To return to my narrative, Mr. Cartier arranged an interview for me
with the Governor-General, Sir Edmund Head, and I presented my letters
from Mr. Baring, and was assured of all the help he could give me.
"Your demands are very clear, and appear to me equally just. First you
ask the Government of Canada to aid you in passing a Bill through
Parliament, which clearly is for the benefit of Canada, because it
proposes to increase the efficiency of the railway service by a further
outlay of capital, and also to pay off debt, a considerable part of
which is incurred in Canada; and secondly, you ask for an immediate and
just settlement of the charge for the conveyance by you of the mails."
The Governor-General then sent for Mr. John A.
Macdonald, who came immediately, and the conversation which had taken
place was repeated.
This was the first time I had seen either Cartier, Sir Edmund Head, or
Macdonald.
Sir Edmund Head was a tall stately man, with thoughtful brow, and
complexion a little purpled by cardiac derangement. As the don of a
college he would have been great, and in his sphere: as the Governor of
a Province with a self-asserting people, I doubt if he had found the
true groove.
His despatches were scholastic essays. His simplest replies were grave
and learned, sometimes too complex for ordinary comprehension. When he,
subsequently, became Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, he tried to
manage a profit-and-loss undertaking as if he were governing a
province: just as when he governed a province he administered all
things as if he were dealing with Russia in Europe. He was, however, a
man of the kindest heart, and the strictest honor. But, after all, he
was one of the round men put into the square holes of Provincial
Government by the "authorities" at home. Still, on the whole, a noble
character, and in very truth a gentleman. His chronic ailment led to
some irritability of temper; and when, during the visit of the Prince
of Wales, one of the Governor's aides-de-camp was pushed over from the
steamer at Detroit by the press of the crowd, and fell into the water,
Colonel Irving said: - "Ah! there was no danger whatever to - - 's life.
The Governor-General has blown him up so much that he could never
sink." I was present at a farewell dinner to Sir Edmund Head at Mr.
Cartier's, at Quebec, in the winter of 1861-2. In response to the toast
of his health, he alluded to his infirmity of temper, admitted his
suffering - before concealed from outside people - and expressed his
apologies in a manner so feeling and so gentle that the tears came into
everybody's eyes. I heard more than one sob from men whose rough
exterior disguised the real tenderness of their hearts.
Mr. John A. Macdonald entered the Governor-General's presence with a
manly deference.
