sir, is an opinion taken upon trust, it is not a new charge. I heard the same last winter, it was communicated in writing to us, by His Majesty's Council. It is not the case, and I cannot express the indignation I feel, that they should so carefully assert, what they might have found to be unsupported by fact, if they had taken the trouble to search their records. The application to government, contained neither reference to emigration from Scotland, nor to any form of Christian religion, but when the bill came back from the Council, it returned with the declaration ascribed to the question. I only state the fact and leave others to form their opinion of the value of such retentive memories. It was a shackle imposed upon the question by others, in some measure unconnected with the legislature, and now they are told it is deeply impressed upon our memories, that you sought the restrictionl What, Sir, was the policy of restriction? It was to classify and arrange dissenters the more easy to keep them down. Let us, say the friends of exclusion, keep the Baptists by themselves, the Methodists by themselves the Seceders from the Kirk by themselves, let them have rival schools, break down any principle of union, and we can take them one by one, when necessary and subdue them; when if united, their combined strength would be too strong for us. But, Sir, if the hon. member from Cumberland, had taken the same pains to investigate other reports connected with the subject, as he has to search for Judge Marshall's speeches 53 against the Academy, he would have discovered the unrelenting spirit of slander and persecution, which has ever pursued this devoted institution, and I think he would have withdrawn his opposition. He would find in one of the reports made to the Society, 62 Mr. Stewart. 53 See below, 131, 416. 112 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON for the propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, the following eulogium on dissenters-' It can be clearly substantiated that in exact proportion to the influence of the established religion, will be the immovable loyalty of the inhabitants of the province.'- and it would be difficult to find in public annals such another abominable libel on dissenters; it is said the person who made it, was once your chaplain.54 Had I been a member of this Assembly at the time, I should have moved to have him publicly censored at the bar of the House; he deserved to have been deprived of his gown, and should have been admonished to 'go and sin no more.' We have been also told, that the opposers of the bill, are willing to grant an annual allowance, but decline to give a permanent endowment. They know but little of the Academical education. Who can suppose you could obtain any person of Dr. McCulloch's literary attainments, to take charge of the institution upon such terms. Can you expect that that old gentleman will condescend to come here yearly, to solicit his salary; to be exposed to have his name unceremoniously handled, by people hostile to the Academy, to continue liable to be suspended in the midst of his useful career, by our caprices; to be told that if a newspaper is published in his parish, he must disclaim connection with it, and that he must be charged as guilty of every act of impropriety at Pictou, until he proves himself innocent? Can you expect that any gentleman will submit to such degradation, or that any institution thus provided for can ever flourish. We are told he gets the enormous sum of ~200 per an. Humble as I am, and inferior as I am to him in talent and attainments, neither I nor the hon. member from Cumberland, would give our professional services for double the sum. They say, too, they are friendly to the bill if differently modified: if that be the case, it is singular that instead of passing amending clauses, as is usual in such cases, they content themselves with voting against it altogether. The moment Dalhousie College was established here, it was resolved to destroy Pictou Academy, and to have two Church Establishments, the Kirk of Scotland, and the Church of England, under the control of which all education was to be placed. By a stroke of policy, which betrays the hand of a master, and which none but a man long practiced in intrigue could have conceived-a plan was concocted here, 54 The Bishop, who had been chaplain of the House previous to his elevation to the bishopric of Nova Scotia. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 113 to set up a few of the high Kirk People at Pictou, to aspire to the government of the Academy and to split these hitherto happy people into two parties-'Divide et impera'-and now that the Christian Tempter has succeeded in promoting dissensions, both parties are met by the same craftiness, and told with scorn, - 'Gentlemen you quarrel among yourselves, you are divided as to the utility, we cannot support your institution any longer.' So well known is it that this opposition was got up at Halifax and not at Pictou, that one of the gentlemen who signed the petition against the Academy, publicly said, admit more classes, (or in plain English find employment for me) and I have such influence in the Legislature, that I will procure you instead of ~400 a year an allowance of ~550. It is now so late in the day, Mr. Chairman, I feel it necessary to trespass no further on your time, but I should not have done my duty in giving a silent vote on this interesting subject." 55 Haliburton continued his attacks upon the unjustifiable and unconstitutional abuse of the Council's powers well into the session of 1829. Even a vice-Regal message failed to stifle his insistence that the Assembly should look to its rights. A communication from the Governor had announced to the House, among other things, an unauthorized expenditure of ~3000 " for various good causes," and requested indemnification. Haliburton at once moved that the different items of the expenditure be referred to the appropriate committees "for investigation," and in defense of his somewhat unusual motion said: "...the expenditure of public money by His Majesty's Privy Council, or by their advice, was a subject fraught with danger, most alarming in its consequences, and one that ought to be at once met with a firm and positive opposition by this house. Independent of the unconstitutional disposal of our funds, it was in 5 Novascotian, Mar. 6, 1828. Further proof of Haliburton's fearlessness in attacking intolerance and the Bishop's intriguing policy may be found in his speech on the marriage licence question. See Novascotian, Apr. 2, 1828. 114 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON the present exceptional shape in which that body was composed, likely to make that body a most formidable one. They are all public officers, with the exception of one country gentleman and a banker, and as self preservation is the first law of nature, it is natural for them to unite in defence, so that the whole influence and patronage of this province can be brought to bear on any point, and if any one be attacked by this house, the power of the whole will be concentrated in his support.... As to the influence of such partial expenditures he would say nothing; it could not influence this house, but in future Houses of Assembly it might have an influence -a powerful and dangerous influence, and the better mode was to make an immediate investigation.56 In the same session Haliburton continued also to champion Pictou Academy, and it was when aroused to a final appeal on its behalf that he made his most forward-looking and progressive proposal as a legislator, and his nearest approach to the proper solution of the colonial problem, though one that was still a long way from being exactly what the situation demanded. A resolution had been offered for the appointment of a committee to confer with the Council, with instructions to express the Assembly's acquiesence in the views of the upper House as set forth in a bill it had sent down during the last session. By the terms of this bill, Dr. McCulloch, the principal of Pictou Academy, was to be removed from the board of trustees, the board was to be replaced by another appointed by the Governor, and the institution reduced to the level of a grammar school.57 "Mr. Haliburton hoped the resolution would be allowed to lie upon the table. He must confess he was a little surprised that men, who had always opposed the Pictou Academy, who had voted against it on every occasion, should now appear to feel so sensitively for its interests, and seem to be afraid that its friends were going 56 Novascotian, Mar. 11, 1829. 7' Paterson, Hist. Pictou Co., 348. IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 115 to let it sleep. After seven bills had passed that House with large majorities, and had been sent down from the Council rejected, it was now to be forced upon them by those who had uniformly opposed it. He was not merely a friend to the Pictou Academy, but a friend to general education, and the rights and interests of dissenters. He wished the resolution might lie on the table, and he also wished that [the] gentlemen would come prepared to resolve themselves into a committee on the general state of [the] province, and to prepare an address to His Majesty, humbly soliciting him to remove from his Council those who filled public offices, or to give the country a legislative council..." 58 This was nothing short of revolutionary. It was worse: it was democratic. Mr. Stewart, as he himself announced, was astonished, and proceeded in his astonishment to accuse Haliburton of virtual treason: "The honorable gentleman from Annapolis says we should go into a committee on the general state of the province, and request His Majesty to remove some of the members of the Council; I should not be surprised if he were to propose to have the Councillors elected, to have the Governor elected, and then to hoist the thirteen stripes on the citadel hill." 58 For once Haliburton was not frightened by the bogey of republicanism. His reply to Mr. Stewart's insinuation was a complete vindication both of the wisdom of his suggestion and of his loyalty: "He rose," he said, "not for the purpose of speaking on the resolution, but to reply to the extraordinary remarks which had just fallen from the hon. and learned member from Cumberland. When a gentleman, who had either not heard him, or had misunderstood him, could coolly draw such inferences as he had from what he had said, and say that he should not be surprised to hear of such doctrines leading to an elected council, and elective government, and to the introduction of the American standard, in justice to his own character and reputation he must rise to repel such insinuations. I am, Sir, I should have thought, one of the last 58 Novascotian, Mar. 26, 1829. 116 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON men, from whose conduct or language such deductions would have been made, and I repel them with the indignation they deserve. I did not propose an elective but a legislative council, and what is there in such a proposition to awaken the fears of the hon. member, or to suggest the idea of the American stars? Will any man say that it is not necessary? Or that it would not be a most desirable amendment of our local government? Will any man say that we the 40 members here assembled from all parts of Nova Scotia, do not bring together a greater body of local and topographical knowledge than any similar number of men residing at Halifax? Or will it be denied that 12 or 14 gentlemen, appointed by the King from different counties in Nova Scotia, to a legislative council, could not better subserve the interests of Nova Scotia, than the same number of people at Halifax? It has been said that this country is a peaceable, quiet country, and is well governed. I admit that it has been a quiet and exemplary province, but, sir, it is owing to the temperance, prudence, good sense, and forbearance of this house, and the morality of the people, for many years past. But as to our local government, the structure and frame of it is essentially defective. Is it possible that any man can assert that where the legislative council consists of the same persons as the privy Council, and the latter is composed of all our public officers, whereby the servants of the public become its masters, that such a form of government is perfect, or that men so situated, unless equal to angels, could in the nature of things give satisfaction? Is it possible to affirm that a council separate and apart from the privy council, but appointed by the King from the country, would not be infinitely preferable? Where is the connection, sir, between this proposition and elective governments, and how can such deductions be fairly made from it? I maintain it, Sir, the state of this country does require us to go into a committee on the general state of the Province. Look, Sir, at the present prostration of every institution of liberal education Look at the destruction of the Pictou Academy Look at the rejection of the Annapolis Academy bill, see the determined hostility that exists to education whether liberal or common, unless it has the mark of the pen of the priest upon it, and then tell me the country is well governed. Look at the venerable and aged president of the Academy at Pictou, whose long life has been spent in literature, and whose days of toil and nights of care have borne testimony to his exertions for the education of our youth, persecuted and trodden under foot, scorned, IN THE HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY 117 ridiculed, and traduced, by men too, so much his inferiors in intellectual acquirements. I would ask, sir, one of those men, who was once his friend when his friendship was useful to him, to behold that sad spectacle of a friend, forsaken and borne down to the earth, by persecution, and to lay his hand upon his heart and say whether his conduct was that of a christian man. I would desire him, when he next descants upon universal benevolence and good will to men, to point to this illustration of his doctrine; and when next he prays, as I have heard him pray, for every sect and denomination of christians, to include the dissenters at Pictou, who engross his peculiar care. And should he be asked why his own friend, and the friend of his father's house should be forsaken: let him say, with whining cant, that he still loves and reveres him, but that when he tore the bread from his mouth, his heart reproached him, and he turned his back upon himl There are other men in this town to whom I would apply, but they, alas have neither head to understand nor heart to feel, and from him and them I would turn to this House and say, consider of this matter and petition the King either to remove the public officers fed and paid by the Province from the Privy Council, or to grant us a legislative council. That there does exist a necessity for this enquiry no man can doubt, who understands the state of our affairs. But I ask again can any man deduce from this opinion, that I desire an elective Government, or that it will lead to the introduction of the American standard, in its consequence. I am not a speculator, Sir, nor a theorist, nor will such propositions as I have made, lead me so far as has been asserted, that at last my own good sense will take alarm. It has no such tendency, nor do I hold any doctrines of that kind, and I will not suffer the imputation I appeal to all who know me, Sir; I appeal to you and this house for my justification; I appeal to the language I have held on the subjects of the Custom House and Quit Rents, and other questions of Government, for my justification-I say, I deny the inferences and that the hon. Gentleman either did not take the trouble to hear me or misunderstood me, or else he has drawn conclusions altogether unsupported by any thing I have said. Thus much, Sir, I have thought it my duty to say, for I should be wanting in a sense of what is due to my own character, to hear such assertions and allow them to go abroad to this Province, as legitimate consequences of my political opinions, and not to rise up and repel them as they deserve." 68 118 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON The close of Haliburton's last session in the Assembly was marked by an agreeable tribute to his ability that must have gone far to remove any unpleasant feelings still remaining from the proceedings which terminated the first. Once again he was summoned before his colleagues and addressed by the Speaker at the unanimous request of the House: "Mr. Haliburton, [said the Speaker] I am directed by this House to communicate to you, that they have had under their consideration a work now issuing from the Press, of which you are the author, entitled 'An Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia,' which they think alike useful to the Province, and honorable to yourself, and that, to mark their approbation of this first effort to describe the Country and develope its resources, they have unanimously passed a vote of thanks to you, for this laudable undertaking, which resolution will be read to you by the Clerk." 9 It was more than a gracious compliment that the clerk then read to Haliburton. For -the first time, provincial literature received official public recognition.6 59 Novascotian, Mar. 27, 1829. 60 Archibald MacMechan, in Canada and its Provinces, XIII, 272, states that, in addition to the thanks of the House for his History, Haliburton was presented with a money vote of ~500. No official record of such a vote exists. Moreover, see Joseph Howe's letter to Haliburton, below, 404. CHAPTER VI AN HISTORICAL AND STATISTICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA THOUGH a pioneer work in its own field, Haliburton's History of Nova Scotia, published from The Novascotian office in August, 1829, was only one among other manifestations of a general literary awakening in the province. Oratory, as we have just seen, was by no means a neglected art in the colony. Other departments of literature were becoming scarcely less well developed. Especially notable during the decade from 1825 to 1835 was the frequent appearance of provincial verse, and the peculiar features of a leisured journalism, descriptive sketches, humorous satire, and philosophical commentary. By the beginning of this period that " highly-gifted songstress of Acadia," 1 Miss Tonge of Windsor, had already left behind her the " few imperishable specimens of heaven-born genius "1 that made her early death so generally lamented by her countrymen, and the new-world Oliver Goldsmith had found an English publisher for his poetic record of the colony's advancement, "The Rising Village."2 A little later the verse of Henry Clinch, a student at King's College, had begun to attract favorable comment from local critics.3 Before the movement which these writers thus inaugurated had subsided, the province was able to 1 The Acadian Magazine, May, 1827, 434. 2 See above, 61, foot-note. 3 Letters and Public Speeches of Joseph Howe, edited by J. A. Chisholm, I, 4. 119 120 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON support, for a few years at least, a weekly journal, the Halifax Pearl, 1834-39, which devoted itself wholly to politics, literature, science, and religion. But most of the versifying and a good deal of the writing of other sorts produced in this first era of Nova Scotian literature found its way into print in the files of two other periodicals, The Acadian Magazine, 1826, 1827, and the Halifax Monthly Magazine, 1830-32, both of which helped materially to make the decade a conspicuous one in the history of the country's intellectual progress. Though they had to depend, of course, largely upon a generous use of the editorial shears for their offerings, they attracted too a goodly number of highly creditable contributions from their colonial readers, and set in those early days a standard of sound literary taste that has not since been improved upon in Nova Scotian periodical publications. Probably the most vivifying stimulus operating upon the literary adventurers of the province, however, was the personal example and editorial influence of the young man whose name appears as the printer and publisher on the title-page of the first edition of Haliburton's History. Joseph Howe had begun his journalistic career as an office apprentice on the staff of the Royal Gazette, Halifax, and as an occasional contributor in prose and verse to the local newspapers. After a year's experience as part owner of one weekly, The Acadian, he sold his interest in it and bought, in 1828, complete ownership of another, The Novascotian, then well known, and ably edited by G. R. Young, who had begun its publication three years before. Under Howe's control, The Novascotian quickly became the leading newspaper of eastern British North America, and attained a circulation that secured it readers throughout Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, in the eastern United States, and even in Great Britain. The amount of labor HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 121 required to edit and print such a paper as he produced was prodigious, yet Howe did most of it himself. He read and clipped intelligently from the Canadian, American, and British press, and so educated his fellow colonials in contemporary politics and letters. He personally followed and reported, from his own short-hand notes, the proceedings of the local legislature and courts, and then, by commenting upon them in a series of able reviews, rallied his readers to active discussion of provincial politics. Riding much about the province on business, he had an opportunity to observe and describe its scenery and resources, the results of which he shared with the public in his informative " Rambles " through town and country. Though he frequently published his own verse in The Novascotian, he sought eagerly for similar contributions from others, and succeeded in finding them too, in rather amazing quantity. He made his paper, moreover, a forum of popular opinion, and the repository of frequent letter-series presenting in comic or serious treatment various topics of public interest. Finally, he succeeded in gathering about him a group of wits who, as much for their own edification as for public good, produced from time to time, from 1828 to 1831, a collaboration called " The Club " done in the manner of Wilson's " Noctes Ambros:anae " in Blackwood's, and lampooning the follies and foibles of the day, particularly those incident to legislative activities.4 The 4 Haliburton himself was named by Howe (Lettcrs and Speeches, I, 4) as one of this group, though there is little evidence that he contributed much to their published jollifications. An orgy of punning included in "The Club" for June 23, 1831, could have been from the pen of none other, however, unless that of an extremely clever parodist. But if Haliburton prepared little copy for the collaborations, he furnished his share of the material upon which the others drew for their contributions. See especially the portrait of the "Major" in the first number of "The Club," May 122 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON desire for self-expression thus asserting itself in the columns of The Novascotian found reflection also in the other newspapers of the time.5 There was, indeed, a fairly widespread spirit of literary endeavor abroad in Nova Scotia during the period we have indicated and Haliburton's History and later his " Recollections of Nova Scotia," 6 practically the only productions of the time which still attract an occasional reader, were produced under, and remain as interesting and easily accessible evidence of, the common impulse then stirring among the whole people. The Historical and Statistical Account of Nova Scotia was written, of course, with no consciousness on Haliburton's part that he was thus importantly contributing to the first out-flowering of Nova Scotia's literary genius. He may, perhaps, have had some intention of making through authorship a bid for further recognition than his law practice, and later his record as a legislator, had brought him, and there may have been some slight desire to tell for its own sake the absorbing story of Nova Scotia's discovery, conquest, and settlement, of which his resi8, 1828; the jokes at Haliburton's expense in the numbers for Jan. 1, 1829, and Aug. 11, 1831; and the mock trial of Haliburton, impeached for various of his indiscretions in the House of Assembly in the session of 1829, published on May 31, of that year. The cleverly humorous pamphlet, Report of Mr. Bull's Jury, Jan., 1829, which is almost certainly the work of this "Club" group, contains also a mock examination of Haliburton, disguised under the pseudonym of "Billy-button," along with that of most of the other members of the Assembly during the session of 1828. See below, 121. 6 Particularly in The Acadian Recorder, founded in 1813, and continued down to the present day in an unbroken tradition of able editorial control and well-considered devotion to the cause of liberalism. See Report of Mr. Bull's Jury, 24. 6 The title under which part of The Clockmaker was serialized in The Novascotian. See below, 178. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 123 dence in Annapolis Royal had been an every-day reminder, but without question, his main purpose was identical with that which actuated him in writing the 'General Description, the desire to correct the "ill-favored brat" conception of Nova Scotia current everywhere among people who had not visited the province, especially among old countrymen. Some notion of the absurdities arising from this general ignorance of the colony may be gathered from a response made by Haliburton to a toast in his honor at a banquet given him in Halifax in 1839: 8 "You have been so good, Sir, as to refer in terms of approbation to an humble effort of mine —the History of Nova Scotia. On that subject permit me to say, that in early life I twice visited Great Britain, and was strongly, and I may say painfully, impressed with a conviction that has forced itself upon the mind of every man who has gone to Europe from this country -namely, that this valuable and important Colony was not merely wholly unknown, but misunderstood and misrepresented. Every book of Geography, every Gazetteer and elementary work that mentioned it, spoke of it in terms of contempt or condemnation. It was said to possess good harbours, if you could see them for the fog, and fisheries that would be valuable, if you had only sun enough to cure the fish, -while the interior was described as a land of rock and barren, and doomed to unrelenting sterility. Where facts were wanting, recourse was had to imagination; and one author stated that these woods were infested with wolves. Not content with the introduction of these savage animals, he represents them as having been endowed by Providence with the remarkable power of ascending trees in pursuit of their prey..... In short it [Nova Scotia] had become a bye word and proverbial term of reproach. Its name was a name of terror in the nurseries, and the threat of sending a refractory child to Nova Scotia was equivalent to sending him to the devil." 9 7 Edmund Burke's phrase, used in his attack on the Lords of Trade in 1780. 8 See below, 281, 282. 9 Novascotian, June 13, 1839. 124 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON In this same speech Haliburton goes on to relate as well the early hopes of and endeavors toward an account of the province that might have put an end to such misinformation as was then general, and his own determination to assume the task still awaiting, at the time recalled to mind, to be carried to successful completion: " Under these circumstances every one at all interested in the Colony was desirous that' some work, however imperfect, by some hand, however incompetent, should be put forth, to dispel this unfavorable impression that had so long been entertained with respect to us abroad. For some years, a hope was indulged that Dr. Brown, formerly a Presbyterian minister of this town, and afterwards President of the high school of Edinburgh,10 would favor us with a history of this Province, as it was well known he had made ample collections for that purpose; but death interposed to blight those expectations. At a subsequent period, the Rev. Dr. Cochran, Vice-President of King's College,"l a gentleman whose great literary attainments and untiring industry, eminently qualified him for the task, made some progress in the work, but increasing years and infirmities deprived us of this hope also. Finding that there was no probability of its being done by anyone else, I ventured upon the arduous undertaking, from a conviction of the necessity there 10 The Rev. Andrew Brown, a Scotchman, called in 1787 to St. Matthew's Presbyterian Church in Halifax. "He remained till 1795, when he returned to Scotland, where he lived till 1834, a part of the time occupying the chair of rhetoric in the University of Edinburgh, which had been previously filled by Dr. Blair. During his sojourn in Nova Scotia, and down to as late a period as 1815, he collected materials for a history of the province. His papers, including original documents, were discovered serving ignoble purposes in a grocer's shop in Scotland, and bought for the collections of the British Museum. Transcripts from the most interesting of them relating to the expulsion of the Acadians have been made at the instance of the Nova Scotia Record Commission, and have been printed in the second volume of the Collections of the Nova Scotia Historical Society." Charles C. Smith, in Justin Winsor's Narrative and Critical History of America, V, 458. 11 See above, 24. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 125 existed for something to be done, and in a full reliance upon the kind and good feeling of my countrymen, to regard its deficiencies and errors with indulgence, and to make the necessary allowances for the difficulties which the duties of an arduous and extensive professional practice and my legislative labours, necessarily imposed upon me." The discouraging extent of the difficulties that awaited Haliburton in undertaking a history of his native province, he also mentions in his Preface to the first edition. "This employment," he says, in reference to the collection of material, " though very humble, has been very laborious. The town of Annapolis, in which I have compiled it, contains neither public nor private libraries; and I have been under the necessity of procuring books of reference from London and Boston; and in some instances, where they belonged to public institutions, of obtaining copies of those passages I was desirous of consulting. Constantly engaged in business either public or private, I have never been able to devote to it my undivided attention, but have written it amidst repeated interruptions, and at different times, as the occasional occurrence of a favourable opportunity permitted me to resume the pursuit." 12 A more complete and intimate revelation of the labor and drudgery involved in the undertaking of a pioneer provincial historian is furnished in such of the letters as happily yet remain from among those exchanged between Haliburton and Judge Peleg Wiswall while the work was still in progress. They furnish also demonstration of the extent to which the latter influenced and assisted in the evolution of a pair of substantial volumes from what must have originally been a plan for a single one meant merely to correct the shortcoming of the General Description; and they afford as well a gratifying disclosure of the devotion and enthusiasm with which Haliburton applied himself to his exacting and long-continued task. The first of these let12 Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S. I, vi. 126 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ters reveals the fact that at the commencement of the year 1824 the project for the new work on the history and resources of Nova Scotia was well advanced, and had already been under consideration by the two friends: [To Judge Wiswall] Annapolis Royal, 7th January, 1824 Dear Sir I received your obliging letter by the last post, for which I beg. you to accept my best thanks. By the Halifax mail I received no reply to my last Communication to the Governor13 who seems disposed to act in the manner prescribed by Lord Bacon although your researches have supplied [him?] with a higher and better authority to support his measures than he himself is aware of. As he has however commenced with all due regard to Lord Bacon's advice, I hope he will pursue it "and voluntarily take some future occasion to redress the Grievance." I fully agree with you that there is in fact no history of Nova Scotia to relate, and that the few military events which might have happened here have as little Bearing on the true history of the Country as the Battle of Trafalgar, of which it can only be said that it was fought in a particular latitude & longitude and of which the sole remaining trace is a point in the general chart of the world. These occurrences resemble duels, for which the parties for political purposes sought our wilderness as the most convenient place of Rendevous [sic.]. When I therefore called the work I had in hand the history of the Country, I did not mean to apply it in the usual acceptation as a narrative of political events, but in a more enlarged sense as an account of whatever might be found in the Colony. Indeed, it is not the name of it which is "An Historical Geographical & Statistical Account of Nova Scotia." The division of the work I intended to make the same as the pamphlet. Devoting the first chapter of 50 or 60 pages to an historical narrative a connected but succinct view of the discovery, settlement and transfer of the Country until the Peace of Paris in 1763, at which period the French yielded all their territorial possessions in North America to Great Britain. After that period 13 Sir James Kempt, to whom Haliburton afterwards dedicated his History. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 127 the "short and simple annals of the poor" afford no materials for a continuation, and a history of the province subsequent to that epoch would be about as interesting as one of Dalhousie settlement.14 Having in the first chapter traced our tittle [sic] to the Province, I would then attempt a Geographical sketch and then proceed to statistics. It is upon the last I shall bestow the most labour as by far the most important part. Our climate population Trade Towns & Rivers Government institutions agriculture natural resources & Political advantages are really subjects worthy of Consideration, & I hope an account of them, if drawn up with tolerable care & accuracy will meet with a favourable reception from the Public..1. Your suggestion of publishing the work in numbers is one which I ought to have adopted in the first instance. It is possessed of many advantages. As you observe, the errors would not then have been beyond recall or correction, and if the performance attracted criticism much advantage might have been derived even from its enemies. It is also not improbable I might have received contributions of valuable matter from those who know the difficulty of the task & the value of it, properly executed-these and many other reasons which might be urged then shew at once the advantage and necessity of that way of appearing before the public. But it is now I fear too late to make a second experiment 6 upon our Community, which is far from being a reading society, and particularly as the new will embrace most of the old work. Whoever is known in this province as the author of any publication must consider that he has voluntarily brought himself to the stake to be baited by the empty barking of some and the stings and bites of others. If he is not known & his work attains to mediocrity, it will not be censured for fear that it should be the work of some established character, nor praised for fear that applause should fall upon an unknown, whom the generality of wits-if they have not considered as their inferior are at all events not disposed to place higher than on an exact level with themselves. The Price of Printing, too, at Halifax is beyond all reason and failure would 14 A scantily peopled farming community to the southeast of Annapolis Royal. 15 The portion here omitted will be found, above, 61. 16 The first experiment must have been the one carried into execution, i.e., solicitation of subscriptions prior to publication. 128 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON be ruin.V7 My intention was to go on progressively but steadily till I had finished the entire work, when I should send a correct copy to my friend Franklin in London18 and desire him to sell it to a bookseller for the best price he could obtain if he could not sell it to give it to the printer if he would publish it at his own cost, & if he could not dispose of it, to light his pipe with it. For I am not one who would rebel at the decision of the Booksellers and say "'S death I'll print it & shame the fools." I think their judgement infallible. They have administered so long to the literary appetite of the Public that they understand as it were by instinct what will be palatable and what will be removed from the table untouched. Every thing however which has America for its Subject (how dull or absurd soever it may be) is read in England with avidity, and I am not altogether without hopes of being able to dispose of my labours in some way or other...19 But the limits of my paper warn me that I am trespassing too far upon your indulgence. I shall as you request consider both our correspondence, and the purport of it strictly confidential. Indeed you are almost the only person, Goldsmith excepted, who knows who the author of that work is, or that I am still employed on the same subject. For the 6th and 11th chapters I shall be most particularly obliged to you for your contributions,20 and for 17 The book was nevertheless eventually printed at Halifax. See below, 143, 144. 18 Possib'y James Boutineau Francklin, who was a brother of Haliburton's step-mother, and for many years clerk of the Nova Scotian House of Assembly; but more likely another brother, Michael Nicholson Francklin, who died in London in 1830, after a residence of some years there. 19 The portions here omitted will be found above, 52. 20 The chapter numbering adopted for the Account in its first form makes it uncertain what portions these were, but manuscripts in the Nichols collection show that Judge Wiswall contributed various information respecting western Digby County. There are also in the same collection many notes in all stages of revision upon Nova Scotia's fisheries, forests, climate, religion, natural resources, commerce, etc., but by no means all of these were prepared for Haliburton's use, as the date 1834, given for some of them, proves. These dated portions more than likely were intended for a work dealing especially with the Acadians' history and expulsion that Judge Wiswall seems to have had in mind. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 129 such other parts as you think more than proper, and I shall deem myself most happy in being favoured with your confidence and counsel. If not asking too great a favour I should be glad to submit the draft of the several chapters as they become finished, for your perusal and correction previous to their being finally engrossed. With many thanks for your goodness and condescension I am, dear sir Yours truly Tho C Haliburton During 1824 work upon the manuscript must have progressed rapidly, for by December a draft of what is now included in the first volume had been submitted to Judge Wiswall, although Haliburton's comments in the following letter show that much still remained to be done: [To Judge Wiswall] 1: Decr. 1824 Dear Sir I received your favour by post, and I assure you it has given me very great pleasure to find that the manuscript has met your approbation. I had fagged & worried over it so much (for it is impossible to convey an idea of the labour it has cost me, in searching, translating, selecting, and composing it, more indeed than would be sufficient to acquire any one modern language) that I had wearied of every subject in it & feared it would prove a task even to read it. It has therefore relieved me of great anxiety to find you think, I have not altogether failed in the attemptI am much indebted to you for the hint of continuing it as a summary, which I shall adopt.21 I have in the old-work a chap — ter entitled "Sketch of the administration of Sir Geo. Prevost - Sherbrooke - Dalhousie & Kempt "- I will in pursuance of your suggestion take all the narrative part of it, which begins in 1807, and, with some alterations make it form a part of the Summary from — 63 to-24. If I can get access to the Council Books I can easily do it, and perhaps if you would be kind enough to give me a letter, this winter when at Digby, to Judge Stewart22 he would 21 See chap. VI, Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., I, 242ff. 22 See above, 50, foot-note. 130 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON obtain me a sight of them - I think their perusal indispensable to this part of the workYour directions about the map, are also noted, and will be strictly followed-I feel pleased you have mentioned it to me so soon, for I have in my possession Judge Chipman's23 map, published expressly for him by Government to guide him as commissioner on settling the lines, embracing the territory from Labrador to Chesapeake with old and new names of places. With a little alteration of [the] interior part of Nova Scotia (for it includes Cape Breton) it will just answer the purpose-I should have returned it if you had not mentioned it -I will now set a surveyor, I know at Windsor (Anson) who is a beautiful draftsman, and was actually employed by commissioners, to copy a map-I forget whether I mentioned to you that I intended to enlarge the plan of the work- I shall give it the following title page an Historical Geographical & Statistical Account of Nova Scotia to which is added a general description of New Brunswick & Cape Breton. Illustrated by a map and several engravings. One additional chapter for New Brunswick24 and another for Cape Breton will be sufficient, I think I can procure materials, from my friends, which with a good deal I am in possession of, will be sufficient to complete the work. Its tittle [sic] therefore professing to treat of so great a portion:of the British Dominions here (all indeed except Canada) will attract perhaps some attention to the work from an English Public. It will doubtless 23 Jared I. Chipman, Judge of the Court of Inferior Pleas for the eastern district of Nova Scotia, appointed to this position at the same time Haliburton's father accepted a similar office in the middle district. See above, 12, 13. 24 Omitted from the History as published. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 131 render the whole more perfect, and acceptable. I am intimately acquainted with the Scotch clergyman at St. Andrews, who will gladly give me the particulars of that place & vicinity-Robert Parker of St. John 25 - and perhaps Judge Marshall 26 will help me to particulars of his Island. You are now, Dear Sir, in possession of all my plans the particular division of my subject into chapters, and of the manner in which I propose executing it. I will now tell you where I am deficient in materials 1st from 1763 to 1824 —2nd Chief Towns, Rivers &c. of Nova Scotia particularly Eastern parts-3 New Brunswick & Cape Breton-4 for account of particular trade & several kind of fishing, mode of catch, expense of outfit, returns &cIn these four departments I am at a loss, and have got to learn before I can instruct. In all other parts of the work I have a great mass of matter collected, & partly arranged. I feel like the man who walked by land to the East Indies (Capt Campbell), got half way, and found the other half appearing a great deal longer, than the whole did at first. It is too much for one person, who has any other business to do, and who has no public library in reach. When you were here, you were kind enough to say you would help me in the statistics of the Eastern part of the province. In this particular I must trust to your kindness not to forget me, and any hints, additions, advice, on parts of the work, you find leisure and inclination to furnish me with will confer an everlasting obligation on me, for I feel great ambition to have this book do justice to our Country, and some little credit to myself. I am Dear Sir yours very truly Th C Haliburton Haliburton's appeal for assistance appears to have met with a generous response, for the next letter, undated, but 25 See above, 23, foot-note, and below, 202, 203, 435. 26 John G. Marshall, Chief Justice of the Court of Inferior Pleas for the Island of Cape Breton. See below, 416. Judge Marshall's assistance was forthcoming, as Haliburton expected. See Hist. and Stat. Acct, N. S., I. vii, and II, 201, foot-note. 132 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON endorsed 1825 in Judge Wiswall's handwriting, contains enthusiastic acknowledgment of help received: [To Judge Wiswall] Dear Sir-On my return from Halifax I found the 1st chapter of [the] History of Nova Scotia under cover of your letter accompanied by the Preface and corrections which you have done me the favor to prepare. I can hardly find words to express my obligations to you for the very great trouble you have taken and for the very extensive nature of the assistance you afforded, so far exceeding anything I had any pretensions to expect from any friend, much less from you to whom the mere literal labour (independent of the enquiry & record) must have been personally inconvenient- accept dear Sir, all I have to offer, my most sincere thanks. If anything can inspire me with renewed exertions it will be not to disappoint your expectations-the prefatory remarks27 are adapted in a peculiar manner to the work, and are perhaps the best apology that could have been composed, for the present backward state of the Country. Since I returned, I have been incessantly employed in assorting, filing &c. the confused papers of the probate office,28 which I had not previously touched, so that I have not been able to resume the work, but so soon as I can with propriety get at it I will write to you on that subject more fully.29 Further evidence of the personal and painstaking interest which Judge Wiswall took in forwarding his friend's 27 The Nichols collection contains several manuscript versions of what may very well have been the preface Judge Wiswall prepared for Haliburton's History, but Haliburton used no part of it in any of his introductory remarks as published. The Wiswall introduction, or what appears to be such, is adapted for a work containing material on New Brunswick. Possibly Haliburton decided not to use it when he decided against including the New Brunswick section. 28 Haliburton was appointed Judge of Probate for Annapolis County in 1825. Nova Scotia Almanac for 1826, 28. 29 For the remainder of this letter, see above, 49-51. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 133 arduous venture is found in another letter of this series, also undated, but watermarked 1826: [From Judge Wiswall] Dear Haliburton, I have perused your MS handed me by Mr. Nichols 30 with great pleasure. It is evident that you spare no pains in collecting facts, nor in detailing them. I think however, that you would save trouble to yourself by being more succinct,- particularly in the narrative parts - many things, such as length and course of roads, - number of houses & inhabitants —extent of townships by miles or acres &c. &c., had best be thrown into tables and appear by way of appendix. I feel a great desire that, your book should afford pleasant reading, together with a comprehensive view of our Province, to foreigners,-and at the same time become a standard book of reference for ourselves. From the New London Encyclopaedia now in the course of publication, I have extracted and herewith enclosed two wretched articles under the head of County of Annapolis and Town of Annapolis - until your book appears & spreads we shall continue to be misunderstood & mis-represented. I approve of your description of the Eastern District of this County but wish you to throw the herring fishing (for there it truly belongs) into the account of Clements31 and the description of the Gut 32 into that of Granville. You will perceive that, I have written for you an entire description of the western district.33 Its history is altogether of recent date, - and it, together with its topography, intimately known to myself. I have omitted your dis30 See above, 45. 31 A suggestion Haliburton followed. See Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S. II, 165 ff. 32 Formerly a sailor's name, now the only one used, for St. George's Channel, the break in the seawall that separates Annapolis Basin from the Bay of Fundy. Haliburton included its description with that of Digby, not Granville, as Judge Wiswall suggested. See Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S. II. 168. 33 Included on the same sheet as Judge Wiswall's letter. Haliburton made only slight use of it in the description of western Digby County as he finally wrote it. See Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S. II, 171 ff. 134 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON sertation upon the manner of the Clare people and also the distinct naming of our worthy friend Mr. Segogne.34 For whatever is said of the Clare people is alike applicable to the Acadians throughout the Province,- and properly comes into that chapter where you may class & characterize our inhabitants under the titles of Acadian, German, New England, Scotch, Highland, Miscellaneous, & Indian. And as to the naming of particular living persons, either in terms of paneygoric 35 or of censure let it be avoided. It is beneath the dignity of your undertaking, and will not be generally well received or favorably commented upon-36 The last letter of this series, endorsed 1829, shows Haliburton still endeavoring to obtain what accuracy was his to command, and seeking Judge Wiswall's criticism and correction throughout the last stages of the preparation of his manuscript, up to the very moment of its going to press.37 [To G. K. Nichols] My Dear NicholsI send you the draft of the Sketch for [the] County of Annapolis for your Perusal, & our friend the Judge. I should be glad if you two would spend a morning over it correct its errors & add what has been omitted-particularly Digby The Neck Brier Island Sis[s]iboo River and other matters connected. I beseech you not to fail me & to return it if possible by first mail, if not next Monday, certainly the Monday following. I call it the poorest report I have. Let your accompanying remarks be free and without reserve, I have no pride of authorship —and don't care how much it is cut to pieces- only send the original back unaltered, for it is all 34 Haliburton persisted in the retention of both. See Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S. II, 173. 35 Judge Wiswall makes in the margin of his letters two other attempts to spell panegyric both as amusingly unsuccessful as this. 36 The letter breaks off abruptly without a signature to make room for the description of western Digby County referred to above. 7 The first announcement of the forthcoming publication of the History appeared in The Novascotian for Feb. 21, 1828. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 135 I have and let remarks accompany it by letters A B C D —refering to corresponding letters on other paper. I entreat you not to disappoint me. The mackerel fishing I have in another place. With great regard Yours ever T. C. Haliburton In all, Haliburton spent seven years of conscientious and patient research among the scattered memorials of his country's history, and in collecting and compiling statistical returns and other data respecting its population, industries, commerce, and its still to be developed resources. It is not to be wondered at, then, that when he finally sent his manuscript to the printer he told his family he felt as though he had parted with a child.38 Such attachment to his task makes it all the more regrettable that fate should have deprived him of an opportunity to correct the proof sheets,39 and necessitated the appearance of his work before the public marred by the grossest sort of typographical errors. Apart from these blemishes, however, the History itself offers all the testimony needed as to the diligence and faithfulness that went into its making. Despite its somewhat too well-starched formality, in point of style and honest execution of its design it was not improved upon by any of the numerous works which Haliburton wrote later. The title of the work describes accurately enough its nature and contents. The first volume confines itself to what Haliburton evidently felt was all that deserved consideration as relevant historical material, an account of the more romantic and stirring events which had taken place in the province from its discovery by John 38 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 39 See Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., I Preface, vii, and II, errata sheet at close of index pages. 136 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON and Sebastian Cabot, in 1498, to its final transference to British control in 1763. To this account is appended by way of chronological entries a naive summary of occurrences that brings the record down to 1828. The statistical account of the province is presented in the second volume, which includes also a good deal of matter of much more interest than a collection of tabulated returns usually promises. As history, Haliburton's work is not altogether trustworthy, and it suffers, of course, from the defects common to inexperienced authorship and the difficulties incident to a pioneer undertaking. Most disappointing among its faulty features is its undue emphasis upon episodes of a purely adventurous or military character, and its neglect of the constitutional development and social evolution of the country, especially in the period from 1763 onwards, for the tracing of which Haliburton's social connections and professional position should have placed him in a peculiarly favorable position. With all its shortcomings, however, Haliburton's account of Nova Scotia has not been surpassed in interest and readability by any subsequent history of the province, nor has any later history succeeded in displacing it as a popular sourcebook of information regarding the period of Anglo-French rivalry for the colony and of its early settlement. To this day, teachers in the public schools of Nova Scotia, whether they know it or not, in "oral history " lessons instruct their pupils to repeat phrases from their country's story just as Haliburton wrote them nearly a century ago..Practically every historical or descriptive account of the province written since Haliburton's time has been based in part, either directly or indirectly, upon his work. And at least two of the more imaginative treatments of Nova Scotian incident, both written, strangely enough, by Americans, have found, if not their inspiration, then certainly HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 137 their facts, in Haliburton's version, one a novel, The Neutral French (1841), a highly sentimentalized narrative of the Acadian deportation, by Mrs. C. R. Williams,40 and the other, Longfellow's famous "Tale of Acadie," the poem Evangeline (1847), based on the same event. Not only did Longfellow read Haliburton's History, and the passage included there from the Abbe Reynal's work 41 on the Nova Scotian French, before writing his romance,42 but he first heard the tragic details of the happenings which went into its telling from a member of the historian's family. The legend, it appears, was told by Haliburton's aunt, Mrs. George Haliburton, to the Rev. H. L. Connolly, rector of a church in South Boston, who later, a dinner guest with Hawthorne at Craigie House, retold it to Longfellow, and stated that though he had urged it upon his friend from Salem, Hawthorne had declined it. Thereupon Longfellow asked permission to try his hand at putting the story into poetic form. To this Hawthorne consented and agreed not to treat the subject in prose until Longfellow had seen what he could do with it in verse. Whether Longfellow derived anything from Haliburton's History besides the setting for his poem, it is now impossible to decide, but if more than the legend itself had been needed to awaken his pronounced sympathies for the Acadians it would have been the comments with which Haliburton accompanied the facts and documents he had assembled bearing on their expulsion. His deprecation of 40 See the Introduction to The Neutral French, 12, 13. 41 Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., 1, 170-172. 42 See the Life of H. IV. Longfellow with Extracts from his Journal and Correspondence, II, 71, edited by Rev. Samuel Longfellow. See also J. F. Herbin, The History of Grand Pre, 119; an autograph letter of H. W. Longfellow's in the Legislative Library, Halifax, N. S.; and another to T. B. Akins in the collection of Beckles Willson, Windsor, N. S. 138 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON the harsh treatment accorded the French neutrals precipitated a discussion as to the justice and necessity of their banishment that still continues. But it seems, in spite of the vehement and reactionary defense of the British side of the dispute, produced in great measure by Mrs. Williams' and Longfellow's disregard of all save the pathos of the affair, that as Haliburton had the first word on the question, so will he have the last. For enlightened opinion tends more and more to accept his view that though the transportation of the French appeared to the English authorities of the time a measure dictated by military necessity, it was carried out so as to inflict unnecessary suffering upon a hapless people. True it is that there have been claims that Haliburton late in life revised his original opinions upon this matter, but they have been made without substantiation of any sort.43 And it is also true that because Haliburton's defective knowledge of the facts of the case led him to state it as his belief that the official records of the transaction had been "carefully concealed," 44 he has been accused of insincerity in his conclusions concerning the English proceedings. But upon this point Judge A. W. Savary's vindication of Haliburton is complete and final: " Defective, but defective only on the side he supported, as his sources of information admittedly were, ample data remained to justify his conclusions... His decision was like the acquittal of an accused party on the evidence against him alone, thus emphasizing his innocence.' 45 It is unlikely, therefore, that future findings on the Acadian question will cast a doubt on either the sincerity or soundness of Haliburton's judgment that an 43 See R. G. Haliburton, The Past and Future of Nova Scotia, 15, and Campbell, Nova Scotia, 46-49. 44 Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., I, 196, foot-note. 45 Hist. County Annapolis Supplement, 34, foot-note. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 139 exile forced upon a whole people for the faults of a few was a punishment disproportionate to the crime.46 The only other expressions of personal opinion which Haliburton permitted himself in his History, like his stand on the expulsion of the Acadians, were repeated for the most part from his House of Assembly speeches, and their reiteration in the pages of a work written dispassionately and without haste afford a sound reason for accepting his vehement legislative pronouncements as true to his personal convictions. The claims of Pictou Academy were once more supported,47 and the need of Dalhousie College again seriously questioned.48 The right of England to levy taxes in regulation of colonial foreign commerce was upheld as eagerly as ever, and supported by the contention that while the provincial legislatures had jurisdiction over internal affairs of the colonies, the British Parliament was supreme in all external affairs,49 a contention later used against Haliburton's defense of Imperial rights by his political opponents in their demand for reform in colonial government. The opposition to the unconstitutional and un-British assumption of legislative, judicial, and executive powers by the Governor's Council, which Haliburton had waged so audaciously in the Assembly, was also continued as earnestly, though less violently, in the discussion his History presents of needed improvements in the provincial administrative offices,50 and the suggestion which had so shocked his antagonists in the House,51 the 46 Striking corroboration of Haliburton's view is promised in the results of the latest research into this vexed question, a volume of hitherto unpublished original material about to be issued by the Nova Scotian government. 47 Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 54-56. 48 Ibid., II, 18. 50 Ibid, II, 317-319. 49 Ibid., II, 326, 327. 51 See above, 115-117. 140 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON reconstitution of the upper branch on a more widely representative basis, was here worked out in some detail. What Haliburton proposed in his calmer-minded consideration of the question was a Council made up of members possessing qualifications "infinitely higher than those eligible to be chosen members of the House of Assembly," determined upon by electors who "should possess qualifications, also proportionately higher than those of the electors of the Representatives." As an alternative to this proposal, and as a concession to those who might oppose it, " as bordering too much on democracy," Haliburton put forward also this other, that "the election might be left with great safety to the Crown, with this express proviso, that every Councillor so named, should be possessed of landed estate in the Colony, to a certain extent, and should hold his seat for life." But in either case Haliburton insisted on this essential feature of improved reconstruction, that the Council should be invested " with no other powers than those necessary to a branch of the Legislature." Upon still another question of much public concern the Historical and Statistical Account records a conclusion early reached by its author which is also interesting, unlike those just cited, however, not because it reiterates a judgment he had passed formerly, but because it anticipated one pronounced much later, not by Haliburton himself at all, but as a professional decision by quite another person with whom he has often been mistakenly identified,52 Sir Brenton Halliburton, in his official capacity as Chief Justice of Nova Scotia. Discussing the applicability of English common and statute laws to colonial cases, Haliburton remarks,53 "as both these laws grew up with the local circumstances of the times, so it cannot be supposed that either of them, in every respect, ought to be in 52 See below, 415. 53 Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 344 ff. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 141 force in a new settled country; because crimes that are the occasion of penalties, especially those rising out of political, instead of natural and moral relationship, are not equally crimes in every situation." Delivered years afterward from the bench of the Nova Scotian Supreme Court, in different form, of course, but with substantially the same legal implication as it has here, this opinion is now considered among the most important, in its bearing on the development of colonial law, that Haliburton's locally illustrious namesake and colleague ever rendered.54 The necessity we have seen Haliburton was under of depending upon the writings and personal assistance of others in completing his History,55 and his lack of presentday meticulous care in recording literary indebtedness and citing sources have led to serious charges of plagiarism in the compilation of this work which the facts scarcely warrant, and which it is perhaps as well to deny, since there still remain more cases than enough in which Haliburton lies open to similar accusations where no denial is possible. For instance, Sir John G. Bourinot in his Builders of Nova Scotia 56 states that much of Haliburton's narrative of the Seven Years' War, and of the account of the second siege of Louisburg, is either condensed or taken verbatim et literatim from Smollett's The History of England. There is, to be sure, in Haliburton's History no foot-note acknowledgment of the obligation to Smollett, but in the Preface of the first edition, unfortunately omitted from those issued later, Haliburton makes specific mention of 64 See Alexander James, Report of Cases... Supreme Court of Nova Scotia, 1853-1855, 289-291, and Canada and Its Provinces, XIV, 464, 465. Both Haliburton and Sir Brenton were, of course, closely following Blackstone in their opinions. 55 See above, 130, and Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., the Preface. 56 63. 142 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Smollett as among the English authorities who "have afforded me the most assistance," while in his General Description, which makes use of the same material, he names the precise source from which it is derived.57 As an additional example of Haliburton's tendencies to appropriate to his own use the labors of others, Bourinot mentions that "the second volume is largely made up of contributions from residents of the counties and townships, of which he gives interesting geographical and topographical descriptions," and that, "the very full account of the island of Cape Breton was written by Mr. W. H. Crawley, who was connected with the survey of that island, and is much above the average merit of the volume from a literary as well as economic point of view." As a matter of fact, Haliburton expressly states in his Preface58 that, "The second volume has been compiled from public records, surveys, charts, personal knowledge, and colonial works; and also from an extensive correspondence with respectable and intelligent people in all parts of Nova Scotia "; and in the second volume, which contains the account of Cape Breton in question, he makes 59 the following complete and hearty acknowledgment of Mr. Crawley's assistance: " My first efforts to obtain accurate information of this interesting and valuable island were so unsuccessful, that I had almost despaired of presenting the public with anything beyond a mere sketch... but just as it was going to the press, I received an offer from W. H. Crawley, Esquire, to inspect the manuscript, and make such corrections and additions as it should require. Instead of new notes as I had anticipated, I received a mass of most valuable information, and should feel guilty of appropriating to myself the credit of his labors, if I did not make an explicit acknowledgment of his kindness." Another charge of the same sort not so generally well known is made in a review of Bourinot's Builders of Nova 57 Gen. Desc., 65, foot-note. 58 vii. 59 201, foot-note. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 143 Scotia,60 and, though more serious, is scarcely better substantiated. Its statement that, "The short histories of townships which Haliburton prints in the latter volume [the second of his History of Nova Scotia], are taken almost literally from the third Charles Morris's61 General Information Book," is, it is true, amply authenticated, but any implication of plagiarism which it carries is more than offset by the fact that Haliburton, after admitting in his Preface his debt to the "public records, surveys, and charts" of his province, goes on to list the "Hon. Charles Morris " among those to whom he is under " great obligation" and to whom he wishes to return "sincere thanks." Financially the publication of the Historical and Statistical Account was a disappointment. Haliburton, indeed, managed to clear himself of the transaction without loss, though it returned him no adequate reward for his labor.62 But to Joseph Howe, the publisher, the speculation proved almost disastrous. Too sanguine expectations of a ready sale abroad led to the printing of an edition more than three times as large as was usual in England with works of a corresponding class.63 From the private papers of Howe one may learn how high were the hopes he entertained of his publishing venture, and how serious was the extent of the losses sustained through his miscalculation. Writing, in July, 1829, of his unexpected successes with The Novascotian and his printing-office, he says: "In addition to this, I have been printing 3,000 copies of Haliburton's History of the Province by which I shall clear a handsome sum, so that, all things considered, I have great reason to be thankful, as I believe few who began 60 By Victor H. Paltsitts, American Historical Review, V. 802. 61 Appointed Surveyor-General of Nova Scotia, 1802. 62 See below, 404. 63 Novascotian, June 13, 1839. 144 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON with nothing have done more in a year and a half."64 The other side of the story is presented in his business memoranda of the same year: " This year published Haliburton's History of Nova Scotia, which was a ruinous speculation. It cumbered my office for two years, involved me in heavy expenses for wages, and in debts for paper, materials, binding and engraving. It was to have been published on joint account, he making some cash advances, and we dividing the profits and loss. To simplify matters I bought the whole, relying upon heavy sales in England, the United States, and the other Provinces. None sold abroad. The Book, though fairly printed, was wretchedly bound, the engravings were poor, and I was left with about 1000 copies, scattered about, unsaleable on my hands."65 As late as 1837, these 1000 copies of the history still remained unsold, though offered at half price. The failure of the English public to justify his belief that it would read with avidity anything on America " how dull or absurd soever,"66 was probably disheartening enough to Haliburton, but even more discouraging, after all his efforts to correct erroneous opinions about Nova Scotia, must have been the Eclectic Review's assertion that his History would hardly excite much interest in England " simply because the subject partakes of the reputed character of the clime and country to which it relates, - cold, sterile, and uninviting"! 67 The Eclectic was sufficiently generous, however, to describe the book as not " destitute of utility," and as " highly valuable" to anyone contemplating emigration to the British settlements in America, and to give its author his due for " the competent execution of 64 Collection of Judge J. A. Chisholm, Halifax, N. S. 65 Papers of Joseph Howe, Public Archives of Canada. 66 See above, 128. 67 III, 3rd ser., 1830, 119. HISTORICAL ACCOUNT OF NOVA SCOTIA 145 his undertaking." In the United States contemporary opinion was rather more cordial, the North American Review in the course of an extended notice declaring that Haliburton "has given us a history and description of his native province which not only does great credit to himself and to Nova Scotia, but will safely bear a comparison with any of the works of a similar kind, that have appeared in the United States." 68 Perhaps as handsome a recognition as any which his History brought Haliburton was the vote of thanks which he received for his work from the Massachusetts Historical Society, and later his nomination and election to a corresponding membership in the same distinguished organization, not the least gratifying feature of both honors being the coupling of his name with that of Washington Irving in the formal motions necessary to vote them.69 At home, Haliburton's reputation was, of course, tremendously enhanced by the appearance of his History, and it is generally conceded that it was his patriotic endeavors as the pioneer historian of his province that finally turned the scales in his favor when the matter of a successor to the office left vacant by his father's death was under consideration, and that thus opened the way for his retirement from the acrimonious scenes of the legislative arena into what in his case was the quiet and leisure of a judicial appointment. 68 XXX, 1830, 121, article by C. W. Upham. Recent expert American opinion still gives Haliburton credit for producing " A work of conscientious and faithful labor," and points out that while "No one without some previous familiarity with the subject can safely read it..., such a reader will find it in much of value." See critical estimate by Charles C. Smith, in Justin Winsor's Narr. and Crit. Hist. of Am., IV, 155, 156. Quoted also in Larned's Lit. of Am. Hist., 431. 69 Proceedings of Massachusetts Historical Society, I, 423, 424. CHAPTER VII JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS THE course of political independence which Haliburton insisted on following in the House of Assembly, however admirable the intention to pursue it may have been, was obviously leading him to no desirable goal. Among his constituents and the voters in the province at large no amount of eloquence in support of their rights could offset the unfavorable impression produced by the patronizing references in his speeches to the "lower orders,"' or by his frequently and forcibly expressed contempt for popularity, about which it was well known he cared " not three puffs of a cigar." 2 In the House, instead of securing the strong and commanding position for which his gifts of oratory and his natural fearlessness may have justified him in hoping, he had followed his inclination for indiscriminate jest and the reckless cracking of skulls 3 until he had lost all prospect of controlling those whom his demands for reform might have induced to accept his leadership had they not been either hurt or intimidated. 1 See Report of Mr. BuT's Jury, 27. See letter signed "Digby," [= Judge Wiswall?] Novascotian, June 5, 1828. 3 A notorious instance of his fondness for merciless ridicule is his attack as one of the Assembly's Committee on Privileges, on John A. Barry, member from Shelbourne, which had its share in procuring Barry's suspension from the House and later imprisonment, not effected without serious rioting in the streets of Halifax. See "The Club," Novascotian, May 21, 1829; a series of twentyfive letters from Barry in the Acadian Recorder, 1829-30; and Campbell's Nova Scotia, 261 ff. 146 JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS 147 Yet he was never without a following, and his dauntless bearing on many occasions very likely compelled approval even when he failed to inspire perfect confidence in the disinterestedness of his motives. Even his most unmistakable exhibitions of ill-temper were not wanting defenders, who insisted on his good intentions and consistent good humor.4 Nevertheless it was the antagonism rather than the support of his legislative colleagues that Haliburton won, although their opposition was never so strong or decided that it might not have been readily overcome by a discreet change of tactics. In the Council, the seat of all power, it was unavoidable that his House of Assembly conduct should arouse both distrust and defiance. His situation at the end of his third session in the legislature had become, therefore, as dangerous as it was difficult. And yet it could hardly have been more uncomfortable than that he had made for the Council. For the restoration of the official peace of mind it was absolutely essential that this turbulent commoner with his persistent challenge of long established authority and privilege should be silenced. Of the two alternatives at the command of the upper House for ridding itself of his constant attacks neither was satisfactory. To crush Haliburton would not have been easy, for he was an eager combatant, not to be bullied out of a resistance to what he thought unconstitutional, and capable of continuing his fight, single-handed if necessary. To conciliate him, on the other hand, was something the Council could scarcely be expected to do with any very evident show of good grace. Still, he was too dangerous to be ignored. 4 See letter signed "Digby," Novascotian, May 1, 1828, and a remark respecting Haliburton in "The Club," Novascotian, May 21, 1829: " Happy dog, nothing discomposes him long; he storms for a few moments and it is all over, clear sunshine again,..." 148 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON It was Haliburton himself who led the way out of the difficulty. The manuscript of his History had barely been completed when he was summoned from Annapolis to the bedside of his father then lying dangerously ill at his home in Windsor.5 On July 7, 1829, his father died,6 and shortly afterward Haliburton relieved the Council of its embarrassing uncertainty as to his conduct by making application for the position in the Inferior Courts of Common Pleas which his father's death had left vacant. The surprise created in the Council by his request for its favor must have approached that produced by his earlier displays of effrontery.7 And yet it should not have been altogether unexpected, for in those days offices continued in families, passed on from father to son as a matter of course,8 and Haliburton, besides possessing the qualifications needed in a successor to his father's office, had eloquently demonstrated his devotion to the interests of the Crown in the debates on the Custom House salaries and the quit rents, and on numerous other occasions. In addition, he had performed a patriotic and much needed service to his country in the preparation of his painstaking account of the province. All these, we may be sure, were 6 Errata note, Hist. & Stat. Acct. N. S., end of vol. II. It was Haliburton's father's need of constant attendance during his last illness that delayed the preparation of an errata sheet so long that Joseph Howe finally determined to trust to the indulgence of an impatient public, and issued the work still uncorrected. 6 " After a most painful illness," Novascotian, July 15, 1829. 7 It must have been Haliburton of whom one of the old Council of Twelve " openly made the remark on an occasion when there was a vacancy on the Bench, and an eminent lawyer had applied for it, that he wondered how the gentleman could have the impudence to apply, after his opposition to the Council whilst a member of the Assembly." Rev. G. M. Grant, "The late Hon. Joseph Howe," The Canadian Monthly, May, 1875, 506, 507. 8 Ibid., 385. JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS 149 reasons urged for granting his request, but against them could be adduced his unforgiven attacks on the Lord Bishop and on the twelve " antiquated spinsters"9 of the upper House (the first of which his enemies termed "uncalled for and unjustifiable" and the other "wanton and unprovoked, and unaccountable " 10) and his continued advocacy of a denatured Council exercising legislative functions only. The matter was finally settled in Haliburton's favor by a proclamation issuing from the Provincial Secretary's office on October 2, 1829, to the effect that "His Excellency the Lieutenant Governor has been pleased to appoint Thomas Chandler Haliburton Esq., Barrister at Law, to be First Justice of the Inferior Court of Common Pleas, and President or First Justice of the Court of Sessions for the Middle Division of the Province in the room of W. H. O. Haliburton, Esq., deceased."11 How near it came to being decided against him and how great was the relief in both Houses of the Legislature to have the case thus finally disposed of is divulged in a rare bit of intimate gossip in a letter from one of the Council members, Judge James J. Stewart,l2 to his friend and colleague of the Supreme Court, Judge Wiswall: 5th Oct. 1829, Halifax. ".. The Judges begin now to think, with the Atty General,l3 that the office of Judge of Probate should not be given to a prac9 See above, 99. 10 See letter signed "Amicus," Novascotian, April 4, 1828. 11 Royal Gazette, Halifax, Oct. 7, 1829. The Gazette prints in obvious error "Western" in place of the "Middle" of the quotation. The appointment which this proclamation makes appears to have been only temporary, permanent appointment not being made until the issuing of the general Commission of the Peace, March 31, 1831. 12 See above, 50, foot-note. 13 Hon. John Richard Uniacke, Sr. 150 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON tising lawyer. Had not Goldsmith the reversion of the Prothonotaryship, he wouJd have stood a good chance for the appointment, but his best friends here think that the two offices of Prothonotary and Judge of Probate, in addition to that of Collector of the Customs,14 would be unreasonable. So much for that affair, which you know results from the appointment of T. Halliburton [sic] to the Inferior Bench. The Governor 15 decided upon that point, only a few days ago, and I can assure you, with much reluctance, as he considered Halliburton's Conduct in the H. of Assembly as almost a barrier against the measure. Had White's16 good fortune enabled him to extricate himself from his pecuniary difficulties, Haliburton would not have succeeded. I must admit however, that many things were in his favour. The lawyers (in the House) say what they will, are to a man, from the speaker17 downward, rejoiced to have him out of their way. Independent of his being on the road to the Chair, he was troublesome to many individual members who were afraid of his wit and sarcasm, and they must feel happy that he cannot come again among them. Some think that the Governor appointed him to the office to get rid of him, and others think that my old friend the Treasurer18 as well as the Attorney General, and even the good Bishop,19 will not lament the appointment at heart. What the people in the District will think of it I cannot say, but I should like to have your opinion on the subject.., 20 The good judge, we may surmise, gave his entire approval to the move. What others thought of it, is not so certain.2 But whatever they thought, there were reasons enough 14 Henry Goldsmith (see above, 61, foot-note) was Collector of Customs in Annapolis in 1829. 15 Sir Peregrine Maitland, Governor from 1829 to 1834. 16 Unidentified. 17 S. G. W. Archibald. 18 Hon. Michael Wallace. 19 See above, 107-109. 20 Collection of G. E. E. Nichols, Halifax, N. S. 21 In Pictou County it is reported that Haliburton's acceptance of judicial office was regarded as a defection from the cause of the Academy. (See R. G. Haliburton in Haliburton: A Centenary Chaplet, 21.) The report, if true, only shows the Pictonians as JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS 151 why Haliburton should, almost inevitably, have wished to obtain his father's office. It meant for him an alliance with the party to which by natural inclination and by training he belonged. The place carried with it the assurance of an adequate living. The duties it entailed were congenial. It presented an opportunity to return from the limited possibilities of Annapolis to the more progressive community of his birth and boyhood, and to bring his family into intimacy with the influential social group of his father and step-mother. Moreover, it promised the leisure to carry out a literary undertaking that had been in his mind since the later stages of his historical work.22 Finally, for him to remain in the Assembly and progress politically was, as we have seen, impossible without his joining the ranks of the radical reformers, a move forbidden by both temperament and conviction, or appearing on the floor of the House in defense of the Council as it was, a change of face, if not of heart, too ignominious to be thought of; while the judgeship to which he aspired brought to its incumbent a degree of public honor and official recognition that could not fail to be desirable to an ambitious young man. Once the party of power had befriended him, Haliburton gave to it his whole hearted devotion and lifelong support. His acceptance of appointment in the Court of Common Pleas marked the turning point of his life. From the time he took his seat on the Bench, any previous tendency he may have shown towards becoming a thorough-going reformer of the British colonial system ceased, and the political bias of which he had most most unreasonable to expect a man who had jeopardized his future for their sake to sacrifice it completely. From Haliburton, Pictou Academy certainly received full measure of justice. 22 See below, 179. 152 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON frequently given evidence in his public life appeared as a fully developed and consistent Toryism. In the era of constitutional reform about to follow he found himself, as a consequence, out of sympathy with the spirit of his age. It was not that he retreated from a position he formerly occupied. He simply stood still in a period of general advance, and so undeviatingly did he cling to his Tory principles that eventually even his own party moved on and left him. Haliburton's duties as judge of the Inferior Court, though they exacted a good deal of arduous driving over well-nigh impassable roads, did not occupy an undue amount of his time. Twice yearly he held the Sessions of the Peace at each of the four county towns in the four middle counties of his province, and on the same occasions heard whatever cases there were to come before him as presiding justice of the Court of Common Pleas. For these services he received the salary of ~405 per annum, with an allowance for travelling expenses, a sum which though much less than the income he had enjoyed from his private practice 23 was, nevertheless, a rather comfortable stipend. His position on the Inferior Bench was, of course, of no special value in affording expert training in the interpretation or administration of the law, nor did it promise any likely chance of further promotion. Only cases involving amounts of less than ~5 were tried before the judges of Common Pleas,24 and even these when they presented any particularly difficult legal points were pled, as often as not, in the Supreme Court, which had concurrent jurisdiction with the Inferior Courts, and was frequently resorted to in preference to them as insuring 23 See letter from Haliburton to the Provincial Secretary, Sir Rupert D. George, N. S. Assembly Journals, 1838, Appendix 64, 154. 24 Hist. & Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 332, 335. JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS 153 decisions almost certain to be sounder in law. Haliburton, however, was apparently well satisfied with his appointment to judicial office, without first importance though it was, preferring, as he said, "the retirement of private life to the excitement of Politics," and doubtless enjoying the opportunity it afforded him for prosecuting the various schemes which his keen eye for business suggested in development of the very considerable property his father had left him, and for carrying out the literary project already mentioned 25 as among the desires that actuated him to seek a government commission at the hands of the arbitrarily functioning Council. Though soon involved more and more in steadily expanding interests widely divergent from those connected with the preformance of his routine court-room duties, throughout the twelve years he held his Common Pleas judgeship he bore, without serious imputation to the contrary, the name of an efficient and conscientious official. Like most of his colleagues in similar positions elsewhere in the province he did not wholly escape criticism on the part of the public, with whom the Inferior Courts never ceased to be unpopular institutions,26 but none of the complaints lodged against his fellows in the other circuits, such as the extortion of unreasonable and even illegal fees, or the failure to make proper returns to the Department of Justice at Halifax, was ever successfully sustained against him. And near the close of his first tenure of judicial appointment, when a rising demand for reformation in the provincial judiciary threatened to put an end to his further employment as a judge, he was the recipient of cordial addresses from the "Assistant Justices, Magistrates, Gentlemen of the 25 See above, 151. 26 See the letter from "Investigator," and the reply from "Scrutator," Novascotian, Dec. 4 and 11, 1834, respectively. 154 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Bar, High Sheriff, and Grand Jury" of the Counties of Hants and Lunenburg, signifying their approval of his faithful and successful endeavors to dispense the laws of the land wisely and well.27 Immediately upon his elevation to the Bench of the Inferior Court, Haliburton removed from Annapolis to Windsor. For a few years following his return to the latter community he lived with his numerous family, which, besides his wife and step-mother, consisted of five children, later increased to eight,28 in the house that had 27 Novascotian. April 19, 1838. 28 Eleven children in all were born in the Haliburton family, three of whom died in infancy. According to Eaton (N. E. Hist. & Geneal. Reg., LXXI, 71, 72) the family record of births, deaths and marriages is as follows: (1) Susanna Lucy Anne, bapt. Windsor, 2 June, 1817, d. 11 Sept., 1899, m. 1848, as her second husband Judge Wesley John Weldon, of the New Brunswick Supreme Court; (2) William Neville, bapt. Windsor, 1 Dec. 1819, d. young; (3) Thomas (twin) bapt. Windsor, 18 Jan., 1821, d. Boston, Mass., in an asylum for the insane, 3 Nov., 1847, buried at Mt. Auburn, Cambridge; [Thomas Haliburton gave promise of becoming a distinguished musician. An interesting note on the musical ability he manifested in boyhood appears with Joseph Howe's poem, "Tom's Apology." See Howe, Poems and Essays, 176. J. B. Atley, Lord Haliburton's biographer, states that Thomas was known as "the American Mozart." See Lord Haliburton, a Memoir, 6, foot-note]; (4) Lewis (twin), bapt. Windsor 18 Jan., 1821, buried two days later; (5) Augusta Louisa Neville, bapt. Windsor, 3 July, 1823, d. Torquay, West Devon, England, 11 Oct., 1891, m. shortly before 16 Sept. 1854, A. F. Haliburton, who d. 29 Jan. 1873; (6) Laura Charlotte, bapt. Annapolis 8 Sept. 1824, d. Nice, France, late Dec. 1910, m. Dec., 1851, William Cunard, 2nd. son of Sir Samuel Cunard; (7) William Frederic Neville, bapt. Annapolis, 1 Dec., 1826, buried 11 Apr., 1827; (8) Emma Maria, bapt. Annapolis, 18 Oct., 1828, m. Rev. J. Bainbridge Smith; (9) Amelia MacKay, bapt. Windsor, 17 June, 1830, m. 1849, Rev. Dean Edwin Gilpin, D.D.; (10) Robt. Grant, b. Windsor, 3 June, 1831, d. unm. 1898, at Pass Christian, Miss., Hon. D. C. L. (King's); [He was the JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS 155 been his father's before him, standing near the waterfront in the very midst of Windsor's commercial activities. But by the middle thirties, or very shortly afterwards, he had built for himself on his holdings near the edge of the town, and overlooking it from the westward, another dwelling, more in keeping with his fast developing aristocratic tastes for seclusion and superiority in environment. Here in the spaciously planned, durably constructed, storyand-a-half wooden villa, which with its extensive grounds he called " Clifton" 29 and which he hoped and expected would serve as the pleasant retreat of his old age,30 Haliburton made his home during the remaining portion of his life spent in Nova Scotia. The new residence stood on the crest of a then thinly wooded hill-top, in sight of King's College, and commanding a view of the Avon up stream and down. It was approached by a long narrow avenue leading for some distance straight through a growth of locust and acacia trees, interspersed with an author of several monographs on anthropology and primitive religion, and Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and of the Royal Society of Northern Antiquaries of Copenhagen. See title-page of his Intercolonial Trade, etc.] (11) Arthur Lawrence, b. Windsor, 26 Sept., 1832, d. London, England, 1907, Hon. D. C. L. (King's), Companion of the Bath, 1880, Knight Commander of the Bath, 1885, Knight of the Grand Cross of the Bath, 1897. Baron Haliburton of Windsor, 1898. [Lord Haliburton served with great distinction in the Commissariat Department of the British Army, in the British Civil Service in connection with army supply and transport, and as a British Under Secretary of War, 1888-1897.] 29 Now usually known to Windsorians as "the Sam Slick place." A recent occupant, Beckles Willson, Esq., did much to restore the property to its old-time attractiveness. For years previous to his taking possession both house and grounds had been allowed to fall into shameful neglect. In 1920 "Clifton" was sold to Norman Corstorphan, Esq. 30 See foot-note 23, above, 152. 156 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON occasional beech, white maple, poplar, or juniper, from which it emerged to curve gracefully, spiralwise, across and around the slope. The entrance to this driveway was marked by the usual sign manual of a provincial first family, a keeper's lodge and a pair of ornamental gates. Within the generous enclosure which made up the estate at Clifton, Haliburton found it necessary to effect a large amount of laborious levelling and filling, owing to the frequent pockets and "sink holes" which characterize the topography of Windsor, before the property could be rendered altogether healthful or convenient for habitation, but once the task was finally accomplished the results were pronounced highly satisfactory. Indeed Haliburton succeeded in transforming Clifton into a good deal of a model homestead, and such he probably meant it to be, as much for an instructive example to his less thrifty and less prosperous neighbors as for his own personal gratification. To the south and east of the house he laid out a fruit and flower garden, surrounded by a hawthorne hedge, and crossed at intervals by pathways edged with box, where he practised a system of scientific horticulture that brought him famous returns in the way of harvests and credit for careful husbandry. A progressively conducted farming experiment carried on, probably between the river and the immediate surroundings of Clifton, also added to his reputation for helpful enterprise. And an ingenious wind-mill, reputed to have been the product of his own Yankee inventiveness, was a daily object lesson in the easy performance of much of the kind of work that those who lived in the vicinity had long been accustomed to doing by hand. But it was rural beauty even more than practicality that Clifton was intended to exemplify. To this end shaded walks were cut through the woods to the haunted " Piper's Pond" and other romantic JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS 157 spots close at hand, a lawn was seeded down at the rear, now the front, of the house, and quaint rustic seats and nooks were devised among the banks of shrubbery that grew wild or were planted at various points of vantage.31 In the designing and direction of these more decorative features about the place, as well, doubtless, as of those more useful, Haliburton had the enthusiastic assistance of his wife, who is said to have been thoroughly well-skilled in the art of landscape gardening. At Clifton, in the midst of its natural and artificial charms, the Haliburtons dispensed the warm hospitality for which they became widely known among those fortunate enough to have the social standing required of persons admitted to friendly intercourse with the family. The line between eligible and ineligible seems to have been drawn rather rigidly, however, and the establishment and maintenance of his household in the somewhat pretentious style that was generally considered to prevail in its improved setting appears not to have added greatly to Haliburton's personal popularity with his fellow townsmen, and Windsorians may still be found who can tell of the resentment felt at the fact that the Judge himself never condescended to walk from Clifton to the post-office, but was always driven into town by his coachman! 32 Possibly, though, this tradition is merely a 81 The details used in this attempt at a description of Clifton as it was were compiled from R. G. Haliburton, in Haliburton; A Centenary Chaplet, 17; Sir James Alexander, L'Acadie; or Seven Years Explorations in British America, II, 229, 230; G. E. Fenerty, Life and Times of the Hon. Joseph Howe, 45, 46; The Halifax Times, Aug. 11, 1840; Lieut. Col. Sleigh, Pine Forests and Hackmatack Clearings, 27; N. P. Willis, Canadian Scenery, II, 112, 113; and personal information supplied by the Hon. M. Grant Goudge, Canon F. W. Vroom, and F. A. Shand, Esq., of Windsor, and the late Maynard Bowman, Esq., of Halifax, N. S. 82 Apparently Haliburton was not above handling the reins himself, however, for natives of Windsor may also be found who 158 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON survival of an ill-feeling kindled against Haliburton in the country at large by his constant habit of referring to the humbler classes as the "yeomanry" or the "peasantry." In spite of his perhaps overdone gentility, and his too conscious efforts, by means of an easily misunderstood example, to advance the standards of Windsor's domestic economy and its methods of exterior decoration, Haliburton nevertheless contributed much to the progress and development of his native town, and was known there for something else than for holding an official sinecure, or being a gentleman-farmer, and, later, an eagerly read humorist. He was president of the local agricultural society and strove assiduously to make its meetings and educational purposes a decided advantage to the community. On his property in the business district of the town he had erected by 1840 as many as six stores,33 and along the river bank a considerable length of wharfage. Under the hillside just below Clifton he opened up what must have been for a time at least a profitable gypsum quarry, if the immense excavation that yet remains to mark its site is any indication of the amount of " plaister" removed. From the western end of this quarry to the wharf where the gypsum was hauled for shipment he built a crude though laborsaving tramway upon which horse-drawn cars were operated, often referred to as the second line of "rail road " to be laid down in Nova Scotia. But the undertaking of most importance to Windsor's well-being with which Haliburton was intimately connected was the construction of a bridge across the Avon, a piece of difficult engineering that should have been put through by the government, tell of frequently seeing him about town in his high-wheeled gig, driving a familiar gray horse popularly known as " Old Clay," nicknamed from Sam Slick's inimitable steed. 83 Halifax Times, Aug. 11, 1840. JUDGE OF COMMON PLEAS 159 since it filled a long standing public need, by enabling travellers from the western counties to Halifax to avoid a dangerous ford, impassible except at low water, or an irksome roundabout journey by the way of another crossing farther up the river. Several times abandoned through the failure of different schemes for financing it, it was finally attempted by a joint stock company of which Haliburton was president,3 looking to the receipt of tolls for a return upon its investment. The successful completion of this enterprise in 1837 was regarded by Haliburton as one of the proudest achievements of his career as a man of business. "One such work as the Windsor Bridge," he said, while the process of its building was still unfinished, in the soon to be familiar manner of his alter ego, "is worth all your laws, votes, speeches, and resolutions for the last ten years, if tied up and put in a meal bag together. If it tante I hope I may be shot." 35 That Haliburton generously diverted some of his by no means excessive wealth (which it is probable was never more than that of a provincial citizen in a little beyond ordinarily comfortable circumstances), as well as much of his superabundant energies, to the betterment of his birth-place, we have the satisfaction of knowing on the authority of so unbiased and dependable an individual as Bishop John Inglis himself, the prelate whom Haliburton had so wantonly assailed in the House of Assembly.36 Writing in his Journal of Visitations, under date of August 21, 1844, Bishop Inglis notes respecting the location of Saint Matthew's Chapel of Ease, then about to be put up for the accommodation of the Anglican worshippers living in Windsor at an inconvenient distance from the regular parish church, which 34 Novascotian, Nov. 5, 1835. 85 The Clockmaker, first series, 207. 36 See above, 107-109. 160 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON at that time stood in the outskirts of the town: "... All difficulty respecting a site (a difficulty continually occurring, and not easily overcome), was here removed at once by the liberality of Mr. Justice Halliburton [sic] whose residence was in Windsor. As soon as the fittest spot was determined upon, he purchased it at an expense of more than 70 1., and presented it to the parish." CHAPTER VIII PROVINCIAL POLITICS THE close of the legislative session of 1830 is memorable in Nova Scotian politics for the so-called "Brandy Dispute," the most decisive disagreement that had yet occurred in the much strained relations of the Assembly and Council. The intensity of the passion and ill-will expressed in the debates of this time makes it clear why there should have been a general feeling of thankfulness over Haliburton's retirement to the comfortable and dignified silence of the Bench, a thankfulness in which Haliburton himself doubtless joined. Never before had there been such out-spoken denunciation of the Council's arrogance, or such humiliating confessions of the Assembly's helplessness. In 1826 the legislature had passed a revenue bill raising the duty on brandy imported into the province from one shilling per gallon to one shilling, four pence, but through some misunderstanding, real or pretended, the customs officers continued to collect the duty at the old rate of a shilling per gallon. The Assembly, however, had remained in ignorance of this defeat of its intentions, until by an ironical twist of fate it developed that not only was the extra four pence being illegally remitted to the liquor importers but that the firm profiting most by the remission had for its senior partner the Honorable Enoch Collins, one of His Majesty's Councillors. The investigation which led to this discovery was occasioned by a petition received in the Assembly from Mr. 161 162 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Collins's firm, Messrs E. Collins and Company of Halifax, praying compensation for loss sustained in paying liquor duties in doubloons taken at what was claimed to be less than their real value, so that a member of the Council appeared in the doubly humiliating light of robbing the provincial treasury through evasion at the same time he was seeking public support in sustaining a doubtful claim against it. As it happened, the revenue law of 1826 expired during the session of 1830, and the Assembly, indignant at the disregard shown for the old measure, set to work to frame a new one that would leave no doubt that it meant the extra four pence to be collected. The Council, however, withheld its assent to the new bill on the ground that commerce could not bear the increased burden of taxation it imposed. Though the amount in dispute formed but a trifling proportion of the revenue, the Assembly stoutly refused to sacrifice it, basing its stand on its former contention that the Council had no right to attempt to enforce a change in a revenue bill by rejecting it. Not even a joint conference with the Council could weaken this decision. While the dispute raged the old law expired, and the liquor dealers hurried to withdraw their stores from the bonding warehouse before new duties could be imposed. To save what it could of the revenue at stake, the Assembly brought in a bill to revive the old law, with the amount of brandy duties left blank until agreed upon in a committee of the House as a whole. Meantime a search of the Council's journals had revealed the disgraceful fact that the first bill had been rejected on the advice of a committee that had included besides Mr. Collins the two collectors who had allowed the extra duty to go unpaid, and that the determination of the Council to reject the bill had been recorded before the conference with 1 See above, 99, foot-note. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 163 the lower House had been sought.2 The Assembly was infuriated at this disclosure of the Council's lack of good faith, and voted thirty to five, every member being in his place, to fill the blank with the figures which had caused the loss of the original measure. The second bill was rejected by the Council on the technical objection that it brought up a matter already disposed of. Since neither side showed the slightest disposition to give way to the other, further transaction of public business was impossible, and the legislature was prorogued, with the revenue bill still unpassed and a consequent loss to the treasury variously estimated at from ~25,000 to ~40,000.3 Fortunately, before the dispute between the two Houses could be renewed in another session, the people at large had an opportunity of registering their opinion on the stand taken by their representatives. The death of George IV in the summer of 1830 necessitated, according to British practice, the election of a new House. In the campaign that followed, the issues of the recent session were debated with unprecedented violence before throngs of greatly excited electors. The will of the people was unmistakeable. Of the leaders of the popular cause all but one were returned. For the Council there was left only the choice of continuing to cripple the country's revenue or yielding. When the new appropriation bill, specifying the increased duty on brandy, came up in 1831, it was quietly passed without alteration or suggestion. The solid front of opposition which, when first called together, the new Assembly had presented to the Council's control at once disappeared. If the public expected its representatives to take advantage of their temporary success and force the fighting to something like a decisive 2 Israel Longworth, Life of S. G. W. Archibald, 58. 3 See Longworth, Archibald, 59; Campbell, Nova Scotia, 275. 164 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON finish, it must have been bitterly disappointed. In those days there was nothing in the House corresponding to party solidarity as we know it now. Upon every question there was a new alignment of forces depending, theoretically, upon each member's honest reaction to the merits involved, but practically upon the success or failure of some few individuals, more interested than others, to secure a following for the moment. Only the continuous pressure of an all-important public need served to secure anything like permanency in party divisions. In the case of the House elected in 1831, once the danger to the revenue had been passed and the Assembly's ability to enforce its will in the question at issue had been demonstrated, all show of a concerted or prolonged opposition to the Council ceased, and the proceedings of the provincial legislature from 1831 until well on towards its dissolution in 1836 were not more disturbed by openly unpleasant relations between the two branches than those of any previous period of the same length. No demands were made upon the Council to compensate for the humiliation and loss imposed upon the people by its rejection of the revenue bills of the preceding session. There was no general agitation for the reconstitution of its unrepresentative personnel. And no condemnation of its continued secret deliberations was spoken. The Assembly, apparently more desirous of getting the public business done in decency and in order than of anything else, recorded no protest when the Council, as though to show its renewed contempt for the people, in recommending a candidate for the post of Chief Justice, left vacant at this juncture, passed over the Speaker of the House, the popular choice, and successfully urged instead the appointment of one of its own members.4 But if the Council 4 Howe, Letters and Speeches, I, 6; Longworth, Archibald, 107. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 165 lulled itself into the belief that it was once more firmly established in unchecked political dominance, it was grossly deceiving itself. Beyond the Assembly's complacency and acquiescence were unmistakable signs of the gathering storm of popular disfavor that was to sweep the whole structure of the old colonial system on to the world's then rapidly accumulating scrap-heap of outworn governing devices. Had the Council been at all discerning it might have observed in the acute financial distress of the time sufficient warning that the provincial people had reached that stage of desperation when revolutionary change of some kind is imminent. Such general discontent as was then apparent had not been known in the previous history of the colony.5 Face to face with the collapse of their prosperity and the failure of their material resources, the Nova Scotians might well have despaired, as they did. Deeprooted and various as were the causes that had produced these lamentable conditions, they may for the most part be summed up in a single phrase: over-dependence upon the Colonial Office and the Imperial Treasury. It was the inevitable result of the very system of which the obsolete Council of Twelve stood as a symbol. As necessary as it may have been for the initial development of the country, there can be no question that Nova Scotia's too willing dependence upon England's paternal treatment had brought disaster among its consequences. Its unfortunate effects can be noted in the case of each successive group of early settlers to arrive in the province after the English had established permanent control there. 5 G. R. Young, The British North American Colonies, 54, footnote; John Homer, A Brief Sketch of the Present State of the Province of Nova-Scotia. with a Project for its Relief, 1-3; Novascotian, May 30, 1839; Acadian Recorder, Jan. 16, 1913, quoting its first issue of 1835. 166 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON For nearly a century the colonists from England who had founded the city of Halifax, and their descendants, had been conspicuous for a lack of self-reliance as a result of their dependence upon Imperial bounty and government contracts.6 Even the thrifty New Englanders were not wholly unattended by the evils of dependency, for among their numbers were a few of the ne'er-do-well, backwoods-hunter type attracted by the government's liberal offers of free land and necessary supplies.7 But it was the Loyalist migration that disclosed and developed to the fullest extent the weakness of depending on a government's generosity and too slightly conditioned offers of assistance. As a class the Loyalists have generally been held a most fortunate addition to Nova Scotia's population, but it is a question whether their coming was the unmitigated blessing it has long been considered to be. For while it is true that the establishment of " a bishop's see, a college and a literary magazine"8 followed their arrival, and that good roads, improved schools, and better public institutions generally must be credited to their efforts, the immediate value of their much talked-of culture, superior education, and high professional standards, 6 R. G. Haliburton, Intercolonial Trade our only Safeguard against Disunion, 6, 7; G. W. Hill, Memoir of Sir Brenton Halliburton, 28. Note R. G. Haliburton's amusing testimony on this point: "Nay, to such an extent did this liberality [of the British government] go, that the first natives of Halifax came into the world with the aid of the government, the Lords Commissioners of Trade and Plantations having provided an official Lucina, who in common with the other Heads of Departments, drew her salary from the Imperial Treasury, and her proteges were in due time baptized and buried by ecclesiastics paid by the government." Work cited, 6. 7 Abraham Gesner, Industrial Resources of Nova Scotia, 6. 8 Archibald MacMechan, " Confederation in Nova Scotia," University Magazine, XVI, 575. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 167 at the price paid for them may well be doubted. The very fact of their superiority, and that they were from the professional, military, and merchant classes, and in many instances used to the conditions of city and town life in the compactly settled districts of the eastern states, made them, in the large numbers in which they came, an acquisition of questionable desirability to a wilderness community in crying need of farmers and laborers.9 Partly because their sacrifices and service in the cause of the Empire won ready consideration for their claims, and partly because their solid voting strength effectively supported them, it was not long before whatever places of emolument lay in the gift of the government fell to their possession.0 Probably they deserved all they got, and doubtless they were well fitted for the offices they held, and returned full value in the way of duty performed, but having established themselves as an office-holding class, they continued such as a political tradition, and, with notable exceptions of course, became the party in support of the governing system as they found it, a system of subserviency. Though they were in control they were yet dependent, and dependent they elected to remain. Upon the country at large the effect of the Loyalists' success in prosecuting their claim to office was a wide-spread mania for place-hunting. There was a time in Nova Scotia when almost every family sought some reward or bounty from the government." And from the period of the Loyalists' coming, onwards, the people of the province very generally 9 Cambridge Modem History, X, 688; Gesner, Industrial Resources, 8-10; Haliburton, Hist. and Stat. Acct. N.,S., II, 195, 196, 359; Homer, Brief Sketch, 14, 15; F. Bradshaw, Self-Government in Canada, 310. 10 Haliburton, General Description, 160; Murdock, quoted by Eaton, Hist. King's Co., 449. 11 Gesner, Industrial Resources, 9. 168 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON remained in a sort of chronic expectancy of a windfall, with a consequent inertia and lack of initiative in developing the country's resources. It was the political party whose example had very largely created this state of affairs that was still in power in the early eighteenthirties. During the French and American wars terminating in 1814-15, the unfortunate consequences of the spirit of dependence in Nova Scotia were greatly accentuated.. The lavish expenditures of British capital in the province made the period one of apparent prosperity. But the wealth that resulted was purely adventitious. Some solid fortunes were indeed made, but in general it was an era of luxury, extravagance, speculation, and final ruin.l2 Upon the agricultural development of the country its effects were most disastrous. Farming had long been a despised occupation among the Nova Scotians,13 and the Loyalists, coming in complete unfitness for a life of manual labor, and crowding into official and professional positions, had very probably contributed to the contempt in which it was held. Early in the war-period the farmers had been led to abandon their arduous and poorly rewarded attempts to grow grain by the high price paid for the more 12 J. H. Marshall, Brief History... Nova Scotia, 38ff. 13 a Strange as it may appear in England, where such opinions will be laughed at, the petty shopkeeper, who retailed rum, sugar, and tea; the pedlar, who carried about tape, thread, needles,, and pins; the keeper of a common tavern or dramshop, the constables who served the writs or summons of the justice of peace, and the cheating horse-dealer; in short, all who made a living by scheming or rascality, considered themselves much more important persons than the truly more respectable, and assuredly more honest man who cultivated his own lands." John McGregor, British North America, II, 142, 143. See also Hugh Murray, An Historical and Descriptive Account of British America.... Nova Scotia..., II, 189-193; Homer, Brief Sketch, 1, 4. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 169 easily produced beef and hay required for the extensive military and naval establishments at Halifax,14 and their farms had gone uncultivated. When the inevitable time of declining prices and retrenchment came, the ill effects of too much easy money became apparent. The farmers in many cases refused to undertake the hard work of intensive cultivation, and their lands continued in neglect. In emulation of the speculating activities of the Halifax merchants, or possibly of what they believed the secret of the Americans' prosperity, numbers of them turned to "tradin'," 5 the one activity least needed in a country of failing food production and without the means upon which a substantial trade could be built. There were no manufactures worth mentioning 16-the British trade restrictions had seen to that- and no protective duties to encourage any. The mining possibilities of the province were tied up in a Royal monopoly,17 and lumbering and ship-building, prematurely undertaken, depleted the natural resources needed for future use, rather than encouraged their development.18 As long as aversion to hard work drove the farmers into trafficking, agricultural methods, always backward in the province, lapsed toward the state of unprogressiveness they were in before the enthusiasm of the Earl of Dalhousie and the letters of " Agricola "19 14 Homer, Brief Sketch, 3-5. 15 Homer, Brief Sketch, 1-3; A Word in Season To the Fishermen and Farmers of Nova Scotia (pamphlet, "By a Mechanic," Pictou, 1836), 13. 16 A Word in Season, 11, 12; Gesner, Industrial Resources, 204, 205. 17 Gesner, Industrial Resources, 283. 18 Ibid., 214, 215; Moorsam, Letters, 330. 19 John Young, a Scotch emigrant to Nova Scotia, whose letters in the Acadian Recorder, in 1817, combined with the Agricultural Societies formed under the patronage of the Earl of Dalhousie, 170 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON had done something to improve them. Indolence20 and intemperance 21 added their influence to continue a makeshift system of cultivation. The difficulty of obtaining cheap labor 22 contributed to the same result. With the depreciation of their property, the farmers' outlook became increasingly discouraging. Finally they began to lose faith in their land. Especially did they doubt its capacity to raise "bread corn," 23 the most essential crop in a community of diminishing wealth. governor of the province at that time, stimulated for a while the improvement of farming methods. How badly the stimulus was needed is shown in this passage from "Agricola's" letters, quoted by McGregor, British North America, II, 145: "The principles of vegetation were so grossly misconceived, that few even of the farmers imagined that plants, like animals, stood in need of food, and manures of all kinds were either disregarded, or shamefully thrown away. The dung by many was suffered to accumulate about the barns, till it became a question of expediency whether it was less expensive to shift the site of the building, or remove such an intolerable nuisance, and several instances are recorded where the former alternative was preferred." Gesner, Industrial Resources, 177, gives another instance of the same sort: "A backwoodsman once told me that he raised wheat and potatoes upon a piece of ground until they would grow no longer; he then 'pitched it out for a rabbit patch and cleared a new bit.' Such rabbit pastures are seen in every part of Nova Scotia..." See also G. R. Young, B. N. A. Colonies, 117; A Word in Season, 11, 12; Homer, Brief Sketch, 22; Haliburton, Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 369, 370, 373. For evidence that these ruinous agricultural methods persisted until as late as the eighteen-forties, see Charles Lyell, Travels in North America, II, 189. 20 Homer, Brief Sketch, 2; McGregor, B. N. A., II, 189; A Word in Season, 11, 12. 21 McGregor, B. N. A., II, 182; Moorsam, Letters, 35, 69, 144; Haliburton, Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 357. 22 McGregor, B. N. A., II, 150; Murray, British America, II, 189-193; Moorsam, Letters, 204; Gesner Industrial Resources, 66. 23 Homer, Brief Sketch, 3, 15. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 171 The growth of wheat in Nova Scotia, it must be admitted, was an undertaking attended with a good deal of risk,24 but the soil was well suited to the hardier kinds of grain.2 Any willingness the farmers may have shown to attempt their production, however, was defeated by the false pride of the people, who refused to eat, except under necessity, bread made of coarse flour,26 their taste for " superfine " brands having been fixed from the days of the Loyalist migration, when the drain imposed upon local resources by the sudden inflow of new settlers compelled the use of flour from the United States.27 Even during the embargo period and the War of 1812, the desire for the finer breads had not been greatly curbed, the plentifulness of war-time money making it possible to pay the ruinous prices demanded to satisfy it.28 Throughout the hard times following the peace, the consumption of Americanmade flour persisted.29 And since the Nova Scotians produced little they could offer in exchange for a commodity they insisted was indispensable, they were forced to pay for it in hard cash, to the constant depletion of the already scarce supply of money in the province. To correct this situation by enforcing the production and consumption of domestic wheat, or other grain, at the time the Huskisson trade reforms were adopted,30 a heavy duty was placed upon American flour imported into the colony, but coupled 24 McGregor, B. N. A., II, 150; Homer, Brief Sketch, 3; Haliburton, Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 367. 25 Homer, Brief Sketch, 8ff.; Haliburton, Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 368. 26 Haliburton, Hist. and Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 368; Homer, Brief Sketch, 2, 3. 27 Homer, Brief Sketch, 3-5. 28 Ibid., 4. 29 Ibid., 5. 30 See above, 75. 172 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON as this restriction was with the absurd requirement that all cargoes be landed at one port of entry,31 it had only the effect of promoting smuggling,32 and of providing the Americans who engaged in the illicit trading with a ready opportunity for introducing directly into the country districts their Yankee "notions," 33 for which they doubtless carried away cash equally as hard as that demanded for their flour. Only the office-holding class whose salaries were paid or guaranteed by England could afford to affect indifference to the rapid disappearance of ready money from among the people. There had formerly been a time when the Nova Scotians had been able to buy the American flour they consumed with the returns from their fisheries.34 Then, cargoes of fish were carried to the West Indies, and there exchanged for island produce, which was, in turn, carried to the eastern coast cities of the United States, and there used to purchase the bread stuffs required at home. But the closing of the American ports to colonial shipping after 1818 put an effectual stop to one side of this commerce, and the admission of the Americans to the West Indian trade in 1830 35 seriously checked the other. The liberation of the West Indian slaves in 183336 produced a disturbance in the finances of the Islands which retarded the provincial export trade still further. Besides encountering the Americans in a losing competition in southern waters, the Nova Scotian fishermen found themselves in a more 31 Halifax. Homer, Brief Sketch, 6, 7. Pictou and Sydney were opened later. Campbell, Nova Scotia, 299, 300; McGregor, B. N. A., II, 152. 32 Homer, Brief Sketch, 6, 7. 33 Novascotian, June 11, 1835. 34 Homer, Brief Sketch, 5. 35 W. A. Dunning, The British Empire and the United States, 59. 36 Ibid., 71. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 173 disastrous rivalry with them in the north. There the Yankee " smartness " of the bounty-paid 37 American skippers and crews proved so much more than a match for the leisurely methods of the local sailors 38 that, assisted by the laxness of the British revenue cruisers in enforcing the none too protective international fishing regulations, the intruders actually crowded the Nova Scotians out of their own waters.39 Under such conditions the provincial fisheries were gradually reduced to secondary importance.40 A loss of skill and self-respect took place among the fishermen parallel to that among the farmers, and brought them to a similar state of helpless dependence.37 When their efforts were most needed by their country, they were drinking themselves into indifferent poverty,40 or hiring themselves out to the Americans to assist in taking the catches that should have been their own.37 Meanwhile the diminution in the supply of the means of exchange went on until the people of the province were driven to the verge of panic. In an attempt to mend mat37 Homer, Brief Sketch, 22-24. 38 Homer, Brief Sketch, 22-24; Young, B. N. A. Colonies, 48ff.; Haliburton, Wise Saws, I, 148, 149, 273ff.; II, 157ff., 290ff., 308ff., A Word in Season, 91; No ascotian, June 11, 1835. 39 Young, B. N. A. Colonies, 48ff.; Haliburton, Wise Saws, as in preceding note. 40 A Word in Season, 9. "To see hundreds of those who call themselves fishermen collected in groups upon the Beach of Crow Harbour and Fox Island, with a dip net in one hand [' in confident expectation that the fish will run aground,' Ibid., 9] and a Bottle of Grog in the other, may well afford the means of ridicule and merriment to their more frugal and calculating rivals, and [sic] who with equal success holds [sic] the plough, mows the meadow, jigs the Mackerel, hooks the Cod; furnish provisions for Cash to Nova Scotians, supplies foreign markets with the produce of our Gulphs and Harbours, and 'guesses,' that Nova Scotians, are 'tarnation lazy' or monstrous stupid." Ibid., 23. 174 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ters the government and the monopoly bank it tolerated 41 issued a supply of paper currency, unredeemable in gold or silver.42 The only possible result of this futile eleventh hour move was to revive speculation,43 and to drive the precious metals from the country more rapidly than ever.44 The long impending crash occurred in 1833-34. Among the alarming number of business suspensions reported were those of some of the supposedly soundest commercial establishments of Halifax.45 Two successive crop failures served still further to increase depression and brought Nova Scotia once more to that state of necessity implied by the nick-name "Nova Scarcity" given the country in derision by the Americans at the time of the Loyalists' flight. The crowning misery was the outbreak of the cholera in 1834.46 Emigration of the now thoroughly disheartened provincials to the United States threatened to become a rout. With plague, panic, and poverty combined, came the most melancholy period in the history of Nova Scotia.47 Happily it was short. With the deepest distress came also the first signs of a definite reaction towards hopefulness. Throughout the years of advancing economic collapse there had been from time to time, as we have seen, 41 See above, 74. 42 Campbell, Nova Scotia, 291. 43 Homer, Brief Sketch, 1. 44 Howe, Speeches and Letters, 1, 7. 45 Novascotian, May 30, 1839. 46 Novascotian, May 30, 1839; Acadian Recorder, Jan. 16, 1913. 47 Novascotian, May 30, 1839; Acadian Recorder, Jan. 16, 1913. ",Since the settlement of this province by the British, perhaps there never was a period when complaints of hard times, scarcity of money, stagnation of trade, bankruptcies, loss of confidence among merchants, and all kinds of evils attendant on a general embarrassment, were so prevalent and universal as the present." Homer, Brief Sketch, 1. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 175 evidence of an accompanying political discontent. The spirit that was then general among the people of western Europe and America was stirring among the Nova Scotians as well.48 If their first move towards self-sufficiency was an attempt towards a greater share of control in their government, it was because there were abroad in the province the same democratic desires as passed the Reform Bill of 1832 in England, and placed Andrew Jackson in the President's chair in the United States. Nova Scotia had had more than enough of a government that made it dependent entirely upon the good will or the good intentions of Great Britain, and was about ready to try the experiment of taking its affairs into its own hands. In the House of Assembly, however, after the peaceful termination of the "Brandy Dispute," there was little indication that the country was seething with political restlessness. During the session of 1834, indeed, Mr. Stewart, who in Haliburton's day in the Assembly had been the ablest defender of the Council, moved a set of resolutions condemning the unrepresentative character of the upper House.49 It was a striking concession to the popular feeling, but nothing came of it. Then suddenly the storm broke in an unexpected quarter. On January 1, 1835, Joseph Howe published in The Novascotian a letter signed "The People," making open charges of corruption and inefficiency against the magistrates who governed the city of Halifax. It marked the opening stages of the last battle against the Council's dominance. Halifax, at that time still unincorporated, was governed by a board of magistrates who owed their appointment to the Council, and were accountable to it alone. Their rule was entirely without responsibility to the people of the city, and was as notoriously dis48 Young, B. N. A. Colonies, 8, 9. 49 Howe, Speeches and Letters, I, 7. 176 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON honest as Howe's correspondent had charged.50 Any attack upon them was an attack on the Council, and "The People's " letter could be interpreted only as an indication of the growing determination to begin the general reformation of the country by first breaking the control of the upper branch of the legislature. Interest as to the immediate consequences of Howe's temerity ran high, but the public was not kept long in suspense. Howe was indicted on a charge of criminal libel. Told by the lawyers that he had no case, he undertook his owni defense, and after a six hours' address to the jury, in which he astutely appealed to their love of British fair-play and their interest in the freedom of the press, gained in ten minutes the verdict "Not guilty." The magistrates at once resigned.51 Enthusiasm over the result of the trial was unrestrained, and for the moment Howe was a popular hero. But it is doubtful if many among those who kept double holiday in their joyous excitement over the acquittal and the bright prospects of better government for Halifax divined that the real significance of the occasion was the discovery of a leader to head the cause of expectant democracy for the country as a whole. As yet, however, Howe had no very definite plans for a province-wide campaign of reform. The descendant of a Loyalist,52 he had been brought up in the strictest Tory tradition, and only gradually did he become the advocate of principles of radical change.53 So far, he had progressed to the point of accepting the ideals of the British constitution as his model for colonial government, and was re50 Ibid., I, 23-72. 51 Ibid., I, 23. 52 Calnek-Savary, Hist. Co. Annapolis, 288. 53 Rev. G. M. Grant, "The Late Hon. Joseph Howe," Canadian Monthly, May, 1875, 381. PROVINCIAL POLITICS 177 solved that he and his fellow Nova Scotians, equally with the people of England, should be Britons in fact as well as in name.54 But beyond securing the incorporation of Halifax, and a reconstruction in the Council that would insure some measure of responsibility, probably by making it elective and purely legislative, it is doubtful if at this time he saw very clearly what was necessary to realize his purpose. For the present, the attainment of even so obviously needed changes was compelled to wait on opportunity. While it waited, Howe busily plied the weapons of reform provided by his control of The Novascotian, and set himself valiantly to rousing the provincial people from their state of despondency into faith in themselves and their country's resources. He plainly told the members of the Assembly to do the bidding of their constituents or give way to better men.55 In a sequence of able articles he urged the building of a government railway from Windsor to Halifax, designed to promote both agriculture and fishing by bringing the Bay of Fundy districts within easy reach of the Halifax markets.56 By all the arguments at his command he endeavored to convince his readers that the deplorable state of the province was due to temporary causes, and that the certainty of its future prosperity was warrant for taking an optimistic view of the situation. All that was needed to tide over the crisis, he insisted, were energy and perseverance. Following his lead, thinking persons throughout the country everywhere discussed in letters to the press various phases of the questions of the hour, from every possible point of view. But cheering words and eager discussion alone were not enough. The Nova Scotian habit of lethargy was too 54 Ibid., 381, 382. 55 Howe, Speeches and Letters, I, 7. 56 Ibid., I, 83. 178 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON deeply ingrained to be easily broken. "This Province must be more severely scourged than it has been, before it thoroughly awakes," wrote Howe 57 in the summer following his trial. It was a hard saying and probably thoughtless in its exaggeration. But Howe was prepared to apply at least the lash of satire as part of the needed discipline. On September 24, 1835, he began the publication of an anonymous series of articles called " Recollections of Nova Scotia," destined to have no inconsiderable influence in bringing the people of the province to a realization that their helplessness was not necessary, and that only their lack of effort was responsible for their failure. It was the contribution of his friend Haliburton to the general flood of comment and advice at that time flowing through the columns of The Novascotian. The series had not been completed when, to meet the insistent demand for its appearance in book form, it was added to and republished as The Clockmaker. 57 Novascotian, July 16. 1835. CHAPTER IX THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES HAIIBURTON'S personal acknowledgment of the purpose of his satire and of the means employed to give it effectiveness was thus reported in The Novascotian 1 at a time when the beneficence of his intentions as a critic of provincial follies stood badly in need of being made unmistakably clear: "Shortly after the History of Nova Scotia was written I retired into private life, and, having more leisure than before, I felt I had not accomplished all I wished [in writing the History], that though something had been attained there was still much more to be done. It occurred to me that it would be advisable to resort to a more popular style, and, under the garb of amusement, to call attention to our noble harbors, our great mineral wealth, our healthy climate, our abundant fisheries, and our natural resources and advantages, arising from our relative position to the St. Lawrence, the West Indies, and the United States, and resulting from the circumstances of this country being the nearest point of the American continent to Europe. I was also anxious to stimulate my countrymen to exertion, to direct their attention to the development of these resources, and to works of internal improvement, especially to that great work which I hope I shall live to see completed, the rail road from Halifax to Windsor, to awaken ambition and substitute it for that stimulus which is furnished in other but poorer countries than our own by necessity. For this purpose I called in the aid of the Clockmaker." 1 June 13, 1839, in an account of the public dinner given Haliburton at Halifax previously referred to. See above, 123, and below, 281-285. 179 180 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON In this acknowledgment there is rather more of assurance than the state of the country warranted when Haliburton's labors of reformation began. A tradition in the Haliburton family according to which the satirist's purpose was " to awaken Nova Scotian people to the fact that they were making themselves poorer every year by their importations, [since] even their Horse shoes and the nails for the coffins came from the Mother Country " 2 reflects more closely the actual conditions then prevalent in the province. The Clockmaker, professionally more familiar as the clock pedlar, whom Haliburton called upon to assist him in stimulating the Nova Scotians to action, was a sharpwitted if garrulous Yankee, since become the most widely known of his class, one "Samuel Slick, of Slickville, Onion County, Connecticut," speaking, except when allowed by the moral earnestness of his creator to forget himself, what evidently passed current for the dialect of New England. No choice could have been shrewder. It combined the advantages of allowing Haliburton to express himself through a character that in many respects it was natural for him to assume, owing to his descent from New England stock,3 "tolerable pure yet, near about one half apple sarce, and tother half molasses," 4 and through one that made just the sort of authoritative appeal to the Nova Scotians permitted by their mistaken admiration and envy for an American successfully engaged in the all too seductive occupation of a trader.5 And at the same time it avoided exciting, and perhaps checked, the local zeal for 2 Georgina Hal'burton, Manuscript. 3 See above, 5-13. 4 The Ciockmaker, first series, first edition, 60. Other references to the first series of The Clockmaker are also to the first edition. 5 See above, 169. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 181 such a calling, by holding up to ridicule its essentially parasitical nature, and by bringing to light its steady impoverishment of the province. As another mouthpiece for his opinions, Haliburton introduced into his book a secondary character, "the Squire," whom the itinerant vender of clocks accompanies as travelling companion. The transcriber of the " sayings and doings " of the loquacious Yankee, and a lawyer progressing about the country from one professional appointment to another, the Squire is readily accepted as the author in his own person. Apart from an occasional interrogation or prompting, it is not he, however, but Sam Slick alone who does the talking in The Clockmaker. But that Sam Slick, a Yankee, and the representative of a traditionally democratic class, should deliver Tory sentiments for his own, as he did, was a perversion that not even his unusual gifts of emphatic expression could justify. Hence it is that we find him in the speeches politically most out of character, made to quote both his father, who, though a hero of Bunker Hill, still had doubts of the necessity and benefits of the Revolution,6 and "minister," the Rev. Mr. Hopewell, who is more truly British than his nationality would lead one to suspect; and thus we gain a fairly intimate acquaintance with two other characters Haliburton later put to important uses. It was the uninterrupted flow of Sam Slick's conversation, with its succession of sharp comment, apt illustration, and grotesquely didactic tales, that was relied upon to point the contrast between American keenness and Nova Scotian indifference, and to stir the provincials into some profitable employment of their resources, time, and ability. "When reason fails to convince, there's nothin left but ridicule. If they have no ambition, apply to their feelings, clap a blister 6 Clockmaker, first series, 194-200. 182 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBTURTON on their pride, and it will do the business. It's like puttin ginger under a horse's tail; it makes him carry up real handsum, I tell you." 7 But the ridicule of The Clockmaker was directed not only at the Nova Scotians. The Americans came in for their share, too, and Sam Slick was bound to draw attention to the superior natural advantages of the colonists, and the desirability of British institutions, even if the people at home had to smart for it. The book consequently afforded its author the double opportunity of speaking his mind to his countrymen and to their neighbors at the same time. Sam Slick described it properly when he said with a pride that was justifiable: "It wipes up the blue noses considerable hard, and don't let off the Yankees so very easy neither, but it's generally allowed to be about the prettiest book ever writ in this country; and although it ain't altogether just gospel whats in it, there's some pretty home truths in it, that's a fact." 8 To equip his pedlar-preacher with the necessary stock in trade to win an auditor or drive home a truth, Haliburton drew upon an apparently unfailing supply of humorous anecdote and adventure. Where he found his material, it is almost impossible to say with certainty. His powers of invention would account for some of it, of course, but we have Sam Slick's own testimony that he gathered it mostly from first-hand observation along the road as he followed the various circuit courts as advocate or judge.9 The rest of it, one may safely surmise, 7 Ibid., 69. 8 Ibid., 3. 9 ("' Where on airth,' says one, 'did he get all them queer stories he has sot down in his books, and them Yankee words, don't it beat all natur?' 'Get them?' says another; ' Why he is a sociable kind THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 183 came partly from the customary interchange of "good stories " among the legal fraternity and others at the semiannual, or more frequent, sittings of the Inferior or Supreme Court, partly from the "Varieties " columns of the newspapers, local and foreign, commonly read in his time in Nova Scotia, and partly from the inevitable backwash of American political gossip which reached the province through other departments of the press, or by word of mouth. If "the Major" of "The Club" group was a portrait drawn from Haliburton, as it seems to have been, in part at least,'1 then as far back as 1828 he had begun the custom which never left him of collecting amusing and extravagant tales, and was already famous among his intimates for his racy and vivid " Recollections of the Peninsula," 1 almost certainly the precursor of his "Recollections of Nova Scotia," which became the first of the Clockmaker series. What he had probably done with these tales or reminiscences in the interim was to give them a local application, often far-fetched, throw them into the Yankee dialect, and invent or discover his clockvending Sam Slick to speak them. Whether the choice of a pedlar as his chief spokesman was a stroke of consummate genius, or the fortunate acceptance of some random suggestion,12 will perhaps never be known, but there is of man, and as he travels round the circuits, he happens on a purpose, accidentally like, with folks, and sets 'em talking, or makes an excuse to light a cigar, goes in, sets down and hears all and sees all."' Attache, first series, II, 18. 10 See above, 121, foot-note. 11 Novascotian, May 8, 1828. 12 R. G. Haliburton accepts his father's choice of Sam Slick for the purpose of his satire as an accident pure and simple, and in support of his belief tells the following anecdote; " On his [Haliburton's] arrival in London [in 1838], the son of Lord Abinger...who was confined to his bed, asked him to call on his 184 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON.he bare chance that he took his cue from a correspondent in The Novascotian 3 who understood perfectly the possibilities of the character, and foretold precisely the use which was to be made of him: ".. No man, Sir, be his situation or profession what it may, can feel the pulse of the community, or form an estimate of their moral and physical standing with the accuracy of the pedlar - the guest, alternately of the rich and the poor, the learned and the unlearned, the religious and the irreligious; he converses with them on equal terms - hears their opinions of men and things - brightens with them in the recital of their hopes and sympathizes in their anticipated evils. It follows that the pedlar is the man to give the true state of the public mind upon questions of general interest, and these, Mr. Editor, may be classed in three leading divisions: Politics, Trade and Religion, and the greatest of these is politics...." If Sam Slick at the outset of his endeavors to read the Bluenoses a lesson almost wholly ignored the third member of this trilogy, and confined his religious discussion to pointing out the evils of church schism,14 and to deprecating the pamphlet war on infant baptism then raging in Nova Scotia,l5 it was a deficiency more than made good in his father, as there was a question which he would like to put to him. When he called his Lordship said, 'I am convinced that there is a veritable Sam Slick in the flesh now selling clocks to the Bluenoses. Am I right?' 'No,' replied the Judge, 'there is no such person. He was a pure accident. I never intended to describe a Yankee clockmaker or Yankee dialect; but Sam Slick slipped into my book before I was aware of it, and once there he was there to stay.'" (Haliburton: a Centenary Chaplet, 25, 26.) J. F. Tupper (The Canadian Academy, March, 1910, 5) tells the identical anecdote to demonstrate that Haliburton in his reply to Lord Abinger inadvertently let slip the secret of his authorship of The Clockmaker! See below, 201-203. 13 For June 26, 1834. 14 Clockmaker, first series, 195ff. 15 Ibid., 153 ff. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 185 later ventures in public instruction. To his concern in trade and politics there was no limit, however, and he reflected accurately the popular interest of the day by placing the emphasis decidedly on the latter, in spite of the Squire's assertion that he hated politics as a subject of conversation,'6 and his own repeated opinion that overindulgence in political talk was the ruination of the country.17 Nothing could better demonstrate the uncertainty that in 1835 existed in Joseph Howe's mind as to what the reformation of the provincial government definitely demanded than his willingness to publish Haliburton's views, as expressed by Sam Slick, on the political situation then confronting the people of Nova Scotia. The position which Haliburton had by this time come to hold in respect to the differences between the public and the authorities bore little resemblance to that he had occupied in the House of Assembly. There was still a slight disposition to maintain himself independently between the lines, but more generally he showed a strong and consistent inclination to support the Council as it was, with as little concession to the growing desire for change as possible. His old propensity to run amuck in tilts with both parties had given way to a discreetly benevolent attitude towards each, so long as neither menaced the other. But he left no doubt that in his mind the danger lurked on the popular side, and should be checked by warnings against drastic action. An outbreak of unseemly conflict was to be guarded against at all costs. In his country's crisis, mutual exchange of confidence, avoidance of extreme measures, and devotion to the existing order, was the course Haliburton advised, the very course Howe was 16 Ibid., 193. 17 Ibid., 17, 18, 78, 79, 81, 109, 129, 130, 133 ff., 209. 186 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON to find impossible to follow, however much he may have wished to adopt it. According to The Clockmaker, four alleged cardinal evils existed in Nova Scotia -" the Council, the Banks, the House of Assembly and the Lawyers." 18 "Now there may be something wrong in all these things," admits Sam Slick, " (and it can't be otherwise in natur)... but change them all, and its an even chance if you don't get worse ones in their room. It is in politics as in horses: when a man has a beast that's near about up to the notch, he'd better not swap him; if he does, he's een amost sure to get one not so good as his own. My rule is, I'd rather keep a critter whose faults I do know, than change him for a beast whose faults I don't know."19 This was Haliburton's typical attitude. The Council, the banks, and the lawyers would of themselves have been negligible reasons for dissatisfaction were it not for the demagogues 20 spouting such political clap-trap as the following: "Feller citizens, this country is goin to the dogs hand over hand; look at your rivers, you have no bridges; at your wild lands, you have no roads; at your treasury, you hante got a cent in it; at your markets, things dont fetch nothin; at your fish, the Yankees ketch em all. There's nothin behind you but sufferin, around you but poverty, afore you, but slavery and death. What's the cause of this unheerd of awful state of things, ay, what's the cause? Why Judges, and Banks, and Lawyers, and great folks, have swallered all the money. They've got you down, and they'll keep you down to all etarnity, you and your posteriors arter you. Rise up like men, arouse yourselves like freemen, and elect me to the Legislatur, and I'll lead on the small but patriotic band, I'll put the big wigs thro' their facins, I'll make 'em shake in their shoes, I'll knock off your chains and make you free."2' 18 Ibid., 82. 19 Ibid., 83. 20 Ibid., 11, 32, 82, 83, 109-111. 21 Ibid., 201. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 187 Least of all did the House of Assembly afford grounds for political unrest. To a people chafing under their lack of participation in anything but the most petty public affairs Haliburton offered only the empty consolation that the branch of the legislature which contained their representatives was not worth being concerned over. The Bluenoses, says Sam Slick, "have nothin to fight about. As for politics, they have nothin to desarve the name,.... Now with us the country is divided into parties, of the mammoth breed, the ins and outs, the administration and the opposition. But where's the administration here? Where's the War Office, the Foreign Office, and the Home Office? Where's the Secretary of the Navy? Where's the State Bank? Where's the Ambassadors and Diplomatists (them are the boys to wind off a snarl of ravellins as slick as if it were on a reel) and where's that Ship of State, fitted up all from the forecastle clean up to the starn post chock full of good snug berths, handsumly found and furnished, tier over tier, one above another, as thick as it can hold? That's a helm worth handlin, I tell you; I dont wonder that folks mutiny below and fight on the decks above for it —it makes a plaguy uproar the whole time, and keeps the passengers for everlastinly in a state of alarm for fear they'd do mischief by bustin the byler, or runnin aground, or gettin foul of some other craft. This Province is better as it is, quieter and happier far; they have berths enough and big enough, they should be careful not to increase 'em; and if they were to do it over again, perhaps they'd be as well with fewer." 22 "... But this little House of Assembly that folks make such a touse about what is it? Why just a decent Grand Jury. They make their presentments of little money votes, to mend these everlastin rotten little bridges, to throw a poultice of mud once a year on the roads, and then take a blowin time of three months and go home." 23 This may have been proof enough that the Nova Scotians had " a government that lays as light on 'em as a down 22 Ibid., 109. 23 Ibid., 151. 188 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON counterpin," 24 but it was hardly the sort of talk to reconcile them to it. Between the supporters of the Assembly and those of the Council Haliburton insisted there was only the misunderstanding born of ignorance of one another. " If they knew more of each other, I guess they'd lay aside one half their fears and all their abuse." 25 He did indeed admit the Assembly's chief objection to the Council, and the principal cause of complaint in the province, when he said of the upper House, "power has a natural tendency to corpulency," 26 but having made this damaging admission, he allowed it no part in his further discussion of the quarrel between the two parties. Instead he was eager to dispel the current notion that the power of the Council was owing to its being made up of " great folk."27 "No, say I dont call 'em great men, for there aint a great man in the country, that's a fact; there aint one that desarves the name; folks will only larf at you if you talk that way.... No, your great men are nothin but rich men, and I can tell you for your comfort, there's nothin to hinder you from being rich too,...,28 But of the power of wealth and vested interests he offered no denial whatever. Rather he argued that because "in our Banks, Rail Road Companies, Factory Corporations, and so on, every man's vote is regulated by his share and proportion of stock," therefore a man's share in the government of his country should be dependent on his holdings.29 Haliburton's only criticism of the Council, in fact, lay in the indirect charge of the abuse of political influence, made in his condemnation of the appointments of pettifogging unprincipled rogues to positions in the magistrate's 24 Ibid., 17. 27 Ibid., 133. 25 Ibid., 110. 28 Ibid., 134, 135. 26 Ibid., 111. 29 Ibid., 193. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 189 courts.30 On the other hand he found fault openly with the Assembly for its occasional combativeness, and with the people who were continually urging it to " spunk up" to the "puss proud folks at Halifax." 31 "As a disinterested man," says Sam Slick, "I say if the members of the House of Assembly, instead of raisin up ghosts and hobgoblins to frighten folks with, and to show what swordsmen they be, a cuttin and thrustin at phantoms that only exist in their own brains, would turn to, heart and hand, and develope the resources of this fine country, facilitate the means of transport-promote its internal improvement, and encourage its foreign trade, they would make it the richest and greatest, as it is now one of the happiest sections of all America —I hope I may be skinned if they wouldn't- they would I swan." 32 The political sentiment behind all this harmonized but slightly, of course, with what Joseph Howe was saying week by week in The Novascotian with a vigor that was increasing with each issue. But as little as his friend's politics must have agreed with the development of his own, Howe found in The Clockmaker material in plenty that fitted well into his plans for stinging the provincial people into active realization of their country's worth and into readiness to exert themselves on their own behalf, and sufficient "home truths" in Haliburton's out-spoken observations upon the industrial situation in the province to neutralize the reactionary effect of his political views. The picture which Haliburton presented of the Nova Scotians was indeed in no sense flattering, but its honesty of purpose justified the limner in signing himself as he did, 80 See the sketch called " Justice Pettifog," Ibid., 23 ff. See also Hist. & Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 336. 31 Ibid., 206. 32 Ibid., 113. 190 THOMAS CHANDLER HALBURTON the " sincere friend and well wisher " of his country.38 He told them frankly that they had only their laziness, their false pride, their gullibility, and the substitution of mere talk for enterprise, to thank for their plight. "They do nothing in these parts," says Sam Slick, "but eat, drink, smoke, sleep, ride about, lounge at taverns, make speeches at temperance meetings, and talk about House of Assembly. If a man don't hoe his corn, and he don't get a crop, he says it is all owing to the Bank; and if he runs into debt and is sued, why [he] says the lawyers are a curse to the country. They are a most idle set of folks, I tell you," 34 and "near about as proud as they are lazy." 3 "Pride, Squire, and a false pride, too, is the ruin of this country. I hope I may be skinned if it tante." 36 "There's neither spirit, enterprise, nor patriotism here; but the whole country is as active as a bear in winter." 37 The residents of the provincial capital were censured no less severely than the country people: "Now the folks of Halifax take it all out in talking..but they all end where they begin- in talk." 38 "They walk in their sleep, and talk in their sleep, and what they say one day they forget the next." 39 "The folks of Halifax have run down, and they'll never go to all etarnity, till they are wound up and put into motion." 40 But Haliburton employed Sam Slick to do something more than to pass judgment on the Bluenoses. The sketches which he drew with unsparing accuracy in The Clockmaker of good-for-nothing characters, of broken-down houses and abandoned farms, and of shiftless farmers who chased their horses fourteen miles to ride two, were quite as effective 33 In a note accompanying the last of the "Recollections." Novascotian, Feb. 11, 1836. 34 Clockmaker, first series, 11. 36 Ibid., 19. 38 Ibid., 18. 36 Ibid., 174. 39 Ibid., 74. 37 Ibid., 95. 40 Ibid., 34. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 191 as his other strictures. No more telling indictment of social heartlessness in Nova Scotia has ever been written than the chapter called " The White Nigger," 41 the record of an incident based on a local custom of farming out paupers to the lowest bidder. Not even the perhaps better known account of Justice Pettifog " 42 and his court can match its disclosure of hypocrisy and depravity. That the province was laboring under the disabilities of poverty, one-sided competition, depreciated currency, the high cost of labor, and the curse of cheap law, Haliburton readily conceded, but that these things of themselves had the power to demoralize the whole country he did not admit for an instant. These were the effects, not the causes, of the general breakdown. If money had disappeared for American flour and Yankee tinware, let the colonists go without the one and replace the other with wheat of their own raising, or failing that, eat their rye and oatmeal; if the bank currency was worthless, there was still wealth to spare on the land, beneath its surface, and in the sea; if labor was scarce, time was plentiful, and hard work no disgrace, and mechanical appliances could be had to replace man-power; if there were too many lawyers, it was because not enough children were brought up to be farmers, a class of men, " more honest than traders, more independent than professional men, and more respectable than either." 43 It was on the farm, in fact, that Haliburton saw the / future of Nova Scotia. If he turned his satire rather too mercilessly against the agricultural classes, it was because he had no patience with methods and habits which kept the province in a state of continual backwardness, and still less with those who were ready to blame the land for mis41 Ibid., 175 ff. 42 See above, 188, 189. 48 Clockmaker, first series, 174. 192 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON fortunes within the control of their own efforts. Industry and skill, the two virtues which he believed would make the farmers masters of the situation, were the two in which they were most conspicuously deficient: "Agriculture is not only neglected but degraded here. What a number of folks there seem to be in these parts, a ridin about, titivated out real jam in their go-to-meetin clothes, a doin nothin. It's melancholy to think on it. That's the effect of the last war. The idleness and extravagance of those times took root, and bore fruit abundantly, and the young people are above their business. They are too high in the instep, that's a fact." 44 It was the inordinate love of gossip among the farmers, of enjoying what Sam Slick called the " blowin time," that kept them always behind schedule and constantly making excuses and complaining of their prospects, so that "When the Spring comes, and the fields are dry enough to be sowed, they all have to be plowed, cause fall rains wash the lands too much for fall ploughin. Well the plows have to be mended and sharpened, cause what's the use of doin that afore its wanted. Well the wheat gets in too late, and then comes rust, but whose fault is that? Why the climate to be sure, for Nova Scotia aint a bread country' 45 Of the ample supply of suitable land for farming in Nova Scotia, Haliburton entertained no doubt,46 and he had little sympathy for those who would point to the lack of it as an explanation for the recurrent crop failures. If any other reason than the universal sloth of the people were needed, it was to be found in their frequently dis44 Ibid., 172. 45 Ibid., 148. 46 And incidentally did a little real estate booming for his own holdings at Douglas, Hants County. See The Clockmaker, first series, 214. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 193 played preference to be jacks-of-all-trades rather than masters of one: " Who lives up there in the big house, says I? Its a nice location that, pretty considerable improvements them. Why Sir, that's A. B.'s; he was well to do in the world once, carried a stiff upper lip and keered for no one; he was one of our grand aristocrats, wore a long tailed coat, and a ruffled shirt, but he must take to ship buildin, and has gone to the dogs.... Well, the next farm where the pigs are in the potato fields, whose is that? Oh, Sir, that's C. D.'s, he was considerable fore handed farmer, as any in our place, but he got up for an Assembly-man, and opened a Store, and things went agin him some how, he had no luck afterwards. I hear his place is mortgaged, and they've got him cited in chancery... But the next, who improves that house? Why that's E. F.'s, he was the greatest farmer in these parts, another of the aristocracy, had a most noble stock, cattle, and the matter of some hundreds out in jint notes; well he took the contract for beef with the troops; and he fell astarn so, I guess its a gone goose with him. He's heavy mortgaged.... Who lives to the left there? that man has a most special fine intervale, and a grand orchard too, must be a good mark that. Well he was once, Sir, a few years ago; but he built a fullin mill, and a cardin mill, and put up a lumber establishment, and speculated in the West Indy line, but the dam was carried away by the freshets, the lumber fell, and faith he fell too; he's shot up, he han't been seed these two years, his farm is a common, and fairly run out."47 On all sides were discernible the natural consequences of such a policy of divided interests, pointing unmistakably to final disheartened emigration or a poor-debtor's flight: "... barn doors off - fences burnt up - glass out of windows - more white crops than green -and both lookin poor and weedy - no wood pile, no sarse garden, no compost, no stock —moss in the mowin lands, thistles in the ploughed lands, and neglect everywhere." 48 Sam Slick had but one remedy for Nova Scotian farming 47 Ibid., 209, 210. 48 Ibid., 210. 194 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ills, the year-round attention to business he had learned in "the States: " " We plowed all the fall for dear life; in winter we thrashed, made and mended tools, went to market and mill, and got out our firewood and rails. As soon as frost was gone, came sowin and plantin, weedin, and hoein-then harvest and spreadin compostthen gatherin manure, fencin and ditchin- then turn too and fall plowin agin. It all went round like a wheel without stoppin, and so fast, I guess you couldn't see the spokes, just one everlastin stroke from July to eternity, without time to look back on the tracks." 49 Next in importance to intensive farming as the necessary first step in rehabilitating his country's agricultural resources Haliburton placed the building of the railway from Halifax to Windsor, which Joseph Howe had proposed. With the opening of this projected line he prophesied would come not only increased marketing facilities for the farmer, but a general advance in trade and industry as well. "A bridge makes a town, a river makes a town, a canal makes a town, but a rail-road is bridge, river, thoroughfare, canal all in one."50 "The only thing that will make or save Halifax, is a rail road across the country to [the] Bay of Fundy." 51 That such an undertaking would involve the expenditure of capital did not lessen in the least Haliburton's confidence that the province, then practically without means of obtaining credit, would be able to finance it, and other desired improvements as well, for the railway was to be but the beginning of his programme for increased transit facilities. There was capital enough in Nova Scotia to invest in English and American public works, he claimed, why not for similar projects at home? 52 To secure the internal improvements needed 49 Ibid., 149. 61 Ibid., 76. 50 Ibid., 105. 62 Ibid., 94. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 195 in Nova Scotia, besides the local wealth, which the watchwords, Industry, Enterprise, Economy, would produce,53 all that was required was less devotion in the legislature to "politicks," and more to the construction of roads and bridges. Once the country was thoroughly opened up for convenient transportation, Haliburton believed that its future would be assured, and that Nova Scotians might hope to hold their own with their chief competitors, the people of the United States.64 What Haliburton had to say of the Americans in the first series of The Clockmaker is chiefly significant of his growing distrust of democracy. He presented them, it is true, as the very incarnation of shrewdness, frugality, and intelligent activity. That, of course, was demanded for the sake of drawing an instructive contrast with his own people. But his admiration of the Americans' habits of thrift, and of their ability to succeed, did not extend to their form of government. There is far more ridicule of the Yankees in the character of Sam Slick, who served as a continuous lampoon of his fellow citizens as well as an exemplification of the qualities desirable for the Nova Scotians, than is utilized in poking fun at their spirit of brag and their habitual "tall" talk. The irony of his repeated references to the " free and enlightened" state of his country, " the freest, says I, on the face of the airth -you can't 'ditto' it nowhere," 55 indicates even more clearly Haliburton's doubt of the boasted blessings of political liberty, than it does the Nova Scotians' general animosity towards their rivals. He had, in reality, little faith in the American experiment in democracy. It had begun in rebellion and would end in civil war. "A republic is only calculated for an enlightened and vartuous people, and folks chiefly in the farmin line." 56 But un 65 Ibid., 220. 64 Ibid., 113 55 Ibid., 156. 66 Ibid., 169. 196 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON restricted immigration and over development of the factory system had introduced elements of corruption, and subordinated agriculture. Mob-spirit was in the ascendency.57 Theoretical equality had not produced equal distribution of power, but only disrespect and discourtesy to superiors.58 Separation of church and state had resulted in a lack of veneration for things sacred. There was "nothin fixed either in religion or politics."59 The Americans had "their head a trifle too much, sometimes, particularly in Elections, both in freedom of Speech, and freedom of Press." 60 The greatest threat of all to a continuance of a stable popular government lay in the doctrine of states rights. Haliburton's views of the entire situation, and of the impending national calamity, is summarized in a single comprehensive statement which Sam Slick quoted from the Rev. Mr. Hopewell: "If our country is to be darkened by infidelity, our Government defied by every State, and every State ruled by mobs-, then, Sam, the blood we shed in our revolution will be atoned for in the blood and suffering of our own fellow citizens."61 To avert the threatened disintegration only an invigoration of the central executive powers with a gradual verging towards the unified control typified by the British monarchy would serve. But Haliburton's fears of dangerous impetuosity in a democratically controlled people led him to prophesy disaster even in connection with the suggested move towards improvement: "If this comes on gradually, like the changes in the human body, by the slow approach of old age, so much the better, but I fear we shall have fevers, and convulsion-fits, and cholics, and an everlastin gripin of the intestines first."62 57 Ibid., 39. 60 Ibid., 189. 58 Ibid., 190. 61 Ibid., 200. 69 Ibid., 199. 62 Ibid., 192. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 197 Signs of internal ills were already apparent: "The Blacks and the Whites in the States show their teeth and snarl, they are just ready to fall to. The Protestants and Catholics begin to lay back their ears, and turn tail for kickin. The Abolitionists and Planters are at it like two bulls in a pastur. Mob law and Lynch law are working like yeast in a barrel, and frothing at the bung hole. Nullification and Tariff are like a charcoal pit, all covered up, but burning inside, and sending out smoke at every crack, enough to stifle a house. General Government and State Government every now and then square off and spar, and the first blow given will bring a genuine set-to. Surplus Revenue is another bone of contention; like a shin of beef thrown among a pack of dogs, it will set the whole on 'em by the ears.... I guess we have the elements of spontaneous combustion among us in abundance; when it does break out, if you don't see an eruption of human gore, worse than Etna lava, then I'm mistaken. There'll be the very devil to pay, that's a fact." 63 Whether it was a general delight in The Clockmaker's prediction of a dire future for the United States that gave it a vogue among the Nova Scotians, or merely an individual pleasure among them in making the coat Sam Slick had cut fit some other fellow's back, Haliburton's letterseries had not been running long before Joseph Howe was able to write: "The Clockmaker, we are happy to find, has become a universal favorite: the greatest certainly (whose lucubrations we have had the honor of introducing to the public) since Obededom Praisepennies64 at all times, of course, excepting the redoutable Major,65 of most facetious memory.... Several of the letters have been republished in the Yarmouth, [N. S.] Herald, the Boston Courier, and other 63 Ibid., 57. 64 A character in another satirical letter-series published in The Novascotian during the early part of 1835, dealing with matters of trade, currency, etc., 86 Perhaps of " The Club" but more likely " Major Jack Downing." See below, 367-374. 198 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON American and Colonial papers —and we are happy to have it in our power to announce, that there is a goodly supply of nos. in reserve; and that we shall have the means of keeping our readers merry not only through the Christmas holidays, but till the very heart of this abominable winter is broken, though the snow should come ten feet deep." 66 It can hardly be credited that The Clockmaker was actually popular with the people whose deplorable characteristics it most unsparingly laid bare, and opinion which ought to be authoritative bears out one's skepticism on this point.67 But unpopular as Haliburton's "Recollections" may have been, interest in them rose steadily as the series advanced, until the demand for extra copies of The Novascotian could scarcely be -supplied.68 With the publication of the twenty-second installment,69 eleven more being needed to complete the whole number as originally intended,70 the author, still clinging to his anonymity, announced the cessation of his contributions to The Novascotian, and his consent to a plan proposed by its editor for their wider circulation: "Gentle Reader." "During four months I have had the honor of presenting you every week with one of these sketches -I now appear before you for the last time, to make my bow and retire. In doing so permit [me] to thank you for the reception you have been pleased 66 Novascotian, Dec. 17, 1835. 67 See J. G. Bourinot, Builders of Nova Scotia, 63, 64, and The Intellectual Development of the Canadian People, 104, 105; R. G. Haliburton in Haliburton: a Centenary Chaplet, 28. 68 G. C. Fenerty, The Life and Times of the Hon. Joseph Howe, 39, 40. 69 Not the twenty-first, as might be inferred from the misstatement in the publisher's advertisement to the first edition, Halifax, 1836. 70 See publisher's advertisement, first edition. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 199 to give them, a reception as much above my expectation, as I fear it is beyond my deserts. Mr. Howe informs me it is desirable that they should appear in a more durable form.... So flattering a request I could not decline; and I have therefore placed at his disposal the remaining part of the series, that the whole may be included in one volume...." 71 The Clockmaker, in book form, though anonymous still, was not issued from the press of The Novascotian office, however, until the very close of 1836. During the last weeks of the year a general election had been in progress in Nova Scotia,72 and for months previous Joseph Howe, oh a platform of incorporation for Halifax and a provincial government responsible to the people, had been busy conducting the campaign that returned him and a majority of reformers to the House of Assembly, where he began his career of over forty years as its most influential member. Between the withdrawal of The Clockmaker in one form and its reappearance in another, he had devoted his newspaper almost exclusively to the election. In the interval The Clockmaker had not been mentioned in The Novascotian. Candidates' cards, and addresses to the electors had crowded an announcement of its republication from even the advertising columns. If not lack of space, it certainly could not have been fear of Haliburton's politics that kept all references to his book out of Howe's paper, for after the result of the polls had been declared, apart from a brief notice that the work had been enlarged and reissued, for several months there was no more mention of it in The Novascotian than before. This continued failure to notice Haliburton's satire can probably be best explained as owing to the fact that beyond the very considerable initial attention The Clockmaker had 71 Novascotian, Feb. 11, 1836. 72 Simultaneous polling had not yet been adopted in Nova Scotia. 200 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON attracted, it had received no further marked recognition for some time,73 and that Howe, who was adverse to reviewing his own publications, or pushing their sale except by reprinting favorable press comment or citing other evidence of approval,7 simply had nothing noteworthy to report about it. We may be sure, however, that The Clockmaker's success had continued, though quietly, in the period of its apparent failure, since during that time its fame had been carried abroad and a demand for it created in England and the United States. On May 18, 1837, Howe was able to present an item in The Novascotian that as a proof of his soundness of judgment in selecting a volume for publication must have given him a good deal of satisfaction, even if it also meant that someone else was making a profit off his discernment. The implied promise it contained was doubtless of more interest to his readers than its half humorous threat: "The Clockmaker has been republished in London, by Bentley, and is enjoying great popularity, selling freely at 10s. sterling a volume.... Though it is gratifying to us in the extreme, to find any book issuing from the Novascotian Press republished in England, and to hear of the popularity of our friend Sam Slick in the great world of letters, still we are not quite sure that we shall not bring an action against Mr. Publisher Bentley, for pirating the copyright,75 and printing an edition without our leave. However, we shall avail ourselves of his exertions, when the Squire has the next volume ready for the Press.76 Before the year was out the first American edition of The Clockmaker appeared from the press of Carey, Lea, and Blanchard, of Philadelphia. 73 See below, 207, 211. 74 See the files of The Novascotian. 75 Howe's edition was, as a matter of fact, not copyrighted. 76 On May 30, 1837, the Acadian Recorder observed that " Sam Slick seems to 'go ahead' in the British book market." THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 201 In connection with Bentley's unauthorized reprinting of Haliburton's book a good deal of misinformation has been put into circulation by persons who should have been able to come nearer the facts than they did. Out of the tangle of inaccuracies it is still possible, however, to unwind most of the truth. According to the most frequently repeated account of the matter,77 which is confirmed in this one respect by Haliburton himself,78 it was Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Richard Fox,79 an officer of His Majesty's forces stationed at Halifax in 1836,80 who induced the famous London publisher to bring out an English edition of The Clockmaker. Returning to England,81 Colonel Fox had taken a copy of the book with him and had urged it upon Bentley as a possible publishing venture, stipulating, however, that if it proved successful the author, if discovered, and if poor, should have a share of the profits.82 Whether Colonel Fox was actually as ignorant of who wrote The Clockmaker as is generally supposed,83 it must be accepted as certain that in following his suggestion Bentley 77 That by Morgan, Bibliotheca Canadensis, 167, 168, which is followed by R. G. Haliburton in Haliburton: a Centenary Chaplet, 25, and by Joseph Freeman Tupper, The Canadian Academy, March, 1910, 5. 78 See dedication of The Clockmaker, second series, fifth ed. 79 Promoted General in 1863, a title usually given him in references to his relations to Haliburton. Colonel Fox was aide-de-camp to William IV, and the husband of Lady Mary Fitzclarence, daughter of His Majesty and Mrs. Jordan. (Information supplied by Harry Piers, Esq., Secretary, Nova Scotia Historical Society.) 80 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 81 Morgan states in obvious error after several editions had appeared in the United States. 82 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 83 See Ibid., and Morgan, R. G. Haliburton, Freeman, etc, all questionable sources owing to demonstrated errors and inconsistencies. 202 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON acted without the author's knowledge or consent84 unless one is willing to believe Haliburton a party to an understanding that absolutely ignored the rights of Joseph Howe, to whom the first series of The Clockmaker had been given outright.85 But the tradition 86 that either Fox or Bentley remained in ignorance of Haliburton's connection with The Clockmaker up to the time of his visit to England in 1838 87 and that then the secret of his authorship was accidentally disclosed, is entirely without foundation in fact. On this point we have positive assurance in a letter of Haliburton's written to one who had been his friend and intimate in King's College days, and since, Judge Robert Parker, of New Brunswick.88 Though the letter is undated,89 its contents show that it was written before Haliburton had seen Bentley in London in 1838 and arranged the terms then agreed upon for the second series of The Clockmaker: "By the last packet I received a letter from Colonel Fox, informing me that Bentley, the publisher, had at his suggestion presented me with a very elegant piece of plate 90 as a token of the estimation in which my talent is held in the mother-land, and concluding by a wish to make my acquaintance if circumstances should take me to England. Shortly afterwards I received another letter from him, containing the key of the box in which he had forwarded the salver, and another from Bentley, offering for another volume. I have another volume ready for the press, which 84 As the various "authorities" cited state. 85 See below, 404. 86 Found in all the accounts cited in one form or another. 87 See below, 217-223. 88 See above, 23. 89 As published in A. Wylie Mahon's "Sam Slick's Letters," Canadian Magazine, XLIV, 75. 90 According to Morgan and those who follow him', a silver salver engraved with an inscription by R. H. Barham of Ingoldsby Legends fame. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 203 is not so local as the other, and I think better suited for English readers. We are no judges of these things ourselves, but I think it better than the first. I intend, therefore, to go home with it and see it through the press myself, and while abroad will lay up materials for the Clockmaker in England, which, if the work takes, I will write as soon as I return." At least two English reviews of The Clockmaker in 1837 91 credited the book to Haliburton, so that not only may the tradition that the author was not known in England before 1838 be definitely denied, but another usually accompanying it,92 that prior to that date the authorship was popularly assigned to an American gentleman resident in London, must be considerably discounted. As to whether Haliburton received anything but formal tokens of approval from Bentley in payment for The Clockmaker, there is somewhat conflicting evidence, but the most generally accepted belief92 is that besides the salver mentioned in the letter to Judge Parker, he got nothing. Haliburton's own testimony on this point appears sufficiently explicit to be conclusive; "for the last volume [the first series of The Clockmaker] " he stated,93 "all the remuneration I had was the satisfaction of finding it had done some good among those for whose benefit it was designed...." But seemingly opposed to this remark is the assertion made by an anonymous writer in Bentley's Miscellany94 to the effect that Bentley, previous to bringing out The Clockmaker, " made a communication to Mr. Haliburton... for the purchase of the copyright, which terminated in an arrangement," but since there was no such copyright to be purchased, one 91 Monthly Review, 1837, 105; The Literary Gazette April 1, 1837, 204, 205. 92 Recorded by Morgan, R. G. Haliburton, etc. 93 Cloccmaker, second series, 318. 94 XIV, 81. 204 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON may suspect the authenticity of the whole statement. Another account of the dealings between publisher and author relates that Bentley offered a remuneration to Haliburton which the latter declined on the ground that he had given away the articles comprising his book, and so had no further claim upon them.95 This version of the incident leaves something to be desired in the way of interest on Haliburton's part in behalf of Joseph Howe, of course, but it reconciles the apparent differences between the long current opinion corroborated by Haliburton's personal word, and the rather doubtful authority of the Miscellany, and possibly comes nearer the whole truth than either of them. However insignificant Haliburton's share of the profits from The Clockmaker may have been, there is little question that Bentley's experiment of undertaking the publication of so unusual a curiosity as a volume of colonial humor proved highly successful. On June 8, 1837, Howe informed the readers of The Novascotian that letters lately received from London reported the English reprint of The Clockmaker "has had such a run as to make another edition necessary. Should this be the case it will have run through four editions in the short space of six months —a degree of popularity rarely attained by any modern work, and we believe never by a provincial one, having a local application merely." Fortunately for the overseas reputation of The Clockmaker it had more than a local application. What the English reviewers failed to understand, and it was much, they ignored, and commented, as a rule, not on the significance of the book as a political document dealing with colonial affairs, but on what they termed the freshness and novelty of its humor and subject-matter, and most of all, 95 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 205 on the originality of its principal creation, Sam Slick. "We must suffer the world to make acquaintance with the greatest original existing on its surface," said Blackwood's 96 in introducing Sam Slick to the public, and the eagerness with which he was received justified Haliburton's faith in the avidity of the English for things American.7 Apparently Haliburton's pedlar was to them the living embodiment of all they had heard of America from the travel-books of their countrymen, "your Halls, Hamiltons, and DeRouses [Rooses]," of whom as a class Sam Slick himself said contemptuously they were "Ensigns and leftenants, I guess, from the British marchin regiments in the Colonies, that run over five thousand miles of country in five weeks, on leave of absence, and then return, lookin as wise as the monkey that had seen the world. When they get back they are so chock full of knowledge of the Yankees, that it runs over of itself, like a hogshead of molasses rolled about in hot weather-a white froth and scum bubbles out of the bung; wishy washy trash that they call tours, sketches, travels, letters, and what not;..."98 But however untrustworthy their impressions, they had whetted the English appetite for more about these nasaltoned, ill-mannered, tobacco-chewing, expectorating, guzzling, whittling, and boasting traders across the Atlantic, and here was one of these irrepressible creatures drawn to the life by the hand of an observer whose testimony might be trusted and whose veracity could not be doubted. " He enters into the secret details of private life and exhibits all which English travellers have left in shadow," was a French corroboration of the opinion common in England.99 Indeed The Clockmaker was looked upon 96 XLII, 673ff. 97 See above, 128. 98 Clockmaker, first series, 58, 59. 99 Chasles, Anglo-American Literature and Manners, 224. 206 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON there as a better authority on the domestic manners of the Americans "than even the novels of Cooper." 100 That Sam Slick was an object for laughter as well as a faithful portraiture of his people only added to his popularity. There was, to be sure, a certain amount of deprecation and baulking at the uncouthness, the innuendoes, and the vulgar exaggerations of his speech, "so huge a mass of slang, slyness, and bitter bad words," 101 but for the most part his language was accepted as one of the necessary characteristics of the genuine Yankee, and laughed at along with his other eccentricities. It was his cheerful self-confidence, his shrewdness, and his "naturalness," however, that were regarded by the more open-minded as most typical of his nation and as making the book in which he appeared truly representative of the independent, aggressive spirit of a people of infinite possibilities, and, in comparison with much of the literature of the time, agreeably different. This merit of welcome unconventionality was in general ungrudgingly accorded The Clockmaker by the English reviews, but Blackwood's 102 praise of the book on this point was so unstinted that its comment, probably the most favorable the first series ever received, was admitted by Haliburton himself to be "remarkably flattering." 103 A small part of the article will suffice to give the tone of the whole, and some idea of the high esteem in which the abilities of the obscure provincial author were held abroad: "The writer of the volume is evidently a capital fellow. We want such to throw a new life even into European literature. Our 100 Bentley's Miscellany, XIV, 91. 101 Athenaeum, X, 262. 102 " The World We Live In," XLII, 673ff., attributed by some to Professor John Wilson (" Christopher North "). 103 In a letter to Judge Parker, quoted by Mahon, " Sam Slick's Letters," Canadian Magazine, XLIV, 76. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 207 writers are sinking into insipidity. The Washington Irving style, which to us tastes like a composition of treacle and water, sickly and sweet, the feeble effusion of feelings which no man ever felt but after a dose of molasses, its imagination the picture of a nightmare, and its sensibility the feelings of a nursery, has utterly spoiled the viscera of the rising generation of American penmen. They produce nothing but Jeremiads. Sterne's Maria in a wigwam, and with a necklace of scalps, is their model of the pathetic; and all the bold novelties of nature in a new country, the vigor of thought which might have seemed inseparable from the struggle with the elements, the wilderness, and the Indians; and even the rude originality which is one of the compensations of national ignorance, are all swamped in the imitation of the style of England in the last century, when the genius of England had sunk to its lowest depths when Horace Walpole was a novelist, and Hayley a poet. We say, let the writer of Slick's aphorisms try his powers on a subject adequate to their capacity. Let him leave Nova Scotia and come to England... what invaluable and exhaustless subjects would this clever scarifier of bombast, absurdity, meanness, and presumption find before him.. " In marked contrast to the cordial recognition given to Haliburton's work in England was the attack made on The Clockmaker in the solitary extended notice which the book attracted in Nova Scotia. More for the naivete and novelty of its point of view, than for the ranting absurdity of its onslaught, though in both respects it remains unique among provincial literary curiosities, the article deserves reproduction. The opinion it expresses was probably purely personal, but it may be a better indication of what was at one time thought of The Clockmaker at home, than reading only the foreign comment reprinted by Joseph Howe would lead one to suppose: "' The Clockmaker.' A work bearing the above title has been sometime out of the press, and as it has been reviewed by no periodical in the Province since its advent into the literary world, I may not, I presume, be deemed intrusive in making it the subject 208 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON of a few observations. It contains a series of letters, the greater part of which appeared in The Novascotian Newspaper; and called forth from its Editor a most extravagant Eulogy on their merits.104 The hero of the work is a Yankee Clock Pedlar, who roams from one section of the Province to another vending wooden clocks, and practising upon the simple and credulous Inhabitants, every species of dissimulation and deceit, and every dishonest art in order to foist upon them at an exhorbitant price his gilded and painted trash. The burden of it is, a description in the spirit of satire and ridicule of the idleness, ignorance, apathy, and extravagance, the manners, habits and customs, of the people of the Province, and their local officers and institutions. And the moral pointed out by it (if any) a Railroad between Halifax and Windsor. The author of this Bantling which in a literary point of view I must proclaim illegitimate, which had a long parturition in The Novascotian and required the assistance of Mr. Howe as accoucheur to bring it into visible existence, has chosen to remain unknown.105 But rumour, I regret to say, points to a learned Judge as the putative father. I should be sorry to believe the author of the History of Nova Scotia capable of indulging [in] the stolen embraces of some Harlot Genius, and causing the birth of such a literary monster as the Clock Maker is, nor until good evidence is educed will I believe, that a man whose style gave dignity to an interesting Historical theme could be guilty of such self degradation, such prostitution of talents, as to write the senseless and pitiful slang of which these letters are made up. Many persons here on the other hand believe Mr. Joseph Howe to be the author. This opinion received sanction from the Imp of the Press who solicited subscriptions for it in this County, and who threw out intimations that the Master-fiend of the Novascotian office was the writer. But be the author who he may he did well to keep out of view when he launched his ill-modelled and worthless Bark upon the waters, for it does no credit, either to his head or to his heart. True it was not dasht, a wreck upon the shelvy shores of criticism, and it continues to float undisturbed among the froth and scum of the literary ocean: But the reason is, it was too con104 See above, 197, 198. 105 "The letters of the Clockmaker were laid like bastards at every writer's door," from a letter signed " Manlius." Acadian Recorder, July 30, 1836. THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 209 temptible a thing to awaken the wrath of the foaming surge: the light and unsubstantial bubble dances harmless on the crested billows, while objects of weight and importance are overwhelmed and lost. However well the letters on the Clock Pedlar might have become the columns of a Newspaper when published singly, and without connexion or any design appearing or professed as the object of the series, they are utterly unworthy of the dignified form of a Book.... The reading of some of the letters may raise a smile upon features not extremely rigid, for we smile at what is ridiculous as well as what is witty, but disgust will quickly succeed, and I do not believe there is a man who has read the volume that could say when he laid it down, his time was well spent, he approved of the principal character, had acquired useful information, respected the author, or admired the language. But let us examine the Book and endeavour to point out its merits. And first the style. If this possesses any merit it is the merit of eccentricity, of running counter to every rule of orthography, and of orthoepy, of setting at naught the principles which govern universally the construction of the English language, of using terms senseless in themselves and of ridiculous sound, never heard but among the lowest and most vulgar of the republican mob, if heard at all, but such as were never known to be used by a vender of Clocks. The merit of forming monstrous metaphorical combinations, and of using figures that have no antitype in nature: The merit of corrupting the purity of our native tongue, and introducing a depraved and vitiated model of taste into the Province. What would be thought of the Englishman who affected in respectable English Society the disgusting Yang-yang aspiration of the Eastern Yankee, the nasal twang which proceeds from a chronic depravity of habit, or perhaps from mal-conformation of the organ of sound. And what should we think of the Novascotian who introduces in permanent form and one calculated to be generally known and adopted, the low, mean, miserable, and witless jargon, supposed erroneously to be in use among the same people; who cannot plead the only Justification which would avail for a defence, that of having copied from nature; as no Clock pedlar, Bible vender, nutmeg maker, or tin oven retailer was ever known, who used the idiom of the letters? What should we think of him on this point? Let the sensible and reflecting part of the community answer as regards the descriptive part of the work and the scenic representations; they by no means merit praise. The Author is 210 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBTURTON evidently ignorant of the People whose domestic manners he has attempted to exhibit, and to ridicule, and of much of the country he has chosen for the theatre of his hero's adventures. His local characters are over wrought and false to nature, and the language which they are made to express themselves in, such as is unknown among them. But what of the Hero of this hodge podge chance medley volume; what of this Yam-spinning, Jest-breaking, Womanwhipping, Slang-Jabbering Clock Maker? Know gentle reader that he is a fictitious character who is made to figure through some thirty letters of two columns Novascotian measure, got up, dressed and equipped by the Author and presented as a model for Novascotians. He is made to ridicule the habits, customs, abilities, and general bearing of the Yeomanry and Magistracy of the Province, to condemn their honest simplicity and open hearted conduct, as utterly unbecoming and unworthy of the age. He is made to reduce into system those base, unmanly, and nefarious practices of misrepresentation, joined with cunning adulation, that he may cheat and swindle the unsuspecting and unsophisticated natives, and then laugh at their stupidity, and oh absurdity this Yankee Democrat, this braggadocio of the American mobocracy, this transatlantic Gascon, is made to abuse the people of Nova Scotia as Political brawlers; as paying more attention to Elections than to farming, and talking about the House of Assembly, when they should be tilling the land. He is made to enumerate the various staples for manufactures, and to dilate upon the facilities for commerce which the Province contains; and to abuse the Inhabitants for not availing themselves of these advantages; laying it all to the account of their ignorance and indolence, that they are not the wealthiest people in the world.... Now what can we say of this character? Is it well drawn and sustained? No, it is a tissue of inconsistencies and contradictions. Is it estimable and worthy of imitation by Nova Scotians? May the race who have cultivated the deserts of Acadia and spread themselves over her bleak hills and billow worn shores, cease to exist; the cheerful voice of the labourers cease to be heard in her valleys; the wilderness resume its ancient limits; and silence and solitude brood over the length and breadth of the land, rather than her sons of the honest Fathers, should become such as this Beau.Ideal of the Author. But it may be asked, has he not drawn this character for our abhorrence and not for our admiration? Has he not chosen one of the gang of imposters who infest the Province as traffickers THE CLOCKMAKER, FIRST SERIES 211 or showmen, and held him up to view, a cheating, lying, bragging, fawning, Yankee, that we may detest and not imitate? Fain would I, were it possible, draw such conclusions; but the winding up of the Volume compels us to an opposite decision. The Clock Maker is decidedly and warmly approved, is praised for sound sense, searching observation, amusing idiom &c. &c. Such being our opinion of the Painting what shall we say of the Artist? What but that he is an ignorant daub who has undertaken to draw an Eastern Republican and has produced a wretched nondescript, a creature-the archetype for which, we may search Nature's wide confines in vain, elsewhere than in the crude imagination of the author, and if the ability infused through the work reflects no lustre on the powers of his mind, do the various adventures in which he makes his hero to figure, and the part he causes him to play, portray him as a man of amicable feelings, or sensible heart?... The Clock Pedler will notwithstanding its defects as a book answer the purpose which I believe to have been the primary object of the Author, viz: to libel the Plebeian population of the Province. It is the echo of that caw, caw cry, which we are accustomed to hear from every official and Tax-eater in the province, and as being such will no doubt pass plausible enough through the higher circles of our Aristocratic metropolis; however faulty in its conception, however gross in its details, however vulgar in its language. Julian. The foregoing observations were written some time ago, but as the work which is the subject of them came still-born from the Provincial Press they were thrown aside as unnecessary, and it was only on reading the puffs of the English press the other day that the paper was brought to my recollection. I send it on for publication because it contains my opinion of the book, an opinion not at all shaken by the favourable reviews taken of it by some trans-atlantic paper. A review is seldom a test of merit of a work, and much less is its reception in the world of letters. In the case in hand the novelty, even the monstrosity of the work may give it popularity in England, as any thing which greatly outrages the order and proportions of nature excites curiosity and has a run. Yours &c. Amherst, 1st. June, 1837. Julian." 108 106 Acadian Recorder, June 10, 1837. An apparent reference in The Novascotian, Aug. 10, 1837, to "Julian" as "the conceitedly 212 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON As Haliburton's first publisher, Joseph Howe paid no more attention to this outburst of refined and tender sensibilities than to observe: "Some worthy, in the last Recorder, has undertaken the hopeful task of writing down Sam Slick. He is very indignant that the people of England, and the reading public in the United States and all the Colonies, admire and praise the book. He must be a descendant of Dame Partington's who tried to sweep back the Atlantic with her broom." The effect of this indifferent rejoinder was to call forth a still more vehement tirade, directed this time solely at "the literary mammoth of The Novascotian office," accusing him of showing the white feather and of refusing to " bind the weighty gauntlets on his doughty bunches of fives," and concluding with the mock-heroic challenge: " Will not the Chivalric Editor mount his Rosinante, place in the rest his goose-quill lance, encase his Knightly person in paper armour, and tilt if it be but a single course in defence of his foster child? If he will here is Julian." 107 But the gage thus tauntingly thrown down was not taken up. The editor of The Novascotian was occupied with worthier antagonists. malignant gentleman beyond the Cobequid mountains" suggests the possibility that he may have been the Hon. Alexander Stewart, who in the House of Assembly session of 1837 assumed an attitude towards Joseph Howe and his measures of reform even more antagonistic than he had displayed towards Haliburton in the session of 1827-29. See above, 84ff. 107 Acadian Recorder, July 1, 1837. CHAPTER X THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES OUT of opposition to Joseph Howe's political activities during 1837 was born a good deal of the condemnation of popular government expressed by Haliburton in the second series of his Clockmaker. The difference between the two friends appeared still in the nature of a mutual agreement to disagree, but it is probable that only Haliburton's consent to revise opinions as first set down in the manuscript of his new satire prevented an outbreak of open hostility. Howe had lost no time in defining his position as a member of the House of Assembly. Almost his first parliamentary declaration was in support of a resolution calling upon the Council to open its doors to the public.2 Passed in the lower House, the resolution was promptly returned from the Council with the curt advice to the Assembly to mind its own business. Admitting that this action had forced the people's representatives into conflict with the upper House sooner than he had expected, Howe swept aside all suggestions of conciliation and moved for an Address to the Throne that would lay bare the evils of government under which the province labored, and, as the basis for such a document, introduced his famous Twelve Resolutions. These embodied an impressive recital of constitutional ills. They pointed out the unrepresenta1 See below, 402. 2 For this and other facts in this section see Howe, Speeches and Public Letters, I, 106ff. 213 214 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON tive character of the Council, its unfair distribution of the patronage, the evil effects of admitting the Bishop and Chief Justice to its deliberations, and its refusal to meet except in secret session; they protested the inability of the people to compel redress of such grievances even by the most drastic method of stopping the supplies, since official salaries were paid out of revenues unjustly removed from the colony's control, and they proposed as a remedy for the conditions thus set forth that the first step should be the granting of either " an elective Legislative Council," or "such other reconstruction of the local government as will ensure responsibility to the Commons." 3 No request was made for complete departmental responsibility of the executive, the system of government which the battle-cry, "Responsible Government," had come to signify.4 Howe was as yet still feeling his way towards reform, and was still willing to compromise upon what he consistently preached in The Novascotian, and with the ideals to which he believed the colonists must soon attain if they were to remain British. Debated one by one, all twelve resolutions were finally passed in the Assembly, when an alarming message from the Council threw most of the supporters of constitutional change into a panic. Aroused, ostensibly by the Assembly's impeachment of its disinterestedness in performance of duty, but really by the prospect of a speedy termination of its existence, the Council had announced to its assailants of the lower House that, pending the withdrawal of the objectionable portion of the twelve resolutions, it refused to proceed further in the transaction of public business. The country was threatened with a repetition of the embarrassing conditions which followed the "Brandy Dispute " of 1830. 3 Howe, Speeches and Public Letters, I, 115. 4 First used in this sense by the Upper Canadian reformers in 1829. F. Bradshaw, Self-Government in Canada, 352, foot-note. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 215 It was a difficult situation with which Howe, an untried legislator, was confronted. On the one hand there appeared the alternative of wilfully sacrificing the revenue needed to maintain the credit of the province, and on the other that of ignominously withdrawing from a position supported by the greater part of the people. But Howe proved himself capable of consolidating his gains in an unexpected manner. Instead of rescinding merely what the Council, in denial of the charge preferred, insisted should be omitted, he declared that his resolutions had done their work, and asked his colleagues to rescind the whole and appoint a committee for the consideration of an Address to the Throne on the state of the colony, to be reported after the business of session had been completed and the supplies secured. It was the first and most dramatic of Howe's many parliamentary coups. The Council was fairly trapped and had no choice but to submit. At the close of the session the Address was presented for discussion. The readiness with which it passed showed plainly that the House was prepared to defy the Council and determined to make Nova Scotia's constitutional defects known to the Colonial authorities. Like the rescinded resolutions on which it was based, the Address requested an elective Legislative Council, or the separation of the Executive from the Legislative Council with a provision " for a just representation of all the great interests of the province in both," but except for suggesting "the introduction into the former of some members of the popular branch, and otherwise securing responsibility to the Commons" 5 it marked no advance toward a genuinely responsible government. In defence of colonial government as it was, and of its own conduct, the Council, too, forwarded an Address to the Throne, accompanied by a strong recommendation from the Governor, General Sir Colin 5 Howe, Speeches and Public Letters. I, 155. 216 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Campbell, in its favor. As one concession to the Assembly's demands, however, the upper House intimated that it was about to make the alterations in the Council Chamber necessary to accommodate the public. By midsummer it was evident that the people had won a more substantial victory. Despatches from the Colonial Secretary, Lord Glenelg, intimated that Her Majesty had been pleased to assent to the reform of the greater part of the evils complained of. The division of the Council into two branches, executive and legislative, was ordered, the Chief Justice restricted to the Bench in the exercise of his official duties, the Bishop relegated from the Executive to the Legislative Council, and the surrender of the casual and territorial revenues offered in return for a suitable permanent civil list. Unfortunately for the popular cause, the Governor saw fit to carry out Lord Glenelg's instructions in such a way as to make the personnel of the new Councils scarcely more representative or acceptable than the old. As for practical responsibility of the executive, none was achieved, for, though four of its members were chosen from the House, they admitted no responsibility to the majority there, and, indeed, took their seats among the Councillors on express condition that none was expected of them. The new Councils had not been discharging their functions for more than half a session, when it became known that the instructions issued to Governor Campbell concerning the numbers they should include, did not correspond with those contained in the commission of the Earl of Durham, the recently appointed Governor General of British North America. The Councils had been accordingly unlawfully constituted, and two others, with fewer members in each, were named, again by Sir Colin Campbell, in their places. By the first appointments, declared void, only one reformer had obtained a seat in the executive. The later THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 217 appointments did not provide for even one. Manifestly the struggle between the two parties was bound to be renewed. Before the close of the session of 1838 the House and the executive were again in open conflict. A civil list bill, designed to meet the offer of the Imperial Government for the surrender of the casual and territorial revenues and passed by the reform majority of the Assembly, was rejected in the Legislative Council. A bill to reduce the cost of the judiciary met with no better fate. The only recourse of the Commons was another Address to the Throne. Again the appointment of Councillors without the confidence of the people's representatives was protested, but no definite demand was made for an executive dependent upon the will of the majority, nor was there mention of the previously proposed elective upper House. From this time on a Legislative Council selected by the people was heard of no more in the Nova Scotian Assembly. In the main the Address was devoted, not to the discussion of the Council, but to a defence of the rejected civil list, though the attention of Her Majesty's advisers was called also to the colony's need of extended free-ports privileges. No response was made to any of its representations until the session of 1839. Meantime the two friends of rapidly diverging political faiths, whose differences must have been considerably accentuated during the progress of the events just narrated, journeyed abroad together in perfect harmony on what proved for both of them the Grand Tour. For Haliburton, it proved also a veritable triumphal progress. A desire for the intellectual stimulus of travel, sentimental interest in the homeland, and curiosity to see at first-hand foreign political conditions took Howe across the Atlantic. Haliburton had much the same reason for undertaking the voyage as his friend, but motives of another sort as well 218 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON were operative in his case. He visited England, for this the third time, on private business connected with the estate of his brother-in-law, Captain William Neville,6 and had, besides this purpose, that of arranging terms with Bentley for the publication of the second Clockmaker, and the intention of engaging upon a quest for further copy in continuation of Sam Slick's " Sayings and Doings." 7 When the Falmouth packet, the ten-gun brig Tyrian, sailed from Halifax Harbor on April 26, 1838, she bore, as the Acadian Recorder 8 noted, " As rich a cargo of intellect as ever left our shores." Besides Haliburton and Howe, there were on board Charles R. Fairbanks, Master of the Rolls of Nova Scotia, as public-spirited and progressively-minded a citizen as any in the province at that time, Major Robert Carmichael-Smyth, an enthusiastic promoter of the idea of an all-British transcontinental railway in North America, carried into realization by the building of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and Dr. Walker of St. John, New Brunswick. The uneventfulness of the long twenty-five days' voyage of agreeable companionship and pleasant weather was broken by one incident destined to have an important bearing on the development of ocean steamship navigation. On May 16 occurred what was recalled by one of the passengers,9 as "a moment full of excitement... when, to our astonishment, we first saw the great ship Syrius [Sirius] steaming down directly in the wake of the Tyrian. She was the first steamer, I believe, that 6 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 7 See above, 203, the letter to Judge Parker. "The Sayings and Doings of Samuel Slick of Slickville" is the at one time familiar subtitle of The Clockmaker under which that work was formerly often mentioned and at least once reprinted. 8 Quoted by the Halifax Times, Aug. 16, 1842. 9 Major, then Captain, Robert Carmichael-Smyth in A Letterto His Friend The Author of "The Clockmaker," (pamphlet), 1-3. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 219 ever crossed the Atlantic for New York, and was then on the way back to England. You will, I dare say, recollect the prompt decision of Commander Jennings [of the Tyrian] to carry his mail bags on board the steamer, and our equally prompt decision not to quit our sailing craft commanded as she was by so kind and excellent an officer; and the trembling anxiety with which we watched mail bag after mail bag hoisted up the deep waist of the Tyrian; then lowered in the small boat below -tossed about between the vessels, and finally all safely placed on board the Syrius." Howe accompanied one of the boat-loads of mail to the Sirius, and, with characteristic love of flourish, "took a glass of champagne with the captain," 10 returning to the Tyrian enthusiastic over what appeared by contrast with the restricted accommodations of the packet the " luxuriant appointments " of the steamer.1l The object-lesson of being left behind by the power of steam to await the good-will of the wind was the occasion of a lively discussion among the passengers of the Tyrian, with the result that before they landed at Falmouth, the Nova Scotians had agreed among them, at Major Carmichael-Smyth's suggestion, to "bestir themselves, and not allow, without a struggle, British mails and British passengers, thus to be taken past their very doors," 12 and to take the first steps in calling the possibilities of steamship connections with the colonies to the attention of the Colonial Secretary. Immediately on reaching port at Falmouth, Haliburton and Howe hurried to Bristol to confer with the owners of the Sirius with regard to making Halifax, if not the western terminus of their line, at least a port of call, and soon after Howe, associated with William Crane, one of the New Brunswick 10 Howe, Speeches and Public Letters, I, 188. 11 C. R. Fairbanks, Journal. See below, 221. 12 Carmichael-Smyth, Letter, 2. 220 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON legislators whom he found in London, addressed a letter 13 to Lord Glenelg urging the importance of establishing a line of steamers for the conveyance of mail and passengers to Halifax under the control of the Admiralty. Within a few months tenders for the service proposed were called for, and another Nova Scotian, William Cunard,14 whose family afterwards became connected with Haliburton's by marriage, was awarded the contract which laid the foundation of the present steamship corporation still bearing the founder's name. Haliburton never forgot, nor allowed others to forget, the part he thus played in securing to the old and new worlds the benefit of rapid intercommunication. On the day after the transshipment of the mails to the Sirius another steamer was sighted eastbound, 16 which turned out to be the Medea convoying the Earl of Durham on H. M. S. Hardy to Canada on a mission which was shortly to have a profound influence on the public utterances of one of the Tyrian's passengers. In company with Howe, besides travelling about England, Haliburton visited Scotland, Ireland, France, Belgium, and the Rhine country.16 Of their rather extensive journey, few intimate or important records remain. One stray bit of personal narrative of more than usual interest regarding their common experience in England is to be found, however, in an article on Daniel O'Connell, contributed by Howe to the New York Albion,17 which recounts their meeting with the famous agitator at the home of an Irish banker named Kiernan, in South Lambeth, on the Thames. When the two, perhaps at first 13 To be found in Howe's Speeches and Public Letters, I, 188ff. 14 Later Sir William Cunard. See above, 154, foot-note. 15 Fairbanks, Journal. 16 Howe, Speeches and Public Letters, I, 187. 17 Reprinted ibid., II, 465ff. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 221 slightly over-awed, colonials were presented to O'Connell, he at once and with rare tact put them at their ease by recalling the successful efforts of Haliburton and his colleagues in the House of Assembly to secure a repeal of the civil disabilities against the Nova Scotian Catholics. But it was Howe, with his genial expansiveness, and not Haliburton, who appears to have occupied the greater share of the Liberator's attention, Haliburton being left to drift over to the ladies on the opposite side of the reception room-possibly a diplomatic withdrawal from a political discussion in which a Tory could scarcely be expected to take the part of a sympathetic listener! Concerning Haliburton abroad, though mostly in his relations with persons other than Howe, some additional interesting scraps of information are preserved in a manuscript "Journal of a Visit and Residence in England in the Year 1838," 18 written by his fellow passenger on the Tyrian, Charles R. Fairbanks, from which may be obtained glimpses of the hitherto unknown provincial judge and humorist driving shrewd bargains with the famous London publisher and his illustrators, or gladly received by well known families between some of which and his own there was only the doubtful connection of a common name, or eagerly sought after by the leaders among London's literary celebrities, or admitted as an interested spectator at the celebration of the Queen's coronation ceremony, and as an honored guest at the Lord Mayor's banquet. " He has fallen on his legs certainly," wrote Fairbanks of his friend's unexpected successes in England. Less dependably, one of Haliburton's kinswomen related that from the time he made himself known in England, " he became a Lion in all fashionable circles —and very much caressed by the highest of the 18 Now in the possession of C. R. Fairbanks' granddaughter, Mrs. Harry Piers, Halifax, N. S. 222 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON nobility." 19 And Haliburton himself referred to his having received in England at this time, " as an obscure provincial author, the most flattering indulgence, as a colonist, the most hearty welcome, and [as] a stranger the most considerate attention.... 20 Early in July the proof sheets of the American edition of the new Clockmaker were ready for shipment to New York,21 and it must have been shortly afterwards that the English edition appeared, but it was not until Haliburton's return from the Continent that the final agreement with Bentley 22 as to the price to be paid for it was reached. On August 11, Fairbanks notes that Haliburton was "in high spirits, having sold The Clockmaker as it now stands to Mr. Bentley for a handsome sum.23 More than Marriot [Marryat] gets for his works and signed articles for a work in 3 vols.24 Did not name sum. Book remarkably well received-most favorably received. H. now the greatest Lion in London. Mrs. Trollope and Theo. Hook desire to be acquainted with him." Already Haliburton had made the acquaintance of R. H. Barham,25 the Fairbanks journal recording in the entry for June 22, "Haliburton greatly delighted with Mr. Barham whom he met yesterday." Subsequently between Hook, Barham, and Haliburton a warm cordiality is said to have sprung up, and it is further stated that many were the stories exchanged among them at the dinners of the Athenaeum 19 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript. 20 Bubbles of Canada, 310. 21 Fairbanks, Journal, entry for July 3. 22 Of whom Fairbanks observed that he "looks like an American — not a man of much talent "! 23 Georgina Haliburton says ~700. 24 Likely The Attache, first published in four vols. See below, 436. 25 See above, 202, foot-note. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 223 Club, to which all three belonged.26 Besides the convivial intimacy of this supposed relationship, must be placed an anecdote told of Haliburton 27 among a group of literary men in Edinburgh, which he visited shortly after the publication of the second Clockmaker. Invited to meet a number of guests at a dinner party given by William Chambers, of Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, he found a company assembled, ready to be amused with the expected flow of his by this time popular humor. But Haliburton sat mum throughout the evening. So disappointed was Chambers that he wrote to a relative in Nova Scotia to ask if the Judge Haliburton he had entertained was certainly the man who wrote The Clockmaker.2 Whether the story is true or not, Haliburton returned to London with nothing but pleasant recollections of his stay in Edinburgh, if we may judge from the reports he brought back as reflected in his friend's diary: 29 ~ He is delighted with his visit to Scotland and Ireland, and the introduction his book has given him. Certainly he has been most fortunate in so easily placing him[self] among the foremost English writers." The first series of The Clockmaker had won for Haliburton an international reputation. The second series showed plainly that he meant to take advantage of the fact to 26 R. G. Haliburton in Haliburton: a Centenary Chaplet, 25, following Morgan. 27 By Peter Lynch, "Early Reminiscences of Halifax," Trans. N. S. Hist. Soc., XVI, 198, 199. 28 As an offset to this story, may be cited the statement quoted by the New York Albion, Feb. 23, 1839, 62, from an unnamed British source: "... Mr. Justice Haliburton, a very intelligent and inquiring gentleman, who is now on a visit to this country,... has already gained a reputation in social circles for his lively qualities and conversational powers." 29 Entry for October 12. 224 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON make himself heard. For the predominantly local considerations of the earlier volume, comparisons of colonial with American or British political affairs or governments were substituted. Sam Slick was introduced as an authority on " the machinery of the American government," with the announcement that his explanations were to be used "to compare it with the British and Colonial constitutions, and [to] throw much light on the speculative projects of our reformers," 30 although Haliburton disclaimed the notion that he was the advocate of British institutions in contrast with American. Rather, he maintained, he was, " the advocate for law, just and equal law, impartially administered, voluntarily obeyed, and, when infringed, duly enforced." 31 "It is contentment with our own, and not disparagement of your [American] institutions, that I am desirous of impressing upon the minds of my countrymen.32 A far greater amount of self-consciousness on the part of the author is revealed in the second than in the first series. He was clearly laboring to live up to his reputation. If there was more of the confident anti-reformer, there was more of the professional humorist as well in the new book. But Sam Slick's greater discursiveness, permitted by release from the space restrictions of newspaper correspondence, while it resulted in the gain of ampler treatment of the various topics presented, resulted also in the loss of the crisp pointedness of the contributions to The Novascotian. In still another way the second Clockmaker proved less effective than the first. A good many of its chapters, written in advance of happenings that had passed into history before it was published, 30 The Clockmaker, second series, 6. The references are to the fifth edition. 31 Ibid., 204. 32 Ibid., 318. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 225 were printed without the revision needed to bring them up to date. As a consequence they present comment or protest that appears at many points belated or unnecessary. Thus it is that the prospect, but not the advent, of new Councils for Nova Scotia or of public sessions in the upper House is made fun of, while the Upper and Lower Canadian rebellions, which by the time the book appeared had come and gone, are referred to only by way of prophecy. In the second series of The Clockmaker Haliburton dropped almost entirely his attempt to interest the Nova Scotians in the natural resources of their province, and tom laugh them out of their habits of affected gentility, possibly because it was no longer needed,33 and devoted himself to stemming the current of colonial democracy. "I am no democrat," he admitted frankly, "I am no friend to novelties."34 But as yet he was careful to trim his 33 As may be inferred from some doggerel stanzas, "To the Clockmaker," in The Novascotian, Sept. 30, 1838, on the lessons learned by the Bluenoses from Sam Slick's teaching: "You've taught them what they did not know, You've told them truths profound,You've done some good, you've done your best, Ambition's raised at lastYou've roused the sleepers from their nest, 'Twas time, they slept too fast. The following is Haliburton's own opinion of the effects of the first Clockmaker: "This work has done a good deal of good. It has made more people hear of Nova Scotia than ever heard tell of it afore by a long chalk; it has given it a character in the world it never had afore, and raised the valy of real property there considerable; it has shown the world that all the Bluenoses there ain't fools at any rate;..." Clockmaker, second series, 319. 34 Ibid., 211. 226 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON course between the extremists on either side of politics, and to show none of his later exultation in Tory prejudices. " The bane of the colonies," he said,35 " as of England, it appears to me, is ultra opinions. The cis-Atlantic ultra tory, is a nondescript animal, as well as the ultra-radical. Neither have the same objects or the same principles with those in the mother country whose names they assume. It is difficult to say which does most injury. The violence of the radical defeats his own views; the violence of his opponents defeats those of the government, while both incite each other to greater extremes.... An unnatural, and it would appear, a personal, and therefore a contemptible jealousy, influences this one, and a ridiculous assumption the other, the smallest possible amount of salary being held as sufficient for a public office by the former, and the greater part of the revenues inadequate for the purpose of the latter, while patriotism and loyalty are severally claimed as the exclusive attribute of each. As usual, extremes meet; the same emptiness distinguishes both, the same loud professions, the same violent invectives, and the same selfishness. They are carnivorous animals, having a strong appetite to devour their enemies, and occasionally showing no repugnance to sacrifice a friend... He who adopts extreme radical doctrines in order to carry numbers by flattering their prejudices, or he who assumes the tone of the ultra tory of England,36 because he imagines it to be that of the aristocracy of that country, and more current among those of the little colonial courts, betrays at once a want of sense and a want of integrity and should be treated accordingly by those who are sent here to administer the government. There is as little safety in the counsels of those, who, seeing no defect in the institutions of their country, or desiring no change beyond an extension of patronage and salary, stigmatise all who differ from them as discontented and disloyal, as there is in a party that call for organic changes in the constitu305 Ibid., 310-312. 36 Joseph Howe made this interesting comment on English and colonial ultra-Tories in 1838: " The Tory species, as known in the British Provinces is nearly extinct in Great Britain; an out-andout Tory is only to be found in the colonies." Speeches and Public Letters, I, 182. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 227 tion, for the mere purpose of supplanting their rivals, by opening new sources of preferment for themselves." Yet Haliburton's exposition of the English system of constitutional checks, King, Lords, Established Church, and Commons, in favorable contrast to what he considered the unregulated rule of the "populace" of the United States,37 leaves no doubt of his own essential Toryism which was of a variety extreme enough to carry him even so far as to advocate a system of landlord and tenantry for Nova Scotia.38 On the question of elective Councils, Haliburton completely reversed the position which he had, at least alternatively, taken in his History,38a and which it had been insinuated he might take even in the Assembly,38b and came out squarely in opposition to Joseph Howe, who had become temporarily his successor in support of this particular method of reform. But so long as the British dominions were committed to a system of government in which the Crown, or its representatives, was a safety-device necessary to its successful operation, Haliburton's later stand was more logical than that which he had previously occupied: "What good would an elective council be?.. If there be any good in that are Council at all, it is in their bein' placed above popular excitement, and subject to no influence but that of reason, and the fitness of things, composed of chaps that have a considerable stake in the country, and don't buy their seats by pledge and promises.... If you make that branch elective you put governr ment right into the gap, and all difference of opinion, instead of bein' between the two branches as it is now, (that is, in fact, between the people themselves), would then occur in all cases between the people and the governor.... Elective councils are 37 Clockmaker, second series, 186ff. 38a See above, 139. 38 Ibid., 52, 53. 38b See above, 115. 228 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON inconsistent with colonial dependence.... Amend what is wrong, concede what is right, and do what is just always; but preserve the balance of the constitution for your life." 39 Haliburton's antagonism to Howe is recognizable in the second series of The Clockmaker, too, on quite other matters than elective Councils. It was clearly his friend he had in his mind when he alluded to the "resolutions of the dominant party" in the House of Assembly or the Council as frequently produced "by the intrigues or talents of one man."40 He parodied Howe's protests against the undue administrative influence of the adherents of the Church of England and the monied interests of Halifax, the excessive salaries of the judges and customs officials, and the exclusiveness of King's College,41 and scoffed at the reformers' dearest measures, vote by ballot and short parliaments.42 While his advice to the "Cariboo member," an accurate reflection of what Haliburton's defenders claimed had been his own position in the House,43 was as obviously addressed to the leader of the Nova Scotian reformers, as to the radicals of Upper Canada: "Be honest, be consistent, be temperate; be rather the advocate of internal improvement than political change; of rational reform, but not organic alterations. Neither flatter the mob, nor flatter the government: Support what is right, oppose what is wrong; what you think, speak; try to satisfy yourself, and not others; and if you are not popular you will at least be respected; popularity lasts but a day, respect will descend as a heritage to your children." 44 Nevertheless, Haliburton's attitude to Howe was not one of unreasoning disagreement. With the latter's plea for s9 Ibid., 70-72. 41 Ibid., 33-35. 40 Ibid., 299. 42 Ibid., 78, 175. 43 See letter from "Amicus," Novascotian, April 24, 1828, and the reply to it from "Digby," ibid., May 1, 1828. 44 Clockmaker, second series, 36. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 229 an increased number of free-ports in Nova Scotia 45 Haliburton was in entire accord, as he was with Howe's plan for scrapping the obsolete ten-gun brigs that performed the colonial packet service, and replacing them by substantially built steam-propelled liners.46 The opinions which Haliburton first put forward in the second series of The Clockmaker in support of a policy of improved speed and safety in transportation between the Mother Country and her possessions overseas, have a peculiar interest in their relation to his later ardent Imperialism. They mark the beginning of his open defiance of the growing anti-colonies sentiment in Great Britain. " Cuttin' off the colonies," Sam Slick told the Squire, " is like cuttin' off the roots of a tree." 47 As an outlet for surplus population and a reservoir for trade the North American provinces were declared to be necessary to the continuance of the Empire, and the belief that they were more of a drain on the nation's wealth than a source of its supply was denied as false: "Oh, squire, if John Bull only knew the valy of these colonies, he'd be a great man. I tell you; but he don't.... You can't put into figures a nursery for seamen; a resource for timber if the Baltic is shot ag'in you, or a population of brave and loyal people, a growin' and sure market, an outlet for emigration, the first fishery in the world, their political and relative importance, the power they would give a rival, convartin' a friend into a foe, or a customer into a rival, or a shop full of goods, and no sale made for 'em." 48 At the bottom of all the unrest in the colonies and the dissatisfaction with them at home Haliburton placed the ignorance and incompetence of the officials sent out to govern them, appointed by uninformed or misinformed 46 Ibid., 154. 7 Ibid., 294. " Ibid., 287ff., 302ff. 48 Ibid., 307 230 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON secretaries in the Colonial office. To guard against the indefinite recurrence of errors which had distinguished the control of the colonies in the past, Haliburton, refusing as yet to entertain the idea of colonial representation in the Imperial Parliament, proposed instead the appointment of a Colonial Council-board, "composed principally, if not wholly, of persons from the respective provinces; who while the minister changes with the cabinet of the day, shall remain as permanent members, to inform, advise and assist his successor." 4 In this thoroughly practical suggestion there is exhibited the remarkable foresight into matters relative to the organization of the Empire of which at different times Haliburton gave evidence. His suggestion of himself for a colonial governorship, on the strength of the reputation he has won through the first Clockmaker, scarcely does him so much credit. But the temptation was strong, there was precedent in plenty, and plain-speaking was the only language the home authorities could be expected to understand, and, after all, it was that irrepressible Yankee, Sam Slick, who was to blame! 50 The second series of The Clockmaker was received by the English press with less of wonder and more of the 49 Ibid., 300. 50 R. G. Haliburton in Haliburton: a Centcnary Chaplet, 39, says that the Colonial office actually offered to appoint his father "President of Montserrat, a wretched little West Indian Island, inhabited by a few white families and a thousand or two of blacks "; but fails to note when. C. R. Fairbanks's Journal records (entry for June 22) that Haliburton "is growing into dislike of N. Scotia says he will accept an office in Van Diemen's land." Commenting on Haliburton's recommendations of himself for office the London Times for Nov. 1, 1838, said, with more than intended absurdity, "It is an unfortunate circumstance for the present ministers that Mr. Slick had not established his reputation in THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 231 laughter of approbation than the first. Opinion was practically unanimous that it was a "vigorous exception "51 to the general rule that the sequel of a successful book is seldom its equal. Yet in spite of its author's evident intention to thrust Sam Slick more prominently forward in the role of an entertainer, it was not his humor that excited the major interest. On all sides there was more genuine appreciation of the new Clockmaker's real significance than was true in the case of its predecessor, an intelligent comprehension of its commentary on colonial political conditions, and a willingness to attribute proper importance to British North America and the problem of its future government. By common consent its exposition of the various phases of a vexatious matter was accepted as that of an authority whose opinions deserved careful consideration. But while Haliburton got a respectful hearing, neither his conclusions, nor his methods of arriving at them, were allowed to pass unquestioned. Prejudice,52 unfairness, the use of incorrect data,53 and actual misrepresentation 4 were among the charges laid against him. For his achievement outside the field of purely political discussion, however, the praise given him was notaEngland when the Governor-Generalship of British North America was given away the first time. For the real practical service of Her Majesty, we would have backed him against the Earl of Durham,... for 'plain work, and no nonsense,' we know of nobody who would have settled the North America colonies like Mr. Samuel Slick; of Slickville. In all probability the situation is now coming to be disposed of for the second time. Surely Mr. Slick will not be overlooked." 51 London Times, Nov. 1, 1838. 52 Monthly Review, III, 8. 53 London, Morning Chronicle, quoted Novascotian, Nov. 1, 1838. 54 Monthly Review, III, 10. 232 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON bly generous and unqualified. Especially were his powers of broad caricature and his extraordinary insight into character, both national and individual, commended.55 There was, of course, the usual outburst of British squeamishness over Sam Slick's vulgarity,56 though it must be acknowledged there was rather more than sufficient ground for complaint. In respect to the ill-taste displayed in The Clockmaker's treatment of Harriet Martineau,57 the " English gall" with a French name, public condemnation was corroborated by the privately expressed disapproval of at least one individual who might have been able to teach Haliburton a lesson in civility. It was Colonel Fox himself, to whom the second series of the book was dedicated, who deplored its "allusions to Miss Martineau as highly indecorous to a woman," and gave it as his opinion that " her infirmity of deafness ought not to have been brought forward." 58 At home in Nova Scotia, press comment on the book followed closely the example set abroad. There was, of course, a more decided feeling of gratulation than in England that a despised colony should have produced an author whose "talent, originality and humor" enabled him to take a place "among the popular and successful men of the day," 59 but it did not result in a greater lack of discrimination in appraising his work in either its humorous or its political aspects. Particularly interesting in this connection, and fairly representative of what Haliburton's fellow55 London Morning Chronicle, quoted Novascotian, Nov. 1, 1838; London Spectator, quoted ibid., Sept. 13, 1838. 56 The Literary Gazette, July 7, 1838, 419. '57 Clockmaker, second series, 58 ff., 84ff. 58 Fairbanks, Journal, entry for Dec. 13, from which it also appears that the dedication was made without Colonel Fox having seen the book. 59 London Morning Chronical, quoted Novascotian, Nov. 1, 1838. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 233 countrymen thought of the second Clockmaker, is the first indication that The Novascotian had at last consented to take notice of his reactionary politics: "... On first being told that a book of merit had been published in Nova Scotia, the literati of England were ready to exclaim 'Can any thing good come out of Nova Scotia.' The event, however, wondrous though it may be, has happened. The 'Clockmaker' has passed, not with credit only, but with distinguished applause through the ordeal of criticism- an ordeal from which few even of the first works of the age have come forth unscathed. That the 'Clockmaker' excited much attention in this province is not surprising, for here, a literary work of even moderate pretension is a novelty - a 'rara avis'; but that it has been so generally admired by the experienced judges of England, stamps it with the quality of sterling merit.... Its humour is broad and amusing without being at all farcical and extravagant; and if there be not in it an equal variety of character and incident, there runs through it a vein of sterling common sense, and every story conveys many valuable practical lessons; not only for the improvement of the province, but for the instruction of every reader.... Conceding, however, this high praise to the work, we would not be understood to concur in all the opinions of the 'Clockmaker' particularly on political subjects. He praises into disrepute in a most artful manner the government of the States, and exalts by censure, the much extolled but inscrutable constitution of Great Britain. In one place he seems to decry all change as dangerous innovations and to represent existing Institutions as a sort of mirror, whose brightness would be sullied by the breath of Reform. In another place he comes forward as the advocate of all 'proper and judicious reform' forgetting perhaps, that the terms 'proper and judicious reform' open a wild [wide?] field for discussion, and need some infallible tribunal such as never yet was discovered to limit and define their meanings. Neither amongst all his valuable remarks upon the state and prospects of this province, has he adverted sufficiently to the slight increase which takes place in its scanty population, a matter which perhaps would better explain some circumstances which he has endeavored to explain on other grounds. What is it, we would ask, which prevents the tide of emigration from England, from being attracted to a province which in the opinion of the 'Clockmaker,' presents so many and 234 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON such important advantages? In his observations on the Canadian revolt, and the obstacles that oppose that most desirable consummation, a thorough amalgamation of the inhabitants, we cordially concur.60 If indeed the British possessions in America are to be assimilated to the mother country, and united into a compact dependency, the French language must be abolished. It is a sort of record of hostile parentage from which one portion of the inhabitants have sprung, and it is connected with too many inflammatory associations even to allow of a cordial union of the opposed parties as long as it exists. Any system of settlement that omits this important particular will be defective and must fail.... [But] we must enter our protest... against the panegyric pronounced upon Governor Head..61 If we had space, we would extract a lively and pungent satire on Nova Scotian Society; we doubt whether its truth equals its severity. At any rate the objects of it have no reason to be offended with the author, who deemed such opinions fit only to be put into the mouth of a drunken Schoolmaster.62 They are, however, worth consideration, and wherever they pinch, there is room for amendment. 60 Haliburton's references in The Clockmaker, second series, to the Canadian rebellion, as stated above (225), were only by way of prophecy. According to his analysis of the situation the French-Canadians were the innocent victims of "Papinor" and other unscrupulous and cowardly demagogues. As to the remedial measure he favored, he gives but the one hint: "The reform they want in Canada is to give 'em English laws and English language. Make 'em use it in courts and public matters, and make 'em an English and not a French colony out of it;..." (Clockmaker, second series, 215.) The development of this suggestion forms the thesis of such constructive treatment of the problem as The Bubbles of Canada contains. See below, 246. 61 See Clockmaker, second series, 301, 302. Sir Francis Bond Head was the Tory governor of Upper Canada just previous to and during the rebellion there, which was, in part, due to his inability to sense the political situation that preceded the outbreak, and his unwillingness to take military precautions against it. The "panegyric" mentioned deals only with his difficulties before the rebellion. Haliburton always remained the zealous defender of Head's Upper Canadian administration. See below, 263. THE CLOCKMAKER, SECOND SERIES 235 We will conclude, with again congratulating this province, on possessing such a talented and distinguished writer as the author of the Clockmaker. Its appearance will constitute an era in the History of Nova Scotia."63 62 See Clockmaker, second series, Chap. XIX. Haliburton in the chapter referred to is far more censorious of the besotted type of derelict Englishman, at one time all too commonly abroad in Nova Scotia as travelling schoolmasters, than of the permanently settled inhabitants of the province. 63 "A correspondent" in The Novascotian, Sept. 27, 1838. At that date Joseph Howe was still absent in England, and his paper temporarily in charge of John S. Thompson. CHAPTER XI THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND THE REPLY TO DURHAM DISAPPROVAL of the political bias of Haliburton's writings, first given public expression in the press notices of the second Clockmaker, was greatly increased by the appearance of his next two productions, devoted, as they were, to a partisan though serious consideration of colonial questions. Early in the autumn of 1838, Joseph Howe returned home to Nova Scotia, leaving Haliburton behind in England. This separation of the two at the close of their tour of sight-seeing and visitation is significant of the complete divergence of their views in respect to colonial administration, though there is nothing in it, so far as is known, indicative of personal feeling.1 Once more in his native province, Howe took up anew the cudgels in behalf of self-control for the colonies, but so stubborn was the opposition he encountered that it required full ten years of incessant plying of his weapons before he succeeded in hammering into the heads of over-cautious and unwilling officials the wisdom and workability of his ideals, and the necessity of their complete and unrestricted application. With the struggle for reform thus recommencing in Nova Scotia, Haliburton prolonged his stay in the old country well on into the spring of 1839. In the leisure of his extended holiday the Satan of politics found abundant 1 Indeed Joseph Howe's privately recorded account of their parting (see the collection of Howe's diaries in the Public Archives of Canada, at Ottawa) shows their attachment to each other to have been at this time marked and affectionate. 236 THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 237 mischief for his idle pen to effect. While Howe was making a long-distance effort to persuade the British public and Parliament that responsible government was the only possible solution of the difficulties in the colonies compatible with their retention as component parts of the Empire, Haliburton in London was attempting to block the acceptance of such a belief by writing in bitter words that perpetuation, through actual enforcement, of the right of Imperial intervention in colonial affairs was the sole means of preventing the colonies from setting up an independent existence before the close of another decade.2 Haliburton had good reasons for assuming the offensive against the opinions of the colonial reformers. To him it was a case of then or never. As a matter of fact his advance was made too late. Before he had recrossed the Atlantic homewards the position of Howe and his associates stood completely vindicated by the publication of that Magna Charta of Canadian liberties, the monumental Report on the Affairs of British North America compiled by Her Majesty's High Commissioner and Governor-General of Canada, the Earl of Durham, whose convoy on his great mission of colonial reconstruction the passengers of the Tyrian had observed wholly unaware of its portent.3 It was distrust of the consequence of Lord Durham's appointment and fear of the effects of his recommendations that induced Haliburton to lay aside the party neutrality demanded by his profession and take on the role of a propagandist exponent on the losing side of a fight against principles the force and reasonableness of which he either could not or would not comprehend. To Howe, the appointment of the Earl of Durham to investigate the causes of the Canadian rebellion and to advise measures for the 2 Bubbles of Canada, 321. The references are to the first edition. 8 See above, 220. 238 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON future government of the colonies concerned must have been full of promise for the realization of his desires. Haliburton looked upon it as a dangerous concession to the deplorable spirit of radicalism, already too powerful. Durham was known as a radical aristocrat. That he was the " advocate of the ballot box and extended suffrage " 4 was sufficient to secure for him Haliburton's condemnation. Anything he might suggest was bound to be tinged with republicanism. Consequently his Report was convicted and sentenced before it appeared. It mattered not that Durham was an aristocratic reformer. To Haliburton his connection with the nobility meant only that whatever he might recommend for the government of Canada would but prove the proposals of " a radical dictator and a democratic despot." 5 Haliburton was not alone in his hostility to Durham. His Lordship was regarded as a dangerous man by all parties in England, including even his own.6 A member of Lord Grey's cabinet, and one of its committee to frame the Reform Bill of 1832, he had outstripped his colleagues in far-sighted support of further electoral reform and emancipation for Ireland. Excluded from the cabinet of Melbourne, Lord Grey's successor, because of his advanced views and his inability to work well in party harness, he had been boycotted by the Whigs generally. The Tories hated him as a matter of course. And the Radicals had not the confidence in one of the aristocracy to submit themselves to his leadership. As a means of getting a subordinate of superior gifts conveniently out of the way, Melbourne had sent him first to Russia on a special ambas4 Bubbles of Canada, 324. 5 Ibid., 325. 6 For the facts in this paragraph see S. J. Reid, Life and Letters of the First Earl of Durham, 2 vols.; especially II, 136ff. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 239 sadorial mission, and then to Canada. If he succeeded in his almost impossible task of reconciling the warring factions in British North America, reasoned the Whigs, that would redound to the credit of the party which had the good fortune to employ him; if he failed, there would be no longer need to fear his political influence. It was the extraordinary powers with which he was armed as Governor-General, and the suspension of the Canadian constitutions during the period of his investigations, that brought upon his undertaking and his policies before they were announced the opposition in the Commons of those ultra-Radicals there, Joseph Hume, J. A. Roebuck, and William Molesworth, who looked upon the French-Canadians as martyrs to British injustice. But it was in the House of Lords that Durham had his greatest enemy, in the person of Henry, Lord Brougham, once his professed friend, later the most eager to accomplish his downfall. Brougham, like Durham, but for party perfidy rather than conspicuous talents, had also been shelved by the Whigs, and he blamed Durham, without any justification, however, for his discomfiture. Hence it was that he pursued his victim with all the jealousy and hatred of a madman. Unfortunately, under the circumstances, Durham laid himself open to attack before he had fairly established his administration in Canada. Arrived in the country, he found the jails overflowing with hapless and misguided rebels, followers of ringleaders who had fled the country.7 To try them for treason before a jury of their FrenchCanadian peers meant only acquittal in the face of positive evidence of their guilt. Plainly some extra-legal procedure was needed, and Durham was not the man to check at putting it into execution. By a special ordinance he 7 As Haliburton predicted they would. See Clockmaker second series, 216, 224. 240 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON declared the renegade leaders of the rebellion guilty of high treason, and forbidden to return to the British dominions on pain of death. On their own confession of guilt those of the political prisoners in Canada who had taken the more prominent parts in the uprising were exiled to Bermuda for a period to be determined at Her Majesty's pleasure. To the others, Durham granted a general amnesty. The fatal mistake, of course, was naming Bermuda, over which the powers of the British North American Governor-General did not extend, as the place of detention for the political exiles. Durham knew the limitations of his jurisdiction as well as anybody, but he relied upon the government at home to pass an enabling bill that would confirm his action. Instead, the Cabinet, which, with the exception of Lord John Russell, had never given him more than half-hearted support, allowed itself to be intimidated by Brougham and the Radicals in the House into annulling the ordinance and passing a bill permitting the return of the exiles in full possession of their rights as citizens, and providing for their indemnification. Partly because of his over-sensitive pride, partly because his natural petulance was aggravated by a fatal illness, Durham, who heard of the Cabinet's treachery before the receipt of the official notification of disallowance, at once determined to resign his position and return to England. On the first of November, 1838, without waiting for his successor to arrive, he sailed from Quebec. But his interest in the destiny of the colonies over which he had been sent to preside was by no means at an end. Though he had been in Canada barely five months, he was confident that he had the proper solution of the Canadian problem to lay before Her Majesty's government. While his enemies secretly chuckled or publicly exulted over what appeared his permanent disgrace and THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 241 final failure, he gathered his secretaries about him and quietly and industriously, and with heroic disregard of the increasing seriousness of his malady, set himself to frame the document that was to reestablish his fame as a statesman forever, and lay down the fundamentals of colonial liberty that have given to British Imperialism whatever qualities of enduringness it still possesses. It was while Durham remained temporarily under the shadow of failure that Haliburton, as an authority on the colonies, was approached for some expression on the Canadian question calculated to forestall the apprehensively expected effects of the forthcoming Report. The result was his Bubbles of Canada, published anonymously as " by the author of 'The Clockmaker.'" Haliburton's new work was issued from the press of Richard Bentley at the very beginning of the year 1839.8 Concerning it James Grant, a London journalist, wrote in 1840: 9 "It was the violence of his [Hal'burton's] political prejudices that led him a year or two ago to practise one of the greatest literary deceptions on the public of this country, to be met in the annals of modern literature, rife as these are with such deceptions. I refer to his advertising 0 a new work, for many months before it appeared, under the title of 'Bubb!es from [sic] Canada,' the title creating an impression in the public mind, that it would resemble in the lightness and liveliness of its literature, the celebrated work called 'Bubbles from the Brummens' 1 by Sir Francis Head.12 The result of the extensive advertising, and of the general 8 The prefatory letter is dated December 24, 1838. 9 Grant's London Journal, quoted Acadian Recorder, Feb. 6, 1841. The article was republished in Grant's Portraits of Public Characters, I, 291-304. 10 The advertising, if there was any, was done, of course, by Bentley. 11 The actual title was Bubbles from the Brunnens of Nassau, by an old Man. 12 See above, 234, foot-note. 242 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON impression which had thus been made on the minds of the public, was that before the book was ready, a sufficient number of orders had been received in Paternoster Row, to carry off nearly the whole of the edition. I leave it to my readers to guess the surprise, disappointment, and indignation, which those who had thus purchased the work, without seeing it, felt, when instead of the light, amusing, and laughable book, which they expected it would be, they found it to consist entirely of a tedious, elaborate, and heavy political ultra-Tory treatise on the state of Canada;..." The culpability of Haliburton in connection with The Bubbles of Canada was, however, not of the nature which James Grant imputed to him. What are probably the facts in the case are given by Miss Georgina Haliburton.13 According to her account, "The Pamphlet entitled 'The Bubbles of Canada' the Judge never considered anything but a compilation, it was wanted by a party in reference to the Administration in Canada and to effect its purpose needed to be written at once in a fortnight's time. Judge Haliburton was applied to, to write it he at first refused as the research and time it would take he could not well spare from his own private business, the party urged, and said whatever documents he required could at once be placed at his command, he consented and the next morning eight hand carts of assorted Documents were brought to his lodgings in Piccadilly, he completed the work in the given time a little circle met to determine the title. Lady Davy the widow of Sir Humphrey Davy was consulted, she took an active interest in all literary works and her Ladyship hit upon the title of The Bubbles of Canada the Author did not quite approve of it as the title was foreign to the subject of the work but it was a popular title and caused the book to be widely read, it fulfilled its political purpose for which it was written." It must have been this work, then, of which C. R. Fairbanks entered in his journal for Sunday, November 11, 1838: 13 In her manuscript account of the Haliburton family. See above, 5. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 243 "Haliburton has made agreement with Bentley for a volume on Canada to be prepared immediately —is to receive a very handsome price for it- he will commence on his return from Gloucester whither he goes on Tuesday- " With wise prescience as to the fate of the undertaking Fairbanks added, " I doubt his success in it." These partly conjectural details regarding the genesis of The Bubbles of Canada, it must be admitted, accord but slightly with Haliburton's own statement 14 that the book was prepared expressly to enlighten the gentleman to whom its letter-chapters were addressed 16 on the course of events in Canada. But the whole tone and structure of the volume argue that it was undertaken for party purposes only and executed under pressure of limited time. For besides being a documentary history of legislative activities in Lower Canada, intended to show that the English and not the French were the aggrieved settlers there - a finding with which most students of Canadian affairs would not be likely to disagree-it was little more than a plea for a policy of force and repression in dealing with the French-Canadians, and an excuse for a series of vicious comments on all phases of British liberalism standing for any other course of action in the colonies, from the littleEnglander attitude of Lord Brougham to the enlightened views on empire-building held by Lord Durham. Moreover it consisted largely of a hastily thrown together col14 Bubbles of Canada, 5, 6, and the dedicatory letter. 15 James Haliburton, Esq., the noted Egyptologist, James Burton, who had but recently reassumed his family name. (Literary Gazette, Jan. 5, 1839, 3.) Haliburton had met him in London at a dinner to Sir Francis Head, and the two on comparing notes were convinced that there was a distant relationship between them, traceable through the supposed descent of the colonial representative of their common name from the maternal ancestry of Sir Walter Scott. (Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript.) 244 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON lection of colonial despatches, instructions to governors, reports of commissions, parliamentary resolutions, and lists of grievances, so generously quoted as to suggest that the entire contents of the "eight hand carts of assorted Documents " went into its making. The compilation is not without its value, of course, as a source book of one aspect of Canadian history, and one will look far before finding elsewhere much of the material it contains, but one cannot suppress the feeling that its faults of omission more than offset its virtues in documentation for the person in search of impartial evidence. Haliburton begins his treatment of the Canadian question by attempting to pick a quarrel with Lord Durham over an expression which he claimed the latter had used in his farewell proclamation, on the eve of his departure from Quebec. " He has thought proper," says Haliburton 16 " in that extraordinary document, to give the sanction of his high station to the popular error that the Canadas have been misgoverned " — when, in Haliburton's opinion, he should have said that their governments had been defective -" a proof, if any were wanting, that he knew as little of the affairs of the colony at his departure from thence, as he admits he did on his arrival there." Whatever version of the Governor-General's valedictory Haliburton had got hold of, it certainly was not that reprinted in the official account of Durham's life.17 In the proclamation as there reproduced the objectionable word does not occur, though there is mention of the "errors " and "deficiencies" of colonial government, which would seem to be as Haliburton would have had its faults expressed. But whether the word imputed to Durham was actually used or not, Haliburton does not escape the 16 Bubbles of Canada, 9, 10. 17 See Reid, Life and Letters of Lord Durham, II, 275ff THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 245 charge that in seeking to draw unnecessary distinctions he was contradicting the logic of his own subsequently developed proof. For his book is a continuous reiteration of the fact that the Canadas were sadly misgoverned countries from the point of view of both the French and the English. Nor is this the only instance, either, in which Haliburton may be found in an agreement with Durham which he was unwilling to admit.l8 Having for the time being disposed of Durham to his satisfaction, he turns his attention to Lord Brougham, and, with a better show of reasoning skill, convicts the Lord Chancellor19 of inconsistency in declaring for casting off from the colonies after having been at pains to point out their commercial value to the motherland,20 a value which Haliburton, with the commendable zeal for making known the resources of the colonies which he always had, goes out of his way to emphasize.21 But his main cause for complaint against Brougham is the same as that for protesting against Durham- misrepresentation of the efforts of colonial administrators. In particular he resented Brougham's dissemination of the misconception that the French-Canadians were "our oppressed and enslaved brethren in Canada." 22 "I am prepared to show," he says, "that every administration in this country [Great Britain], without exception, from the conquest of Canada to the present time, whether Tory or Whig, or mixed, or by whatever name they may be designated, have been actuated but by one feeling, an earnest desire to cultivate a good understanding with their new subjects of French extraction, and 18 See below, 304, 503, 557. 19 Brougham had been politically sidetracked to the Chancellorship in 1830. 20 Bubbles of Canada, 20ff. 21 Ibid., 18ff. 22 Ibid., 12. 246 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON on one principle, a principle of concession. Canada has had more privileges and indulgences granted to it than any other of our American colonies; unpopular officers have been removed; obnoxious governors have been recalled; constitutional points abandoned to them; all reasonable changes made (or, as they would express it, grievances reduced); and the interests of commerce and of persons of British origin postponed to suit their convenience, or their prejudices; in short, everything has been done, and everything conceded to conciliate them that ingenuity could devise or unbounded liberality grant, and no sacrifice has been considered too great to purchase their affections, short of yielding up the colony to their entire control; and for all this forbearance and liberality they have been met with ingratitude, abuse, and rebellion." 23 According to Haliburton's theory - and it is historically defensible — two fundamental errors had been made by the English in dealing with the French-Canadian situation: the passage of the Quebec Act in 1774, and of the Constitutional Act in 1791. By the first, the inhabitants of Quebec after having been conquered and given the opportunity of leaving as French or remaining as British subjects, and after having been governed for ten years under English laws, had had restored to them the French criminal code and their medieval system of land tenure, and were confirmed in the use of their own language for legal and legislative purposes, in the hope, justified of the event, that they would remain passive during the course of the American revolution. By the second, the conquered territory was divided into Upper and Lower Canada in order to separate the English- from the French-speaking settlers, an intention imperfectly carried out, however, a partial failure which did not affect its main result, that a foreign state was set up in the midst of the British dominions and encouraged in its aspirations for a distinct nationalism. Finding them23 Ibid., 13, 14. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 247 selves in the position of a favored people, the French made special demands of the British government which were at first readily complied with; but not satisfied with such generous treatment, they had met each new concession with a new demand or a fresh set of grievances, until gradually they had got power enough in their own hands to dictate terms to those theoretically their superiors. Finally, under the leadership of unscrupulous demagogues, they had seized upon the idea of asking for responsible government, as a pretext for securing practical racial tyranny and eventual independence. Failing to obtain this one last request, they had thrown off all disguise of their real intentions, and sought to free themselves from British rule by force of arms. The lesson as to the treatment needed in the sorely distracted colony, Haliburton stated, was obvious - anything but further concession. It was a proper Tory pronouncement, critically sound, constructively worthless. By Haliburton's own showing it was impossible that things could continue as they were in Canada; to return to former conditions was equally impossible. But what to do was not so easy to say as what not to do. In his helplessness it was perhaps natural that he should turn once more with hostile criticism upon the Earl of Durham. who had approached the Canadian question with confidence and returned with the assurance that he had found the answer. " It has proved a failure," he said of Durham's administration of the affairs of Canada, largely because of the Earl's unwillingness to take advice from the well-informed, and his desire to assume personally the entire direction of his mission, when he lacked the first qualifications for leadership. "Instead of being willing to bear the whole responsibility, as he announced, he shewed that he was unwilling or unable to bear any. As soon as Parliament felt itself called upon to pronounce the illegality of his measures, and stepped in to rescue him from the consequences of his precipitate conduct, he relinquished his government, not in 248 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON the usual and proper form by tendering his resignation, and waiting until his successor should be appointed, but by instantly leaving the colony." 24 And on this same point Haliburton adds later, "he who undertakes the benevolent office of calming the excited passions of others, should first learn to govern his own."25 To Durham's " ill-advised and ill-timed " 26 farewell proclamation, with its alleged reference to the House of Lords legislating "in ignorance and indifference 27 on matters of colonial interest he attributes the second outbreak of the rebellion in Canada, which took place late in 1838 shortly after the Governor-General's departure. "To shake the confidence of the colonists in the justice and integrity of that high tribunal to which they have to look as a last resource, was indeed unkind to them, unworthy of himself, and injurious to the honour of the house he assailed. He who advocates democratic institutions will soon find the effect of his theory influencing his own conduct and though he may commence in the assertion of principles, he is apt to end in the expression of feeling." 28 But the greatest evil of Durham's mission Haliburton considered was yet to be reaped, the harvest bound to spring from the suggestion of a federal union of the British American provinces, which it was known Durham had in mind when he undertook his task of pacification,29 and 24 Ibid., 317. 25 Ibid., 328. 26 Ibid., 318. 27 Ibid., 319. See Reid's Life and Letters of Durham, II, 285, where it appears that Durham spoke not of the House of Lords but of the Imperial Parliament in general. 28 Ibid., 319. 29 It mattered nothing that Durham had announced his abandonment of this proposal. " He might have spared himself the trouble of the announcement and the pain of a recantation. All those who THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 249 which he had broached to a deputation summoned to Quebec to discuss the political situation in the lower provinces. In complete disregard of the struggle at home, in one stage of which he himself had taken part on the popular side, Haliburton indignantly inquires: "What could be more injudicious than to send to the contented and happy colonies of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and ask for deputies, to listen to crude and undigested schemes for their future government, or to give their own visionary plans in exchange for his? What more cruel than to unsettle men's minds as to the form of their government, and make the stability of their institutions a matter of doubt? What more pernicious than to open a political bazaar at Quebec for the collection and exhibition of imaginary grievances? In the Lower Provinces we are contented and happy. We need no reforms but what we can effect ourselves; but we are alarmed at changes which we never asked, and do not require. The federative union proposed by his lordship has opened a wide field for speculation, directed men's minds to theoretical change, afforded a theme for restless young demagogues to agitate upon, and led us to believe that our constitution is in danger of being subverted. Most people think, and all reflecting men know, that it would ripen the colonies into premature independence in less than ten years; and who, I would ask, that is attached to the mother country, and desirous to live under a monarchical form of government, can contemplate a scheme pregnant with so much danger, without feelings of dismay? "30 As a sort of appendage to the plan for a colonial federation Haliburton seems to have believed, though with what warrant does not appear, that Lord Durham had suggested " another for colonial representation in Parliament," which is contemptuously thrown aside as an "absurd and imwere at the trouble of inquiring into the nature of his views were already convinced of his error." (Bubbles of Canada, 327.) And yet he must be attacked for opinions he no longer held, and which he had publicly declared premature! o0 Ibid., 320, 321. 250 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON practical scheme," with a satirical reference to the "provincial sycophants" dreaming of "the wool-sack and the ermine -the treasury and the peerage" brought within their grasp.31 Lord Durham, in short, was not the man to govern a colony. "When a noblemen advocates democratic institutions, we give him full credit for the benevolence of his intentions, but we doubt the sanity of his mind. Keep such men at home... send them not among us, where their rank dazzles, their patronage allures, and their principles seduce the ignorant and unwary."32 Others besides Durham came in for their share of the blame for the troubles in Canada. Upon Brougham, Hume, and Roebuck, with their declaration of revolutionary doctrines and publicly avowed sympathy for the cause of the Canadian agitators, Haliburton squarely placed the responsibility for the outbreak of rebellion, and he takes occasion to warn the people of England what they might expect if they much longer permitted the promulgation of popular political theory in their midst: "The history of this Canadian revolt is filled with instruction to the people of England. It teaches them the just value of the patriotism of those who are intemperate advocates of extreme opinions.... It exhibits in bold relief the disastrous effects of incessant agitation, and demonstrates that the natural result of continued concession to popular clamour is to gradually weaken the powers of government, until society resolves itself into its original elements." 33 For Brougham, and his parliamentary following of philosophical radicals, who had seduced the French-Canadians "from their allegiance by promises of support, and direct 31 Bubbles of Canada, 322, 323. 82 Ibid., 324. 88 Ibid., 308, 309. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 251 encouragement to revolt,"4 and excited them" by every stimulant that parliamentary declaration could apply," 36 Haliburton had the special message that the due punishment inflicted on the victims of their " mischievous counsels" carried a personal lesson for them: "They who advocate revolutionary doctrines must necessarily shudder at the untimely fate of those who have dared to act upon them. It was a warning not to be disregarded, a consummation that might be their own." 36 And out of his generous tribute "to the pious, amiable, and loyal Catholic clergy of Canada," to whose efforts in preserving their flocks from the "contamination" of political leaders he attributes the general failure of the rebellion, he draws, also for the benefit of the radical school, the moral, " that treason always calls in infidelity to its aid; and that there is a natural alliance between the assailants of the throne and the altar." 86 To the reader of Haliburton interested in tracing the development of his constitutional principles, The Bubbles of Canada is of decided importance since it contains his first published reaction to the theory of responsible government for the colonies, and his most carefully reasoned objection to his own former proposal of an elective legislative council. Concerning the latter he says wisely, with particular application to Quebec, where its attainment would have only placed an additional instrument of racial tyranny in the hands of the French majority: "The avowed object of the assembly in advocating this change, is to procure an identity of views in the two branches, which would be effected by their being elected by the same persons, or what is the same thing, by the same influences. Were this to take place, it would be a duplicate of the house registering its Acts, but exercising no beneficial legislation upon them. A difference of 34 Ibid., 8, 9. 8s Ibid., 310. 36 Ibid., 308. 252 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON opinion then, whenever it occurred, would not be between the two houses, but between them and the governor, and it is easy to conceive how untenable his position would soon become.... Instead of two co-existent but independent chambers, it [the legislature] would in fact be only one body occupying two halls." 37 Upon the plan of making a colonial governor's executive responsible to the majority of the people's elected representatives Haliburton was content to quote the opinions of the parliamentary commissioners of 1834 appointed to consider the requests of the French-Canadian reformers, who had asked that the Canadian constitution might be remodelled to permit of popular control of departmental heads: "...if the councillors were rendered accountable for the acts of government, and accountable not to the executive authority by which they are appointed, but immediately to the house of assembly, we think that a state of things would be produced incompatible with the connexion between a colony and the mother country. The council having to answer for the course of government, must in justice be allowed also to control it; the responsibility, therefore, of the governor to his Majesty must also cease, and the very functions of governor, instead of being discharged by the person expressly nominated for that high trust, would in reality be divided among such gentlemen as from time to time might be carried into the council by the pleasure of the assembly. The course of affairs would depend exclusively on the revolutions of party within the province. All union with the empire, through the head of the executive, would be at an end; the country in short would be virtually independent;.."38 In reply to these objections, Haliburton might have cited his own previously recorded answer, that since "Parliament is supreme in all external, and Colonial Assemblies in all internal legislation... the Colonies have a right 37 Ibid., 270, 271. 38 Ibid., 280. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 253 to be governed, within their own jurisdiction, by their own laws, made by their own internal will," 39 a right the confirmation of which the majority in the colonies was then demanding. But he was now so haunted by the fear of colonial independence, that he preferred instead merely to observe in support of the commissioners' decision, "that if the majority in the house, appointing the legislative council, and controlling the executive, is not a state of independence, as regards Great Britain, and of despotism as regards the province,40 it must at least be admitted that it confers all the advantages of such a condition but the name." 41 The Bubbles of Canada was received with approval or disapproval among the English periodicals according to the political affiliations of the journals that reviewed it. The Monthly Review42 dismissed it as "a mere party production... in point of literature below mediocrity." The Spectator43 termed it a " downright imposition " but paid it the negative compliment of an extended adverse criticism which began with: "Having written a clever, humorous, and sensible work on Nova Scotia...the author undertakes to do something on Canada, where, for aught that appears, he has never been, and of which he knows nothing beyond what records open to any one can teach. Armed with these and his reputation, he pounces upon Canada as an interesting subject; he steals a title page from Head; he concocts a dull party pamphlet in the shape of a volume; and, we conceive, imposes upon his publisher, for Mr. Bentley would never have been so inconsiderate as to print the book, had he been, at starting, fully aware of its nature and character...." 39 Hist. & Stat. Acct. N. S., II, 346. 40 Lower Canada, where the conditions of interracial hatred probably justified the remark. It did not of course apply to the other provinces demanding responsible government. 41 Bubbles of Canada, 281. 42 I, 300. 43 Jan. 19, 1839, 64. 254 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON and concluded by pronouncing it "the one-sided statement of an enraged partisan," without a particle of literary merit save for an occasional passage in "a clear, rapid, slashing style," and, in the first few pages of the introduction, "a neat and trenchant sarcasm." On the other hand a review in the New York Albion44 reprinted from an unacknowledged English source 45 presents an entirely different impression of Haliburton's ability to handle the French-Canadian question, and of his success in attempting it: "Mr. Haliburton is so well acquainted with the character of the people, that his book possesses a tone of authority which no preceding publication can claim in equal degree. He writes not merely a statement of historical facts, but he gives them a force derived from personal observation that greatly enhances their value. Then his narrative is conducted with so much perspicacity, and the main features are thrown out with so much skill, that it will be interesting and instructive even to those who are well acquainted with the particulars of which it is composed. The conclusions at which he has arrived coincides [sic] with the convictions of the great mass of the people of this country." In Nova Scotia the book excited no immediate comment. On January 31, 1839, the Earl of Durham's great Report was laid before Parliament. On February 11, it was ordered printed.46 Its analysis of what a pacification in French Canada involved gave startling proof of the seriousness of the situation there. "I expected to find a contest between a Government and a people; I found two nations warring in the bosom of a Single State," were Lord Durham's often quoted preliminary words, "and I perceived that it would be idle to attempt any amelioration of laws or institutions until we could first succeed in terminating 44 Feb. 23, 1839, 62, col. 1. 46 Reid, Life of Durham, II, 312. 45 Probably The Times. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 255 the deadly animosity that now separates the inhabitants of Lower Canada into the hostile divisions of French and English." 47 As the cause of this inter-racial hostility Durham pointed out, as Haliburton had done in the Bubbles of Canada, a sequence of ill-advised British parliamentary legislation designed to keep the French habitants a race apart. In Upper Canada the situation was less difficult. There the struggle was much as in Nova Scotia, a contest between two parties, but of the same race, aggravated in the former province, however, by a greater abuse of power upon the part of the Loyalist place-holders, and by the addition of a dispute over the Clergy Reserves.48 Besides the difficulties peculiar to Upper and Lower Canada individually, there was the further complication of a commercial quarrel between them, caused by the fact that the latter held control of the St. Lawrence river, the highway of trade to the former. Economic, religious, political, and racial factors were thus involved in the Canadian problem. In facing the perplexities of his task Durham remained true to his word given when he accepted his appointment: " He would not go to Canada to support a party, but to assert the supremacy, in the first place, of Her Majesty's Government and to vindicate everywhere the majesty of the law. He would not look upon any part of the Canadians as French, but merely as Her Majesty's subjects, and would defend the rights of all, whether French habitants in Quebec or British merchants in Montreal; "49 and again, 47 Ibid., II, 315, 316. 48 One-seventh of the public lands originally set apart for the support of the Anglican Church and held for the most part in a state of unimprovement to the constant hindrance of internal development. 49 Quoted from Durham's speech in the House of Lords by F. Bradshaw, Self-Government in Canada, 9. 256 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON "I go to restore the supremacy of the law, and, next, to be the humble instrument of conferring upon the British North American Provinces such a free and liberal Constitution as shall place them on the same scale of independence as the rest of the possessions of Great Britain, and as shall tend to their own immediate honour, welfare, and prosperity." 0 Durham was both a Liberal and an Imperialist, a democrat of the Cromwellian type. If his recommendations pleased the conventional-minded of neither of the older parties at home it was because they transcended at once the laissez-faire liberalism of the Whigs and the highest ideals of Tory imperialism. They provided for the protection of the people's rights, without imperilling in the least the interests of the Crown. They were intended to do justice to the French, and at the same time to secure to the English the whole of Canada. While they liberated the colonies from constitutional bondage, they linked them to the Empire with the strongest bonds of union. They were not the makeshifts demanded by the exigencies of the moment, but the foundations of an enduring structure of colonial government. The key-note of the whole Report is contained in the following passage: " It needs no change in the principles of government, no invention of a new constitutional theory, to supply the remedy which would, in my opinion, completely remove the existing political disorders. It needs but to follow out consistently the principles of the British constitution, and introduce into the Government of these great Colonies those wise provisions, by which alone the working of the representative system can in any country be rendered harmonious and efficient. We are not now to consider the policy of establishing representative government in the North American Colonies. That has been irrevocably done; and the experiment of depriving the people of their present constitutional power, is not to be thought of. To conduct their Government harmoniously, 50 Reid, Life of Durham, II, 154. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 257 in accordance with its established principles, is now the business of its rulers; and I know not how it is possible to secure that harmony in any other way, than by administering the Government on those principles which have been found perfectly efficacious in Great Britain. I would not impair a single prerogative of the Crown; on the contrary, I believe that the interests of the people of these Colonies require the protection of prerogatives, which have not hitherto been exercised. But the Crown must, on the other hand, submit to the necessary consequences of representative institutions; and if it has to carry on the Government in unison with a representative body, it must consent to carry it on by means of those in whom that representative body has confidence.... Every purpose of popular control might be combined with every advantage of vesting the immediate choice of advisers in the Crown, were the Colonial Governor to be instructed to secure the cooperation of the Assembly in his policy, by entrusting its administration to such men as could command a majority; and if he were given to understand that he need count on no aid from home in any difference with the Assembly, that should not directly involve the relations between the mother country and the Colony." 51 In reply to such views as those of the parliamentary commissioners cited by Haliburton in opposition to responsible government, which were typical of contemporary objections to the principle, and in absolute confirmation of Haliburton's own abandoned theory of the relations that should exist between mother country and colony,52 Durham said conclusively: "I know that it has been urged, that the principles which are productive of harmony and good government in the mother country, are by no means applicable to a colonial dependency. It is said that it is necessary that the administration of a colony should be carried on by persons nominated without any reference to the wishes of its people; that they have to carry into effect 51 Lord Durham's Report on British North America, edited by Sir C. P. Lucas, II, 277-280. 52 See above, 252, 253. 258 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON the policy, not of that people, but of the authorities at home; and that a colony which should name all its own administrative functionaries, would, in fact, cease to be dependent. I admit that the system which I propose would, in fact, place the internal government of the colony in the hands of the colonists themselves, and that we should thus leave to them the execution of the laws, of which we have long entrusted the making solely to them. Perfectly aware of the value of our colonial possessions, and strongly impressed with the necessity of maintaining our connexion with them, I know not in what respect it can be desirable that we should interfere with their internal legislation in matters which do not affect their relations with the mother country.... A perfect subordination, on the part of the Colony [in matters which the Imperial authorities should control] certainly is not strengthened, but greatly weakened, by a vexatious interference on the part of the Home Government, with the enactment of laws for regulating the internal concerns of the Colony, or in the selection of the persons entrusted with their execution. The colonists may not always know what laws are best for them, or which of their countrymen are the fittest for conducting their affairs; but, at least, they have a greater interest in coming to a right judgement on these points, and will take greater pains to do so than those whose welfare is very remotely and slightly affected by the good or bad legislation of these portions of the Empire. If the colonists make bad laws, and select improper persons to conduct their affairs, they will generally be the only, always the greatest, sufferers, and, like people of other countries, they must bear the ills which they bring on themselves, until they choose to apply the remedy." 63 Durham's recommendations, in addition to the insistence upon responsible government as the fundamental principle in colonial control, were six-fold: a legislative union of Upper and Lower Canada, designed to check the aspirations of the French for independence, and at the same time to safeguard their rights as British subjects; an extended system of state supervised and state subsidized colonization; independence of colonial judges in re58 Durham's Report, edited Lucas, II, 280-283. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 259 spect to tenure of office; an executive budget, the appropriations of which should be subject to the approval of vice-regal authority, exercised through the Governor's responsible advisers; the repeal of all previous legislation respecting the Clergy Reserves, and provision for their future disposal as part of the public domain under Imperial regulation; and the building of an inter-colonial railway, the usefulness of which in bringing the remotely separated ends of the colonies together, and in effecting a unity of commercial interests, was obvious. The proposed legislative union of the Canadas was determined upon only after the larger proposal of a federal union of all the British American colonies had been thoroughly canvassed, and abandoned as premature. It is proof of Durham's wisdom in statecraft, however, that he foresaw in acceptance of the former plan a necessary first step to the latter. In this comprehensive scheme of reconstruction only two errors appear, one of judgment, the other of purpose. Durham was mistaken in believing that the national identity of the French-Canadians could be fused with an English majority, or submerged by a flood of immigration; and in reserving the disposition of Crown lands to the British government he showed himself not altogether free of the popular fallacy of denying power to the colonies. Happily neither mistake had serious results. The impossibility of absorbing the French-Canadians through inter-mixture with other peoples was discovered in due season, and an opportunity to develop in accordance with their own racial ideals was guaranteed them at the formation of the Canadian confederation for which Durham had builded so well. Provincial management of colonial Crown lands was arranged for at the same time. The appearance of Lord Durham's Report was the signal for an outburst of vituperation from the Tory press and 260 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON party. It is hardly to be wondered that Haliburton who had worked himself into such a fury of indignation against the noble earl in The Bubbles of Canada should have joined in the factional chorus of abuse. It made no difference that Durham's main purpose was identical with his own - the retention of British North America in loyal and permanent union with the Empire. It mattered not in the least that Durham was the champion of his own favorite policy of " Ships, Colonies, and Commerce." Nor did it count at all in Durham's favor that the two agreed as to the successive acts of unwisdom in the English rule of Canada, as to the ignorance concerning Canada in the Colonial Office, as to the practical utility of opening colonial official careers to the colonists, and as to the necessity of making French Canada British if not English; or that both had the common desire to head off further movement in Canada towards the American form of democracy, and wished to raise up a British power in America capable of balancing that of the United States. It was sufficient that in the attainment of their single end they should have differed absolutely as to the means. Haliburton, much to his uneasiness, had found the England of the late thirties seething with radicalism, and here was a document bearing the signature of a peer of the realm calculated to augment the spread of dangerous doctrines to the colonies. To the colonial judge of the old school, Durham's Report was indeed the work of the "Lord High Seditioner,"64 and his recommendations nothing short of traitorous. One must do Haliburton the credit of believing that it was not merely the personally important fact that their adoption meant the final collapse of the decrepit system upon which he was dependent for office that aroused his 54 As certain sections of the press termed Durham. Reid, Life of Durham, II, 274. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 261 antagonism. Rather it was that he believed their adoption meant of a certainty the immediate, or at best the not long postponed, loss of the colonies, and a definite conclusion to the imperialistic dream of a British world-power. And in truth it must be granted that against Haliburton's position of distrust nothing could be cited from the history of empire expansion. The experiment in colonial responsible government which Durham proposed to try was without precedent in the control of colonies. The courage to propose it was born not of proof but of faith in the inherent willingness of man to respond to justice. It involved acceptance of the then seemingly absurd paradox that the looser the ties of government, the closer the bonds of sentiment that link colony to motherland. It was only a vision, shared alike by Durham and by Joseph Howe and the other Canadian reformers, but of which Haliburton was utterly incapable, that enabled men in those times to look forward with confidence to the possibilities of the apparently impossible. Of the splendor and reality of what they foresaw the Canadian crosses in Flanders fields are to-day mute witnesses. Altogether apart from its eloquent advocacy of responsible government the Report of Lord Durham was bound to arouse Haliburton's fiery protests. Its crediting the immediate cause of the Upper Canadian outbreak to the imprudence of Sir Francis Head, of whose incompetence Haliburton had made himself the special defender55 was alone enough to provoke angry recrimination. Its exposure of the unwarranted attempts of the Anglicans to hold the Clergy Reserves in exclusive possession was another point upon which Haliburton could hardly be expected to remain silent. And the demonstration of inefficiency in municipal administration throughout the British American 65 See above, 234, foot-note. 262 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON colonies generally, and of incompetence in the dispensation of justice in some, was still another. But the sovereign affront which Haliburton found in the Report was purely personal. It lay in the fact that his own incontrovertible testimony in the first Clockmaker had been cited by Durham in support of the hateful, and never to be seriously admitted, truth that in comparison with the phenomenal development of the United States progress in the colonies made but a sorry contrast. " For further corroboration [of 'the obvious superiority of the American settlements in every respect' to those on the British side of the line], I might refer indeed, to numerous and uncontradicted publications," had written Lord Durham; "and there is one proof of this sort so remarkable, that I am induced to notice it specially. A highly popular work, which is known to be from the pen of one of Your Majesty's chief functionaries in Nova Scotia, abounds in assertions and illustrations of the backward and stagnant condition of that Province, and the great superiority of neighbouring American settlements. Although the author, with a natural disinclination to question the excellence of government, attributes this mortifying circumstance entirely to the folly of the people, in neglecting their farms to occupy themselves with complaining of grievances and abuses, he leaves no doubt of the fact."56 This was the red rag to the bull in Haliburton. It must have been almost immediately upon reading it that his wrath boiled over once more in a series of passionate letters to the London Times,57 which were reprinted shortly 56 Durham's Report, edited Lucas, II, 214. The identification of Haliburton as the author referred to has been made in recent years only by Lucas (II, 214). That Haliburton was meant was accepted by his contemporaries without question, however, as indeed it must be still. See Acadian Recorder, May 25, 1839, letter signed "Also a Colonist." For Haliburton's parody of this section of the report see below, 298, 299. 47 Feb. 18-Feb. 26 (7 letters), 1839. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 263 afterwards in pamphlet form under the title A Reply to the Report of The Earl of Durham, " By a Colonist," with the head-note, "These Letters, written on the spur of the moment, first appeared in the Times Newspaper, and are now gathered into a Pamphlet to meet the wishes of many Persons who feel interested in the North American Colonies," and the highly appropriate motto: " — What great men do The less will prattle of." Like most products of ill-temper Haliburton's Reply was ineffective and futile. The judicious among his friends could only have grieved over its publication. 'It was marred by violence of tone and expression. It wilfully disregarded or distorted the meaning of the Report it professed to answer. And it stooped to contemptible meannesses in the tricks of argument it employed. But what makes it most deplorable, when viewed from the standpoint of the present, is that it was so largely an unnecessary and unfeeling attack made by a colonial upon one far gone in disease, who had risked life and reputation in an honest attempt to help the colonies. The pamphlet opens with a sneer at Durham's precipitate departure from Quebec as an "edifying example," affording "pleasing proof of how much you had at heart the object of your mission, and how great a sacrifice of personal vanity you were willing to make in the service of the public," 58 and the unfounded charge that on his return to England Dur58 Reply to... Durham, 4. Haliburton again taunts Durham on his retirement from his appointment to Canada by comparing him to Sir Francis Head: "... he [Head] did not desert his post in the moment of danger —having first increased the difficulties of his successor and then insinuated things to tarnish his character, -but met his enemies in the field, as became a brave man, and vanquished them." (Reply, 26.) 264 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ham had appealed against the injustice of the Colonial Governments towards the rebels, arguing "that when the Colonists exceed the limits assigned to them they should be supported, and when their acts are unlawful they should be rendered legal." 59 As in The Bubbles of Canada, Haliburton in his Reply quarrels with Durham's use of language, objecting in this case to the latter's use of such " temperate terms," as " discontented parties " for rebels, and " distrust" for the feeling of those Canadians who knew the rebels' ultimate object; and then, having set a punctilious standard for inspecting Durham's exact expression, proceeds forthwith to misinterpret him, and in spite of his open disavowal of any preconceived scheme of federal union in the British province, to insist that Durham's proposed legislative union of Upper and Lower Canada was really a federal government modelled after the American congress! Haliburton's misunderstanding of Durham upon this point is so complete as to force one to the conclusion that he either deliberately attempted to deceive the public, or that he replied to portions of the Report without having read them over. In derision of what he pretends to believe is Durham's plan of a federal government for the colonies, he sets forth again the sort of thing he had presented in the earlier Clockmaker 60 as evidence of the failure of federation in the United States: " Had your Lordship visited that country... you might possibly have heard of collisions between the General Government and the State Governments,- of disputes about sovereignty and jurisdiction, and of a term peculiar to America, of 'nullification': you might have heard of determined threats on one side, and fierce defiance on the other; of undefined rights, of constructive powers, and of unfortunate omissions. You would have learned that, though the people may petition the Congress, the 69 Ibid., 4, 5. 60 See above, 197. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 265 Congress may not deliberate; that there may be rights unaccompanied by powers; and that written constitutions may be more vague and more uncertain than unwritten ones; you would have seen a Legislative Union of separate States, where the Supreme Legislature possessed too little power to answer the purposes of national government, and where the individual States had parted with too much to retain any separate influence or individual authority. In short, you would have everywhere beheld the melancholy spectacle of a Government unable to enforce obedience to its own laws, or respect for those of its neighbours; to protect its own armouries against its own people, or to restrain its own population from piratical incursions into adjoining countries, with which it had entered into solemn treaties of peace.61... you would have found it [i.e., Congress] had little or nothing to do; that though the separate States had conceded all the authority that could be safely entrusted to it, it did not amount to enough for vigorous action; and although they had rendered themselves powerless, they had not made the Central Legislature strong by their several contributions; you would have learned among other things, that its chief duty was to deliberate upon all external matters; also to regulate the army and navy, the post-office, the coinage, the judiciary, the commerce with foreign nations, and the wild lands, not of several States, but the domains belonging to the United States; " 62 - none of which, Haliburton argued, existed in the colonies, altogether ignoring the fact that Durham had provided for most of them in his survey of colonial needs. "Their foreign trade they cannot regulate, so long as they are colonies, and ought not if they could,"63 Haliburton continues in his rejection of a plan that had never been proposed, forgetting, or quite unaware, that Durham had said practically the same thing, though somewhat less dogmatically.64 "Where then are the powers 61 The very sort of thing which Durham's influence with the government of the United States had effectually checked. Lucas, I, 258-260. e2 Reply, 14-17. 63 Ibid, 18. 64 Durham's Report, edited Lucas, II, 282. 266 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON of this legislature to be derived from? And what is it to do? Is it, like Congress, to be converted into a debating society, for wordy orators and vain-glorious patriots? Or a caucus for the election of the Governor-General? Or a hall of pensioners, where demagogues are to receive eight dollars a day as the reward of successful intrigue? " 65 In his over-heated resistance to the idea of a federal union Haliburton makes much of the difficulty of reaching any central meeting-place that might be selected as the capital, and, by resorting to the cheapest kind of dialectic, contemptuously disposes of Durham's projected inter-colonial railway as the means of overcoming the lack of transit facilities: "But I forget that your Lordship has solved the difficulty, and has promised us a railway from Quebec to Halifax; and we make no doubt, when the great preliminary, but equally feasible, work of a bridge across the Atlantic shall be completed, that the other will be commenced without delay. It was a magnificent idea, and will afford a suitable conveyance for the illustrious members of the great British American Congress. I will, my Lord, not ask you where the means for this gigantic undertaking are to come from, because that is a mere matter of detail, and beneath the notice of a statesman of your Lordship's exalted rank. They will doubtless be had for the asking. The Government is liberal, and the Radicals will vote the money."66 "It is difficult to reply to such a document as your Lordship's Report with becoming temper," observes Haliburton, immediately following this demonstration which renders his comment unnecessary; and by way of further substantiation of his remark goes on to say, " It [the Report] is so inaccurate in its statements of facts, so wild in its theories, so dangerous in its tendencies; it is so unsuitable to meet the public eye, so calculated to mislead the people of England, to irritate and alarm the Colonists, 66 Reply, 18, 19. 66 Ibid., 20, 21. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 267 and to mystify what is in itself plain and intelligible, that I will venture to affirm the records of Parliament contain nothing so unworthy, nothing no mischievous." 67 Every page of the Reply affords additional evidence that Haliburton indeed found his undertaking difficult to conduct "with becoming temper." Repeatedly throughout his pamphlet 68 he gives currency to the slander, set afoot by the malice of Brougham, to the effect that Durham's Report was not the work of Durham himself, a libel since definitely disproved.69 But not content with making charges and insinuations which he could not have verified if he would, he deliberately seeks to create wrong impressions about matters upon which he had first-hand information. Thus he denies Durham's description of Nova Scotia as a country of abandoned farms and decayed lands, and this in defiance of his own published accounts, and of the special report submitted to Durham setting forth the well-known economic crisis and the general backwardness of the province.70 He disputes Durham's state67 Ibid., 22. 68 Passages in Haliburton's Reply in which it is stated or implied that Durham was not responsible for the statements of his Report: 24, 26, 40, 41, 63, 64, 66, 70, 71, 72, 74, 76, 82, 83, footnote, 84. 69 By Reid, Life of Durham, II, 338-341. 70 Haliburton explained what he called the error of the Report in stating that "half the tenements" in Nova Scotia were abandoned by recounting how at first temporary houses were built by settlers there, which being abandoned for permanent dwellings built later had not been torn down when Lord Durham's commissioners passed through the country. (See his retort to Durham on this point below, 298.) He had no explanation, however, for the deplorable lack of industrial or agricultural development in the province, nor for "the lands everywhere falling into decay" there, that made either appear a much less genuinely economic evil than Durham had represented it. 268 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON ment that Nova Scotia was without proper municipal bodies for the control of local public business, and attempts by mentioning the county tax returns received at the Colonial Office to divert attention from Durham's real purpose, which was not to point out that Nova Scotia was absolutely without municipal machinery, but that the provincial Assembly was too much occupied with the petty affairs of townships and the counties. One can readily understand, however, why Haliburton wished to becloud Durham's revelation concerning the financial activities of the Nova Scotian legislature, for it constitutes the most damaging evidence possible of the paltry business which the lack of an executive budget forced upon the Assembly, and of the absurd limits to which as a result the scramble for trivial patronage extended. The single instance which Durham cited of this sort of public evil makes clear the reason for Haliburton's outraged pride in his native province: "According to a report presented to me by Major Head, an assistant commissioner of inquiry whom I sent to that Colony [Nova Scotia] ", wrote Durham, "a sum of 10,0001 was, during the last session, appropriated to local improvements; this sum was divided into 830 portions, and as many commissioners were appointed to expend it, giving, on an average, a commissioner for rather more than every 121, with a salary of 5s. a day, and a further remuneration of two and a half per cent. on the money expended, to be deducted out of each share." 71 The plan for a responsible executive, which Durham insisted upon as the prime necessity in the government of the colonies, is, of course, the object of an especially vehement and malevolently conducted assault. To the constitutional arguments quoted against it in The Bubbles of Canada, Haliburton adds nothing new, but his indig71 Durham's Report, edited Lucas, II, 93. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 269 nant resentment of Durham's concessions to democracy gives him in his Reply the confidence to express himself in his own vigorous language: "We have seen enough of rash innovation, of reckless change, and of dangerous experiments, of late years, not to tamely submit to follow the prescriptions of speculative men like your Lordship.... Your Lordship's schemes have been concocted according to the political creed of a certain democratic party in this country [England], whose favour it was necessary to conciliate, and although you have disregarded the feelings and the wishes of loyal Colonists, you have paid a reverential respect to those of the movement party in Great Britain. Of that party your Lordship may flatter yourself you are the leader, or, to use a more intelligent term, the precursor;... Your Lordship talks of a Government of the Colonies, responsible to the Colonies, and of a Governor ruling by heads of departments, amenable to the Legislature. However this theory may apply to Great Britain, it is sheer nonsense as regards a dependent state. Your Lordship has lost sight of a Colonial dependence. The power of a Governor is a delegated power, and if it be designed that it shall have a useful and independent action, it must be held responsible to the authority only that delegated it and not the parties governed. He is an officer of the metropolitan State; if the control over him be relinquished, or transferred to the Assembly, then the Assembly is no longer subordinate but supreme, and he ceases to be an officer of Great Britain, and becomes an officer of a foreign country. If a Governor is to be controlled by his Council and that Council amenable to the Assembly, then the Assembly controls the Governor, the character of its political relation is changed, and it is no longer a dependent but an independent state." 72 As to Durham's intentions of making the heads of departments responsible to the popular majority in the Assemblies, Haliburton adds later: "This, my Lord, may tickle the ears of the English Radicals, because it adopts the cant and phraseology of the sect, but such puerile twaddle can only excite the risibility of the Colonists." 73 72 Reply, 51-53. 73 Ibid., 55. 270 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON Having for the second time 74 attributed the cause of the first Canadian rebellion to the disloyal utterances of the British parliamentary radicals, Haliburton advances in his course of properly distributing responsibility by laying the occasion of the second to " a certain imprudent ill-judged, and inflammatory proclamation issued by a certain Governor-General, in which he accused the Government that employed him, of all that the rebels had accused it."75 The course of justice was obvious: " I think also that your Lordship will concur in opinion with me, that, if the statement I have just submitted to you be true, both those men who were 'the predisposing cause 76 of the first, and the man who was the 'predisposing cause' of the second rebellion, ought to be impeached, and that whatever a reformed Parliament may do, no doubt can exist that an unreformed Parliament, such as once existed in this country, would have lost no time in visiting those men with that punishment which such serious offences so justly merited."77 What is still more meanly and unreasonably condemnatory of Durham is the prediction that if a third insurrection should break out, he would find 'the predisposing cause' " in a certain Report, which certain persons unknown have recently compiled, and very properly published, and from its republican tone as properly addressed to the Queen, in which they, the said compilers... deceived your Lordship's unsuspecting confidence, misstated facts, and misrepresented motives.... 78 But of all the controversial smallnesses resorted to in Haliburton's Reply perhaps the most contemptible is his attempt to prove Durham igno74 See above, 248. 7s Reply, 80. 76 Durham's words. See Report, edited Lucas, II, 176. 77 Reply, 82. 78 Ibid., 82, 83. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 271 rant of the laws governing emigration to Canada, and purposely deceptive in stressing the unsanitary conditions prevailing on emigrant ships bound thither,79 when as a matter of fact the portions of the Report selected for censure were not by Durham at all, but were quoted from the evidence given by Dr. Poole, physician at the Grosse Isle immigrant station, Quebec, before the Commissioners of Inquiry on Crown Lands and Emigration.80 The dishonesty of Haliburton's stooping to such trickery in connection with this subject is the more apparent when it is recalled that his own and other contemporary works contain information regarding the shameful lack of decency and comfort on British emigrant vessels that make the voyage of a prospective settler to Canada in his time look little better than the mid-passage tortures of a slave-ship.81 In his summary rejection of Durham's settlement of the Clergy Reserves question Haliburton makes use of another device of forlorn hope in debate, the personal application of a general argument, and again impeaches the High Commissioner's knowledge of legal decisions concerning the subject of one of his special investigations: "Ignorant of the world, and holding the antiquated notions of Colonial simplicity, I should have thought it was your duty to have inquired into the right of the Church to this property.... But such opinions I find are long since exploded as too primitive for this enlightened age, when Reform has enlarged our ideas as well as extended our Suffrage.... It is the principle to which I object, that the property of any individual or any body of men should be forcibly taken from them, and distributed among others to appease their turbulent clamours.... In this country it has already been announced as an article of the political creed of a certain party, and will doubtless receive additional weight from the 79 Ibid., 83. 80 Durham's Report, edited Lucas II, 249 ff. 81 See Clockmaker, third series, 1, and The Old Judge, I, 197. 272 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON sanction of your Lordship's name. But, my Lord, in the eventful changes that are in progress, and which I fear a chastening Providence has in store for us, the division of the Lambton Estates 82 may awaken your Lordship when too late to a knowledge of this truth, that the principles of justice are uniform, universal, and immutable, and that which is right in Canada cannot by any possibility be wrong in England." 83 The concluding remarks of the Reply to Durham constitute a complete epitome of Haliburton's personal prejudices and party principles so far surpassing the rest of that unamiable production in simultaneous audacity to a nobleman and servility to aristocracy as to convince one that in command of unblushing " cheek " Sam Slick was own child to his father, and made wholly in the image of his creator: "The nobility of this country give stability to the Government, splendour to the Throne, dignity to the Legislature, and character to the People, and are at once its brightest ornament and its best support. When your Lordship shall have occupied the high station a few years longer to which you have been so recently elevated,84 and the pride of rank shall have departed with its novelty, and when the exercise of new duties shall have superseded former habits of agitation, I make no doubt that better, calmer, and juster notions will prevail in your Lordship's mind. The Crown and the People have an equal claim upon the protection of the Peers against any encroachments on their rights, and they best consult their own safety in a vigilant restraint of both within their legitimate sphere. An undue preponderance given to the one endangers the liberty of the subject; an opposite inclination of power perils the safety of the Sovereign; but vibration affects the harmonious action of each and disturbing the balance of the constitution produces a cessation of its powers. This crisis, my Lord, is called a revolution. The Report of La Fayette on his return from the States, subverted monarchy in 82 The family property of the Durhams. 83 Reply, 85-88. 84 Durham had been made an earl in 1833. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 273 France; the Report of your Lordship, equally laudatory of that Republic and its institutions, is no less dangerous from its democratic tendencies to the Monarchy of England. Let us hope, that as your Lordship is as much superior to that man in principle as you are fortunately inferior to him in talent, there may be no resemblance in the result, and that the crude and undigested theories of a few visionary men will not be substituted for the experience of ages." 85 Whatever slight excuse may be discovered for Haliburton's indiscretion in the fact that he was not alone in bitter denunciation of Lord Durham's Report, it can hardly be urged in justification of the extreme vindictiveness which according to contemporary opinion earned him the unenviable reputation of having handled it more severely than any one else.86 Some additional empty satisfaction to that arising from this poor distinction Haliburton may have derived from the knowledge that his efforts to check the spread of colonial democracy were not wholly unseconded. But the appearance of having accomplished anything more substantial than arousing a limited amount of popular approval was purely deceptive. In Upper Canada both Houses of the Tory Legislature appointed a Select Committee to consider the insidious Report, and each submitted and secured the passage of a set of fiery resolutions opposing its acceptance. Others of the influential and official class in that colony were reported to have designated it as "a most imprudent, unpatriotic, erroneous, and inflammatory document."87 And according to the opinion of one observer of its effects there it had become the " very manual of treason," reviving the 85 Reply, 88, 91. 86 New York Albion, May 18, 1839, 159, col. 3. 87 Introduction to Durham's Report, edited anonymously, published by Dutton, 1902, xvi., quoting Dr. Walter Henry's Trifles from My Portfolio, 1839, by a Staff Surgeon, II, 214, 215. 274 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON drooping courage of the exiled Canadian traitors, and inducing their sympathetic American friends to engrave "the name of Lord Durham on the blades of their bowie knives in demonstration of their idea of the certain result of 'Responsible Government."' 88 In Nova Scotia the newly constituted Legislative Council also adopted resolutions condemning Durham's findings and suggestions. 89 But it was among English Tories that Haliburton found the heartiest corroboration of the spirit and purpose of his Reply, if the furious criticism of Durham's Report which it inspired in The Quarterly Review90 reflected at all accurately their general sentiments. In the estimation of that ardent promoter of the rule of force, it was a "mass of presumptuous and mischievous nonsense " which made up the Report, and the scheme which it proposed " must be utterly rejected." It was, moreover, "a farrago of false statements and false principles" and "the most fatal legacy that could have been bequeathed to our American colonies." The Quarterly's final passionate outburst was worthy of Haliburton himself in the midst of his most excited fears: " if that rank and infectious Report does not receive the high, marked, and energetic discountenance and indignation of the Imperial Crown and Parliament, British America is lost." With this ultra-Tory pronouncement, the echo of his own judgment, Haliburton was, of course, in perfect agreement. By the force of his violent reaction to the promise of colonial liberties he had placed himself fairly in the ranks of those political extremists whose influence he had so strongly deprecated but a short while previously.9' How completely he had grown out of sympathy with, and understanding of, the prevailing spirit of his time, especially in the colonies, 88 Ibid., xvii. 90 LXIII, 521, 522. 89 Howe, Speeches and Letters, I, 217. 91 See above, 226. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 275 can best be shown by a glance at the reception accorded Lord Durham's Report outside the circles of despairing Tories. In England, where there was usually a large degree of indifference to the fate of dependencies, in spite of the venom of its critics, it awakened generally high enthusiasm. In the colonies, as Charles Buller wrote,92 it became "the textbook of every advocate of colonial freedom," and far from its being the source of treason and rebellion there that Haliburton and the Quarterly Review assured their readers it would, it was the occasion of a loyal and spontaneous devotion to the Empire. Even in disaffected Canada it became the rallying point of a submissive people eager for the adoption of its principles.93 In Nova Scotia, no less than in the other colonies, it was greeted by the majority as the definite assurance of the long sought for new era of reform. The House of Assembly, then dominated by Joseph Howe and his followers, the real representatives of popular feeling, passed resolutions concerning it precisely opposite in character to those adopted in the Legislative Council. The Novascotian recommended its study " as the best exposition that has yet been given of the causes of the dissensions in the Canadas, and containing the best suggestion for the avoidance of kindred troubles in all the Provinces," and warmly approved of its remedies for securing harmony between people and executive as being " perfectly simple and eminently British." 94 Nowhere, indeed, was Haliburton more hopelessly opposed to the characteristic desires and 92 After Lord Durham's death, 1840. See Durham's Report, edited Lucas, III, 374, 375. Buller was Durham's chief secretary in Canada and during the preparation of the Report. 93 With the exception, always, of that which looked towards the gradual absorption of the French- by the English-speaking settlers. 94 Howe, Speeches and Letters, I, 217. 276 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON determination of the day than in his own province. If he thought by the invective of his Reply to delay for a single moment the coming of responsible government to Nova Scotia he was doomed to grievous disappointment. Even more disheartening than mere failure was his positive achievement. He had succeeded very largely in destroying his power to influence, one might almost say to interest, his fellow-colonials, - except as a target for their opprobrium. And it was by his own countrymen that he was forced to pay the humiliating penalty of his exaggerated partisanship. Copies of The Timres containing his assault upon the Earl of Durham had barely preceded Haliburton homeward, whither he journeyed in the spring of 1839, after having allowed himself the novelty of an ocean steamship voyage on the Great Western to New York,95 when a furious counter-assault was launched against him through the columns of The Acadian Recorder 96 by an anonymous writer signing himself "Also a Colonist." Every weapon of argument and abuse which Haliburton had employed in his Reply was now turned upon him with far more skill and fury than had ever been his to command. "Feel the pangs which, with demoniac pleasure you strove to inflict; writhe under the scourge which hate and envy and partisan views induced you to flourish," his self-appointed castigator warned him of what to expect, as the process of chastisement began. Every fact of his public record as a politician, judge, and humorist, that could possibly contribute to the completeness of his discomfiture was used to lash him into contempt. The impossibility of his sustaining the triple role without loss of dignity and honor was pointed out. Much was made of the effrontery of his 95 Georgina Haliburton, Manuscript.?' May 18, ISKE, and ff. nos. THE BUBBLES OF CANADA AND REPLY TO DURHAM 277 attempt to bring Lord Durham into disrepute, of the unfairness and meanness of his methods, and of the inadequacy and weakness of his case against the theory of colonial self-government. " The Report of the Earl of Durham, will stand a monument of imperishable honour to his memory," he was assured, "when you and your bubbles shall have passed into long oblivion." The service of his books to the Tory cause was brought under incriminating review. He was reproached with endeavoring to block constitutional progress in order to continue the system upon which he depended for appointment and salary. Even his literary shortcomings were dragged forth in cynical disdain,. and he was ridiculed with having ventured "gladiator-like " into the arena of controversy when intoxicated with an unexpected fame of authorship. He was charged with political inconsistency, and with having sold himself to a party. It was a most damaging accusation, but it was pressed openly and without pity: " The time was, Sir, when you gave indication of being possessed of an independent and honest mind; but you became recreant to your own principles, sold yourself to a party, and now basely employ your prostituted pen, to effect the destruction of opinions, which you then possessed. It is in the recollection of us all, that at the time you possessed a seat in the popular branch of the Legislature, you led -or at all events went with the 'discontented party' in this province. None then so clamorously as you, twanged the oratorical bow; none so truly pointed the barbed arrow of ridicule, at the then Council and other constitutional absurdities of the provincial government. You became a Judicial functionary, and... no sooner felt yourself independent of the means of your elevation, than you became anxious to convince the public mind by every means in your power, that you had been a mere political hypocrite. You kneel at the idol of conservatism, and affect the devotee at its sanguinary shrine. You sacrifice upon its unholy altar the principles you once professedly cherished, the rights you once advocated, and the gratitude you still feel to be due to your country in order to propitiate an impure God." 278 THOMAS CHANDLER HALIBURTON A month's installments of this sort of thing culminated with: " I denounce you as as enemy to your country and the Empire I proclaim you a traitor to the most sacred rights of your native Province, a renegade to British freedom I And I consign you, Thos. C. Haliburton, to the scorn, the contempt and the detestation of your betrayed and libelled countrymen." While the evidence was being produced upon which this terrific indictment was based, another series of letters, undertaken also to excoriate Haliburton for his political activities abroad, was commenced and ran side by side with "Also a Colonist's" in The Acadian Recorder.97 Though cruder in workmanship and more trifling in tone, they were not less serious in intent or defamatory in effect. The particular means of vilification in which their anonymous author, "Peter Pindar," took most frequent and shameless delight was the distribution of malicious gossip and disagreeable small-talk concerning Haliburton's personal affairs and prospects. Certainly for excessive indulgence in contemptible personalities Haliburton could have been no worse than his detractors. But he had given too much cause for their anger to reasonably complain of his treatment. The long period of immunity from rebuke which he had enjoyed in saying what he pleased about his fellow Nova Scotians was definitely at an end, and he was now compelled to settle for it at a high price, with no discount for good intentions. "Peter Pindar" was the first of his critics to exact payment in revenge for the Clockm;aker's derogatory observations regarding provincial people and customs.98 97 May 25, 1839, and ff. nos. 98 " Also a Colonist" noticed too that Haliburton "