- (J. M. L.)
[80] The first idea of utilising the ruins of the Chateau St. Louis, burnt
in 1834, is due to His Excellency the Earl of Durham, Governor-General and
High Commissioner in Canada from the 29th May to the 1st November, 1838.
George Lambton, Earl of Durham, died in England in 1840. He was one of our
ablest administrators, and with all his faults, one of the most
ungenerously treated public men of the day by the Metropolitan statesmen.
[81] "Le Chien d'Or - the History of an Old House," - MAPLE LEAVES, 1873, p.
89. [82] "His constant attendance when he went abroad," says Mere
Juchereau.
[83] The Old Regime in Canada, p. 177-9.
[84] John George Lambton, Earl of Durham, was born at Lambton Castle, in
April, 1792, and died at the Isle of Wight, on the 28th July, 1840,
broken-hearted at the apparent failure of his Canadian mission.
"Lord Durham," says Justin McCarthy, "was a man of remarkable character.
It is a matter of surprise how little his name is thought of by the
present generation, seeing what a strenuous figure he seemed in the eyes
of his contemporaries, and how striking a part he played in the politics
of a time which has even still some living representatives. He belonged to
one of the oldest families in England. The Lambtons had lived on their
estate in the north in uninterrupted succession since the Conquest.
