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The Other Side

OF

The "Story, "
BERING SOME REVIEWS CRITICIZING "THE STORY OF THE
UPPER CANADIAN REBELLION;"

ALSO,

THE LETTERS

IN THE

Mackenzie -Rolph Controversy

AND

A CRITIQUE ON "THE NEW STORY."

By JOHN KING, Barrister.

TORONTO :
James Murray & Co., 26 and 28 Front Street West.

THE
OTHER SIDE OF THE "STORY,"
BEING SOME REVIEWS OF MR. J. C. DENT'S FIRST VOLUME
OF
"Tie Story of tie Upper CaMian ReMlion,"
AND
THE LETTERS
IN TUB
MECKEEZIE-ROLPH CONTROVERSY.
ALSO,
A CRITIQUE, HITHERTO UNPUBLISHED, ON
"THE NEW STORY."
» i » *P
" I have read somewhere or other, in Dionysius of Halicarnagsus, I think, that history
is philosophy teaching by examples." — Henry St. John, Viscount BolingbroJce.
'' William Lyon Mackenzie was the leader of the real struggle for Responsible Govern
ment in Canada. He conducted the political siege, and headed the storming party that
effected the breach. Mackenzie personified the mm and virtues, personal and political,
that fought the fight and won it." — New York Tribune.
^ That Mr. Dent is bent on exalting Dr. Rolph at the expense of other characters, and
notably at the expense of Lyon Mackenzie, . . . nobody can fail to remark. He has a
right to the indulgence of his fancy : these are the days of hero worship, rehabilitations
and historical paradox ; but he cannot expect us all at once to bow down to the image
which he has set up, and to trample on the image which he has cast down." — The Week.
" Truly, no man is ever so effectually written down as when he himself holds the pen."
—J. C. Dent.

TORONTO:
James Murray & Co., Printers, 26 and 28 Front Street West.
1886.

INTRODUCTORY.

Pew words of introduction are needed for this brochure, and none to
justify its appearance at the present time. The prospectus of the
"Story of the Upper Canadian .Rebellion" promised the public that it
would be written "from a Liberal but non-partisan point of view."
Had this promise been kept, these pages would never have seen the
light. But the faith plighted in the word has been broken in the
deed. It has been broken repeatedly — may we not say deliberately? —
throughout the volume.
Mr. Dent's Story is not Liberal in any proper sense of the term. A
Liberal in political or historical authorship is not only a friend to liberty,
but to liberty's friends, whether living or dead. To all alike he is, or
at least ought to be, fair and considerate, just and generous. To those
who have battled and suffered for popular rights in freedom's cause,
he should never be anything else.
Nor is the Story non-partisan. It is a fierce, and in many respects,
vindictive arraignment of the Oligarchy of ante -Rebellion times. Not
a few may say that this is right. Others — and we think many of the
most intelligent adherents of the Liberal party in Canada — while
admitting considerable justification, will not go the lengths that Mr.
Dent has gone, and will have little sympathy with his injudicious and
intemperate methods. Only the strongest provocation can justify
venomous detraction of the dead. The writer of the narrative has
received none such in the case of Chief Justice Robinson, Bishop
Strachan, William Lyon Mackenzie, and others whom he has relent
lessly pursued beyond the grave. Authorship of that stamp is not
Liberal ; it is no honour to the name ; it is the narrowest kind of in
tolerance and bigotry.
In regard to William Lyon Mackenzie and John Rolph, the partisan
ship of the Story is beyond all question. A single paragraph in the
chapter on the "Fathers of Reform" proves this conclusively, while
the whole volume is a standing witness against its pretended imparti
ality. In so far as both these historical personages are concerned, this
bulky book is partisan from the circumference to the core.

The appearance of so extraordinary a Story at once challenged criti
cism from the press. In this the leading organs of the rival parties
took opposite sides. But considering the manifest disfavour with which
life-long and pronounced Reformers received this new conception of
Rebellion history, the Mail's editorial review was mildness itself. Other
Conservative newspapers have been more distinctly hostile. The Globe
committed itself strongly at the outset to the general scope of the
narrative, especially those portions of it denunciatory of Family Com
pact rule. It praised the book, and defended it against the Mail's
review. But, if there be any truth in a startling rumor afloat as to
the paternity of its own reviews, their laudatory tone can occasion no
surprise. With respect to the Mackenzie-Rolph analyses, criticisms
and contrasts, it was for a long time silent. But when the storm of
controversy fairly broke, it had honestly to admit that such a con
troversy was "inevitable." Mr. Dent's indiscretions had too plainly
precipitated the issue to make any other statement possible.
The outside organs of Reformers have concurred with their leading
journal on this point, but not in its estimate of the book as a whole.
As to this there have been differences of opinion, with, in a number of
cases, strong disapproval of Mr. Dent's historical treatment of his two
most prominent " personalities." Up to the present time not a single
newspaper, expressing the views of the Reform party, has endorsed the
author's judgments on either Mackenzie or Rolph. The voice of what
is known as the independent and non-party press must always com
mand attention in such a discussion. It spoke in temperate tones, but
unmistakably condemned the book. The attempt to manufacture
political capital out of this " old, old story " will scarcely succeed. The
great rival parties of Canada will be more likely to stand or fall on their
present relative merits, than on the sins or follies of either of them
fifty years ago.
What more need be said ? The attitude deliberately taken up by
the author with respect to William Lyon Mackenzie, made it the im
perative duty of that worthy's friends and admirers to interpose, at the
earliest possible moment, between him and his defamer, and, if neces
sary, to vindicate his name and memory. They would have been false
to their political faith and antecedents, and to all the honoured traditions
of Reform, had they failed to do so. In the publication of this
pamphlet, which will express to a certain extent the feelings and senti
ments of Reformers everywhere, that duty has been partially discharged.
It can scarcely fail to be supplemented hereafter, and in due time, it is
expected, will be fully completed in an enlarged and improved edition

of the life and times of the old Liberal leader. Meanwhile, the
accompanying letters and newspaper reviews will be found exceedingly
readable, interesting and instructive. They contain important facts
which have never before appeared in print, and are, as a whole,
pointedly and pungently written. The last critique is now published
for the first time. " The Other Side of the Story " reflects, I believe,
the views of men of all shades of political opinion, and should
be acceptable to all alike. All that is asked for it is a fair and thought
ful perusal.
JOHN KING.
Berlin, March 15th, 1886.

?£

MR. DENTS STORY

or THE

UPPER CANADIAN REBELLION.

A STORYTELLER IN HISTORIC GARB.

The following ably written, calm and dispassionate review of Mr.
Dent's book appeared in the Toronto Daily Mail of November 19th,
1885: An impression has got abroad that Mr. Dent's " Story of the
Upper Canadian Rebellion " is to be a whitewashing book. The
conclusion has been hastily formed, and so far as we can see at
present, without sufficient foundation. The fantastic idea of
elevating Dr. Rolph on a pedestal of glory is, it must be confessed,
a sinister omen. Mr. Dent has undertaken the herculean task of
making a hero out of the most unpromising material, the most un-
heroic of men ; but that he intends to go to the extent of washing
the blackamore white is an assumption unwarranted by anything
that appears in the first volume. The proper place for the chief
director of an insurrection is at the head of his forces, and there
Dr. Rolph ought to have been at the rising of Yonge Street in Dec
ember, 1837. Instead of being in the van of the movement of which
he was a principal director, he suddenly appeared clothed in the
livery of the Government which the insurrection was intended to
overthrow, accompanied by as loyal a man as ever drew breath,
Robert Baldwin, and flying a flag of truce. The strange spectacle
of this inexplicable transformation struck his bewildered followers
with horror and dismay. They concluded that'they were betrayed,
and many still hold that the act was one of treachery. Assuredly
it was unheroic.

The development of the central idea of the book — that Dr.
Rolph was a hero whom the world has hitherto ungratefully
neglected — is set about without circumlocution, and in a way
which shows that the author intends to do his best in the per
formance of his task. Under Mr. Dent's manipulation Dr.
Rolph, who read his Braithwaite and compounded his pills like
any ordinary physician, becomes " unquestionably one of the
most extraordinary persons who ever figured in the annals of
Upper Canada." To this extent critical readers, with a living
knowledge of the facts, would probably be willing to go. But
the directions in which an individual may differ from the ordinary
run of mortals are various, not necessarily admirable. " Like
Bacon," Mr. Dent says of his hero, "he seems to have taken all
knowledge to be his province." The reader is asked to accept this
preposterous eulogy on the strength of a couple of speeches, which
have a strong odour of the midnight oil about them, and which
were probably indebted to many touches made after the speeches
had been delivered, and which gave them their final form.
In elevating his hero Mr. Dent has thought it necessary to
depress contemporaries and colleagues not less than Family Com
pact Tories. Chief Justice Robinson, Henry John Boulton.
Christopher Hagerman, Chief Justice Powell, and even William
Lyon Mackenzie, are all minimized for the greater glory of one
man. The following specimen of the style of contrast in which
Mr. Dent indulges may be regarded as the keynote of the book : —
" No two human beings could well be more unlike than
William Lyon Mackenzie and John Rolph. They were compelled
to work together in a common cause for many years, but the two
entities were thoroughly antagonistic, and there was never much
personal liking between them. The structure of their bodies was
not more dissimilar than was that of their minds. The one,
slight, wiry, and always in motion, seemed as though it might
be blown hither and thither by any strong current. The other,
solid almost to portliness, was suggestive of fixity, of self-depend
ence, and unsusceptibility to outside influences. The one was
suggestive of being in a great measure the creature of circum
stances ; the other of being a law unto himself — one who would

9
be more likely to influence circumstances than to be influenced
by them."
This contrast is kept up throughout the volume. It is, no
doubt, a high crime and misdemeanour for one man to be
inferior in stature and portliness to another, and a very trans
cendent merit in him who outweighs any other man with whom
he may be favourably contrasted.
A somewhat minute examination of the manner in which Mr.
Dent does his work may not, perhaps, be amiss. Let us " taste"
the book at the first chapter. The theme is the " Banished Bri
ton," and it professes to be an account of the persecution which
Robert Gourlay suffered at the hands of the Family Compact.
Let us premise that, for the treatment of Mr. Gourlay, we have
not one word to offer by way of palliation. He was arbitrarily
ordered to leave the province, under cover of the Alien Act, the
charge being that he had endeavoured to alienate the minds of
the King's subjects from their attachment to his person and Gov
ernment, and to raise a rebellion. On one point the evidence
against him, if technically true, was substantially false. No one,
who had been in the province more than six months, could be
legally tried under the Alien Act. One of the witnesses swore
that Gourlay had not been in the province long enough to exempt
him from trial under this Act. One of the magistrates before
whom Gourlay was tried, Dickson, Mr. Dent says, " had been in
constant and familiar intercourse with him for sixteen months."
The inference intended to be drawn is that Gourlay, at the time
of the trial, December 21, 1818, had been continuously in the
country for a period of sixteen months. It is certain that, on the
17th September, 1818, three months and four days before the
trial, Gourlay was in New York, where he had arrived on the
13th. But the fact, if it enabled the witness to quiet his con
science, would not affect the question of domicile in ordinary
cases. Still, it is at least possible that, in this state of the facts,
Isaac Swayze did not feel the guilt of perjury on his soul j a man
under the influence of party passion may well have believed that
the prisoner, who had been in New York three months before, had
not, within the meaning of the statute, been a resident of the

10
province for the last six months preceding the date of the infor
mation. Of the Alien Act Mr. Dent says, "This statute, be it observed,
was not passed at Westminster during the supremacy of the
Plantagenets or the Tudors, but at York, Upper Canada, during
the 44th year of Geo. I CI." Was this statute, as Mr. Dent
would have us believe, so anti-British in spirit as to have been
unheard of even in the times of the Plantagenets and the Tudors 1
We need not go back to these remote times for examples. So late
as 1816, the Solicitor-General of England stated in the House of
Commons, that the Crown possessed the power of sending aliens
out of the country by an act of prerogative, without the sanction
of the statute law. And the Alien Act, passed during the admin
istration of Pitt, threw the burden of proof on the accused — a
departure from a general rule of law which, as one of Mr. Gour-
lay's counsel, Mr. McAdam, told him afterwards, had become not
uncommon. At the time of Gourlay's trial it was a standing order
of the House of Lords that no naturalization bill should be read a
second time, unless a certificate of the person to be naturalized
was signed by the Secretary of State. The Alien Acts of Upper
and Lower Canada, concerning as they did matters of Imperial
interest and Imperial policy, were no doubt passed in pursuance
of orders sent out from Downing-street. Both were directed
against offending British subjects as well as aliens. All British
subjects who had resided in France for the space of six months
subsequent to the 10th June, 1789, were brought under purview
of the Lower Canada Act. The Alien Act of the United States
conferred on the President authority to deport by his mere fiat,
and without any form of trial, aliens suspected of designs against
the Republic ; and, at one time, there were no less than seventy
thousand persons who were liable to be sent out of the country in
this arbitrary way. Compared with the powers vested in the
President of the United States, the Alien Act of Upper Canada
under which Gourlay was tried, was, in the procedure which it
sanctioned, mild and merciful. But it suits the purpose of Mr.
Dent to describe the Alien Act of Upper Canada as a measure of

11
unknown severity, as one which would not have been passed at
Westminster during the supremacy of the Plantagenets or the
Tudors. Nor is Mr. Dent's account of the causes and consequences of
Gourlay's trial a whit nearer the mark. He says : " To what,
then, was his long and bitter persecution to be attributed 1 , Why
had he been deprived of his liberty ; thrust into a dark and unwhol-
some dungeon ; refused the benefit of the Habeas Corpus Act [he
was in fact brought up under a writ of Habeas ' Corpus] ; denied
his enlargement upon bail or mainprize ; branded as a malefactor
of the most dangerous kind ; badgered and tortured to the ruin of
his health and his reason 1 Merely this : he had imbibed, in ad
vance, the spirit of Mr. Arthur Clenman, and had 'wanted to
know.' He had displayed a persistent determination to let in the
light of day upon the iniquities and rascalities of public officials.
He had denounced the system of patronage and favoritism in the
disposal of the Crown lands. He had inveighed against some of
the human bloodsuckers of that day, in language which certainly
was not gracious or parliamentary, but which as certainly was
most forcible and true. He had ventured to speak in contumelious
terms of the reverend rector of York himself, whom he had stig
matized as 'a lying little fool of a renegade Presbyterian.' Nay, he
had advised the sending of commissioners to England to entreat
Imperial attention to colonial grievances. He had been the one
man in Upper Canada possessed of sufficient courage to do and to
dare ; to lift the thin and flimsy veil which only half concealed the
corruption whereby a score of greedy vampires were rapidly en-
riching^themselves at the public cost. He had dared to hold up to
general inspection the baneful effects of an irresponsible Executive,
and of a dominating clique whose one hope lay in preserving the
existing order of things undisturbed. It was for this that the
inquisition had wreaked its vengeance upon him ; for this that the
vials of Executive wrath had been poured upon his head ; for this
that his body had been subjugated and his nerves lacerated by more
than seven months' close imprisonment ; for this that he had been
" ruined in fortune and overwhelmed in mind.' "
Mr. Dent had the means of knowing, and we fear it must be said

12
that he could not help knowing, the untruthfulness of the state
ment which he endorses, that Gourlay, through his imprison
ment, " had been ruined in fortune and overwhelmed in mind."
Gourlay was bankrupt when he left England. No less than $20,-
000 would have been necessary to put his affairs on a secure foun
dation. He tried to borrow in various directions without success,
and came to Canada mainly with that object. If his affairs were
wound up, he admitted, before he reached Canada at all, that none
of his creditors would get much (letter to Mrs. Gourlay, April 17,
1817). The charge that he was overwhelmed in his mind by poli
tical persecution will not stand the test of investigation. The
nervous weakness which overcame him on his trial before Judge
Powell in August, 1819, which took place in consequence of his
not having obeyed the order of the magistrates to leave the coun
try, did not then show itself for the first time. In a letter to the
Hon. Thomas Clark, dated Niagara Falls, September 1, 1817, he
says : — " A nervous weakness, which got hold of me at Liverpool
[in the previous April], but which my voyage and travels so far
dissipated, has increased with my confinement till I find myself
totally unable to speak with you on the state of my affairs — the
prime object of my crossing the Atlantic." The " confinement "
here mentioned probably had reference to a change in his mode of
life which deprived him of his accustomed exercise. Seven months'
imprisonment, which he afterwards underwent, would not be likely
to make a mental wreck of a person who was previously in a sound
mental condition. About half that time Gourlay was kept in close
confinement. " While yet I had free range of the prison," he says
(Statistical Account, vol. II., page 401), " it was my custom to sit
from seven till ten at night in the doorway, noting the course of
nature and inhaling the very air of heaven, balmy and sweet, and
invigorating." In January, 1819, he reported himself as being "in
comfortable winter quarters," and on the 27th April he wrote : —
" My confinement is not severe upon me, now that I have the
whole range of a large house." But still, even then, a giddiness in
the head marked the continuance of the nervous symptoms which
first showed themselves at Liverpool, and which were his early
companions in Canada. On the 26th July he complains of close
confinement and unreasonable surveillance.

13
Mr. Gourlay " wanted to know, you know," and, when he found
out, he intended to let the public know by publishing " a statistical
account of- Upper Canada." And he, at one time, cherished the
fond hope that the "lying little fool of a renegade Presbyterian,"
as he politely styled Dr. Strachan, and the hated Family Compact
would hand over a heap of shekels to aid him in the enterprise.
But Governor Gore's Administration turned a deaf ear to his loving
appeals. Nothing daunted by the rebuff, Gourlay made up his
mind to return to the charge when a new governor had come to
Upper Canada. Writing to Mrs. Gourlay from New York, Sep
tember 17th, 1818, he said, " My plan is to return to Canada and
solicit his (Sir Perigrine Maitland's) patronage to my statistical
enquiries, which the old (Gore's) administration would not counten
ance.'' To Mr. John Rankin this statement was repeated in an
other letter of the same date. A writer who asks a grant of public
money, to enable him to publish a statistical work, must be pre
sumed to imply that, in such work, he will at leastfebstain from
gross abuse of his patrons. But Maitland's Administration proved
as obdurate as that of Gore had been ; and when Mr. Gourlay
failed to get the grant for which he had twice sent up a beseeching
cry to the Council Chamber, he must have felt the refusal as con
ferring on him a grateful license of freedom, not quite equal per
haps to the hard cash, but still a species of compensation which,
if not complete, might be enjoyed to the full. The result was that
statistics occupied but a small part of the three volumes, and abuse
of the Family Compact a very large part. From this pure source
Mr. Dent has drawn great store of seraphic inspiration.
Another conspicuous merit of Mr. Gourlay was that "he had
denounced the system of patronage and favouritism in the disposal
of Crown lands." This he did with great good will ; but he did
something more. After he was utterly ruined and was in desper
ate circumstances, he magnanimously offered to begin to take over
to himself Crown lands by the round million of acres at a time.
Of course, his object must have been to save the lands from the
clutches of " the bloodsuckers of the day." • He wished to follow
the example of Col. Talbot, to whom an immense grant of lands had

14
been made. He was willing to be another Penn, to trade in philan
thropy and work his worthy way to wealth. The naivete of his
letters to Lord Bathurst is quite refreshing. " I could afford to
pay the Government," he blandly suggested, "one dollar per acre,
say for one million acres to begin with, by three instalments, at
the end of five, six, and seven years, and so on for an indefinite
term, receiving more and more land from the Government, to settle
as the process went on and payments were made good." He wrote
to Lady Torrance, trying to get her aid in forwarding his scheme.
In these letters he represented that the public lands, managed after
his fashion, would yield enough to support two regiments ; though,
several years after, over half a million of acres, brought to sale
for taxes, fetched only thirteen cents an acre. If Gourlay had got
his way he would have reformed the land-granting system with a
vengeance. He inveighed against the " bloodsuckers," but he
showed that he had the capacity to suck more blood than all the
Family Compfct taken together, if he had got the opportunity.
Mr. Dent has failed to point out to public reprobation the " score
of greedy vampires who enriched themselves at the public cost,"
and, if called upon to make good the sweeping charge, he would be
obliged to confess a failure.
It is not necessary to stop to apportion the degree of merit due
to a critic who covered himself with glory by stigmatizing the
Rector of York as " a lying little fool of a renegade Presbyterian."
" It was for this," Mr. Dent tells us in his summing up, " that the
inquisition had wreaked its vengeance upon him," with much more
ornate denunciation to the same effect. It is, perhaps, unfortunate
that Gourlay gives a totally different reason for his prosecution.
"What do you think," he said, writing to Mrs. Gourlay after his
conviction before the magistrates, "pushed Dickson and these
people on to such lengths, but a paragraph in the London Courier,
stating that I was concerned with Hunt at Spa Fields." And in
another place (General Introduction, cc, xvi.) he says : — " It was,
no doubt, the Courier's false report which worked up the frenzy of
the poor madman at York ; and such was the silliness of many
other people they also gave credit to it. To outstare the audacious
falsehood, I published in the Niagara Spectator the fact that I had

15
been at Spa Field meeting." On the previous page Gourlay reports
the following colloquy which took place at his trial before the
magistrates : " Do you know Mr. Cobbett V " Yes." " Do you
know Mr. Hunt 1" "Yes." " Were you at Spa Fields meetings ?"
"Yes." * * * "Were you lately in the United States?" "Yes."
The two authorities, Mr. Dent and Mr. Gourlay, differ as to the
cause of Gourlay's arrest ; and, as Mr. Dent is the more elaborate, he
must of course be right ; and Mr. Gourlay must be wrong. But
for this it might have been supposed that the victim, who was a
man who "wanted to know, you know," would have been success
ful in his enquiries, when he himself was the subject of them.
Sample chapter No. 1, jewel of the volume, is padded and ex
tended and elongated, with fiction, hyperbole and exaggeration,
with commination for the most part as unmerited as it is merciless,
with snatches of biography and catches of rhyme : by padding,
extending and elongating in every conceivable and inconceivable
way, the chapter is swelled out to twice ten times Falstaffian pro
portions. The sample chapter opens in the orthodox style of
writers of romance : "In the afternoon of a warm and sultry day,
towards the close of one of the warmest and most sultry summers
Upper Canada had ever known, an extraordinary trial took place
at the Court House in the old town of Niagara." This promise of
a " thrilling" report of a great trial is followed by the regulation
mise en scene,grea,t array of accessories and supernumeraries. Full
twenty bits of biography are edged in, and coaxed to swallow up
page after page. At page fourteen light seems to dawn; the reader
gets the important information that " the twelve jurymen sat in
their places to the left of the judge." This is promising ; now at
least we may expect the trial to proceed. But no ; we get instead
bits of biography and more biography. The reader plods his devi
ous way to page thirty, when he begins to wonder whether the
long promised account of the trial is ever to come. At page thirty-
one the prisoner is at last produced ; but still the action is pro-
vokingly slow. Instead of an account of the trial, now comes a
curious bit of scientific information which is nothimg less than
that a man may be made tipsy by supping a plate of soup, eating
a bit of beefsteak, or even by taking a draught of fresh air in a

16
crowded court-room ! At page thirty-four the prisoner is asked if
he is ready for his trial. But before Mr. Dent can allow the trial
to proceed, he gives a mortal page of reverie. Of the prisoner he
says : " The dead and gone years rose up before him like the scene
of a rapidly-shifting panorama." And, when the reverie is over,
the judge is about to pass sentence. Finally, the chapter closes at
page forty-five, without any rational or intelligible account of the
trial which the opening sentence had invited us to witness. A
remark is put into the mouth of the judge, which, as objection to
its appropriateness cannot be made, Mr. Dent stigmatizes in words
boi-rowed from George Eliot, as " a deep truth uttered by lips
that have no right to it." When so much time is spent in all sorts
of by-play, and elaborate reveries are made to pass through the
alembic of the imagination, it need not excite surprise that some
of the essential facts of the " story " are neglected. Mr. Dent
deals in surmises as to who set the secret springs of this prosecu
tion in motion. But there was no need for surmise ; the whole
truth has been publicly stated on the highest authority, and with a
frankness which leaves nothing to conjecture. But, in constructing
elaborate reveries, Mr. Dent missed the essential fact.

The next critique on the book is taken from that high-class, ably-
conducted paper, Tlie Week. In reference to this article it should be
explained that Mr. Dent, the author of the Story, had rushed into
print with a short letter over his own name in the Globe of October
23rd, 1885, imputing the authorship of a previous review in the Week
to Mr. Charles Lindsey. Although this review was very fair and
temperate in every way, he virtually denied to Mr. Lindsey, as the
author of "The Life and Times of William Lyon Mackenzie," the
right to criticize " The Story of the Upper Canadian Rebellion," and
was not above threatening the hypothetical reviewer with direful con
sequences. This second article in the Week is understood to be from
the pen of a well-known and distinguished contributor to that news
paper, and appeared on the 19th November, 1885. As an expression
of opinion, from a most authoritative and perfectly independent source,
it is a valuable addition to the controversy : —

17
"THE WEEK'S" OPINION.
We have now been able to read and digest Mr Dent's History
of the Rebellion ; and we must confess ourselves at a loss to
understand why he should be so much incensed at the criticisms
of our contributor, " Thorpe Mable," and threaten, if " Thorpe
Mable" does it again, to turn literary decorum out of doors and
break his head. "Thorpe Mable" gave Mr. Dent credit for in
dustry, for bringing new and interesting matter to light, for
popular qualities as a writer. If he declined to give him credit
for having said the last word of impartial history, he only with
held that which no intelligent and dispassionate reader will
accord. Mr. Dent may have taken the right side ; but he dis
tinctly takes a side, and his tone throughout accords with his
feelings. The key-note is struck in the account of the " slow
crucifixion" of Gourlay, with which the narrative opens, and is
prolonged crescendo to the end. Moreover, Mr. Dent fails to see
this group of events as it stands in its historic surroundings, and
to judge the acts and actors with a fair and comprehensive refer
ence to the circumstances of the period. The old Colonial Con
stitution was well exchanged, when the fulness of time came, for
one of a more liberal kind ; but it was itself liberal for its day,
especially when we consider that one moiety of the double colony
was a conquest. It was practically not much less liberal than that
which, before the reform of Parliament, was enjoyed by the
Imperial country. Nor does it seem to have been ill-administered,
so far as the governors were concerned : it may reasonably be
doubted whether, for the young community, a government of party
politicians would have been really better than theirs. An admin
istrative oligarchy, nicknamed the Family Compact, had grown
up, kept to itself the spoils of office, and, it seems, abused its
power over the Crown Lands. That there was corruption on a
colossal scale we find it rather difficult to believe. The " man
sions" of the principal members of the Compact are still to be seen,
and are of very modest dimensions, while nothing is more certain
than that their owners did not leave vast fortunes. The great

18
political reaction, caused by the French Revolution, and the
Napoleonic wars, was succeeded by a tidal wave of liberalism
which extended from the Imperial country, where it swept away
the Rotten Borough Parliament, to the colony, and for the
government of the Crown and its councillors, substituted that of
the Colonial Parliament. The past seldom slides smoothly into
the future. There was a struggle between the administrators of
the old system and the aspirants of the new, in the course of which
many violent things were said and some violent things were done :
though it is absurd to talk of the wrecking of a printing-press as
if it had been a massacre, nor less absurd to accuse a man of " a
cruel and dastardly murder" because, in the days of duelling he
killed his adversary in a duel. At last there was a sputter of
civil war (for that, rather than rebellion, is its proper name),
caused, be it observed, not by any act of tyranny on the part of
the Governor or the official oligarchy, but by the defeat of
the Reformers in a popular election, owing mainly to the publica
tion of an indiscreet letter from Mr. Hume. The page of history
being ever chequered, all this might well have been told with
philosophic calmness. Of the State Church we are well rid ; but
the institution existed in those days everywhere except in the
United States, and the Scotch Presbyterians, who were active in
pulling it down here, upheld it in their own country ; nay they
would have upheld it here if the Anglicans would have gone
shares with them in the endowment. That Mr. Dent is bent on
exalting Dr. Rolph at the expense of other characters, and notably
at the expense of Lyon Mackenzie, whose " mannikin" figure is
constantly used to set off the physical, moral and intellectual
majesty of the great man, nobody can fail to remark. Mr. Dent
has a right to the indulgence of his fancy : these are the
days of hero-worship, rehabilitations and historical paradox ; but
he cannot expect us all at once to bow down to the image which
he has set up, and to trample on the image which he has cast
down. He will tell us more about Dr. Rolph in his second
volume ; but so far the hero rather wears the aspect of a timid
and wary politician, who inspires councils at which he refuses to
be present, and is willing that his friends should face the risk of

19
enterprises which he declines to share. Mr. Dent's book is lively
and readable ; no doubt it will have many readers. But it leaves
room for a more impartial treatment of the subject. We do not
know that " Thorpe Mable" has said more ; and if he has only
said this, his head ought not to be in peril.

MACKENZIE AND ROLPH.

A REFORMERS VIEWS ON MR. DENTS HISTORY OF THE REBELLION.

THE FLAG OF TRUCE EPISODE.

Evidence in support of Samuel Lount's Testimony on the Point.

WHAT ROBERT BALDWIN THOUGHT OF HOLPH.

AN INTERESTING CHAPTER OF CANADIAN HISTORY BROUGHT
UNDER REVIEW.

The following lengthy and somewhat pungent communication ap
peared in the Toronto Daily Mail of 26th December, 1885. It deals
with quite a number of new points not touched upon in any previous
criticism, in regard to both Mackenzie and Rolph. The latter is again,
as he used to be very often, arraigned at the bar of public opinion as a
perfidious friend, and the evidence indicated upon which his guilt was
established. The writer is evidently an old Reformer who expresses
the views of- those most competent to form an opinion on the whole
subject treated of in Mr. Dent's story : — .
To the Editor of the Mail :
Sir, — I write you as one of the " Mackenzie Radicals," sneered
at by the author of this "Story," many of whom have lived to see
the day when all the great reforms fought for by their leader have
triumphed, to protest against the manner in which that " Father

20
of Reform " is treated by a writer who pretends to be a Liberal.
The Globe, overlooking the gross injustice which the " Story of the
Rebellion " has done William Lyon Mackenzie, and its fulsome
eulogies on John Rolph, has thought proper to champion the book
as on the whole favorable to the spread of Reform ideas at
this time. As a Reformer I can quite understand this motive in
a leading party paper, and its unwillingness to say or do anything
that will injure the object which it apparently has in view. All
the same, it is asking a little too much of Reformers to read and
re-read a book that is most repellant to their notions of justice and
fair play to one of the greatest Liberal leaders in Canada, and one
who certainly was largely instrumental in gaining the victories
which Mr. Dent and his too indulgent critics glorify. The pur
chasers of this expensive subscription "story" are not all unrea
soning partisans, and it would be far more Liberal, and in accord
with Liberal opinion everywhere, if, while extolling the merits of
the work, the Globe would at the same time notice its flagrant
defects. These latter are rapidly coming to the surface in the
press. The policy of silence is a mistaken policy. Misrepresenta
tion and falsehood may prevail for a time, but truth must win in
the end. Mackenzie has hosts of friends and admirers who will
not suffer his name and memory to be besmirched by an author,
under the specious guise of friendship for the cause in which the
man whom he defames spent his life, and in which he sacrificed
everything that most men count dear. Reformers especially will
always feel that the people of Canada owe a deep debt of, gratitude
to Mackenzie, and that he is well worthy of a most honorable place
in any history of the struggle for responsible government.
It is, however, somewhat significant that while applauding Mr.
Dent's views on Family Compactism, and the subject matter of
the book generally, neither the Globe nor any other newspaper has
endorsed the author's scurvily mean treatment of the old Reform
leader. The Globe perhaps feels — and in this it is quite right —
that Mackenzie, unlike Rolph, stands in no need of "whitewashing."
It may well think, without saying so, that he is too well established
in the popular heart, and his work and services too well remem
bered and appreciated, to be injured at this late day by a writer

21
who has undertaken to turn history topsy-turvy on this point,
and to construct a hero out of a man who never, as long as he
lived, cleared himself from the charge of traitoi'ism to Mackenzie
and his friends at the most critical moment in the struggle. That
charge has been too well proven ever to be doubted, and notwith
standing any service Rolph rendered the Liberal cause, it damaged
him irretrievably in popular estimation. Now that a barefaced
attempt is being made to canonize him, it is just as well that that
little episode in his career should not be forgotten.
THE FLAG OF TRUCE.
Rolph, it is well known, was one of the chief instigators of the
revolt. He was the Head or the Executive, as it was called, and
its principal adviser, but very cunningly showed his hand as little
as possible, and took as few of the risks as he could. He first
broke faith with his compatriots by changing the day for the rising,
and a few days afterwards, when the insurgent force appeared
before the city, he had not the courage, like Mackenzie, to head
the movement. More than that, although deep in the plans of the
" rebels," he was so steeped in duplicity that he accompanied
Robert Baldwin, and two other loyal men, to the rebel camp as the
bearers of a flag of truce. He was asked to accept this mission,
and there is no doubt he did so in order to remove well founded
suspicions against himself, and thereby escape arrest. He well
knew he was playing a double part the whole time. His appear
ance as a Government emissary struck consternation into the
hearts of the insurgents. They might well believe, as they did,
that their cause must be desperate when they saw one of their own
trusted leaders in the service of the Government against which
they were arrayed.
The evidence taken before the Commission on Treason in Dec
ember, 1837, supplies overwhelming proof of Rolph's treachery to
his friends, and his betrayal both of them and of Baldwin Poor
Samuel Lount, who was with Mackenzie on Yonge Street at the
time, and who was shortly afterwards executed, made a sworn
statement before the commissioner. Lount said : — "When the
flag of truce came up Dr. Rolph addressed himself to me ; there

22
were two other persons with it besides Dr. Rolph and Mr. Baldwin.
Dr. Rolph said he brought a message from his Excellency the
Lieutenant-Governor to prevent the effusion of blood, or to that
effect. At the same time he gave me a wink to walk on one side,
when he requested me not to heed the message, but to go on with
our proceedings. What he meant was not to attend to the mes
sage. Mackenzie observed to me that it was a verbal message,
and that it had better be submitted in writing. I took the reply
to the Lieutenant-Governor's message to be merely a put-off. I
heard all that was said by Dr. Rolph to Mr. Mackenzie, which is
above related." carmichael's story.
When the bearers of the flag of truce appeared the first time —
because, as will be seen, they came a second time — they asked
the insurgent's what they wanted. Believing this message to be a
stratagem to gain time, Mackenzie answered that they wanted
" independence and a convention to arrange details," that any
message from the Governor must be in writing, and that it must
be forthcoming in an hour. The bearers of the flag of truce then
returned to the city. In about an hour's time they came back
again to the rebel camp with the Governor's reply, which was un
favorable. Rolph was with them on both occasions. A man
named Hugh Carmichael carried the flag of truce, and, in 1852,
Rolph got Carmichael to make this statement: — "During the
going out and staying on the ground, and returning to the city, as
above stated (all of which was promptly done), Dr. Rolph, Mr.
Baldwin and myself, being all on horseback, kept in close phalanx,
not a yard apart. Neither of the persons mentioned could have got
off his horse, nor could he have winked to Mr. Lount and walked
aside and communicated with him, nor have said anything irrele
vant to the flag of truce, or against its good faith, as is untruly
alleged, without my knowledge." This statement was prepared in
Quebec, dated there and sent to Toronto for signature. It was
generally believed to have been Rolph's production, and no doubv
it was. Frequenters of the old Parliament House may remember
Carmichael, who was appointed a messenger, doorkeeper, or some
thing of that sort, when Rolph was afterwards a member of the

23
Canadian Government. Carmichael's statement just quoted — it
seems he made several different statements of the affair — is defec
tive in one very important point ; it does not go the length of say
ing that, after the flag of truce was at an end by the delivery of the
Governor's reply, Rolph did not do and say what Lount says he
did, viz., tell Lount to march his men into the city. It matters
little when Rolph said this. The question is, Did he say it at all 1
Mr. Baldwin's evidence shows clearly that Rolph had ample oppor
tunities to act as he did, and is decidedly contradictory of Car
michael's statement that while " returning to the city " they all
three kept together. BALDWIN'S EVIDENCE.
Mr. Baldwin swore before the Commission that, " On the return
of the doctor and myself, the second time, with the Lieutenant-
Governor's reply that he would not give anything in writing, we
found the insurgents at the first toll-gate, and turned aside to the
west of Yonge street, where we delivered this answer ; after which
Dr. Rolph requested me to wait for him. I did wait some time,
during which he was out of my sight and hearing. I was then
directed to ride westerly. This occupied the time while I was
riding at a common walk from Yonge street to the College avenue,
probably three-eighths of a mile. The direction to ride westerly,
a^ I then supposed, was for the purpose of the flag being carried
to the city by way of the College avenue. Shortly after reaching
the avenue, however, I was joined by Dr. Rolph, and we returned
together by way of Yonge street. I have no reason to know
what communication took place between Dr. Rolph and the in
surgents when he was out of my sight and hearing."
This evidence appears at page 406 of the Legislative Assembly
Journals for 1837-8. A man named William Alves, who was
with Mackenzie and Lount at the time, stated that when the
bearers of the flag of truce returned with the message, Rolph
advised the insurgents to go into the city. Another insurgent,
P. C. H. Brotherton, swore to the same thing on the 12th Decem
ber, 1837, before Vice-Chancellor Jameson, saying that Rolph
had told him on the 8th that " Mackenzie had acted unaccount
ably in not coming into the town, and that he expected him in

24
half an hour after he returned with the flag." Mackenzie and
Lount say Rolph's order was given on the first occasion ; their
two friends, Alves and Brotherton, that it was on the second
occasion, and Mr. Baldwin says enough to show that Rolph could
easily have done what was charged against him. There are
four against two (Rolph and Carmichael) who say positively that
it was done, and the statements of the two were not sworn state
ments. No person of intelligence who has enquired into this
matter has ever doubted Rolph's treachery. Old friends of Bald
win know very well what he thought of Rolph's conduct. He
always believed and said that Rolph had betrayed him as. a per
sonal friend, and after his betrayer fled the country he never again
had a friendly communication with him. And yet this is the man
whom Mr. Dent exalts as a hero, and glorifies in his book at the
expense of William Lyon Mackenzie, whom his hero basely sold !
ROLPH'S CHARACTER AND DISPOSITION.
Mr. Dent's description of Rolph is a grandiloquent and ridi
culous panegyric. "John Rolph," he says, "was unquestionably
one of the most extraordinary personalities who have ever figured
in the annals of Upper Canada." That is quite true. A man
who, at a vital moment, was a traitor to both his political and
personal friends was " unquestionably an extraordinary" sort of
man. But besides this he had "a comprehensive, subtle intel
lect." " Like Bacon he seems to have taken all knowledge to be
his province." There is a good deal more of the same fulsome
flattery. Then he had also "a noble and handsome countenance,-'
" a voice of silvery sweetness," " a dignity and even majesty in his
presence that gave the world assurance of a strong man," "a well
rounded chin, a firmly set nose, and a somewhat large and flexible
mouth, capable of imparting to the countenance great variety of
expression," while " his smile had a winsome sweetness about it."
Mr. Dent certainly makes the most of John Rolph's heroic fea
tures. But then, we are told, "there was unquestionably a per
contra.'' " There was probably no human being who ever pos
sessed John Rolph's entire confidence"; "the quality of caution
seems to have been preter-naturally developed within his breast" •

25
he was not "open to the imputation of wearing his heart upon his
sleeve"; " never abandoned himself to frolicsomeness or fun"; his
indulgence in "hearty laughter" was " a very rare occurrence";
" he could successfully simulate the most contradictory feelings
and emotions." So, I may add, could Catiline, who was described
as a simulator and a dissimulator. This last characteristic of Mr.
Dent's hero was, it seems, shown "in his addresses to juries and
public audiences." His panegyrist adds, " one who judged him
simply from such exhibitions as these might well have set him
down for an emotional and impetuous man, apt to be led away by
the fleeting passions and weaknesses of the moment." This is a
surprising admission on Mr. Dent's part, because it is what, the
author says, Mackenzie was during his whole life. We are next
told that this "extraordinary personality" "certainly never acted
without a motive." For so extraordinary a personality this was
certainly very strange. It seems, however, that " his motives were
sometimes dark and unfathomable to everyone but himself," and
that "there were depths in his nature which were never fathomed
by those nearest and dearest to him — possibly not even himself."
This was also extraordinary, and, most people will say, somewhat
contradictory. But the riddle is solved when we are told that
even Mackenzie regarded the hero "as a Sphinx, close, oracular,
inscrutable." Mr. Dent, however, rather puts his foot in it when
he says that " not one among his contemporaries was able to take
his moral and intellectual measure with anything approaching to
completeness ; and throughout the entire length and breadth of
Canadian biography there is no man of equal eminence respecting
whose real individuality so little is known."
A PEN PICTURE.
This is not true. The Globe was one of Rolph's " contempor
aries." It was, as it is still, the leading contemporary organ of
the Reform party, and there were able, shrewd men on the staff
of that paper who knew a good deal more about Rolph than Mr.
Dent knows, or at least more than he chooses to tell us. Taken
in connection with some of Mr. Dent's expressions quoted above,
the following "moral and intellectual measure" of the great

26
man is exceedingly suggestive. It appeared in the Globe of July,
1854:— ' ' He is a sleek-visaged man, of low stature, with cold grey eyes and
treacherous mouth, lips fashioned to deceive, and whose mildest lines
are such as Nature cuts solely for the passage of insincerities. His
countenance seems so complacent — wears an expression so bland and
guileless that no person would dare venture to suspect him of any
thing — even of being an honest man. To the superficial observer, his
contour presents a riddle in physiognomy ; but the connoisseur reads
studiously — and with feelings of commiseration for the depravity of
human nature, he mentally ejaculates,
' 0, what a goodly outside falsehood hath.'
"Deep, dark, designing, cruel, malignant, traitorous, are the deeps
revealed to a student. His manners are civil and insinuating ; his con
versation soft, sparkling and instructive ; a cold, distrustful sneer and
grin ('tis not a smile) plays habitually about his oily lips, while at times
there glances forth expressions indicative of polished ferocity of soul,
revealing hard and stony depths beneath, that make honest be
holders shudder to think that some unfortunate believer in his fair
seeming may be doomed to sound and fathom. In short, he is a kind
of highly polished human tiger ! Cat-like in his demeanour — tiger
like in the hateful ferocious despotism of his unfeeling soul. One who,
as a judge, would pass sentence of death in the polite eloquence of a
Frenchman, and with the civil cruelty of a demon. It is thought he is
an agile man. He certainly is a slippery one."
I commend the above portrait to Mr. Dent as a suitable addi
tion to the second volume of his " Story," and, for the time being,
dismiss his hero off the scene.
A HISTORIAN'S QUALIFICATIONS.
As a whole this work will be acceptable only in so far as it is
reliable. Having heard that its author had once been a writer
for the Globe, that he was a Liberal in politics, and that the sub
ject would be handled acceptably and satisfactorily to Reformers,
I subscribed for the book. Hundreds of others probably did so
for the same reasons. It is impossible to say that faith has been
kept with us. On all sides I have heard expressions of opinion
from members of my own party that this book, which promised
so much, has come far short of their expectations, and that it is

27
in many respects very obnoxious to their feelings and sentiments.
I have been a life-long Reformer, never gave other than a Reform
vote, and no one can condemn the Family Compact rule more than
I do. But when I find the motives, character, and conduct of the
real hero of the struggle misrepresented at almost every turn, and
the most ludicrous laudations of John Rolph's intellectual, moral
and political perfections, I find it hard to believe that Mr. Dent's
book is not a mere story book and little else besides — a historical
fiction from beginning to end. Certainly when its readers dis
cover grave errors, glaring mis-statements and gross exaggerations
in regard to men and things that they had a personal knowledge
of, they may well be excused for doubting the reliability of the
book with respect to many other things in which they have to
trust solely to the author. One's doubts are confirmed when he
finds so few references to historical or other authorities outside
the standard authorities on the subject. These latter are cited
only when they chime in with the writer's prejudices ; e.g., to
blacken Mackenzie or to whiten Rolph. Apart from these the
book is made up almost wholly of Mr. Dent's unsupported opinions,
and Mr. Dent must show that he is honest, impartial and just be
fore his unsupported opinions can be considered of any value.
He has failed to do this. He is plainly prejudiced very strongly
against Mackenzie, and is quite as strongly biassed in favour of
Rolph. MR. DENT'S AUTHORITIES.
What confidence, then, can we have in the most of his "Story?"
It may be that much that he has written is true, but one must
feel that it is the truth if he is to get any real satisfaction out of
the truth. Fine writing may be pleasant reading. But it is
often inaccurate and untrustworthy. Macaulay is a splendid
word painter, but no one accepts Macaulay as a sound historical
authority. Like Mr. Dent, he was a thoroughpaced partisan who
squared his facts by his violent prejudices. Aping Macaulay now-
a-days is rather a perilous pastime. Mr. Dent has used the Whig
historian's style of varnish very freely ; he throws in no end of
florid colouring, and the production generally has a fair exterior.

28
But like Macaulay's the varnish is the principal ingredient, and is
easily rubbed off. We were told that it was to be derived
"largely from original sources and documents," but so far we
have seen very few of these. Mr. Dent has built up his book
" largely " on the writings of Robert Gourlay, which can be got
in most old libraries, " The Life and Times of W. L. Mackenzie,"
by Mr. Lindsay, for many years editor of the old Conservative
Leader, Governor Francis Bond Head's Narrative, the " Canadian
Political Portrait Gallery," and a lot of old newspaper articles
thrown off in all the heat and excitement of the struggle — these
are the principal authorities cited, and they are certainly not very
" original" sources of information. I have read these and much
more besides, and it seems to me Mr. Dent selects from them just
what suits his purpose and discards the rest. Occasionally, e. g.,
when he finds a nasty thing in Head's narrative or anywhere else
about Mackenzie, or a nice thing there or anywhere else about
Rolph, he quotes it in each case. And so it is all through his
book where either of those "personalities " is referred to. Every
one knows that Rolph had his enemies as well as Mackenzie, and
that he had infinitely fewer friends. A man who had " depths in
his nature dark and unfathomable even by himself," who gave his
confidence to nobody, whom nobody could understand, whose
" lips were fashioned to deceive, and were such as Nature cuts
solely for the passage of insincerities," was scarcely the man to
give or to gain friendship.
And yet in regard to this man, of whom perhaps as bitter things
were said and written as of any man who ever figured in public
life, Mr. Dent has not a single line of unfriendly criticism from
all this political literature of the past ! How can any fair-minded
reader approve of suppressions of opinions so notorious, garbling so
unmistakeable, and book-making so palpably one-sided ?
Mackenzie's position.
So far as Mackenzie is concerned, it would be hard to find any
where a meaner and more niggardly tribute to an able, unselfish
and patriotic public man. According to Mr. Dent Mackenzie's
" itch for notority " was the guiding star of his whole life. His

29
personal appearance, mental endowments, political judgment, in
telligence and tervices, as well as his honesty and disinterestedness,
are similiarly misrepresented. Nor is the writer's method of doing
this at all creditable. It is generally done by contrasts and com
parisons most invidious, by references to the idle gossip of street
acquaintances, and by disingenuous suggestion and pitiful innuen
does. " An insinuation," Mr. Dent should know, "is the refuge
of a coward." Mackenzie, unlike Rolph, was not perfect ; he had
faults and he never concealed them. It cannot be said of him, as
the Globe said of the " extraordinary personality," that he had
" dark, designing, traitorous deeps revealed " in his nature ; he
truly wore his heart upon his sleeve. He was not an out-and-out
party man because he was too independent, and hence he was
sometimes at loggerheads with the would-be runners of the " pol
itical machine." When he thought his allies were wrong he said
so frankly and above board. There was no double-dealing about
him ; he was a loyal, true friend, and an open, manly opponent,
and never, like Mr. Dent's patent hero, stabbed either friend or
foe in the dark. There is no doubt he was a hard hitter when he
was roused ; so is any public man Worthy the name ; but he was
withal kind-hearted, -forgiving, and generous to a fault. Some of
his warmest personal friends and admirers were Conservatives,
who could appreciate his true worth, if they could not approve of
his political course. Mackenzie's platform.
Altogether Mr. Dent's opinions of Mackenzie are sorry compli
ments to the intelligence of his readers. " His views," he says,
" would now be considered Toryish and" out of date," in the face
of the fact known to any schoolboy, that they are now universally
accepted by both political parties, and largely embodied in the
legislation of the country. It is insinuated that he entered public
life from the most sordid of motives — a man who was a life-long
foe to venality in every form, who more than once was offered a
lucrative office under the Government, and who resented all such
offers as attempts to control his independence. Then we are told
that he was a mere creature of impulse and circumstances, who

30
could " be blown hither and thither by any strong current," and
who "from his cradle to his grave was never fit to walk alone
through any great emergency ! " And this against the acknowl
edged fact that mainly through his self-reliant exertions, stead
fastly and determinedly pursued, and with false friends like Rolph
to hamper him, the great reforms for which he struggled were
carried long years before they possibly could have been in the
ordinary course of events. If there ever was a man who had
fixed and uncompromising views of public policy and public affairs
'it was Mackenzie. And yet it is said that "the instability of his
opinions" was "one of his most dangerous characteristics," and
that he was as changeable as a " chameleon." When ever before
was such arrant nonsense dignified by the name of "history?''
Those who knew the man, and the transparent, unbending honesty
of his whole life in word and deed, are also asked to believe that
"his unsupported testimony is of very little value," and that
" his word " could not be " credited." I wonder how far Mr.
Dent will be "credited," or "his unsupported testimony" taken in
the face of such an unblushing falsehood ? He is, however, just
as veracious in regard to Mackenzie's labours and influence as a
legislator, and what he calls his " misty conceptions of states
manship." Mr. Dent slurs these over as mere matters of "detail,"
suppressing, as he does, in regard to many important facts in
Mackenzie's public life, the instructive records of parliament show
ing his thorough acquaintance with all the great political questions
of his day, and his initiation and comprehensive knowledge of the
largest measures of legislative policy. But the climax is reached
by this Liberal story-teller when, with cool effrontery, he tells us
that, " as to any real influence " in the House of Assembly, Mac
kenzie " had no more than the junior messenger! " It is plain that
Mr. Dent does not stick at trifles. He has unlimited faith in the
gullibility of his readers and their capacity for mendacious cram.
THE " UNLETTERED."
Mackenzie's influence in the country, he says, was of just as little
account. At one time it was confined to " the unlettered yeomen
of Wentworth," at another to "the unlettered farmers and recently

31
arrived immigrants." At one time "the farmers and mechanics"
were his "satellites," at another "the rural and uneducated por
tion of the community." And then we are told of his "origin,"
" social grade," etc., and the Canadian Macaulay's picture of
"the noisy little firebrand" and his, " unlettered" followers is
complete. All this is really very dreadful ; to the highly refined
intellect and high born soul of this cultured man of letters,
it is unspeakably shocking. Mr. Dent is constantly parading
Mackenzie's want of tact, discretion and judgment, yet one would
have supposed that in thus winning his way and extending his
influence among the masses of the Canadian people, he was not
altogether devoid of worldly wisdom. If Mr. Dent had read
history to any purpose — if he had studied it as well as he has
studied human nature ill, he would have discovered that amongst
politicians and public men there is a good deal of consorting with
the "unlettered" farmer and mechanic. It may seem very
strange to Mr. Dent, but it is nevertheless a fact that they are a
power in the country. Leaders of men, who respect public opinion,
consult and consider them, and horrifying as it may be to Mr.
Dent, they will continue doing so to the end of time. No man in
his day did it more successfully than Mackenzie, because he was
in thorough sympathy with the people. He had faith in them
and they in him, because they knew how unselfish and patriotic
his motives were. He believed in trusting them, and gloried in
being the champion of their rights, and in making their cause his
' own. These supercilious sneers by Mr. Dent at the " social grade " of
an old Liberal leader and those who were proud to follow him —
their intelligence, their worthy employments, and their honest
toil, require no answer. They are simply pitiable, and coming
from a professed Liberal, show how utterly unfitted he is to write
the history of a popular struggle. Weak-minded persons, who
fancy they have a pedigree, sometimes exhibit their weakness in
this way ; but it is more often exhibited by unmitigated snobs, or
persons who have no pedigree at all. From what I have heard of
Mr. Dent's antecedents he can hardly afford to sneer at the
"social grade" of any person. Mackenzie, it is well known, never

32
set much store on birth or lineage, and he had no reason to feel
ashamed of his own. His father was a poor man like the fathers
of hundreds of men in this country who have risen to the highest
positions. His mother was related to some of the first families in
the Highlands of Scotland, but of this he never made a boast.
Unlike Mr. Dent, he loved and honoured men for their sterling
manhood, no matter how high or humble their origin might have
been. Any person aspiring to be a public teacher and instructor,
who writes in such a strain, will speedily find his level, and I am
much mistaken if Mr. Dent has not greatly lowered himself in
public estimation — assuming that he has any " social " status from
which to fall — by this gratuitous display of snobbishness.
Yours, etc.,
A Reformer.
Ottawa, December 24th.

MACKENZIE AND ROLPH.
The pen and ink sketch from the Globe of July, 1854, quoted in the
above communication, seems to have revived old memories of the men
of '37, and the estimation in which they were held by the Reform press
of succeeding years. It called forth the following interesting letter
from ' ' Another Reformer," who quotes again from the Globe in a letter
to that journal from its chief representative in the Press Gallery of
the old House of Assembly at Quebec. It seems the correspondent of
the leading Liberal newspaper knew Rolph well. The latter is here
descried fleeing from the country, and from those whom he had shame
lessly betrayed, and effecting his release from arrest in a thoroughly
characteristic fashion . —
To the Editor of The Mail.
Sir, — To what was said on this subject by " Reformer," whose
letter you published on Saturday, perhaps you would be good
enough to add what the Globe's parliamentary correspondent said
when the subject of the flag of truce was brought up in Parlia
ment at Quebec. The letter, dated " Quebec, Wednesday, Nov.
3, 1852," is accredited '¦'¦From Our Oion Correspondent" : —

33
" Previous to the regular business of the House commencing
yesterday, Mr. Mackenzie informed the Speaker, in his place, that
he had a personal matter to bring up. The gallery, as I informed
you yesterday, was cleared; and he then went on to say, that Dr
Rolph had procured a certificate of one Hugh Carmichael, and
published it in the Quebec Gazette, to the effect that he (Dr.
Rolph) had not acted in the manner, on the occasion of the well-
known -flag of truce in 1837, which he had been accused of — his
former principal accuser being Mr. Lount, who was executed, and
his latter Mr. Mackenzie himself. Mr. Mackenzie then stated, in
substance, that all that Mr. Lount had stated, and more, was
strictly true ; that Dr. Rolph was the Executive of the insurrec
tionists in 1837, of whom Mr. Mackenzie was one of the leaders,
at Gallows Hill; that all he had directed to be done was done; he
being obeyed in all things as the Executive, and looked up to as
director ; that on the occasion of the flag of truce, he did tell —
after the more formal message was delivered in presence of Mr.
Baldwin — Mr. Lount to come into Toronto at once, for the people
were frightened, and the place could be taken. Whatever name
such an act might be called by, or however Dr. Rolph might seek
to shield himself, by false statements, from the responsibility of
it, these, he alleged, were the facts ; and no certificate, subterfuge,
or falsehood, could make them otherwise.
" Dr. Rolph denied the whole. This, of course, he must have
made up his mind to do when he got the certificate.
"But how a man — who evidently feels keenly the black dishonour,
or, at least, the deadly dislike and distrust that all honourable men
must have of him after so vile an act — could be such an arrant
fool as to risk an investigation into it upon so slight a ground for
ultimate acquittal as the certificate of this man Carmichael, I
cannot conceive. It is but another instance, however, of the
thousands on record, of the weakness of a man who was guilty ;
and the absolute certainty there is of his very attempts to conceal
his crime, leading to his detection. What did he run away for if
he did not know that he was guilty of what Mr. Lount, before his
execution, charged him with 1 The writer of this letter met him
at Oakville when he was flying ; and his excuse for leaving Toronto
3

34
was, that he was going to see a sister, who was ill ; and when he
was arrested, and brought back by the guard, he said, ' Oh, you
will surely not think of suspecting me when Sir Francis Head,
your Governor, entrusted me with a flag of truce?' He was, in
consequence, at once released. Now, if he did not feel that he
had played a perfidious part, why was he flying after he had been
entrusted with a flag of truce? But why, a rebel himself, and the
instigator of those who were — the Executive, as Mr. Mackenzie
calls him — why did he hypocritically and villainously smile in Sir
Francis Head's face, and pledge his sacred honour to the citizens
of Toronto, that he was against the rebellion — yet convey, for
these citizens, a flag of truce to men with whom he was in league;
men who were but obeying his instructions , men who were but
invested with his own spirit ? And what more natural than that
these men, seeing him with a flag of truce from their enemy,
should like to know what he meant by it ! And what more natu
ral, too, than his telling Mr. Lount privately what to do; and what,
that unhappily misguided man — just before his execution — said he
did tell him ! What would these men think when they saw Dr.
Rolph, their chief and their reliance, in the service of their foe ?
Would they not seek an explanation ? Would he not have
endeavoured to explain ? What more true than the few horrid
words, behind Mr. Baldwin's back, of instruction to Mr. Lount ?
" Miserable, degraded, false-hearted sneak, you are caught.
You have put upon record what will provoke inquiries, which will
sear you as with a rod of iron. Yes, and it is left for you to be
not only the despised of honour, loyalty and truth, but to be a
detested recreant to your brother criminals ! Go, however, and
dine, and smile, and advise with Lord Elgin. He has helped to
make you the guardian of Britain's chivalry and loyalty in
America, and it may be proper to add, that he should, at least,
have all the honour of it.
" After this explanation of Mr. Mackenzie's — for which he will
be duly persecuted, and at the same time fully believed — there
was a long debate upon resolutions introduced by Mr. Hincks, to
secure the Government guarantee to a railroad down to Trois
Pistoles, on the St. Lawrence, from here."

35
The view of the Globe's correspondent regarding the transaction
is that of Reformers generally. Ever after the affair of the flag
of truce Rolph was generally known as the traitor— the Benedict
Arnold of his party. The prediction of the writer of the Globe
that Mackenzie' would be " duly persecuted and at the same time
fully believed," has proved literally true ; but he could scarcely
have foreseen that there would be found instruments base enough
to pursue the work of detraction beyond the grave.
Yours, etc., Another Reformer.
Newmarket, Dec. 28th, 1885.

AN OLD REFORMER RETURNS TO THE MACKENZIE
ROLPH MATTER.

A REPLY TO MR. T. J. ROLPH.

The next contribution to the controversy was another communication
from "A Reformer" at Ottawa, whose former letter had been falsely
ascribed by Mr. T. J. Rolph to Mr. Lindsey. (See Appendix.) This
appeared in the Mail of January 4th, 1886. It corroborates Mr. Lind-
sey's denial, fully exonerates him from any responsibility for the writer's
previous letter, and deals' with all the points worth noticing in Mr.
Rolph's letter :— To the Editor of The Mail.
Sir, — The Globe of Thursday last contains a letter from Mr. T.
J. Rolph, in which the writer charges Mr. Charles Lindsay, the
author of "The Life and Times of William Lyon Mackenzie,"
with being " the responsible author " of my communication
published in The Mail of the 26th ult. The letter is not very
original either in matter or sty e. But as its inditor has shown
no discretion in assailing an innocent person, his mode of doin
so is of little moment. He repeatedly borrows and adopts as his
own expressions used by me in my communication, and is other-

36
wise a mere angry echo of Mr. Dent in his " Story of the
Rebellion." It is plain that, in more ways than one, " the voice
is Jacob's voice, but the hand is the hand of Esau." Mr. T. J.
Rolph, it seems, is a son of Dr. John Rolph — the " extraordinary
personality " and " strong man" of the story— and I am told he
is a lawyer by profession. It is quite natural that he should seek
to defend his father, and had he done so in a proper spirit I should
not have replied to his letter. But he has robbed himself, and the
subject of his defence, of all sympathy, by his wanton recklessness
of assertion and utter disregard of the truth. It is no part of my
present business to defend Mr. Lindsay, whose talents and abilities
as a literary man are widely known and acknowledged. That
crentleman is quite able to defend himself, and to make his assailant
regret rushing headlong into a controversy for which Mr. Dent is
solely to blame. In justice to Mr. Lindsay, however, I desire at
once to say that this reckless young lawyer's badly drawn
indictment against him is utterly false and unfounded. Mr.
Lindsay had as much to do with my communication as Mr. Rolph
himself. He did not write it or cause it to be written, nor did he
inspire, prompt or instigate it, either directly or indirectly. If
Mr. Rolph is a, gentleman he will at once retract his dishonest
charge, and properly apologize to the gentleman whom he has
foully maligned.
I have also a few words, on my own account, to address to this
double- voiced and indiscreet young man. He speaks of my letter
as " one of the most disgraceful and unwarranted attacks on the
memory of the dead that has characterized journalism in this
country for tlie last half century." These be brave words, and
if Mr. Dent's detraction of "the memory of the dead" Mackenzie
had been included in his anathemas, there would have been some
truth in them. Mr. Rolph's knowledge of Canadian journalism
is evidently not very extended. He can carry it about with him
without much trouble, and, for the future, I would advise him to
be a little more guarded in writing about matters which he does
not understand. With his prompter and inspirer, Mr. Dent, at
his back, the least said by either of them about disgraceful
journalism the better. The dastardly attacks on public and

37
private character which appeared in the Toronto News, in the first
days of its existence, are not yet forgotten. I am told that some
of these were the product of Mr. Dent's pen. I must also remind
Mr. Rolph that all that has been said, or that may hereafter be said,
in the public press in regard to his father, has been provoked by
Mr. Dent. The Story-teller has forced the issue by his indefen
sible slanders and lampooneries of 'Mackenzie, and his gushing
and ridiculous flattery of Dr. Rolph. The very edition of the
Globe which published the young man's f oolisji letter candidly
admits this. Referring to the letter the editor says : — " In
another column will be found a letter replying to letters which
have appeared in another journal concerning the connection of Dr.
Rolph with the rebellion of 1837. That such a controversy
should have arisen was inevitable, however much it may be
regretted." In fact the Globe itself is one of the most formidable
antagonists that the great Rolphite apostle and his young disciple
have to encounter. The severest part of my last communication
was taken from one of the numbers of that journal of July, 1854.
The extract was quoted in reply to Mr. Dent's statement as to none
of Dr. Rolph's contemporaries being able to take his " moral and
intellectual measure." As I knew the Globe had measured him
pretty accurately, I thought I would turn up the record. And
there it is in black and white. The same extract appeared in the
Citizen newspaper of this city on the 14th November last, and
excited some comment at the time. It revived in my mind the
generally accepted estimate, by the great body of Reformers in
Canada, of John Rolph's political crookedness and base treachery.
That estimate will be hard to disturb, and Mr. Dent is not the
man to do it. The Globe's pen and ink portrait was not compli
mentary, but it was life-like, and it had tlie solid substratum of
truth to rest upon, which is more than can be said of a large part
of the Story-book. Why this piteous whine in print by the Story
teller and his mouthpiece, the young lawyer ? Mr. Dent has been
dragging the sea of political literature with his net for anything
and everything to make Mackenzie odious in the eyes of the world.
He has made the most of his catch, such as it is. He has
undoubtedly found much infinitely more damaging to Dr. Rolph,

38
but he has not had the manliness or honesty to say a word about
it. Yet Mackenzie's friends must grin and bear all this with
equanimity ! They must rake nothing from the ashes of the past,
and must be dumb as an oyster ! Or, if they resent it, as it well
deserves, a long whining complaint must be poured into the public
ear about "justice" and "fair play!" Has this exceedingly
innocent young man never heard of jug-handled justice ?
Mr. Lindsay's biography of Mackenzie is also assailed in the
same reckless style by the Globe's sapient young critic. I am not
concerned about defending it, except in so far as it bears on my
last communication and supports my statements. As a historical
and literary work it must, like Mr. Dent's, stand or fall on its
merits. If time be any test of its value, it has stood the test well.
Although published in 1860, in Dr. Rolph's lifetime, its accuracy,
truthfulness, and honesty have never before been impeached. It
has maintained a place in Canadian history for over twenty-five
years. Any person who has read the two works (Lindsay's and
Dent's) with any care must have been struck with the bold
freedom with which Mr. Dent borrows from this biography. In
fact he often uses the very same expressions in describing the
same incidents. It is plain to any discerning reader that he is
greatly indebted to Mr. Lindsay's book (in fact he often quotes it
approvingly in his Story) for information disclosed in his own, that
he has founded his work very largely upon this biography, and
that were it not for the industry and research shown in its
pages the gaudy, padded out superstructure reared by himself
would have been a much more ricketty concern than it is. Sir
Francis Hincks, in the " Reminiscences of his Public Life," speaks
of the biography of Mackenzie as trustworthy. He had every
means of satisfying himself on this point, and no one can doubt
that he was perfectly honest in his statements about it. Yet we
find young Mr. Rolph in his letter referring to the biography as
"replete with errors of fact and detail," as "fictitious," and as
"bolstering up Mackenzie's reputation" with forgeries! To say
nothing of his audacity, this is exceedingly rich. But is the
person who addresses the public in this reckless fashion not aware
that he is playing with edge tools 1 '

39
So far as the flag of truce episode is concerned, it is very evident
that the whole truth as against Rolph has not yet been told. This
appears from the letter of your Newmarket correspondent. Rolph
is therein descried as a fugitive fleeing for his life, begging for
release from arrest on the plea that he was a loyal man — one of
the bearers of the Government flag of truce — and excusing his
hasty flight to a political friend on the score of the illness of a
relative ! The extract from the Globe's parliamentary corres
pondent, in November, 1852, published in that letter, also shows
what the leading organ of the Reform party then thought of
Rolph. It was far from flattering. The extract in my former
communication, from the Globe of July, 1854, proves that in the
interval he had sunk still lower in the estimation of the Reform
party, and that he was at about as low an ebb in their res
pect and confidence as it was possible for any public man to
be. These extracts from the leading Liberal newspaper of Canada
are infinitely more Cutting and severe than anything I have said
about Dr. Rolph ; they corroborate and confirm all that I said,
all that Baldwin and the others, mentioned in my letter, said
about him, and show that my letter, instead of being " a disgrace
ful and unwarranted attack " on Dr. Rolph, was not only perfectly
justifiable, but far milder and more lenient than it might have
been. Mr. Lindsay, in his biography of Mackenzie, has been even
more generous to the father of his recent assailant ; in fact when
his book appeared it was a matter of surprise to Reformers, and a
subject of animadversion by many, that Rolph had been let down
so easily. The little that is said by Mr. Lindsay is said tem
perately, but it contains the elements of a direct charge of
treachery on the part of Rolph to Mackenzie and his friends ; it
produces evidence in support of the charge; "the testimony of
witnesses," that young Mr. Rolph in his letter says "will com
pletely refute and overthrow " the charge, could then have been
easily got ; Dr. Rolph himself was then living and lived for years
afterwards ; and yet from that day to this that charge — one. of the
blackest and most dishonouring that could be made against any
man — has never been answered, much less refuted. And I make
bold to say that it never will be.

40
The statement by Mr. Rolph that many of the patriots of '37
were " basely misrepresented and maligned by Mackenzie '' is on
a par with the rest of his letter. It is too puerile and absurd to
notice, and carries its refutation on its face. The writer fails to
give a tittle of evidence in its support, and, like the unsupported
opinions of Mr. Dent, his bare assertion is worthless. The patriots
of '37 were, and always continued to be, Mackenzie's staunchest
friends. The relations between him and them were always of the
most friendly and affectionate nature, and to this day, the men of
that time, who were identified with him, can scarcely mention his
name without evincing an emotion which speaks volumes for the
love and admiration which he inspired in their hearts. This
" consistency," if we except the marvellous " consistency " of their
betrayer, John Rolph, was never called in question either by
Mackenzie or his biographer, as is suggested in this young man's
letter. The loyality between them and their old leader was
mutual and lasting. It was strengthened by their common suffer
ings and sacrifices ; and so far from being abated, it was only
intensified as the years rolled on, and they saw that their once
" lost cause " was fully vindicated by their united struggles, and
that its principles were triumphant in the permanent establish
ment of responsible government.
Mr. Rolph speaks of the nature of the correspondence between
his father and Mr. Baldwin up to 1849, as enabling him to contra
dict my statement " that Mr. Baldwin never spoke to Dr. Rolph
after the pretended violation of the Flag of Truce in 1837." I
made no such statement, and, with my letter before him, Mr. Rolph
knew I did not. I said there was no " friendly communication'
between them, and I say so still. When this much vaunted " cor
respondence" is forthcoming, the public can judge from the nature
of it as to who is in the right. I say here confidently, in advance of
its production, that what I have already said on that point will be
literally verified. Rolph very probably tried, in his wily fashion, to
explain away his traitorism to the friends who had once trusted
him, and whom he heartlessly deceived. He did so to others, and
to the Assembly at Quebec in 1852, when the question was
discussed with closed doors, and when Mackenzie nailed the

41
accusation against him on the floor of the House. " Correspond
ence" of that kind with Baldwin can scarcely be called "friendly
communications." Neither can formal or business letters between
two men whom an act of treachery — never forgiven on Baldwin's
part — had alienated. No, Robert Baldwin, like all the Reformers
of his day, had too strong and conclusive proofs of Rolph's
dishonour ever to treat him as a friend again, and he certainly
never was so treated.
As to the further assertion, in this letter, that Mackenzie, in
1852, publicly declared that he had taken no part, "civil or
military," in the insurrection, and had " merely acted as an
individual friendly to a change in the Canadas" — we shall see,
when the whole case is presented, what this pretended inconsist
ency on Mackenzie's part amounts to. Garbled quotations of
Mackenzie's public declarations are not evidence. There has been
so much garbling already in Mr. Dent's description of his public
conduct and career, that I may be forgiven for believing that the
same sort of shamelessness will be continued to the end of this
precious historical romance. Mackenzie, as everyone knows,
never denied the part which he had taken in the revolt ; he
manfully accepted his full share of the responsibility ; and he was
made to feel it in his long years of bitter exile. And I am greatly
mistaken if the public opinion of to-day, and the public opinion
of the future, do not mark in a signal manner their condemnation
of the conduct of a writer, professedly Liberal, who seeks to heap
obloquy on the dead patriot's grave.
I have now done with this youthful indiscretion of revising the
Canadian "journalism" and political history of the past. I have
given the letter a somewhat lengthy consideration for obvious
reasons. " The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hand is the hand of
Esau." Yours, etc.,
A Reformer.
Ottawa, Jan. 1.

42
ROLPH AND MACKENZIE.

At this point the discussion takes a new and rather unexpected turn
for the Rolphites. Mr. T. T. Rolph's letter (see appendix), in which
Mackenzie was assailed so maliciously, had been just four days in print.
It excited, as we believe, the strongest indignation and resentment, and
called forth the following letter from Mr. John King, Barrister, Berlin, a
son-in-law of Mackenzie. The war is here carried into Africa. In
his perusal of -the Rolph papers, Mr. Dent is shown to have dis
covered "the most damning proofs of Rolph's treachery," and the
larger question of the honesty and good faith of the author's narrative
is thus distinctly opened up. The circumstances are clearly set forth,
and proof is offered, if necessary, in support of Mr. King's statement.
This letter appeared in the Mail and World of January 9th, 1886 : —
To the Editor of the Mail.
Sir, — I would gladly refrain from interfering in a controversy
respecting Dr. Rolph's connection with the rebellion of 1837-38,
but the violent letters to the Globe of his son (see appendix), Mr.
T. T. Rolph, in which the writer denies his father's treachery to
Mackenzie, and makes a counter-charge of wholesale treachery
against Mackenzie himself, compel me to give to the public
informatidn of a most material nature on the question. It seems
that, with a view to his writing the " Story of the Upper Canadian
Rebellion," the author, Mr. Dent, had placed in his hands Dr.
Rolph's private papers relating to the movement. These he
perused, and I am credibly informed that, in the course of his
perusal of them, he fell upon evidence which perfectly convinced
him of Dr. Rolph's guilt. He, as I am advised and as I fully
believe, told my informant that he had discovered in those papers
the most damning proofs of Rolph's treachery to Mackenzie. My
informant is a gentleman of acknowledged abilities, well-known
reputation and undoubted veracity, whose word, I think, even
Mr. Dent will not question. He told me what I have stated
under circumstances which ent'rely rebut any imputation of
unfriendliness to Mr. Dent, or of a breach of private confidence
on his own part, and I have his authority for making the state
ment. This information has been in my possession for a long time

43
past. I was loth to make use of it against a gentleman whom I
have known for many years, and with whom I have always held
the most friendly relations, until, as the public have seen, tolera
tion of venomous attacks on Mackenzie's name and memory has
ceased to be a virtue on the part of any of his friends or rela
tives. Although I have made the disclosure under great provoca
tion, it is made solely in the interests of truth and justice. In
giving it publicity at this time, I feel 1 am not chargeable in any
way with unfairness to Mr. Dent. His first volume of the " Story
of the Rebellion," shows very plainly that he has accepted a brief
as a professional writer in the Rolph interest, with all that that
means, and that he intends to do his best to earn his retainer.
The letters which Mr. T. T. Rolph has written to the Globe bear
the impress of being inspired by him, and clearly indicate that
Mackenzie is to be pursued to the end of the " Story " with even
greater injustice and calumny than have marked the pages of the
first volume.
On some future occasion I shall ask the Toronto press to do me
the favour of publishing a letter dealing more fully with Mr.
Dent's narrative. There will at all times, I have no doubt, be
manhood enough in Canada to vindicate William Lyon Mackenzie,
if vindication be at all necessary against his defamers. Mean
while I may surely ask my brother Liberals and the Liberal
press — the press of all parties — to see to it that a spirit of
generous fair play and just consideration be shown to a man
whose patriotic services, sufferings and sacrifices are, I believe,
not yet forgotten by his country. Yours, etc.,
John King.
Berlin, January 7.

44

THE MACKENZIE-ROLPH CONTROVERSY.

It seems the above letter was also sent to the Globe for publication.
It did not appear in that journal on account of the editor's having
previously shut down on the controversy with the second letter of Mr.
T. T. Rolph. Mr. King's letter was, however, made the subject of a
short article in the Globe of the 11th January, 1886, in which a kindly,
well-meant endeavour was made to smooth over the whole matter,
and pour oil on the troubled waters. In stating the question at
issue the writer said, "It is interesting to note that the whole con
troversy is as to who was most active and influential in opposition to
the Family Compact." This remark, and the article as a whole, called
forth the following second letter from Mr. King to the Daily World of
January 13th, 1886 :— To the Editor of the World.
The Globe of to-day has an article under this heading in which
it refers to a letter received from me — a triplicate of that
published in the Mail and World of Saturday. It says " that
the whole controversy is as to who was most active and influential
in opposition to the Tory Family Compact." That, I respectfully
submit, is not what the controversy was about.
The real question is, whether the charge of treachery to Mac
kenzie, Baldwin and their friends, preferred by a correspondent
of the Mail against Dr. Rolph, is well founded. The Mail's cor
respondent produced evidence in support of his statements. Mr.
T. T. Rolph, evidently speaking for Mr. Dent, the author of the
" Story of the Rebellion," as well as for himself, and without
offering a scintilla of evidence in reply, denied the charge in toto,
and brought a counter charge of universal treachery against
Mackenzie. It was this last statement particularly which called
forth m.y letter in which I alleged, on good authority, that Mr.
Dent had found in Dr. Rolph's private papers " the most damning
proofs of Rolph's treachery to Mackenzie."
The controversy has in fact broadened out into a question of
the honesty and good faith of the author and his narrative. If
Mr. Dent found such proofs of Rolph's treachery, and I am satis
fied he did, no language is too strong, even at this stage of the

45
" Story," in condemnation of the author and his book. I don't
think Mackenzie was faultless, but I do say that he has been most
unfairly dealt with in this narrative, and I shall very soon
convince the public of this, if they are not fully convinced
already. I shall also have something to say about John Rolph,
the only perfect riersonage in Mr. Dent's gallery of "personalities."
I aoree with the Globe that " different views may with perfect
honesty be held over the relative merits of two such men." But
what should be said about Mr. Dent's " honesty," in view of the
statements in my last letter that are as yet unanswered
Berlin, January 11. John King.

The above letter was written, as would appear from its date, on the
11th January, 1886, the same day on which the Globe's editorial
appeared. The next issue of that journal contained the following
paragraph amongst its editorial " Notes and Comments " : —
" With respect to the article on Mackenzie and Rolph in the
Globe of yesterday, Mr. Dent writes us to say that he is too much
occupied, with hard work upon the second volume of his Story, to
reply to the numberless attacks upon him which have appeared in
the columns of a contemporary. He, however, gives the most
emphatic denial to the statements in a letter which appeared
in the Mail of Saturday last, to the effect that he admitted
having found among Dr. Rolph's papers conclusive evidence of
the Doctor's treachery. He expresses his intention of dealing
with the other charges contained in that letter before another
forum."

THE MACKENZIE-ROLPH CONTROVERSY.

The above paragraph in the Globe was not allowed to pass. It was
replied to by Mr. King in the following third letter published in the Mail
and World of January 15th, 1886. The writer here gives his authority for
his statement, previously made, that Mr. Dent had discovered amongst

46
the Rolph papers "the most damning proofs of Rolph's treachery. " He
also fully exculpates his informant, Dr. Bingham, of Waterloo, from
any improper breach of private confidence with respect to Mr. Dent : —
To the Editor of the Mail.
Sir, — I notice that Mr. Dent indirectly, through to-day's Globe,.
" gives the most emphatic denial to the statements in my letter,
which appeared in the Mail and World of Saturday last, to the
effect that he admitted having found among Dr. Rolph's papers
conclusive evidence of the doctor's treachery." I have now to say
that I was told the admission, as I stated it, was made to Dr.
Bingham, of Waterloo, who is my informant in the matter. In
justice to that gentleman, who is a very old friend of Mr. Dent's,
I should explain that the information was given to me without the
slightest desire or- intention to injure or prejudice Mr. Dent in any
way. On the contrary, it was disclosed with the view of remov
ing what the doctor thought was a misapprehension, on the part of
another member of the family and myself, of the attitude likely to
be assumed by Mr. Dent in his book in regard to Mackenzie and
Rolph. We had at the time, for various reasons, formed the
opinion that the " Story of the Rebellion " would be unfriendly to
the one and exceedingly favourable to the other, and, in a conver
sation with Dr. Bingham on the subject, we expressed that opinion.
He at once took the part of his friend, said he was sure from what
Mr. Dent had told him about the Rolph papers that we were under
a. false impression in regard to Mr. Dent's intentions, and, in order
to disabuse our minds of the feeling which we entertained, he made
the statements referred to in my letter of Saturday last. Nothing
could be more evident than that he wished to place Mr. Dentin a
favourable light. We were, I must confess, more or less reassured
by what we were told, but you may judge of our painful surprise
when the book itself appeared, and was followed up by Mr. T. T.
Rolph's letters to the Globe foreshadowing, to a certain extent, the
scope of the second volume. An indictment for wholesale treachery
against Mackenzie was plainly indicated in those letters, and cer
tainly that was something that could not be lightly overlooked.
While I must not, from anything I have written, be understood

47
as imputing any mere mercenary motives to Mr. Dent in the stand
which he has taken with respect to Mackenzie and Rolph, I know
I am not alone in the opinion, already expressed, that he is employ
ing his pen in the Rolph interest. He has a perfect right to do
so, but, if he voluntarily undertakes such a task, he has no right
to expect immunity from hostile criticism. Dr. Bingham, I feel
assured, stands ready to make good his statement.
Yours, etc.,
John King.
Berlin, January 12.
To the above letter no reply has ever yet appeared from Mr. Dent.

THE MEN OF THE REBELLION.

The two following extracts are from the Toronto World of October 5th,
1885. After speaking of Mr. Dent's treatment of the leaders of the
Family Compact, it goes on to show how grave an error the author has
made in trying to detract from Mackenzie's position as the true cham
pion of the cause of the people, and says : —
Let us turn to the other side, the leaders of the Reform party.
If Mr. Dent has ruffled the feathers of descendants of the Family
Compact, he has equally upset the conceptions that men held of the
prominent Reformers. What the second volume will develope we
do not know ; but, in the first, there is ample evidence that, ac
cording to the author,%Mr. Rolph and Robert Baldwin were, if not
the leaders of the rebellion — " an ill-planned and feebly conducted
movement " — they were at least the true champions of the cause
of the people. Public opinion long ago made William Lyon Mac
kenzie the hero of the cause of the struggle ; we shall see what
success attends the historian who proposes to reverse this recog
nized order. Already the champions of Mackenzie are furbishing
up their armour, and, from what we know of them, they will not die
without a struggle. * * *

48
Our only commentary, for the present, on Mr. Dent's portraits
of these men is that, if Mackenzie was as he draws him, and Rolph
and Baldwin were the men he paints them, why then did they not
so size him and keep him in his place ? How was it that " the
little proletarian " got the stars ?

Next day there appeared in the same paper the following spirited
letter : —
MACKENZIE AND ROLPH.

To the Editor of the World.
Of all the Reviews of Dent's Story of the Rebellion yours
is the only one that dares touch the real purpose of the book :
the setting up of Rolph in the place held by Mackenzie. I
am the son of an old rebel, and my training and information
go to show that Mackenzie was the one man, of the Reform
leaders in those trying times, who had the courage to act. Mac
kenzie had faults, many of them, but he had the courage to do,
and it is because of that that he is the hero of the people's rights.
Flaws can be picked in anyone's character ; courage in supreme
moments falls to few ; Mackenzie happened to be one of those few.
Vaughan Boy.

A ROMAN CATHOLIC OPINION.

From the Irish Canadian of January 15th, 1886.
In dealing with these [Mackenzie, BalSwin and others] our
author [Mr. Dent] seems to regard Mackenzie as if with aversion.
We regret this exceedingly, for we believe that the depreciation
of Mackenzie's abilities is undeserved ; and that no matter what
our author may say derogatory to the personal habits and charac
ter of the " Tittle Scotchman," the latter will always be regarded
as the head and front of the movement which culminated in the
obtainment of the liberties now enjoyed by the people of Canada.

49

THE NEW "STORY OF THE UPPER CANADIAN
REBELLION."
A PROSE EPIC REVELATION.

In common with others who subscribed for. the work, I have
read with curious interest Mr. John Charles Dent's " Story of the
Upper Canadian Rebellion." It is not the first narrative of a
historical or semi-historical character which has reviewed that
period in our history. Nor will it be the last. The materials for
even a prose epic on the subject — for such the author seeks to
make it — are neither few nor far between. There is abundance
of sources whence an impartial hand may draw as it needs. De
spite this, the story is to all intents and purposes a new story.
To all who have studied the causes and progress of the movement,
or who knew the prominent personages who figured therein, it will
be a marvellous revelation. With respect to these latter, Mr.
Dent does not accept the popular gospel of the struggle. He ap
pears not only as a skeptic but as a denouncer of the old faith,
fortified by authority, which has been handed down to the Liberals
of to-day in regard to William Lyon Mackenzie. He proclaims,
with much unction, a new and startling creed in regard to John
Rolph. To accomplish this required rare ingenuity, and the
writer has shown that he is endowed with that gift in a remark
able degree. It is manifest in his manipulation of materials which
are always within reach of a reviewer of the period in question, in
his artful methods of introducing new subject matter, and the
dramatic surprises of the narrative, not less than in his confident
statements and suppressions of facts, his criticisms of public and
private character and reputation, his strong contrasts of some of
the Reform leaders of the time, and his sensational judgments upon
them. All this is done in vigorous English and attractive style.
The graces of description, the beauties of prose and poetical quo-
4

50
tation, are scattered with a free hand. Even the halo of ro
mance is not wanting. The narrative opens, as did that of the
" Last Forty Years," like a New York Ledger novelette. Its
pages sparkle very often with the same sort of fascinating
fiction. However much or little this new Story may catch the
popular eye, its literary sagacity and judgment will never win
the popular heart.
Assuming the allegations of fact to be indisputable, there will
be a general consensus of opinion in regard to a number of topics
discussed by the author. The treatment of Robert Gourlay was
cruel and inexcusable, even under an* alien law that was not more
exceptionally severe in Canada than it was in England, and less
so than it was in the United States. Few in our day defend the
odiousness of a system which developed the political Oligarchy of
1837-38. The evils of State-Churchism, in a young country for
which it was utterly unsuited, are pretty generally admitted. The
abuses of the then land-granting system in Upper Canada, and
the "prostitution, of the Royal prerogative, and the revenues of the
Crown for purely party purposes, cannot be justified. Political
tyranny is always hateful. But, notwithstanding all this, the
story-teller's impassioned and partisan treatment of the whole
subject is fairly open to criticism.
The author probably feels strongly, at all events he writes
strongly, indeed vehemently, in regard to these and many other
things which he passes in review. I do not at present question
his sincerity. He is a professional writer who lives by his pen,
and has, I believe, been a contributor to publications in the inter
est of all political parties. He is here professedly a Liberal, and
in espousing that view of the principles and issues involved,
Liberals will consider, he has taken the right side. It is very
doubtful if there will be the same unanimity of opinion in regard to
his judgment and. discretion as a writer. The complaint has been
made — and I have heard it made by intelligent persons holding
all sorts of political views — that there is little of the philosophy
of history in this narrative : that it lacks that judicial tone and
temper that are always befitting a historic pen ; that its author
appears rather as a hired advocate than an independent thinker

51
and writer ; and that a rancorous, bitter and vindictive spirit not
unfrequently mars its pages. Such a spirit in such a theme is not
ingratiating ; it does not woo conviction ; it is more apt to repel
than to persuade. In a work claiming to be historical, we expect
a thorough sifting and fair presentation of all the material facts,
un warped by prejudice or bias, and with a just regard to the cir
cumstances .and the polity of the time. We expect moderation of
tone, and, above all, perfect fairness and impartiality. None of
these is inconsistent with vigorous diction. There is no reason
why all this Story of the past should not be calmly told, even from
a Liberal point of view. At all events, there is no need for the
writer showing the hand of a specially retained advocate at nearly
every turn in his narrative. That sort of advocacy does not as a
rule make converts ; the sympathy which it wins is neither strong
nor lasting ; it attracts few recruits of promise ; it very often in
jures the cause which it is designed to serve. Hysterical screech
ing at effete political abuses never yet turned a vote worth having.
If it be true, as I understandits author insists, that such a Story
can be told only from a Reform standpoint, there is all the more
reason for doing so with equanimity. Just consideration of poli
tical antagonists, who have long since gone down to their graves,
is never thrown away ; venomous personal detraction is far from
seemly. THE OLIGARCHY.
It has been the fashion among extreme partisans to decry the
dominant party of Rebellion times as irredeemably bad, and to
stigmatize the faintest praise of them as rank heresy. Is not this
the creed of a bigot 1 It certainly proceeds from a mistaken idea
of the facts, and is no proof of undying devotion to the true faith.
A narrow spirit of intolerance and injustice is not Liberal ; just
we can at least afford to be. The system of Government which
then prevailed was unquestionably bad, and practices had grown
up, under the forms of law, that were extremely vicious. It was
a system, the full conception of which it is hard to grasp, living as
we now do in the hey-day of civil and religious liberty. It
was really the reign of military Governors, accustomed all their

52
lives to harsh military discipline, with little or no experience in
civil administration, and who were given the great powers and
responsibilities of civic rule, arbitrary and unrestrained, over the
Canadian people. For this the Robinsons, Hagermans, Strachans,
Boultons and others of that time were not responsible. The re
sponsibility lay with the Imperial authorities ; it was part and
parcel of Imperial policy. The Tory party in Upper Canada ac
cepted the system, and administered it as they found it. They
abused the power entrusted to them, but most men, even the
best of them, will do this when they get the opportunity.
They are more apt to abuse it in affairs of Government in which
there is so much at stake, and in which the combined influences of
self-interest are so often irresistible. There are some other tyran
nies quite as hateful as that of a political Oligarchy. In the sys
tem, such as it was, the leading Tories of that day had the fullest
faith ; they believed it was the best for the country ; as such it
had come down to them, and they regarded it as a trust to be
preserved and kept with all the power at their command. Mac
kenzie rather unsettled their minds on some of these points ; he
was one of the first to do so ; but the facts nevertheless are unde
niable. With all their faults the Tories of that day are entitled
to the credit of some good legislation, more, in fact, than is gen
erally supposed. No one but a blind, unreasoning partisan would
say otherwise. There were, too, amongst them many men of high
personal character, and unsullied private virtues. Mackenzie,
who knew them well and had no reason to love them, has left
behind him some generous testimony in their behalf. Mr. Dent
paints them always in the blackest colours, with scarce a single
redeeming trait. THE AUTHOR'S LIKES AND DISLIKES.
If this much may be said for political opponents, what
should be said for political friends who, under the cover of
sympathy for their principles and their cause, are pursued with
the shafts of calumny? In reading this narrative one cannot
repress the feeling that the author is very intense in his likes and
¦ dislikes. This idiosyncrasy — to use no harsher term — permeates

53
and colours the whole. The facts and evidence are digested,
adjusted and embellished accordingly ; the balance, which should
be fairly held, is often held very unfairly ; the scale is made to
kick the beam when it suits the purpose ; and there is little
scruple about using false weights when those of the standard
order might fail of the desired effect. In one chapter we find
the late Chief Justice Robinson, and the late Bishop Strachan,
compared to "half famished tigers of the jungle." In another
Gourlay 's description of the Bishop, as " a lying little fool of a
renegade Presbyterian; " is approvingly quoted. Here, there and
everywhere the most offensive epithets are applied to William
Lyon Mackenzie, while John Rolph is little short of an angel of
light. Hysteria is not history.
THE ASSUMPTIONS OF THE ONLY TRUE STORY-TELLER.
Of Mr. Dent's assumptions in the task he has undertaken, I
wish to say a few words. Of this he cannot complain. In his
prospectus of the Story, and in the Story itself, he has arrogated
to himself a very high place as a writer and authority on the
subject. He affirms that his is the only true narrative. He says
further that no accurate account of the movement has ever been
written, and that although Mr. Charles Lindsey's Life and Times
of Mackenzie " is a work of much value," it has a " strong bias."
Left me here say that I think the imputation of bias in Mr.
Lindsey's biography is undeserved, and I am certain it will not
be concurred in by intelligent persons who have read it. It
is well known that the author and the subject of his work differed
widely in their political views, but their personal and private
relations were necessarily most intimate. The biographer has
truly said that Mackenzie " never concealed his hand" to him.
Mr. Lindsey was, at the time of writing it, the editor of the
leading Conservative journal in Upper Canada, and, politically at
least, he had and could have no bias whatever in Mackenzie's
favour. If anything it was a bias the other way. One of the
highest compliments paid the work was that of a prominent
Liberal newspaper which praised its impartiality, and said that it
was impossible from its perusal to detect the politics of its author.

54
Sir Francis Hincks, no mean authority, considers it trustworthy.
In the " Reminiscences of his Public Life," he. says : " I have no
reason to doubt the general accuracy of the account given in
Lindsey's ' Life and Times of W. L. Mackenzie ' of the circum
stances which preceded the actual outbreak." And he straight
way proceeds to adopt these as strictly reliable. Mr. Dent might
have deserved equal credit if, like his historical predecessor, he
had simply stated facts and plain inferences from facts, and
modestly refrained from putting forth page after page of mere
opinions, in a large measure unsupported and unwarranted by the
general data. He should be the last man in the world to impute
bias of any sort to any previous narrator. His own book is
surcharged with that quality_f rom beginning to end. " Strong bias"
is one of its distinguishing and crowning characteristics.
THE AUTHOR'S SOURCES OF INFORMATION.
Mr. Dent also declares that, since the biography appeared, "much
additional light has been thrown upon the subject matter from
various sources." What that light is, the reader of this volume
will fail to discern. The effulgence shed by the author's pen is
not particularly bright or shining, in so far at least as new informa
tion is concerned. The real pith and marrow of the Story have
been long since given to the public Without the aid which he
has received in this way, his narrative would, I fear, be » sorry
production. Nor is he always as grateful as he should be in making
use of the labours of others. He speaks with contempt of Mac
kenzie's Sketches of Canada and the United States, but is not above
using them as an effective help in the compilation of his own work.
In resorting to old materials he has pursued two courses : he has
either elaborated the facts with most artistic tediousness, or has
coloured and distorted them to suit his own purpose. This is one
mode of writing history, but it is not the most meritorious one.
A writer in the Mail some time ago questioned the originality of
the Story on these very grounds, and, I think, with perfect fair
ness. " A Reformer," whose nom de plume was evidently an honest
one, mentioned a number of works, well known and easily acces
sible, to which Mr. Dent had recourse with the greatest freedom

55
for materials for his narrative. He complained, and with just
cause, of the author's manipulation of these as palpably onesided
and unfair. Mr. Dent was charged with concealing or suppress
ing important information set forth in those works, and with
making quotations from them for a partisan purpose. The accu
sation is, in my opinion, well founded. The writer might have
gone further. He might have shewn, as I shall show later on,
that the author of the Story has been guilty of what he has
unscrupulously charged Mackenzie with, viz.: of giving "various
and conflicting accounts " of the same transaction in Rebellion
history, and of imposing these on the public in each case as the
true version. For this sort of "additional light," I fancy the long-
suffering public will feel anything but grateful. Mr. Dent also
claims credit for having accumulated a mass of written informa
tion on the subject that is " not elsewhere to be found." As yet
we have seen very little of this, unless we except a mass of
opinions by the author, the most of which are quite unwarranted
by the facts. THE MACKENZIE PAPERS.,
Although Mr. Dent affects to attach little importance to the
Mackenzie papers, their great and permanent value as a historical
collection is unquestionable. Most competent judges have so
attested. The collection would fill a fair-sized room, and in Mac
kenzie's lifetime in the old Bond Street homestead, a single room
of fair dimensions was allotted to them. They were added to,
preserved and guarded by him with sacred care, and their arrange
ment and tabulation are most complete. He spent an hour or
two each day, even during his busiest moments, in this work, and
the result shews what a systematic worker he was, and how mar
vellous was his industry. An examination of these papers will
satisfy any intelligent person that there is a gr.eat deal of impor
tant information, bearing upon the Rebellion movement and subse
quent political events, which has never yet been disclosed. I
have, within the past two or three months, seen documents of a
most material nature relating to these which', I am sure, Mr. Dent
has never heard or even dreamt of. When his Story is finished,

56
publicity may very properly be given to these, and to much
more in the same connection. There is no person, I am as
sured, who more envies Mr. Lindsey the possession of those
papers than Mr. Dent. THE ROLPH " MEMORIAL."
Whatever merit may be claimed for the Rolph papers, and for
Rolph's " review of the facts and circumstances bearing upon the
rising," Mr. Dent is of course entitled to. Rolph has a right to
be heard even in his posthumous defence. How far it will redeem
his reputation, which he was unable to redeem in his lifetime,
remains to be seen. The " Review " will certainly lose nothing
in the hands of his panegyrist. In this critique I have no desire
to bear with undue severity upon Rolph ; but, it must be remem
bered, Mr. Dent has made him his hero, has contrasted him with
Mackenzie in the most invidious fashion, and has provoked the
most unsparing criticism of Rolph's character and career as a
public man. The author has in this way signally defeated
one of the main purposes — if not the only main purpose —
of his book. There would have been no strong desire to re-
arraign Rolph, and parade the guilt of his treachery, if he and
his principal associate had been treated with anything like
even-handed justice and open-handed equity. At all events,
under such circumstances, there is ample justification for plain
speaking, and, unlike Mr. Dent, I am under no obligation to
speak other than, plainly.
MR. DENT'S PRETENSIONS AND QUALIFICATIONS.
Mr. Dent himself does not mince matters in announcing his
call to the sacred office of a Rolphite missionary. He boldly
declares that the true Story of the Rebellion has never been told,
and that, through the pages of his revelation, the great truth will
be proclaimed for the first and only time.
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea, * * *

57
" The time has come," he says, and " the author of the present
work has undertaken to tell the Story." Judging by the first volume,
Mr. Dent's lofty pretensions are not likely to be sustained. The
reflecting reader of its 384 pages will hardly be prepared to admit
that the " aching void " in historical literature has been filled, or
that either the time has come, or the man. The author's pretensions
would scarcely be admitted even with a better imprimatur than
he can boast of. Be this as it may, what are his credentials as
the sole and only bearer of this message of. truth ? He is still a
young man, and his life and experience as a practising attorney
at the quiet little village of Ayr, and afterwards at Toronto, did
not, as far. as I can learn, imbue him deeply with the lore of
Rebellion history. Neither did his long subsequent residence in
England. His knowledge of public men as such is plainly very
shallow ; of intuitive knowledge he has evidently little or none.
His acquaintance with politics is in no sense practical ; it is book
knowledge pure and simple, and seemingly ill digested at that.
Some of the theories of legislative and party government, which
he has propounded, are of the crudest possible kind. A young
men's political club would tear them into tatters in less time than
it takes to formulate them. Mr. Dent is not and never has been
a politician. He seems incapable of comprehending the true
meaning of the term, or what is implied in it, in the wear and
tear of rugged political life. Yet, in this Story, he assumes to be
a politician prescient and far seeing to the last degree, and to pro
nounce upon the minutest phases of politics, and the judgment
and sagacity of politicians, fifty years ago, with absolute infalli
bility. He throws himself into the struggle with all the self-
confidence of a veteran diplomat, and, at the same time, with all
the vim and heat of the keenest combatant in the fray. There
are able living politicians in Canada, and more experienced political
writers than he, who would hesitate to do this. Mr. Dent does
not hesitate a moment. The proverbial folly of rushing in where
angels durst not, is no part of his creed. He rushes in headlong,
and hits out right and left — often in the blindest and wildest
sort of way. He probably thinks this is doing the thing " with
out fear or favour." just as he thinks that an entirely different

version of some well ascertained fact is an evidence of original
ity. This is surely a self-delusion. It leads into all sorts of
historical pit-falls, and into some of these Mr. Dent has certainly
stumbled. With the public men of his Story Mr. Dent's acquaintance is
clearly of one kind : it is that of a book-worm. This may be
estimable enough, but it does not entitle him to speak with the
unerring wisdom which he assumes. Although he is the first
missionary of the tru^h, he will hardly claim to be inspired. He
has probably, like many other people, read and heard a good deal
about those of whom, in these pages, he writes with such self-
contained assurance. I question if he ever knew or spoke to any
one of them. He has, in short, had no means or opportunities
not open to hundreds of other intelligent persons, and certainly
none phenomenally favourable, of forming a judgment upon those
leaders of rival parties long since departed. Yet he presumes to
pass the. most sweeping judgments upon them — rupon the minutest
points in their public and private life, with all the wisdom of a
Solomon. Less fallible men than Mr. Dent would have thought
twice before doing this. His long sojourn in England, amongst
contributors to a press that is notoriously ignorant of Canadian
affairs, might have made him more chary of vaulting at one bound
into the judgment seat of a court of final appeal in Canadian
history. > I respectfully submit that His Lordship in so doing
is labouring under a dangerous hallucination. Such a court is
not yet constituted, and is not likely to be for some time. In
seeking to create it in his own person, Mr. Dent is, to say
the least, presumptuous. OPINIONS OF THE BOOK.
There are hundreds of persons living, whose judgments, as to
the men and events of '37, are of infinitely more value than Mr.
Dent's. During the period in question they knew the leading men
on both sides personally very well, and, some of them, intimately —
knew their true characters, what they really were in themselves,
and not merely by reputation, knew them and their manner of living
and acting under all sorts of conditions and circumstances. Many

59
of these, of course, are now old men ; but, like all old men, their
recollections of those times are far more vivid and reliable than
of the men and things of recent years. I have seen and spoken
with a number of such persons, and have letters from some of
them, since this book was published. Their estimate of Mr. Dent's
work is not flattering to his judgment and discretion as a writer
of the history of the period. With some divergencies of opinion
on some minor points, I have found them singularly unanimous
in this : that the author does not appear to grasp the real state
of 'society, or to discern the true force of £he under currents of
politics, of the time ; that, in the purely descriptive parts of his
Story, there is too much straining after mere theatrical effect that
is false and delusive; and that the analyses of the "personalities"
of the Story are highly exaggerated, and very much overdone.
I find this opinion strongly prevailing, not only as to Mackenzie
and Rolph, but as to some others on the same side, and also as to
the leading spirits of the Tory party of that day. I have the
best reasons for saying that Mr. Dent has been plainly told this,
and much more in the same strain, by not a few who are not
unfriendly to him.
Mr. Dent's capabilities as the only true story-teller are evinced
in still another way. His conception and discrimination of evi
dence, for one who has had some professional training as a lawyer,
are confused in the extreme. He violates its commonest rules
repeatedly. The best available evidence should alone be admis
sible, yet he admits mere gossip and hearsay, where there is
no necessity for it, where better evidence is unquestionably
to be had, or where the introduction of anything but the best
evidence is contrary to the plainest principles of justice. There
is probably room for considerable divergence of opinion on
some points ; as to others, there is room for none. As to
all classes of evidence, the impression left of Mr. Dent's judicial
faculty is not a favourable one. In view of this his bare
opinions must be taken just for what they are worth. To
say nothing of his honesty and good faith as an author, they
will carry weight in proportion to his capabilities for forming

60
them, and it is not too much to aver that these have been far
more limited, and far less trustworthy, than he would have
the public believe. DRAMATIC STORY-TELLING.
To all this, however, Mr. Dent can put in an unanswerable
plea. He can properly contend that we are expecting too much
from this Story in the way of historic fidelity. Stories are never
absolutely true to fact ; they do not pretend to be ; they would
be very poor stories if' they were. If the romance were omitted,
their distinctive feature would be gone. They would be just the
play of Hamlet with the Prince nowhere in the cast. Mr. Dent's
is intended to be a highly dramatic Story ; he means it to be that
or nothing. Poor Gourlay, for example, is kept in theatrical
tortures before the reader through the whole of one blessed
chapter. It is a positive relief when the coup de theatre is at an
end, and the "Banished Briton," who has been going through a
banishing process page after page, as cruelly slow as the rack, of
the Inquisition and just as excruciating, is really banished at last.
The intensely dramatic or sensational, either in prose or verse, is
seldom consistent with either accuracy or truth in narrative ;
playing with imaginative facts is quite permissible. In the
author's dramatis persona of the Rebellion, Mackenzie is the
sham hero of shady antecedents. His appearance on the stage
is generally the signal for manifestations of disapprobation or
or contempt. Rolph is the star of the company, the gentlemanly
man of the world, wrho is always keeping the " snarling little up
start " in order, and redeeming, by his delicate sense of honour,
the merits of the play. Some allowance, therefore, must be made
for the imaginative in Mr. Dent's Story, especially as the story
teller is constructing new characters and new plots out of material
worn to the warp and half a century old.
THE ROLPH BRIEF.
A master pen has written that, although a historian "must
possess an imagination, yet he must control it so absolutely as to
content himself with the materials which he finds, and refrain

61
from supplying deficiencies by additions of his own." "He must
also possess sufficient self command to abstain from casting his
facts in the mould of his hypothesis." These canons are suggestive
in the present case. Mr. Dent has a vivid imagination, but, in
so far as Mackenzie and Rolph are concerned, he makes no attempt
to control it. He draws upon it for his facts with the greatest
self-complacency. He has put before him the unenviable task of
degrading Mackenzie in popular estimation, and of exalting Rolph
as the great hero of his epic, and the incarnation of all the reform
virtues of the time ; and in this he gives his imagination full
play. He is not satisfied with what any honest searcher after
truth can easily find in the way of materials. When deficiencies
are wanting to make the hero — and those who knew the man
know how many there are — he is ever ready with his imaginative
additions, and " piles on the agony " to an excruciating extent.
"The mould of his hypothesis" has been contrived with the same
set purpose, and he casts his facts in it accordingly. In a
word, as I have stated once before, " Mr. Dent has accepted a
brief as a professional writer in the Rolph interest, with all
that that means, and he intends to do his best to earn his
retainer." Of anything like mere mercenary motives, I have
already acquitted him, but, of the employment of his pen on
the Rolph side there is abundant proof, and will be, I ven
ture to say, stronger proof still. Mr. Dent has a perfect
right to do this, only let him do it in a fair, open and manly
way. This he is not doing when he is falsifying the record,
and withholding evidence that is notorious to the world. He
is not doing it when striving for » snap verdict by perversions
of fact and misrepresentation of the truth. He may suppress
or distort the testimony, but it is becoming clearer every day
that he cannot pack the jury.
It is not my present purpose to vindicate .William Lyon
Mackenzie. That, I imagine, is not required as against the author
of this Story. I desire rather to point out to my brother Liberals,
and to the Liberal press, the false impression which has been
created with respect to a book which, it was believed, would voice
their opinions in regard to the two " Fathers of Reform " above

62
mentioned. 1 am a Liberal myself, and have been all my life,
and I must confess to a feeling of painful disappointment that
any public writer claiming the name, should deliberately seek to
fasten odium and dishonour upon a man who waged a long and
hard life battle for Liberal principles, who suffered so much in their
behalf, and who sacrificed his all in the struggle. Had this
unsavoury task been performed by some one with the "fiendish
and unrelenting spirit " of the Family Compact, we should have
been less surprised. But proceeding, as it does, from a professed
friend, who can wonder that it has roused indignation and
resentment ? The flimsy veil of friendship is easily penetrated.
If John Rolph is to be made the great hero of the epic, no
superior, no equal, must be brooked near his throne. The ground
must be carefully prepared beforehand ; mine and countermine
must be insidiously run ; reputations must be sapped by every
device of literary art ; this one and the other of the old
leaders of reform must be belittled or passed over with a
mild platitude of praise ; above all Mackenzie, who thoroughly
unmasked the hero, must have his influence broken and his
testimony destroyed., Then shall the way be fairly opened
for the grand coup in the second volume of the Story when
the unmasker shall be covered with ignominy, and the un
masked shall be completely rehabilitated. Such a consumma
tion is no doubt ardently desired, but I am confident it will
never be reached. It would be an everlasting disgrace to the
Liberal party if it were.
PROMISES AND PERFORMANCES.
When this work first appeared a number of Reform news
papers, looking at it in its broad outlines, received it with
considerable favour. It met their views as to some things, and, I
am free to admit that, to a limited extent, it always will. As to
some others, I am satisfied it did not, and that it never will. To
Mackenzie, it is not too much to say, a large and generous measure
of justice was due, and it was confidently expected that this
would be ungrudgingly given. This expectation has been far from
met. Assuming, as Reform journalists had a right to assume,

63
that the book would deal fairly by Mackenzie, some few were
ready at the first blush to say so, and to pay the author some polite
compliments which he really did not deserve. In most cases,
doubtless, opinions were expressed without a careful perusal of the
book. A good deal was taken for granted; its misrepresentations
were inconceivable by honest men. Although Mr. Dent was not
known as a historical expert, he was generally supposed to be a
gentleman of Liberal instincts. He had been connected in a sort of
way with Liberal journalism, just as he had been connected, in a
similar way, with journalism that was not Liberal. Some of his
previous essays in literature had prepared the public to believe
that his historical treatment of the Upper Canadian Rebellion
would be at least fair to all the leaders of Reform in those early
years. I venture to say that nine-tenths of those who revere the"
memories of the men of '37, subscribed for the book, in the
implicit trust that this would be done. They have been egreg-
iously deceived. It was also supposed that there would be
much new information, fresh contributions to the history of
the period, and that, although old facts would be shown in a
new light, and old familar figures in a different framework,
the facts would not be distorted, nor the figures discoloured.
It was naturally thought that no author of honest purpose,
and desiring to give a true and faithful record of the period
in question, would strive to bestow honour where it was not
due, to disparage, depreciate or defame where it was ill de
served, to extol one historical character — and he of all others
the least worthy of it — at the expense of another, and to be
little and sneer at patriotic self-sacrifice as if it were made
for the mere sake of vulgar " notoriety " instead of from the
highest motives, and the most unselfish aims. In all this, and
much more besides, the readers of this book have been grievously
disappointed. THE AUTHOR'S " DEAD SET " ON MACKENZIE.
Ill dealing with individuals especially, Mr. Dent nearly always
flies to extremes, and in regard to no two " personalities," as he
calls them, is this more, noticeable than William Lyon Mackenzie

64
and John Rolph. He is compelled to give Mackenzie some
credit as a popular leader and public man, but it is given
very half-heartedly, and in the most stinted measure. Mr.
Dent seems to be always trying " how not to do it." His
portraiture of him as a whole is ¦most unfair and untruthful,
while, in some respects, it is positively offensive. No person
can peruse this volume without feeling that there is through
out a decidedly strong tone of depreciation of Mackenzie at
almost every step in his career. He is contrasted with Bald
win, Bidwell, Rolph, and others, with the most ingenious in-
vidiousness, and " damned with faint praise " in nearly every
other paragraph. His motives, actions and conduct are con
tinually placed in the most sinister light, and his influence is
minimized at almost every turn in the struggle in which he
was engaged. His shortcomings are magnified to the last de
gree — pourtrayed as the ruling passions of his life ; his virtues
are either concealed altogether, or are darkly shaded by his
shortcomings. Is this mean sort of microscopic portraiture
fair, or just, or honest? Who of our public men, living or
dead, could stand such a test? We are told that it was the
persecution to which he was subjected that alone made Mac
kenzie, and that if the leaders of the reactionary party had
treated him with contempt, he would have been a political
nobody, would speedily have found his level, and would have
sunk into his native obscurity ! Yet even reading between the
lines, in Mr. Dent's partisan narrative, and supplying mentally
the omissions which he has not the common honesty to furnish,
the truth is not wholly hidden away. Amidst the devious
windings of the Story we discern traces of the well known his
torical fact that the Oligarchy dreaded Mackenzie more than
any man living, and that they appreciated to the fullest extent
his widely felt power and influence in exposing the dominant
misrule of the time, and rousing popular indignation against
it. Even Mackenzie's personal and " social " standing, con
nections and surroundings are made the subject of a species of
criticism which no one with the instincts of a gentleman would

65
resort to, and which it is difficult to speak of in terms of polite
ness. One would suppose that the author had some "social"
grudge to gratify against a man who was possessed of the most
kindly and generous nature, and the warmest sympathies. Mean
spirited sneers like these show the " true inwardness " of the
writer. As compared with Rolph — who was a traitor to Mac
kenzie, Baldwin and their friends, if any man ever was — Mac
kenzie, it will be seen, always suffers. In proportion as Rolph
is sought to be exalted, Mackenzie is sought to be lowered,
in public estimation. In short, it is very evident to every fair
minded reader that no opportunity is lost to place Mackenzie in a
false and unfavourable light before the world, to disparage his life
work in the cause of good government, and to detract from the
generous meed of praise which he should receive from all who are
now reaping the benefits which he helped to secure for them and
their children. A " BILL OF PARTICULARS."
I have said that Mr. Dent has given Mackenzie some credit.
So he has, but it is seemingly dragged out of him as if to preserve
a semblance of historical decency. " It must be admitted that •
he possessed considerable aptitude " for journalism ; " that he
was sincere in his advocacy of reform, must in all fairness be
conceded," is the style in which this is invariably done. Any
thing and everything else, when boiled down, is reduced to "good
intentions " and nothing more. We have all heard of the place
that is " paved with good intentions," and Mr. Dent's generosity,
in according even this much to Mackenzie, will be duly appreciated.
" His itch for notoriety must always be considered in reviewing
and estimating his actions," says Mr. Dent. No patriotic
endeavour, no long years of toil for better things, that was not
tainted with the mere vulgar love of being simply notorious !
What a liberal tribute to one whose whole life was a witness
against a. motive so grovelling ! But the author has it in his
brief, and why should he not callously blurt it forth ?
Then we are told of Mackenzie's " chief motives " and his
political views when, in May, 1824, he started The Colonial
5

66
Advocate. It is said that one of his principal motives was that
he " might command anything within the power of his party to
grant;" but, the writer adds, " the labourer is worthy of his hire."
Such an imputation of self seeking and sordidness could only
come from one who is either incapable of understanding an
unselfish action, or bent on decrying the unselfishness of
Mackenzie's whole life. Speaking afterwards when he was in
exile of that early time, he himself said : " Other men had opposed
and been converted by them (the dominant party). At nine-and-
twenty I might have united with them, but chose rather to join
the oppressed, nor have I ever regretted that choice, or wavered
from the object of my early pursuit." Mackenzie might have had
anything he wanted from the Family Compact had he even winked
at public abuses. While in England, in August, 1832, as the
accredited agent of the petitioners to the Imperial Govern
ment against existing grievances in Upper Canada, he was
offered a most lucrative office. One of the grievances com
plained of was the refusal of the Canadian Government to ac
count for the revenue of the Post Office department. Mackenzie
had several personal interviews with Lord Goderich, the Colonial
Minister, as to this and other subjects of complaint. At one of
these the Minister proposed to. divide the department ami its man
agement into Wo sections, the Eastern and Western, and to give
Mackenzie control of the Western section with all its emolu
ments. This handsome offer was promptly declined. Mackenzie
said, " So far as I am concerned, the arrangement would be a
beneficial one, as I could not fail to be personally much benefitted
by it ; but your Lordship must see that the evil I complain of
would be perpetuated, instead of being remedied. I must, there
fore, decline the offer." His acceptance of it would have given
him an income of $7,500 a year. How many men could have
resisted a bait so tempting? And long years afterwards, when
it was " within the power of his party to grant " whatever he
desired, he would accept nothing. Several times he was offered
offices which would have placed himself and his family in
affluence. He firmly rejected all such offers as calculated to
shackle his independence. This he valued more than all the

67
patronage of Governments or parties. He was unpurchaseable
even by his own friends, and was a life-long foe to venality in
every form. He might have bequeathed to his children the
wealth which the world values, but he preferred to leave them
"that better part," the legacy of an honest name.
Mackenzie's principles and opinions.
As to his opinions when he founded the Advocate, Mr. Dent
is just as veracious. He says that "many of them were what would
now be considered Toryish, and out of date." This is one of
many historical inaccuracies that might be pointed out in this
Story. Mackenzie, as the Advocate shows, favoured the complete
independence of members of the Legislature with respect to the
government of the day, the independence of the Judges and their
appointment for life free from executive control, an Executive
p assessing the confidence of the people's representatives, religious
equality, the abolition of primogeniture, responsible government
to the fullest extent, a union of all the British North American
provinces, the establishment of a Provincial University free from
sectarian control, etc. Are these " Toryish " views ? On the con
trary they are now accepted by men of all parties ; they are uni
versally recognized as part of our present system, and we are
certainly indebted not a little to Mackenzie for his early, earnest
and persistent advocacy of them. The only question on which he
was in the slightest degree " Toryish " was the Clergy Reserves
question-. As to that he did not for a time hold the voluntary
view. He believed in setting apart a portion of the public
demesne for the support of religion — of the clergy, not of one
church but of every church. He expressed a hope that a law
would be enacted " by which the ministers of every body of
professing Christians, being British subjects, should receive equal
benefits from these Clergy Reserves." When he saw that the sta
tute creating the Reserves was being construed in favour of the
Anglican body alone, he changed his opinions on the question, but
it was the only prominent question upon which he did change —
Mr. Dent to the contrary. As to the University, he strongly
supported Bishop Strachan in its establishment, but protested

68
against its being sectarian, and predicted that it would fail in its
objects if it were. " The first newspaper," he says, "I ever issued
was a protest against binding down our projected University to the
dogmas of any sect : whether of Oxford, Edinburgh, Rome or
Moscow." His predictions as to its failure as a sectarian institu
tion were literally verified, and, a quarter of a century afterwards,
the University was reformed in accordance with the principles
which he laid down in 1824.
HIS " CONCEPTIONS OF STATESMANSHIP."
Mr. Dent also says that he had " the most hiisty conceptions of
statesmanship." There were unfortunately few opportunities for
reformers in those days to display statesmanly qualities. Mr.
Dent has described them as "the maimed and bleeding under dogs
in the fight among that crowd of venal and merciless sycophants."
There is no need to show that Mackenzie's " conceptions " were
statesmanlike. If they were not, the subsequent leaders of
parties would not have adopted them as they did. It certainly
.says something for his prescience and farsightedness as a public
man, that he was one of the earliest advocates of British American
Union, and it is to his credit that, in the Advocate of June 24th,
1824, in an article headed "A Confederation of the British North
American Colonies," he outlined the very plan of carrying it out
that was afterwards adopted. Mackenzie had also a statesman
like " conception " of the commercial legislation best suited for
Canada. In the parliamentary session of 1836, he carried an
Address to His Majesty on the subject of the restraints imposed
upon the Province by the. commercial legislation of the mother
country. At that time all British goods, passing through the
United States to this country, were subjected to American duty.
The Address prayed that negotiations might be opened up with
the Government at Washington to remove this restriction. The
East India Company also enjoyed a prohibitive monopoly by which
tea could not be imported into Canada vyi the United States.
The abolition of this unjust monopoly was also demanded.
Canadian wheat was then taxed twenty-five cents per bushel on
its admission to the American markets. Our lumber was also

69
heavily taxed, while these and some other articles, imported from
the States here, were not dutiable at all. The Address pointed out
a number of such commercial anomalies, and prayed for their
removal by the means above indicated. Mackenzie was indeed at
that early time the foremost advocate of reciprocity of trade
between the two countries, contending that the principle should
be extended to all articles which were admitted free of duty from
our neighbours' markets into our own. He in fact anticipated,
far in advance of his contemporaries, the Reciprocity Treaty of
1854. All this is deserving of special mention by reason of the
universal importance that attaches to our trade relations at the
present time. Many other illustrations might be given, if any such
were necessary, of his broad, statesmanlike " conceptions " of
legislation. A FEARLESS REFORM JOURNALIST.
Mr. Dent is equally unjust to Mackenzie as one of the first and
most fearless of reform journalists. He says his Advocate "was
personal journalism with a vengeance." Nothing could be further
from the truth than this, and the changes that are rung upon it
all through the volume. It would be more candid to say, as Sir
Henry Lytton Bulwer says of Cobbett, that Mackenzie " re
presented journalism, and fought the fight of journalism against
_ authority when it was still a doubt which would gain the day."
There were then enormous public abuses in Upper Canada, and
he assailed them and their authors on public grounds, and in
severe terms, as any honest journalist would do. I have ex
amined a file of the Advocate and nothing is plainer than that
he was anxious to avoid personalities, and only resorted to
them under the most extreme provocation. In one of the first
numbers he says : " When I am reduced to personalities, I will
bring the Advocate to a close." He distinguished between the
private and political character of his opponents, was never the
ajgressor in personal abuse, and when he was made the subject of
it himself, complained of it rather in a spirit of injury. The
Government newspapers of that time teem with the grossest
personal attacks on him to which the reader of the Advocate wil

70
find no replies whatever. Nor was he vindictive either in word or
action. He very properly sued the genteel roughs who destroyed
his types and press, and had them mulcted in exemplary damages,
but although strongly urged to do so, he would not prosecute
them criminally. When they were prosecuted, at the instiga
tion of other parties, he stated in the witness box that he did not
approve of the proceedings, and he hoped the punishment would
be nominal. A few years afterwards, when the tyranny of his
repeated expulsions from the Legislature roused popular excite
ment and indignation to the highest pitch, he counselled calmness
and moderation. " If public opinion," he said in the Advocate,
" will not avenge our cause, violence and tumult will not help us."
I have heard old politicians, who .knew him well, say that his self-
control all through that crisis, and at other times of great popular
commotion, was something remarkable. He was a generous oppo
nent as well. If he was unsparing of public wrongdoers, he was no
less frankly appreciative of their good qualities. As a journalist
he frequently spoke of Governor Maitland, Macaulay, Robinson,
Boulton and others, his most bitter antagonists, in the kindliest
terms. In fact on one or two occasions he espoused their cause
and opposed Rolph, who, he thought, was unnecessarily severe
upon them. His fairness to the Government led to a personal
estrangement between himself and Mr. Dent's hero. This
thorough independence of Mackenzie, all through his public life, is
constantly misrepresented by the author as fickleness, obstinacy,
lack of judgment, want of discretion, and every other human
weakness. Following out one of the main purposes of his narrative, the
author belittles the influence of the Advocate from the outset.
He only admits a bare possibility of its contributing, in January,
1825, "to the election of Mr. Willson, the Reform candidate for
the Speakership in the Assembly." Mr. Dent did not always
think so. In his sketch of " Toronto : Past and Present," in the
Memorial Volume, he says : " When Parliament met on the ,
1 1th of January, 1 825, it was evident that a great change had
been wrought in public opinion, and it was pretty generally
believed that the philippics of the Advocate had had something to

71
do with bringing about the change. The Compact found itself in
a minority." Although very coyly put, there is a strong sugges
tion here of Mackenzie's power as a journalist. - The Advocate had
been only two months in existence in Toronto when the House
met, and only eight months in existence altogether. Mr. Dent's
story-telling discrepancies, as we shall see, are of frequent occur
rence, especially where Mackenzie is concerned. They are one of
many phases of his general unfairness. Wherever he has a choice
of two aspects of a public transaction that affects Mackenzie —
which is not often — he is very ready to choose the one that is
least favourable. He never gives him the benefit of a reasonable
doubt, and not unfrequently 'where there is no doubt at all, and
no reason for critical censoriousness, he will be found playing his
old game of cynical depreciation. He speaks of Mackenzie's
" holding some of his opponents up to public ridicule " in his
newspaper, as if it were a breach of every article in the moral
law. Ridicule, as a journalistic weapon, never seems to have
entered Mr. Dent's head. Mr. Dent is not a humourist. Nor
does he appreciate humour in others. He delights in telling us
that Rolph had scarce an atom of " frolicsomeness or fun " in him,
and that he rarely indulged in "hearty laughter." His book, I
need hardly say, is not a funny book in that sense ; but it is a very
funny book otherwise. The merest glint of humour would have
been an oasis in its desert of ***** jars,
Suspicions, quarrels, reconcilements, wars ;
but there is none. The whole Story is about as genial as a
butt of white wine vinegar. SOME WANTON SLANDERS.
In the same strain the writer elsewhere says : " The instability
of his (Mackenzie's) opinions was one of his most dangerous char
acteristics, and this alone marked him out as unfit to be trusted
of others." In another place his opinions are spoken of as being
with the guidance "as changeable as the hue of the chameleon."
This only shows " how unfit to be trusted " is Mr. Dent himself
in criticizing. There probably never was a man in public life in

72
Canada who had more decided and unwavering views on public
affairs. It was the soundness and honesty of his opinions, and
his steadfastness in maintaining them, that gave him his wide
popularity, and made him the power he was in the country.
What is more, he knew his power and "was self-confident in his
assertion of it. Few men had a quicker and deeper insight into
the influences that controlled public opinion. Yet, according to
this profound critic, '' Mackenzie, from his cradle to his grave, was
never fit to walk alone and without guidance through any great
emergency ! " This grim piece of humour is refreshing. If that
"extraordinary personality" and "strong man," John Rolph,
had only been by his side, how majestic would have been his
strides through life's emergencies ! Mr. Dent next has a fling at
Mackenzie's truthfulness and veracity. H e is, by the way, very
ready to accept these when.it answers his purpose. He defends'
Bidwell, one of his political pets, from the charge of complicity
in the Rebellion, and virtually rests his defence on a statement
made by Mackenzie, who simply said that Bidwell was not. in
volved as far as he knew. But elsewhere, in a spiteful little foot
note, we are told that " Mackenzie's unsupported testimony, more
especially as to matters in any way coming within the scope of
politics, is of very little value." A complimentary remark about
Rolph is also quoted, and it is said, in so many words, that Mac
kenzie's word is not to be " credited." In another place he is
charged with making statements which he must have known
" had no shadow of foundation in truth."
The author's object in this species of defamation is obvious
enough. One of the blackest spots in Rolph's record was his
traitorous conduct in the flag of truce affair. Mackenzie's testimony
against him is overwhelmingly strong. If Mackenzie can only be
discredited generally, the process of whitewashing the hero will be
comparatively easy. Of all the writers on tlie period in question,
Mr. Dent stands alone in the utterance of such reckless slanders.
There is not a man living, whose opinion is worth anything as to
the events of that time, who will give them the slightest credence.
Statements so audacious and so wide of the truth can scarcely fail
to destroy confidence in the trustworthiness of his authorship.

73

" NON-PARTISAN " CRITICISM.

In the general election of 1828, Mackenzie was returned for
the county of York, and Mr. Dent, who gets bolder and less
scrupulous as the Story progresses, delivers himself as follows :
"He (M.) displayed precisely the same characteristics as a legislator
that he had displayed as the conductor of a newspaper — great
energy and vigilance, accompanied by a critical and fault-finding
spirit, and an almost entire absence of tact and discretion. He
gave wanton and unnecessary offence to those who differed from
him in opinion, not only on important political questions, but even
on comparatively insignificant matters of every day occurrence.
His coadjutors found that, independently of the sincerity or
insincerity of his intentions, his judgment was not to be trusted.
He could be misled by any ignis fatuus that displayed a bright
light, and was led into many a Serbonian bog from which he was
not extricated without serious difficulty. Some men have an
unerring instinct which, even in the absence of calm judgment or
mature reflection, commonly leads them in the right path.
Mackenzie's first conceptions, on the contrary, were almost
invariably erroneous ; and he had a perverse habit of frequently
clinging to an idea once formed, even when experience and
deliberation had proved it to be unsound. * * * In justice to
others it becomes highly necessary to form a correct estimate of
his personality. This is all the more essential from the fact that
he himself at different times gave various and conflicting accounts
of the episode with which his name is inseparably blended, which
accounts have hitherto been the only sources of information drawn
upon by so-called historians. All the references to the Upper
Canadian Rebellion to be found in current histories are trace
able, directly or indirectly, to Mackenzie himself, and all are
built upon false hypotheses and perverted representations of
events. To Mackenzie, more than to any other person, or to
all other persons combined, are to be attributed all the worst
consequences which flowed from that feebly-planned and ill-
starred movement," etc.

74

A FEW HISTORIC VAGARIES.
All this is in the author's brief, and he reels ^it off with the
flippancy of a school boy. I had always supposed that a "critical
and fault finding spirit " is what leaders of a Parliamentary
Opposition usually display. If Mr. Dent had been reading the
Parliamentary news during the past few years, instead of digging
for slanders amongst the Rolph papers, he would have found this
out. Mackenzie's " entire absence of tact and discretion," and
his "coadjutors" (alias Rolph's) distrust of his "judgment,"
were simply his indocility to the great man. He did not always
agree with Rolph, and sometimes, as we have seen, he opposed
him. The hero had a profound sense of his own superior wisdom,
and was not very tolerant of those who questioned it. Mackenzie
was not alone in the belief that Rolph was not a Solon ; Rolph
found he had always an independent mind of his own. Why
should Mackenzie yield his political conscience to a man, who
was not his leader, in any matter in which there was room for an
honest difference of opinion ? There was surely no want of tact
or discretion in holding to his own view. The author blames
Mackenzie for his tenacity in clinging to his opinions ; elsewhere,
as will be remembered, he condemns him for his chameleon-like
changeableness. Which is the true story ? And, after all, is Mr.
Dent not the real chameleon ? He ought to know that Mackenzie
was, from the moment he first entered public life, an independent
Liberal in the true sense of the term. He chafed under the
servility of party in minor matters, although no man was ever
more staunch and devoted in his attachment to Liberal principles.
The author's men of " unerring instinct " who always go right is
just another synonyme for Rolph. He is the perfect public man.
Mackenzie's " perverse habit of clinging to an idea " that was
" unsound " was well exemplified later on in regard to the
Municipal Loan Fund scheme. He stood alone in the Legislature
in his opposition to that short-sighted and mischievous piece of
policy, and " experience proved " that he was right and his
" coadjutors " wrong. He imperilled his popularity in so doing,
but he had the nerve to do an unpopular thing when he felt the

75
occasion demanded it. The "justice to others" that the author
refers to, is only a periphrasis for justice to, or rather white-w ash
ing of, the hero. If that immaculate being is ever to be rehabili
tated, it must be at the expense of Mackenzie and at any cost.
THE "SO-CALLED HISTORIANS."
The " so-called historians " are next combed down. It seems
that all those who have written anything about the Rebellion,
during the past fifty years, are all wrong. Although they per
sonally mingled with the living actors in it on both sides, and
informed their minds by intercourse with them, and although they
searched all the available records of the movement, they don't
know anything about it. Their " hypotheses " are all " false," and
their " representations perverted," i. e., the hypotheses 'and repre
sentations that Rolph sold his friends, and that his friends knew
he did, and said so. Mr. Dent, the new and resplendent star in
the historic firmament, is now forthwith to shine. He is to be
the historian par excellence, the real " Daniel come to judgment,"
who will straighten out those horrible hypotheses and perversions
of events, and make " the crooked places straight, and the rough
places smooth " — for Rolph. How lovely ! How grateful, too,
" the so-called historians " and everybody else should be that the
dawn of true history is at hand, that the scales will once for all
fall from their eyes, and that their moral and political blindness
and obliquity of vision will be for ever removed ! It is, to say
the least, strange that for nearly half a century Mackenzie's
" various and conflicting accounts of the episode " should have so
imposed on " the so-called historians " that they all agree in their
versions of it. What a lot of simple-minded innocents they
were, or what a historic conjuror Mackenzie must have been, to
have been able to make the false true, or the true false, according
to his own sweet will and pleasure ?
Mackenzie's and rolph's responsibility.
To Mackenzie more than all others combined "are to be
attributed all the worst consequences " of the movement. The
Rolph brief again. What these consequences wer6, that made

76
them any worse than those usually following an unsuccessful
insurrection, the author does not tell us. They were no worse
than the results in Lower Canada, and nothing to be compared to
those in the Great North-West. Rolph was the adviser-in-chief ;
Mackenzie acted in conjunction with him and others ; he could
not act alone ; and the event of failure must have been fully con
sidered by all of them alike. Why make Mackenzie the only
scape-goat ? The brief does not contain the great fact that Rolph
was the Executive, the real head of the insurrection — the one man
whose orders were strictly carried out even to changing the day
for the rising, and who, for that very reason, is more responsible
for "the worst consequences" than any one else. The change of
day was generally considered a grave error, whatever might have
been the ultimate issue. As to that we need not speculate. At
all events, was not a man like Rolph, who was most zealous in
enticing others into the revolt, equally responsible with Mackenzie ?
Was he not even more responsible for the consequences when he
not only gave no assistance to Mackenzie in operations which he
advised, but actually made such operations a foregone, calamitous
defeat by the very advice which Mackenzie followed. The " worst
consequences " plea is all moonshine. When the movement failed
there were many very ready to throw the whole odium of failure
on Mackenzie. This is what usually happens in such cases. In
Mackenzie's case, it was unjust ; he did not deserve it. He at
least had the courage of his convictions ; he was in the field at the
head of his men, where Rolph should have been if he had had a
particle of heroism in his nature. Rolph promised to be there but
broke faith with his allies and followers, as he did with Baldwin,
the tried friend who trusted him. He had not the pluck to show
himself, and while Mackenzie and his friends were impatiently
awaiting his coming, he was playing loyalist in the city, and
running to and fro with a flag of truce in the devil's service.
" always tittle-tattle."
One of Mr. Dent's favourite weapons of detraction, and, as I
have also learned, a fertile source of his historical data, is what
Lady M. W. Montagu calls " always tittle-tattle." In estimating

77
Mackenzie's " personality " he is very fond of retailing tittle-tattle
talks and, calling these "testimony," "the conviction of Mac
kenzie's contemporaries," " of those most favourably disposed,"
holding " most intimate relations," "bound to him by close ties,"
etc. He gives no names for an obviously good reason. One of
these convenient tattlers is made to say : — " I knew him
intimately from his boyhood, and I am compelled to say that,
whenever he was in the least excited, he acted like a spoiled child.
He underwent no change in this respect, and was the same in
youth, manhood and old age. A more unfit person to be entrusted
with the management of any great enterprise, or with the control
of his fellow creatures, I can hardly conceive." And Mr. Dent
calls this idle gossip history ! It is as likely as not a concoc
tion, more or less, of the author, but, assuming it to have been
said at all, was there ever before a book dignified as historical
that traduced a public man in such a fashion ? Yet I am told,
on good authority, that an important part of the story is made up
of information acquired from just such sources. Fancy any work,
seriously called by the author a history, founded in any material
part on the half a century old gossip of the streets ! Were I to
apply the same kind of criticism to the fictions of this narrative,
the result would be infinitely nearer the truth, and far less
complimentary. a "bit o' havering" on party strategy.
In the chapter on " Parliamentary Privilege " the author gives
us what, to use a Scotch phrase, may be called a " muckle bit o'
havering." He bewails the want of "union" between the
moderate Conservatives of the time, who " were disgusted with
the greedy self-seeking Compact," and "the men of moderate views
in the Reform party like the Rolphs," etc. We are told that if such
a "union" could have been effected; the Compact would have been
driven to the wall. But it seems that the horrible " Mackenzie
radicals," " composed for the most part of unlettered farmers and
recently arrived immigrants," prevented this happy issue. As to
how any " union " of the kind could possibly have ousted the
Compact, the reader is not informed. He is left in a " Serbonian

78
bo<r." The author says the moderate Conservatives dreaded the
"radical element," and that they supported the junto "as the
less of two evils." He also tells us that the moderate Reformers
" composed fully two-thirds " of the Reform party in the Legisla
ture, and yet he wants us to believe that they, along with the
moderate Conservatives, could not have kept the nasty radicals in
order. After setting up his beautiful theory in one paragraph,
he demolishes it in the next by showing that the " Mackenzie
radicals " were not the lions in the path at all. In one breath he
says that the Reformers " had exerted a predominating influence
during the last two Parliaments," and in the next he declares that,
even with that superiority, "they possessed the shadow of power
without the reality." With the Executive Council entirely under
tlie control of the Compact, and consequently a complete block
to any Reform legislation in the Lower House by any Liberal-Con
servative alliance that could have been formed, what real progress
could have been made ? Mr. Dent doesn't tell us. It is just at
this point that we are dropped into his " Serbonian bog." The
plain truth is, as every politician and reader of history knows,
that in those times party lines were most rigidly drawn, and
while there might have been shades of difference of opinion in
both parties, as there always are, each party in the House
answered, was in fact forced to answer, as one man to the ring of
the division bell. The Compact were securely entrenched in their
stronghold, the Executive Council. The Lieutenant-Governor
was on their side. All the official power and patronage of the
country was at their disposal. They were in fact in a position
safely to defy any hostile combination against them in the
Assembly, and all the "moderate views" under heaven could not
have advanced good government a hair's breadth. It was for
this reason, as I shall show, that Robert Baldwin declined for a
long time to re-enter public life. He despaired of real Reform
under such circumstances. There are some other disquisitions in
this Story, light and nebulously airy like the foregoing, that a
breath of common sense can just as easily blow away. As a
political strategist on paper, Mr. Dent is not an unqualified
success.

79

Mackenzie's agitation and the author's generosity (?).
Reference is also made — and it is the curtest possible reference-
to a most important movement in Upper Canada, originated
and successfully carried out mainly through Mackenzie's exertions.
This was during the parliamentary recess of 1831, when, as the
author puts it, " Mackenzie turned his notoriety to account in
getting up a series of petitions to the King and the Imperial Parlia
ment, calling attention to the various grievances wherewith the in
habitants were burdened, and praying for redress." It is in this
slip-shod, indifferent style that Mackenzie's services are passed
over in an agitation which, as has been truly said, " shook Upper
Canada throughout its whole extent," and for which he deserves
the largest measure of credit. The reader will find none given
him. Mr. Dent does not even mention the grievances set forth
in the petitions. If he did it would be seen that they respectfully
and loyally demanded all the great measures of reform which were
afterwards embodied in the legislation of the country. Respon
sible Government, an Executive possessing the confidence of the
people's representatives, the establishmant of municipal councils
controlling local assessments, the secularization of the Clergy
Reserves, law reform, etc., were prayed for as vital to the welfare
His Majesty's Canadian Commonwealth. Mr. Dent disposes of
all this in a couple of sentences, one of which I have quoted. The
same exceedingly generous spirit is displayed throughout the
book. the expulsions from the assembly.
Mackenzie afterwards besame the bearer of those petitions, to
England, "turned his nptority to account" again in that patriotic
mission. These appeals to the Home authorities, signed by some
25,000 persons, and backed by the bearer's personal representations,
were of immense service. As will hereafter appear, they secured
the redress of a number of very serious grievances, and were the
commencement of a powerful popular movement which revolution
ized the government of the country. The expulsions of Mackenzie
from the Assembly are treated of in this connection, and in a man-

80
ner that might have been expected from Mr. Dent's pen. It is a
well-known fact that he was really expelled five times, and
his seat declared vacant, and that he was re-elected twice by
overwhelming majorities, and twice by acclamation. In one of
the contests only one vote was polled for his opponent. It was a
splendid triumph for any man. Yet the author dismisses the
magnificent receptions given Mackenzie in ' Toronto with the
ill-concealed sneer that " all this popular adulation was grateful
to his soul ; he was in his element." If the author's hero of
" glorious, pious and immortal memory " had been the victorious
tribune, what a blast we would have heard from the Dentine
trumpet ! MR. DENT AS A PATENTEE.
Having described the fearless assertion of the parliamentary
rights of his constituents, which even in Mr. Dent's peculiar style
is calculated to create a somewhat favourable impression, the
author proceeds to nullify, as far as he can, any real credit to
Mackenzie in the matter. He says that " the efforts of the faction
to ruin and humiliate Mackenzie made a popular hero of one who,
if the truth must be told, had very little of the heroic in his
composition." No one will be surprised at this oracular judgment.
Mr. Dent has made up his mind to have but one hero in his Story.
Two heroes would never do ; it would defeat its p.rpose. He is
busily engaged in taking out a patent for a monopoly of all the
heroism in the narrative for John Rolph. The specifications in
part are in his first volume, and more are to follow. In the
meanwhile he is jealously guarding against the smallest attempt
at an infringement in the market of the quack Rolphjte article.
Mr. Dent ought to know that the public regard all monopolies
with suspicion and distrust. As a solicitor in the courts " in the
far-away days that are gone " — to use one of his own phrases  he
should have learnt that many patent rights are often patent
wrongs, and that they are frequently set aside for fraud and mis
representation. I fear Mr. Dent's patent will meet with a similar
fate. Its novelty is a self-delusion of thie patentee ; its pretended
bona, fides is simply an imposition on the public.

81

HISTORIC INCONSISTENCIES.

Having thus settled the heroic part of Mackenzie's composition,
the author proceeds in the same oracular strain : — " Had the
Government been wise enough in their own interests to let him
(Mackenzie) have his say in the Assembly, he would soon have
found his proper level, and would have ceased to carry any weight
there. He would undoubtedly have raised a good deal of temporary
excitement by unearthing abuses, and by vituperating persons
whom he disliked. But he could never have seriously threatened the
supremacy of the Compact, for the very sufficient reason that he
could not command the sympathies or respect of the leading spirts
of his own party. Rolph, the Bidwells and the Baldwins had by this
time come to rate Mackenzie at about his true value," etc. This
is just one of Mr. Dent's "unsupported" statements which are
of "little value," and for which he gives no "sufficient reason," in
fact no reason at all. It is also a fair sample of his self-contradic
tions as a story-teller. As against Mr. Dent I will cite Mr. Dent
himself, in another statement which is borne out by the judg
ment of history. Towards the close of the same chapter he
says : — "The plain fact of the matter is, that no sentiment of either
loyalty or disloyalty had anything whatever to do with the treat
ment to which Mackenzie was subjected at the hands of the
Compact and their supporters. It was simply this : Mackenzie
was a thorn in their sides. He watched them closely, and
exposed their conduct in language which was telling and vigorous.
* * * They felt that their supremacy was menaced, and
largely by his instrumentality." This is "the plain fact of the
matter," but the author seems to have forgotten that he had just
before expressed a directly contrary opinion. The Story abounds
in similar inconsistencies. A writer who employs detraction
should have a more convenient memory. The Compact must
have known who was their most formidable opponent, and I
fancy the reader will prefer to take their deliberate judgment and
action, at the time, to that of a prejudiced story-teller who has his
eye at this point upon his patent, and is evidently jealous of
Mackenzie's rising ascendancy in the Liberal party.
6

82

THE GREAT " UNLETTERED.

Mr. Dent thereafter demonstrates to his own satisfaction that
Mackenzie's " true value " was very little. He says : — " His in
fluence was pretty much confined to the farmers and mechanics of
that portion of the country where his paper was chiefly circulated ;
and even there his influence would never have been anything like
so great as it actually became had it not been for the persecution
to which he was subjected. Over and beyond, he could not be
said to have any distinctive locus standi in the Reform party.
* * * The structure of his mind prevented him from seeing a
question in its various aspects, and, in judging of future political
events, he was much more often wrong than right. * * * He
seemed to be utterly incapable of keeping his own counsel, and a
secret once told to him was a secret no longer. * * * It was
surely a short-sighted policy which gave to a man so constituted
a factitious importance, and which made him for some years the
most notorious personage in Upper Canada." This is another
deliverance which is to settle the points referred to for all time to
come. It will be seen that Mr. Dent's idea of "the farmers and
mechanics," as a vital force, is not a very exalted one. In other
places he speaks with less disguised contempt of Mackenzie's
" satellites among the rural and uneducated portion of the com
munity," " the unlettered yeomen of Wentworth," "the unlettered
farmers and recently arrived immigrants," etc. This sublime posing
as the elegant and cultured man of letters is a phase in literary
aesthetics that " the so-called historians " will please make a note
of. The intellectual refinement of lofty minds may at once
dismiss the " bone and sinew of the country '' as a mere vulgar
metaphor of the hustings. It is no less suggestive to our political
leaders of all parties who are periodically striving to " influence "
the great "unlettered" of the country. They have had fair
notice of the estimate to be put upon their " influence " and
their political " locus standi " by future writers " from a Liberal
but non-partisan point of view," if that low sort of popularity-
hunting is persisted in. Leaving out Mr. Dent's canaille — the
farmers, mechanics and immigrants, all of whom felt honoured in

83
following Mackenzie, and whom he was proud to lead, will our very
literary Yellowplush kindly tell us who was left to follow Rolph ?
In the name of goodness, Mr. Dent, who in those primitive days
were the people ? A, MAN OF THE PEOPLE.
Mackenzie was essentially a man of the people. He could say,
as Charles Dickens once said, that he " had unlimited faith in
the People with a big P." He was a man of action with a
passion for ideas, and he well knew that if his ideas were ever to
be carried out, he must have the sympathy and support of the
yeomanry and the artisan class who composed the great mass of
the population. He was heart and soul with them in their
aspirations, and, if they gave him their confidence in no unstinted
measure, it was because they felt it would never be betrayed.
And it never was. Mr. Dent has surely read history to little
purpose, and has gained less from its teachings, when he makes it
a reproach to Mackenzie for having successfully extended his
influence amongst those who were a tower of strength in a great
political struggle. " The persecution to which he was subjected "
was due to his fearless championship of the popular cause, and,
unlike Mr. Dent, those for whom he fought and suffered gratefully
gauged their opinion of him by his untiring devotion to their
service, and his cheerful sacrifices in their behalf.
ONE OR TWO ROLPHITE SLANDERS.
The threadbare tirade about his want of judgment is revived in
this quotation. It is a sweet morsel for the author, and he is
constantly rolling it under his tongue. That Mackenzie committed
errors of judgment, like every man who has been in public life, is
not denied. He was not immaculate in this respect like the hero
of the epic Story. "The structure of his mind" had not the mani
fold, rotund perfections of that " extraordinary personality," but
it served his purpose as a lover of his country well enough, and it
had none of the Benedict Arnold fibre in its composition. " Weak
judgment is not crime, nor is indiscretion always the greatest
guilt." Let Mr. Dent remember this when he next undertakes

84
to enlighten the world with his anatomy and physiology of
politicians' hearts. Mackenzie's deliberately expressed convictions
with respect to British American Union, the Provincial Uni
versity, the Municipal Loan Fund Scheme, and Reciprocity of
Trade, have already been referred to. These were a few of
many great questions that might be mentioned, of the "various
aspects" of which he showed the fullest comprehension, and
in which the accuracy of his judgment and foresight was
strikingly manifest. The charge of disclosing confidences, brought
against him for the first time by Mr. Dent, is a calumny that no
one who knew Mackenzie, and his fidelity as a political and per
sonal friend, will ever believe, even if it had a better basis to rest
upon than the calumniator's worthless statement. To those who
did not know him his reputation is a sufficient answer to so un
founded a slander. The charge is varied afterwards in the assertion
that, after his return from exile, he "was ready enough to betray
the secrets of his somewhile coadjutors." This refers of course to
his exposure of Rolph in his Flag of Truce pamphlet, and explains
the origin of the whole calumny. From first to last it is an enven
omed product of the Rolph papers, manufactured out of whole
cloth, and worthy of its author, who never, as long as he lived,
cleared himself from one of the foulest stains that could rest upon
the name and character of any public man. ,
ANOTHER SAPIENT POLITICAL THEORY.
Mr. Dent's theory of the " short-sighted policy " of the Compact
in giving Mackenzie " a factitious importance," is one of those
sapient political theories that are frequently encountered in
this book. It shows how " short-sighted " and befogged the
writer is in comprehending the political situation of the time.
Mackenzie was one of the leaders of the Reform Opposition ; he
controlled their leading organ ; he was a power with his voice as
well as his pen, both in Parliament and the country, and his "im
portance" could not be ignored. A closely besieged garrison
might as well have tried to ignore their most determined foe. A
leading New York journal once said of him that "his powers of
agitation were almost equal to those of the great Daniel O'Connell.'

85
The " importance " of such a man was created by himself, and not
factitiously by his adversaries. It was forced upon them in a
thousand ways, and, although they might have pursued a different
course of action towards him, they would have been arrant fools
to have adopted, even if they could, the course indicated by this
visionary theorizer. THE AUTHOR'S POLITICAL ACUMEN.
The passage above quoted is not the only one which proves Mr.
Dent's unfitness to deal with the period in question. His literary
talents I freely admit, and I only regret that, for his own sake,
he has not employed them to better advantage in this Story. But
tricks in style, and deft turning of periods, are of small importance
in the performance of such a task, when political acumen and
other substantial qualities are wanting. Many a writer of
mere paragraphs of Rebellion history has hit the nail o'h the head
far better, with his limping sentences, than has Mr. Dent with all
his flowery rhetoric of over three hundred pages. Of the human
nature of the public life of the time, he shows as little knowledge
as he does of the human nature of those who figured in it. He
has little or no sympathy with the trials of public men, and is quite
incapable of appreciating them. He makes no allowance for the
unseen, potent influences which sway their action, and which, as
I heard a distinguished politician once say, so often "make of
public life the life of a galley slave." He cheats himself into the
belief that his hard, surface glance at the political situation, as a
professional reviewer, has enabled him to fathom all its problems
to their farthest depths. Assuming him to be perfectly sincere,
no one who knew the men will say that he has any true conception
of Mackenzie's " personality " any more than he has of Rolph's.
He has overdone both in opposite directions, and his blunder is
almost incomprehensible. Personal qualities, which men carry
on their sleeves, any penny-a-liner can hit off. But Mr. Dent is
not a penny-a-liner ; he is the historian — facile princeps in his own
estimation — of Rebellion times, the guide, philosopher and candid
friend of the " so-called historians " who preceded him. He is the
great high priest, the Alpha and Omega, of his craft. If a merely

86
readable book, " pleasant to the eye," be the object of Mr. Dent's
ambition, he has perhaps succeeded ; if it be one that is " good for
food," his success is certainly far from assured. A historian whose
pen is steeped in flagrant prejudice never can be a success.
" LIBERAL " STORY-TELLING WITH A VENGEANCE.
The author follows up with another of his peculiar criticisms
on Mackenzie's career in the Canadian Parliament after his return
from exile. He says : " He adopted precisely the same role as of
yore, and delivered himself with great vehemence on matters which
he did not understand. The inevitable result was that the Assembly
soon ceased to attach any weight to his opinions. He had lived
long enough to repudiate many of his old doctrines, and to eat
many of his past words. His views on Tuesday were frequently
the very opposite to what they had been on Monday, and neither
were any' indication of what they would be on Wednesday. Mem
bers ceased to attach any importance to his statements, or to think
of them as calling for serious consideration. He came to be re
garded as a sort of unlicensed jester who might be permitted to
amuse the House by his antics when there was no pressing business
on hand ; but, as to any real influence, he had no more than the
junior messenger. It took him several years to find this out, and
when it was brought thoroughly home to him, he resigned his seat."
A more insolent fabrication is not to be found in this book, and
it is as heartless as it is insolent. The reader may well ask, is the
fabricator a Liberal and a friend of Liberals, or is he the bitter,
vindictive mouthpiece of Family Compact journalism ? An anony
mous libel in a newspaper is a tribute, however small, to journalistic
decency ; it shows the author has a remnant of shame. But there
is none of this in the paragraph just quoted. Mackenzie had
been over twelve years in banishment when the general amnesty
was proclaimed ih February, 1849. He was the last of the
proscribed patriots who were pardoned. He had drunk the bitter
draught of exile to its very dregs ; those who were dearest to him
alone knew the sufferings he underwent during those twelve long
weary years. That he admitted his errors in promoting an armed
revolt — errors for which he thus dearly paid — is true. It is the

87
one mutilated grain of truth in Mr. Dent's elegant phraseology of
his eating his past words. He wrote a simple letter to Earl Grey,
the Colonial Secretary, expressing his regret for much that he had
said and done in inciting insurrection. That his manly action
was fully appreciated by the British Government, there is ample
testimony. It was no humilation to Mackenzie, and no one but
Mr. Dent would ever make it a reproach to him. His honesty in
confessing his error is an example that the defamer of his name
and memory may profitably follow.
THE RETURNED EXILE.
Mackenzie's terrible trials as an exile would have completely
broken a .spirit less proud and gallant than his own. The wonder
is that he should ever afterwards have regained his old position in
public life. He did regain it. He came at once to the front,
with all his old fire and energy, to the discomfiture of some who
supposed he was forever undone, and of others whose quailing
consciousness of their past betrayal of him made of them his
meanest foes. His manner of doing so and his public record
afterwards, Mr. Dent, with his usual fairness, studiously conceals.
In less than a year after his return to Canada with his family he
stood for Haldimand, the first open constituency, defeating the
late Hon. George Brown, the most formidable opponent he could
have encountered, by a considerable majority. That he was for a
number of years a power in other constituencies, the record of
their electoral contests abundantly proves. He was far from being
" downed " by adversity, crushing as that had been. During his
absence the principal political reforms, for which he had no long
struggled, had been gradually conceded, and it was naturally
difficult for him for a time to realize the marvellous change. But
he had lost none of his old-time independence ; he had learnt
something of the hollowness of professed friendship ; and,
reading between the lines in the above quotation, it is very
evident that his well-founded distrust of the political sincerity of
Rolph and his parasites has incurred Mr. Dent's displeasure.
This appears in the author's poor sneers at the weight and import
ance of Mackenzie's parliamentary opinions, and their reception

88
by the Assembly. Petty gibes like these are not very gracious
compliments to some of the able men in the House who shared,
and publicly endorsed, the sentiments of the returned exile.
They are quite as applicable to the minority who so often agreed
with Mackenzie, with whom he so often voted, and who comprised
some of the first men in the old Parliament of Canada. Experi
ence repeatedly proved that the judgment of that minority, thus
scouted at by Mr. Dent in the person of Mackenzie, embodied the
real wisdom of the Legislature, and by far the best policy for the
country. Mr. Dent's allusion to Mackenzie as the " unlicensed jester "
is worthy of its author. The dramatist has said that
A jest's prosperity lies in the ear
Of him that hears it, * * *
Mackenzie humour had this prosperity. It is still a pleasant
tradition of by-gone parliamentary life. His jests were tender in
their mirthfulness ; they never left a wound behind. They were
not the scornful jests of a Jeremy Diddler "raising the wind " in
literature by fictitious stories of the past.
Mackenzie's later parliamentary influence.
The author's closing reference to Mackenzie's influence in the
Assembly as being "no more than the junior messenger's" is of a
piece with the rest of this insolent quotation. It is a simple fact
of history that, in 1851, this insignificant "junior messenger"
moved, and supported in a powerful speech, a motion to abolish
the Court of Chancery. The Baldwin- Lafontaine Ministry was
then in office. They did their utmost to defeat the proposal,
which was hostile to their views as a Government, but, notwith
standing this, Mackenzie carried his motion. Baldwin, the
Premier and Attorney-General, surprised and mortified by the
vote, at once resigned his seat, and sought re-election in North
York, his old constituency. He was defeated by a well-known
Reformer, Mr. Joseph Hartman, and thereafter retired from
public life. One of the most powerful governments that ever
existed in Canada, prior at least to Confederation, was thus

89
effectually broken up. Of the merits of the question nothing
need be said, except that Baldwin's retirement was a source of
regret to all his friends. I merely mention the fact, as one proof
out of many that might be given, to show that the author's
estimate of Mackenzie's parliamentary influence, or of his influence
in any way, is never to be trusted. How true it is, as Butler
says, that " prejudice may be considered as a continual false
medium of viewing things ?" What I have just mentioned is,
however, something more than this : it is a mean, cold-hearted
misrepresentation of historical fact by a writer who loudly vaunts
his truthfulness. Mackenzie's exit from the legislature.
Mackenzie resigned his seat in 1858. He disagreed with some
of his constituents in regard to a certain railway bill affecting
their interests, but, as I also learn from the letter of a gentleman
who knew him most intimately, he had a strong conviction that there
was not that disposition in the Legislature to trust themasses which
he believed should prevail in their representative body. That
he should be forced to leave the arena some time, was of course to
be expected. His life there had been one of incessant strain and
toil. He had secured none of the plunder, had impoverished himself
for the rest of his days, and had reaped many a bitter disappoint
ment in the cause that Was very dear to him. But he had fought
a hard fight, had fought it bravely and well, and he could at last
afford, when the day was won, to quit the field with honour.
His exit from such a scene surely deserved a parting tribute less
harsh and unfeeling than his relentless critic has given him'.
This whole paragraph, upon which I have been commenting, is
exceedingly suggestive of a series of disgraceful personal articles
which appeared in a Toronto journal a little over two years ago.
In these some of our most distinguished public men of all parties
were assailed in the most infamous terms. It was said at the
time that " a gang of libellers " had appeared in the metropolitan
press. A well-known writer in the Week described them as
" waifs of the Canadian or rather of the continental press, who
have sold their pens to journals of all parties in turn, and, except

90
when they were giving vent to their malignity, have probably
never written a sincere line." Mr. Dent knows full well who got
the credit of being in the " gang."
a little cock and bull story.
When Toronto was incorporated as a city, in March, 1834,
Mackenzie was elected its first Mayor — the first Mayor in Upper
Canada. This was a distinctive honour, and its bare mention in
the narrative would have been sufficient as evincing the then state
of popular feeling in the chief city, and political capital, of the
Province. In Mr. Dent's hands the election is made to serve
several sinister purposes. The purpose which it ought to serve is
entirely ignored. The author uses it, in the first place, to eulogize
Rolph at the expense of Mackenzie, to slander the latter as "a
snarling little upstart," " the mere tool and mouthpiece of a low
Radical clique," etc., and to detract in every possible way from
the credit justly due him as the recipient of this mark of civic
confidence. A cock and bull story is told about Rolph's having
been first selected by the Reformers of the city as their candidate
for the office, and of his subsequently " waiving his claims " in
favour of Mackenzie. The latter, it is gratuitously insinuated,
intrigued with their mutual friends against the great man to
secure his own elevation to the position. This little story, like
many parts of the big Story, is exceedingly thin. It differs
very materially from Mr. Dent's version of the matter in his
sketch of " Toronto : Past and Present," in the Memorial Volume
of the city, published in 1884. Assuming for the moment that
there is any truth in it, it only shows that Mackenzie had more
influence with his party than Rolph. The insinuation is a
characteristically mean one, and, 1 believe, is without a shadow
of foundation. Had there been a particle of proof to warrant it,
the reader may depend it would have been blazoned forth with
all the verity of Holy Writ. If there is one thing more than
another in which Mr. Dent's industry is shown, it is in hunting
up and parading, with the most hypocritical professions of fairness,
everything that could possibly disparage Mackenzie in the eyes of
the world. Of this the chapter, in which the Mayoralty election

91
is referred to, furnishes abundant proof. It is a tissue of slanders.
Not an iota of evidence is produced in support of the charge of
" double-dealing," which is a pure invention. It is possible that
Mackenzie aspired to the Mayoralty, and why shouldn't he?
That Rolph certainly did, and that he was keenly disappointed at
being pitched overboard, is proved by the fact that, when he
found Mackenzie was the candidate fixed upon by the Reformers,
he " took the sulks " and resigned his seat in the council, thereby
saving himself the mortification of a defeat at the hands of his
own political friends. In his " Toronto : Past and Present," Mr.
Dent says Rolph "was far from satisfied, and, on the following
day, determined to withdraw from the council altogether." For
so great a man this was a very small thing to do, and for a hero
it was anything but a heroic thing. It was simply childish.
the true inwardness of the mayoralty business.
Mr. Dent's palaver about his " waiving his claims " is a good
one. Rolph was not the man to waive his claims to anything
if he were in a position to enforce them. In the sketch
referred to the same writer says, " he (Rolph) bowed to the will
of the (Reform) majority." In other words he was compelled to
waive his claims, was in fact dropped from the outset as an
unpopular candidate, or, at all events, as a less acceptable and
popular candidate than Mackenzie. I am speaking advisedly
when I say that the latter was, from the first, the deliberate
choice of the Reformers. Undoubted proof of this can be pro
cured at any moment. Rolph's historical touter says the
Conservative members of the Council would have supported his
candidate, and that they with the Reformers could have elected
him easily. No doubt they could, if they had all been united,
but the trouble with Mr. Dent's candidate was that the Reformers
did not want him, and would not have him. If, as we are told,
he was so transcendently the superior " of any other man in the
city " in his fitness to "grace the position," it is very strange that
the Reformers did not join with the Conservatives in running, him
in. They wanted a Reform Mayor ; they would have had one in
Rolph ; but why didn't they take him up ? I fear there was a

92
larger Ethiopian in the fence than Mr. Dent permits us to see,
and that the " strong man " of the Story was too heavy a man to
carry. It was not the first time that his party found him a poli
tical dead-weight. His subsequent conduct increased his avoir
dupois in that way to an incalculable degree. That he was ever
seriously thought of for the Mayor's chair, as against Mackenzie,
is incredible. The latter was preferred for many good reasons,
and he was unquestionably the free and voluntary choice of
the electorate. His election was fully in accord with popular
sentiment. Conservative at other times, the city had just before
this returned a Reform majority to the council board. The
strong sympathy for Mackenzie, on account of his expulsions from
Parliament, and his great popularity otherwise, made him the
natural choice of the people who would, if necessary, have elected
him either as Mayor, or member for the city, by an open popular
vote. the doctor's "dignity."
Mr. Dent consoles himself over his hero's discomfiture in
characteristic style. He says, " Dr. Rolph needed no accession
of dignity." This dignity of the Doctor is everlastingly cropping
up in this Story. It is occasionally interspersed with the
" majesty of his presence," and his Baconian grasp of " all know
ledge." If one half that Mr. Dent says about it is true, this
heroic quality must have been perfectly overwhelming. It was
probably too much so for the lilliputian commonalty amongst
whom the great man moved^ and from whom he vainly sought the
highest civic honours. Can we wonder that they preferred a
man who was not so august a " personality," and who could be a
simple human being like themselves in the hum-drum of every day
life ? The great marvel to every one who reads this Story will
ever be how all this wealth of human perfection should have been
so long undiscovered. The ignorance of the past two or three
generations of Canadians must have been truly deplorable.
MACKENZIE AS MAYOR.
The author's opinion of Mackenzie's performance of his duties
is of little consequence. He does not record the fact that, at a

93
large public meeting held on the 5th of January, 1835, and which was
attended by persons of all political parties, Mackenzie received a
unanimous vote of thanks " for the faithful discharge of his arduous
duties during his period of office." This would have proved what
the Mayor's fellow citizens thought of him, and that, too, at a
time when party feeling ran very high. But as Mr. Dent wants
posterity to have a very different opinion of Mackenzie, he sup
presses the fact, and is as silent about it as the grave. The truth
is that while Rolph was reaping profit in attending the cholera
patients, Mackenzie was reaping honour as an unsalaried public
servant. He dared death intrepidly scores of times in ministering
to the stricken patients in their homes, and in placing them with
his own hands in the cholera carts, and driving them to the
hospital. Mr. Dent gives him credit for pluck and courage, but
he conveniently omits mention of this chivalrous service. In his
" Toronto : Past and Present," he says it was " heroic," but in
this new Story he " eats his past words," and says Mackenzie
had " very little of the heroic in his composition."
There is one little incident that he makes the most of because it
presents a rare chance for a slap at the city's chief Magistrate.
The latter, it seems, put a notoriously abandoned and bad-tongued
woman in the public stocks, as a warning to others in the like
case offending. This harrows the inmost soul of the author to its
very depths ; he grows purple with manly indignation, and reels
off a resentful screed against the barbarous tyranny of the Court.
He takes good care, however, to say nothing against the law
which enacted, and which, with the practice, fully sanctioned the
sentence. One would have thought that this was at least equally
open to his highly virtuous censure. He also conveniently fails
to notice the fact that the prime cause of the woman's punish
ment was her hurling one of her muddy shoes at the occupant of
the judgment seat. The incident only illustrates what I have
said before, that the best of men will sometimes err in the exercise
of legal authority. I sincerely hope, for the credit of the Magis
trate, that the woman whom he thus reformed was as ugly as she
was bad. If she were a good looking woman, what possible pallia
tion could there be for conduct so ungallant ?

94

A BIT OF DENTINE LOGIC.

It would puzzle any person to know what the author's rig
marole about Mackenzie's course as a civil official has to do with
Rebellion history. More puzzling still is what the publication, in
the Colonial Advocate, of Mr. Joseph Hume's " baneful domina
tion letter " has to do with the conduct of its editor and publisher
as Mayor of Toronto. It is only by a logical process, peculiar to
Mr. Dent, that any sort of connection can be traced between the
one and the other. Yet the author blends the two, and makes a
sustained attack, as unfair as it is illogical, on the "indiscretion"
of the publisher. No writer of sense would do this. In assuming
official duties as a citizen, Mackenzie did not abnegate his func
tions as a journalist. Does Mr. Dent want any intelligent person
to believe that everything that its editor wrote or published in
his newspaper was in his capacity as Mayor of the city ?
THE "BANEFUL DOMINATION" LETTER.
Mr. Hume's letter, looking at the circumstances under which it
was written, and the very reasonable explanation of its meaning
given by the writer, was a very harmless and innocent production.
It raised some well-feigned ire at the time on the part of a few lip-
loyalists, but all the fuss made about it, either by them or their
latter-day mouthpiece, Mr. Dent, is a veritable tempest in a tea
pot. Mr. Hume was a well-known British statesman of the
Liberal school, and a life-long friend of Mackenzie. He took a
warm interest in Canadian affairs, and his letters to the editor
frequently appeared in the Advocate. In one of these, written
just after Mackenzie's repeated expulsions from the Assembly, the
writer gave it as his opinion that these events would hasten a
crisis in Upper Canada that would " terminate in independence
and freedom from the baneful domination of the mother country."
In the same letter Mr. Hume replied to an attack made upon
him, publicly and privately, by the late Dr. Ryerson, and it is
evident he was smarting under a sense of injuries so received
when he penned this " baneful" opinion. The writer subsequently
explained his meaning to be " that the misrule of the Government

95
in Canada, and the monopolizing selfish domination of such men
as had lately (though but a small faction of the people) resisted
all improvements and reform, would lose the countenance of the
authorities in Downing street, and leave the people in freedom to
manage their own affairs." The result proved that he was not far
astray in his calculations. Before this explanation reached
Canada, an attempt was made in the city council to censure
Mackenzie for publishing the letter. It failed, and the amend
ment that was adopted in place of the motion of censure,
expressed Mr. Hume's meaning substantially as he gave it
himself, without any knowledge apparently of the council's
action. This shows that the letter was fairly open to an innocent
construction, and was so understood by an intelligent body of
representative men. Mr. Dent, like a true partisan, makes the
barest reference to this significant incident, and rings the changes
on the point he wants to make against the publisher. He rakes
through the Canadian newspapers, from Dan to Beersheba, for all
the violent denunciations he can find of Mackenzie, and quotes
these with much gusto as the expression of public opinion. And he
calls this the "true story!" The whole thing is a glaring
exhibition of partisanship. Its animus is self-evident, more
especially as the author is forced, later on in his book, to admit
that Mackenzie's loyalty at this time was undoubted. Yet
nowhere, amidst his array of one-sided, senseless quotations, has
he the common honesty to say so.
Mackenzie's acknowledged leadership.
If the publication of the Hume letter was so indiscreet and
mischievous as the story-teller seeks to make it out to be, it is
very strange that, at the general election right afterwards in
October, 1834, the Liberals carried the day. But such is the
fact. Mackenzie was again returned for York. Baldwin and
Rolph did not offer themselves as candidates in any constituency,
and the author says that, although the Reformers had a majority,
yet " with the exception of Bidwell and Perry, their best and
most trusted chiefs had no seats" in the new Parliament.
Although Mackenzie is not classed by Mr. Dent with the "best

96
and most trusted chiefs " of the Reform party, it goes without
saying that he was one of them. He in fact overshadowed the
others, and the author makes this plain by the false interpre
tation which he puts upon Baldwin's motives in declining to
stand as a candidate. He declares this was due to " the ascend
ancy of Mackenzie and his satellites among the rural and
uneducated portion of the community " — which is simply a
Dentine way of saying that Mackenzie had the country at his
back. He also says that Rolph declined re-election for the
same reason. While few will believe — even if it were not
contrary to the fact — that Baldwin acted from any such small-
minded motives, we can all readily believe that Rolph did. A
man who had shortly before this sulked his way out of the city
council through sheer jealousy of Mackenzie's superior standing
with his party, would not be above sulking his way out of Parlia
ment for the same reason. It was very like the great man to do
this, and Mr. Dent has rather re-exposed Rolph's infirmities, and
the weakness of his own advocacy of that heroic soul, in making
so damaging an admission. TWO DIFFERENT LITTLE STORIES.
The extract from Baldwin's letter of the 13th March, 1834,
given as proof that its writer was so actuated, is no proof at all.
On the contrary, it is more consistent with the writer's friendly
feeling towards the editor of the Advocate, in whose columns it
appeared, and with his conviction that a Reform Assembly could
accomplish nothing substantial with an irresponsible Executive in
power. And such, I believe, is the fact. Mr. Dent, who gives the
false version of Baldwin's motives in this Story, gives the true
version in his sketch of Baldwin's life in the " Political Portrait
Gallery." He there says that " he (Baldwin) had been irresistably
led to the conclusion that his presence in the House at that time
would be of little service to the country. He clearly perceived
that a, Reform House of Assembly could make little headway in
the direction of constitutional progress so long as that House was
hampered by an irresponsible Executive." Mr. Dent, in telling
historical stories, should try and make them agree. He should

97
have gumption enough to avoid contradicting himself, and not
tell one story about a certain thing at one time, and a different
story about the same thing when he has an unworthy object
to serve. Students of history don't like that sort of historical
teaching, and they are very apt to put down the methods of
the professor as somewhat of a historical imposition.
Baldwin's position.
Although nothing is adduced to show that Baldwin and
Mackenzie were not, at the time referred to, in perfect accord, it
may be stated that such was the case in later years, not only so far as
Mackenzie was concerned, but the other Reform leaders as well.
Baldwin was then regarded by them, and many of their principal
supporters, as being too Conservative and Mr. Dent himself admits
this, although not in this book. On the Clergy Reserves question
he was not in harmony with the great bulk of his party.
On the motion moved by Mackenzie in 1851 for the abolition of'
the Court of Chancery, there was an Upper Canadian majority
against him. This comprised not a few Reformers, and some
members of his own profession. This want of accord, it is said,
was one of his principal reasons for retiring from public life.
Baldwin was undoubtedly a high type of a Canadian public man,
but he differed from Mackenzie in this that he was neither bold
nor aggressive. The Hon. Alex. Mackenzie, a high authority,
who has spent the greater part of his life in studying men, has
stated that Baldwin was "a pure-minded but timid statesman."
In some things, I may add, he had the right sort of timidity ; in
others, he might well have laid his timidity aside.
AN AMUSING DUAL ATTITUDE. ROLPH'S MAGNANIMITY.
Keeping all this in mind, Mr. Dent's description of Baldwin's
and Rolph's mental attitude towards Mackenzie in 1834 is very
amusing. They are both represented as feeling that he was a break
on the Reform wheel retarding its onward progress. In other
words, that Baldwin, who is always spoken of by the author as ex
ceedingly "moderate" in his political opinions and actions, was then
7

wanting to move faster in the direction of reform than Mackenzie,
who was not moving fast enough ! Mr. Dent has only thus to be
quoted against himself to show the absurdity of the views which
he presents of the political situation. Rolph is evidently coupled
with Baldwin, in this opinion of Mackenzie, in order to give an
air of respectability to Rolph's patriotic trouble of mind. Not a
tittle of proof is offered to show that Baldwin ever held such an
opinion ; it is simply one of those gratuitous assertions for which
the author of this Story will always be famous. I am told that
Baldwin's father, Dr. W. W. Baldwin, always voted for Mackenzie.
And Mr. Dent plainly intimates, what I believe is the fact, that
the father had great influence with the son, who reverenced his
sire's precept and example in all matters political. Robert Baldwin
was a gentleman, and his admirers will not thank Mr. Dent for
striving to make him anything else. In another place the author
imputes aversion to Mackenzie as the reason of Robert B. Sullivan's
" retrogressive tendency " in politics. In his " Toronto : Past and
Present" he gives a different reason. Sullivan's "social" surround
ings and influences are there mentioned as the prime cause. They
would no doubt be mentioned again in this Story, were the writer
not elaborating a new slander against Mackenzie. That slurs are
cast upon other worthies in so doing, is nothing to Mr. Dent.
Mackenzie must be hit, no matter who is wounded. Sullivan was
a Liberal, but Mr. Dent makes him out to be a political turn-coat
mainly on account of " personal rivalry between Mackenzie and
himself in municipal matters !" The imputation is no doubt as false
and far-fetched in Sullivan's case as in Baldwin's, and is a precious
poor compliment to both of them.
The funny part of the whole thing is, that Rolph is represented
as taking a "broader view" than Baldwin of Mackenzie's character,
and his capabilities as a director of the party's counsels, and we
are told, with refreshing coolness, that "he(R.)did not feel disposed
to throw him overboard ! " I should rather think not, and for the
best of reasons. He had tried it once before in the Mayoralty
business, and was made a Jonah himself in short order. Rolph's
magnanimity, in not desiring to be a Jonah again, is one of the most
beautiful tributes to his memory that his panegyrist has paid him.

99
That he should not wish to be — but why dwell on the virtues of
this truly noble man ? Are they not all manifest to the world
" hitherto lying in darkness " in this touching Story of his life-long
constancy to his friends ?
MACKENZIE PERSONALLY.
The author's unwarranted representations as to Baldwin and
Sullivan, noticed in the last paragraph, are quite in keeping with
his slanderous methods generally. He never hesitates on the
flimsiest basis possible, and often on no basis at all, to hold up his
victim to public contumely. The species of odium which he there
seeks to attach to him is ingeniously paltry. It is that of a man
who inspired in the breasts of others feelings of personal aversion,
and who on that account either repelled intercourse or association
with him, or provoked hostility on their part. We shall see some
fresh illustrations of this further on, in the case of the late Dr.
Ryerson. Meanwhile, let me say that this method of attack is
sui generis. Mr. Dent is the only writer, claiming to be historical,
who has so demeaned himself. A more false and unfair impres
sion of Mackenzie personally, than that which he thus seeks to
convey, it would be hard to conceive. All who knew Mackenzie
at all well will bear me out in the statement that he was a pleas
ant companion and associate. He was full of vivacity and good
humour, and the ready mother wit of a Highlander. He had
strong convictions, and these he never concealed, but there was a
great deal of thorough geniality in his nature. Despite all the
bufferings of fortune, he never wholly lost, even in his declining
years, the freshness, buoyancy and brightness of youth. He
froliced with his children, delighted in their society, and was as
young in spirit as any of them. He had many bitter public antag
onists, because he was a hard hitter. No man in his day took and
gave more in that way than he did ; but, in the wide circle of his
personal acquaintances, on both sides of politics, he^had perhaps, all
things considered, as few personal enemies as most public men of his
time. As is often the case with politicians who are vituperated
in the press, those who hated him most were those who knew him
least, or who did not know him at all. In the Conservative party,

100
to say nothing of his own, he had many warm personal friends
and admirers. I have it, on the authority of members of his
family, that many of his old political opponents visited and min
istered to him during his last illness. On these occasions his sick
chamber was the scene of not a few touching and tender inter
views. He was indeed all his life a most kindly, warm-hearted,
and generous man — generous to a fault. Nationality, creed, or
party was nothing to Mackenzie whenever his ready, helpful hand,
or a good word in season, could be of any avail. Men of that
stamp, from whose hearts flows the true " milk of human kindness,"
never want friends. He always had " troops of friends," who
appreciated his virtues and his worth. This was shown most
touchingly in his days of darkest adversity. He returned fro'in
exile broken in fortune. No sooner was it known than private
munificence at once came forward with manifold proffers of assist
ance. Mr. Robert Hay, M.P., the present member for Centre
Toronto in the House of Commons, liberally offered to furnish
his house from top to bottom. The late Hon. Isaac Buchanan — big
hearted Scot that he was — placed his ample purse at his disposal
Other wealthy men did likewise ; their bounty was pressed upon
him in the most delicate way. Mackenzie would accept nothing ;
he thought his doing so would hamper his political independence.
The moral that riches must reinforce such a virtue, and are neces
sary in the practice of it, he never believed in ; he at least taught
the world differently.
He was a frank and sincere man as well, and had a holy hatred
of all that was false or mean. There were not in his nature, as
Mr. Dent says there were in Rolph's, " depths which were never
fathomed by those nearest and dearest to him — possibly not even
by himself." He wore his heart upon his sleeve, and loved those
who were as ingenuous as himself, but he was none the less quick
to fathom the " ways that are dark" of deep men. When in Par
liament he sometimes attended caucuses of his party, but he did
not regard them with a favouring eye. He thought that a repre
sentative of the people, charged with great individual responsibil
ities, should exercise these without the trammels which a caucus
sometimes imposes. There was " the machine" in politics then as

101
there is now ; but it was far from being one of his idols. These
convictions of political action and public conduct occasionally
placed him in a seemingly awkward position, and exposed him to
misconception when there was really room for none. His influ
ence, too, upon public men, even of marked individuality, was, I have
reason to believe, a good influence. I have heard the late Hon.
John Sanfield Macdonald acknowledge this in his own case. Mr.
Macdonald once told me that, whatever errors he himself might
have committed, he owed very much of the political good that
was within him to Mackenzie. The first premier of Ontario was
not a man to pay idle compliments, and this was said under cir
cumstances that made its sincerity undoubted. Mackenzie is long
since beyond the reach of either praise or censure.
When old age came with muffled drums
That beat to sleep his tired life's story,
the voice of generous praise was not silent. It was heard even
where it was least expected, and has been heard very often since.
The voice of " Liberal" censure is Mr. Dent's alone ; his only is
the harsh grating of the insectile cynic's pen.
THE UPPER AND LOWER CRUST OF REFORM.
Besides being the only true history of the Rebellion, this book
assumes to be a very high-toned work as well. The vein of
hauteur, that runs through some of its personal allusions and criti
cisms, quite accords with its aristocratic airs and graces generally.
The insensate snobbism of these allusions is apparent to any per
son of refined feeling : a snob is a snob always, masquerade as he
will. The author has got the idea that there were two classes of
Reformers in those days, viz., the exceedingly genteel and emi
nently respectable "like the Rolphs, the Bidwells, and the Bald
wins," who formed the upper crust of reform, and the hoipolloi or
« noisy Radicals of the Mackenzie stamp," who composed the lower
and vulgar strata of the party. The former come in for all the
literary tit-bits of compliment, praise and adulation, the latter for
all the cuffs, coppers and small beer. This is not a very happy
way of writing the history of a soldier's battle for good govern-

102
ment, but there is no accounting for tastes when a writer with a
great mission appears on the scene. The line must be drawn some
where, you know. The Pharisees did that in the olden time, and
the phylactered race is not yet extinct. In accordance with this
beautiful fitness of things, the author, without properly stating the
facts, is constantly harping on Mackenzie's " birth and breeding,"
his " low social grade," etc. Mr. Dent having a patent of nobility,
and having been hob-nobbing all his life at Ayr and other places
with aristocrats of the purest cerulian tint, can of course afford to
do this without a quiver of discomposure. Seriously speaking,
does Mr. Dent really think he can ? But I shall spare his feelings.
I have no desire to wound, although he has not scrupled to do so
repeatedly. His pettiness in these sneering allusions to Mackenzie
is simply pitiful. He has truly said that " there must surely be
some foul taint in the blood of any man who can stoop to such
methods." In a country like Canada, whose rulers in every
department of human activity are self-made men, they will be
received with the contempt which they richly deserve.
Mackenzie's ancestry.
Mackenzie had no reason to feel ashamed of the race from which
he sprung. He had some of the best Highland blood in his veins,
and his life proved that he inherited many of the famous clans
men's virtues. He never boasted of his ancestry. Once or twice
only, when charged with disloyalty, did he refer to it, and then in
language which no one can read without a thrill of admiration.
He was a Mackenzie through and through, both his paternal and
maternal ancestors being of that name. His paternal grandsire,
he tells us, was a Highland farmer, under the Earl of Airlif in
Glenshee, Perthshire, and joined the Stuart standard as a volun
teer in the famous 1745. His mother's father also served under
" bonnie Prince Charlie " as an officer in the Highland army.
" My ancestors," he says, " stuck fast to the legitimate race of
kings, and though professing a different religion, joined Charles
Stuart whom (barring his faith) almost all Scotland considered as
its rightful sovereign." . . " Both my ancestors fought for the
royal descendant of their native kings ; and after the fatal battle

103
of Culloden, my maternal grandfather accompanied his unfortunate
Prince to the low countries, and was abroad with him on the con
tinent, following his adverse fortunes for years. He returned at
length, married, in his native glen, my grandmother, Elizabeth
Spalding, a daughter of Mr. Spalding, of Ashintully Castle, and
my aged mother was the youngest but two of ten children, the
fruit of that marriage." His father was, comparatively speaking,
a poor man. But who in a country where, from the lap of
poverty, so many have risen to the most exalted positions, will say
aught of this ? " My mother," he says, " feared God, and He did
not forget nor forsake her : never in my early years can I recol
lect that divine worship was neglected in our little family, when
health permitted ; never did she in family prayer forget to implore
that He, who doeth all things well, would establish in righteous
ness the throne of our monarch, setting wise and able counsellors
around it. Was it from the precept — was it from the example of
such a mother and such relations, that I was to imbibe that
disloyalty, democracy, falsehood and deception, with which my
writings are charged ? Surely not." He respected rank when it
had the attributes of true nobility, but he admired such attri
butes far more whoever might be their possessor. Whatever
his station in life might be, the man who had manly worth had
always a friend in William Lyon Mackenzie.
ROLPH'S " EXTRAORDINARINESS."
The author's description of Rolph is one of the most unique
things to be found in history or biography anywhere. It is, to
use a German phrase, "the only one." "John Rolph," he says,
"was unquestionably one of the most extraordinary personalities
who have ever figured in the annals of Upper Canada." This is
a pretty good lift to start with, and, what is very rare in some of
Mr. Dent's descriptions, it has the merit, in a certain sense, of
truth. Good old Isaac Taylor, speaking of some persons he knew,
sayS  "Their extraordinary did consist especially in the matters
of prayer and devotion." That, I need scarcely say, was not Rolph's
"extraordinary." Another old writer, Dr. H. More, quaintlysays —
"I chuse some few for the extraordinariness of their guilt," etc.

104
This is a little more apt in its application. To put it mildly,
Rolph's "extraordinariness" consisted mainly in his falseness to
his friends. Did he not betray Mackenzie, Samuel Lount, David
Gibson and all the rest of his confederates who anxiously awaited
him at Montgomery's on the ill-fated 4th of December, 1837?
Did he not betray the Government as their trusted emissary on
that day ? And Robert Baldwin, one of his best friends, who
. accompanied him ? Has Mr. Dent not stated that he discovered
in the Rolph papers the most damning proofs of Rolph's treachery ?
Does Mr. Dent not know, was he not told, on undoubted author
ity, that Baldwin, from that day forward, always considered that
Rolph had betrayed him as a personal friend, and that he never
afterwards had any friendly intercourse with him ? Has Mr.
Dent himself not said this in his sketch of Baldwin's life in the
Canadian "Political Portrait Gallery"? Was Mr. Dent not also
told at the same time, and by the same high authority,
that on one occasion when Baldwin and his eldest son visited Dr.
Widmer, who was ill, Baldwin treated the attendant physician,
Dr. Rolph, with the silent contempt begotten of the latter's prior
personal treachery ? When Mr. Dent was giving Baldwin's
hypothetical opinion of Mackenzie, why did he conveniently for
get Baldwin's well-known opinion of Rolph ? Why, too, did he
fail to recall the continuity of Rolph's falseness ? Does he not
know that it was consistent and persistent ? Has Mr. Dent never
heard that this model of all that was high-minded and honourable
in old Reform, tried to compass the defeat of Sir Francis Hincks,
his political leader in the same Cabinet, when the latter sought
re-election in Oxford? That he tried to bring influence to
undermine and destroy his own colleague in his old constit
uency? Does he not know that this fact can be established
by living witnesses ? Mackenzie has been recklessly and falsely
charged by a correspondent in a leading journal with whole
sale treachery. But what should be said of a man who was
guilty of Rolph's triunity of baseness ? Yet this man is the
author's hero ! Most people will agree with Mr. Dent— John
Rolph was a " most extraordinary personality."

105

SOME MORE LITERARY " TAFFY."

I need not dwell on the author's mellifluous description of all
the " sweetness and light " of this model Reformer. I leave the
reader to wonder over his "comprehensive, subtle intellect," his
"noble and handsome countenance," his "voice of silvery sweet
ness," "the dignity and even majesty in his presence that gave
the world assurance of a strong man," his " fixity of purpose," his
" well-moulded chin," his " firmly-set nose," his " smile that had a
winsome sweetness," and all his other perfections physical, moral
and intellectual. It is the portrait of one who is only a little
lower than the angels. What wonderment, what awe he must
have inspired !
And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew,
That one small head should carry all he knew.
A GREAT MAN'S " PER CONTRA."
" But," says Mr. Dent, " there was unquestionably a per contra."
" Ah ! now," says the confiding reader, " the truth is surely
coming." But the truth does not come at all. Mr. Dent strug
gles agonizingly with his hero's per contra, and only evolves
"peculiarities" and "idiosyncrasies" that' are simply virtues of
another order. " No human being possessed John Rolph's entire
confidence " ; he had " no such thing as self-abandonment " ; his
" quality of caution" was " preternaturally developed"; he did
not "wear his heart upon his sleeve"; "not one among his
contemporaries was able to take his moral and intellectual '
measure " ; he "seldom or never abandoned himself to frolicsome-
ness or fun "; — these were a few of the peculiar traits of the great
man. And they are always coupled with such words of honeyed
sweetness that the writer seems truly sorry when the per contra
runs out. One startling and momentous truth, however, Mr.
Dent has vouchsafed to a gaping world. He solemnly tells us
that Rolph "certainly never acted without a motive." This is
" certainly '' a metaphysical gem of the first water. It ought to
have a whole museum to itself. That a personage so extraordinary

106
never acted without a motive is one of those profound discoveries
in mental science that marks a new departure in psychology. How
Sir William Hamilton would have exulted in a revelation so
wondrous ! Mr. Dent should take a long vacation in story-telling,
and deyote his talents to mind-reading.
THE FLAG OF TRUCE EPISODE.
Frequent reference has been made to Rolph's treachery. The
facts, as generally stated and accepted, are briefly these : Rolph,
who was at the time unknown to the authorities as the executive
head of the insurrection against the Government, at the request
of that same Government, accompanied Baldwin and one Hugh
Carmichael as bearers of a flag of "truce to the headquarters of
the insurgents at Montgomery's on Yonge-street. The truce-
bearers first met Mackenzie, Lount and others with an official
verbal message to the effect that the Government wished to know
the demands of those in arms,, and to prevent bloodshed. Mac
kenzie, who suspected that the mounted embassy was a, mere sub
terfuge to gain time, demanded a message from the Governor in
writing. He also demanded "Independence and a convention to
arrange details," and went forward with his force. The truce-
bearers returned to the city for the written message asked for,
and came back without it. The Governor, it seems, had got over his
first real fright, and declined to give anything in writing. In the
course of the parley between the opposite parties, Rolph called
Lount aside and told him not to heed the message, but to march
his men into the city. This, in a word, is the great damning fact
against Rolph whose treachery was threefold — to the Government,
to Baldwin, and to his own confiding but deceived confederates.
The proof rests so far on the statements of five persons, viz.,
Mackenzie, Lount, Alves, Brotherton and Baldwin. Those of the
first four are positive and direct on the point. Baldwin's is of a
circumstantial, but strongly confirmatory, character. On the other
side are Rolph's and Carmichael's. Their statements cannot, I
submit, be accepted. Both are interested, and the weight of evi
dence is against them. Carmichael's, besides being exceedingly dis
ingenuous, is interested in this respect, that it was a written

107
statement prepared, it is generally believed, by Rolph, and signed
by Carmichael either just before or after he had had procured for
him a Government appointment through Rolph's influence. Apart
from this, his account of the affair is contradicted materially by
Baldwin. There is no doubt Carmichael gave different versions
of what occurred, and I have good reasons for saying, from docu
ments which I have seen, that his statement is simply incredible.
The full particulars of this painful episode would be somewhat pro
lix. They have appeared in print many times already, but the
above is a fair digest of the facts. Rolph fled the country, and
the evidence against him came out clearly before the Special Com
mission appointed to enquire into the whole matter, and whose
proceedings are reported in the Legislative Assembly Journals for
1837-8. Baldwin testified before the Commission, as did others,
including poor Lount, who told his honest, sad tale of false
friendship and wrecked hopes almost within the dark shadow of
the scaffold upon which he perished. He was executed a few
months afterwards, and his fate was universally lamented.
No one who has enquired into the facts has ever, from that day
to this, doubted Rolph's guilt. The Globe was for many years the
organ of all parties in denouncing it. My brief recital corresponds
substantially with that given by Mr. Dent in his sketch of Bald
win's life, and subsequently, in his " Toronto : Past and Present."
Speaking in the sketch of the direction given by Rolph to Lount,
Mr. Dent says : " Assuming this message to have been really deliv
ered by Dr. Rolph, it must be admitted that it places him in an un
enviable light, for, in that case, he was guilty, not merely of treason
to his country, but of treachery to his friend. Mr. Baldwin never
jorgave him, and was never again on speaking terms with him." Re
ferring, in the Memorial Volume, to Rolph's denials of his guilt,
Mr. Dent again says that " it can hardly be said that his (Rolph's)
presentation of the case has ever been satisfactorily established."
We shall see whether, like Carmichael, or whether like himself,
the author will give still another version of the same matter, when
he has Rolph for a prompter and inspirer, and has a different
purpose to serve.

108

THE AUTHOR AS A QUOTATIONIST.
Some statements in the Narrative of the Lieutenant-Governor,
Sir Francis Bond Head, may also be mentioned in this connection.
I cite these for two reasons. One is to show that the opinion enter
tained of Rolph's conduct, from a high official point of view, was
in the main in accord with the opinions of men of all parties,
and of the Globe as their universal exponent in after years ; and
the other is to prove the one-sided character of Mr. Dent's histor
ical references and quotations in regard to both Rolph and Mac
kenzie. One very remarkable feature of the Story is this : that
no end of quotations, from different sources, is given derogatory to
Mackenzie, and scarcely one of the thousands that might be given
in his favour, while, as to Rolph, everything laudatory of him is
sedulously hunted up and cited, without a solitary syllable that is
disparaging. Could any stronger proof be required of the author's
deliberate partisanship ? The reader of the Story will see that
Mr. Dent has culled from Head's Narrative several of the most
offensive passages he could find against Mackenzie, but not a word
against Rolph. And so it is in regard to every other reference in
the author's book. It is notorious that Rolph's baseness, and
his consequent unpopularity amongst the people of Upper
Canada, made him the common target for many years of the
strongest attacks and denunciations. Of these not even the most
distant echo is heard in this bulky, gilt-edged volume. Is it any
wonder, then, that the hero appears " without spot or wrinkle or
any such thing ?" Or that the whole portraiture of Mackenzie is
marred, blotched and blemished ?
A NEW RULE OF CRITICISM.
Apply this new canon of story-telling all round, and see the
effects of it. There is not a statesman or politician of prominence
anywhere whose character and career have not been both praised
and censured by their contemporaries in the press or otherwise.
Yet, according to the novel rule laid down in this highly judicial
narrative, we must accept as final, in every case, a judgment based
on the voice of praise or censure alone ! Run down the compara-

109
tively long roll of Canadian public men living and dead — and it
is for our young country a roll of honour — and who in the list could
stand in history were he thus left at the mercy of the garbler ?
And who, on the other hand, through this patent winnowing
process of Mr. Dent's, might not, like Rolph, come out an embodi
ment of perfection ? Take as a single illustration another " per
sonality " amongst the author's Patres Conscripti — Robert Bald
win. I will concede to him as much of immaculateness as will any
one, but had he no frailties or shortcomings ? And how would it
be if, in the pages of historic story-telling, all these were studiously
and continuously elaborated and magnified with every artifice of
literary ingenuity? What if the portrait of him in John William
Kaye's "Life of Charles, Lord Metcalfe" were taken as the only
true portrait from life? What if every line and feature there were
enlarged Or distorted? Kaye's limning of Baldwin is far from in
gratiating. It is not true, no more true, although more flattering
to the original, than is Mr. Dent's, unsightly limning of Mac
kenzie. Or, suppose we take Baldwin, as he appears in the
Memoir, by G. Poulett Scrope, M.P., of Charles, Lord Sydenham,
and the Narrative of his Administration in Canada ? Scrope there
charges Baldwin with political ignorance, tergiversation and dis
honour, and states why he has been led to such conclusions. I
do not sympathize with his views, but I am not called upon to
discuss them, nor shall I do so. But what if Baldwin were
dealt with, in the light of such a narrative, as mercilessly as is
Mackenzie in Mr. Dent's ? Mr. Dent does not mention Kaye or
Scrope, but who that has cast a stone at Mackenzie has he not
mentioned 1 If the " so-called historians " had winnowed political
literature in this way,' giving all the wheat to one personage and
all the chaff to another, we should not have been surprised, be
cause they, according to Mr. Dent, are a lot of ignoramuses. But
Mr. Dent, be it said again with all reverence, is not of these.
Not much. He is the only true story-teller, the Gamaliel of
Canadian annals, at whose blessed feet the great " So-Called "
must sit and learn — the self-appointed Lord Keeper of our his
torical conscience.

110

SIR FRANCIS BOND HEAD TO THE FORE.
The following quotation occurs in Sir Francis Bond Head's des
patch to Lord Glenelg, the Colonial Secretary, dated January
26th, 1838. The writer was protesting against Rolph's being
made a member of the Executive Council, and, after giving Mac
kenzie the place of honour in his anathemas, he proceeds : — " Dr.
Rolph has been proved to have been the most insidious, the most
crafty, the most bloodthirsty, the most treacherous, the most
cowardly, and, taking his character altogether, the most infamous
of the traitors who lately assailed us. After having been the
person who fixed the day on which Toronto was to be attacked,
he hyprocritically undertook to be the bearer of my appeal to
the rebels, to avoid the effusion of human blood ; and it has
actually been proved before the Commission, which is investigat
ing this treasonable affair, that, after Dr. Rolph and Mr. Robert
Baldwin had delivered this message from me, the former, Dr.
Rolph, went aside with two of the principal traitors, and diaboli
cally recommended them to come and attack the town. 1 will
only add that Dr. Rolph's consciousness of the part he had acted
prompted him to fly to the United States (before any idea was
entertained of arresting him) the moment it became evident that
the treacherous attack he had planned would not succeed. As a
fugitive traitor, his seat in the House of Assembly has just been
declared void, with only two dissentient voices, which merely
disagreed on a question of form."
A CHRONIC DISORDER.
When Mr. Dent was pelting Mackenzie with some of the
nastiest missies he could pick from this self-same Narrative, he
forgot the above fragrant little nosegay from the library window
of the old Government House at Toronto. His forgetfulness in
this line is, I fear, chronic. Mr. Dent is a great book-maker,
but one of his infirmities is that his different books on the same
subjects do not always tally. Nor do they always tally as to the
same transactions in the same book. He is troubled with a men
tal disorder called in classical times lubrica memoria, which, in

Ill
our " low radical " vernacular, simply means lubricity of memory.
It has affected him a good deal during the past few years. For
example, he says one thing in one book about Mackenzie and
Baldwin, and, forgetting all about it, says a very different thing
in another. He says one thing in one place about Mackenzie in
his present book, and, forgetting all about it, says a different
thing in another place in this same book. His forgetfulness about
Rolph is merely another symptom of the same unfortunate ail
ment. He forgets everything that would soil the stainless name
and character of that monument of political constancy, and
even manufactures virtues out of his per contra ; he remembers
every good word that ever has been penned about him. Mr.
Dent's fits of mental lubricity are a good deal like the lazy boy's
attacks of " school fever " : they come on just when he wants them.
They are as handy as a pocket in a shirt — to be used or not at
the owner's convenience or pleasure ; but like the " tricks that
are vain," of the Heathen Chinee, they are also very "peculiar."
MR. DENT RESPONSIBLE.
But why, some may ask, do you now unearth this old story of
Rolph's besetting sin? Why, when even the Globe declared, so
early as the 3 1st of December last, that this controversy " con
cerning the connection of Dr. Rolph with the Rebellion of
1837," was "inevitable?" When the Rolph papers, and Rolph's
memoranda of the movement, are manifestly the source of many
of the worst calumnies against Mackenzie ? When Mr. Dent has
given the strongest provocation for unearthing everything by the
lofty pedestal of goodness and worth on which he has placed his
hero ? When he has challenged the strictest scrutiny into every
motive and action of his hero's public life ? When he has sought,
by every means in his power, and notably by the most offensive
sort of contrasts with Rolph, and the most unworthy aspersions of
the latter's associate, to degrade in the eyes of the world one whose
transparent honesty and sincerity alone should have shielded him
from such wanton insults ? When a scion of the Rolph family
has, in the leading journal of the Liberal party of Canada, reck
lessly and falsely charged the victim of his father's malice with

112
universal treachery ? Surely the limit of endurance was reached,
was passed, when calumnies so vindictive were sown broadcast in
the fierce light of the public eye ? Do I ask for justification or
excuse in raking up the ashes of the past under such circum
stances ? For exposing this white sepulchre of a Story? For
stripping its slanders to their rotten framework ? For unmasking
the author, and condemning his partisan production ? For promptly
casting back upon his traducers the ignominies heaped upon the
dead patriot's grave ? I ask for none, for none is required. But
if I do ask, upon whom rests the responsibility for all this crimina
tion and recrimination, no one can mistake the certain and only
answer. The ripping open of old wounds and sores, as yet unhealed
and irritating, is an extremely unpleasant, a very painful operation.
But it is Mr. Dent who has forced the fighting ; he has been the
heartless, rancorous aggressor ; his barbed javelins have been
hurled everywhere ; and upon his shonlders alone must the res
ponsibility — be it heavy or light — remain.
A CHARACTERISTIC CONTRAST OF MACKENZIE AND ROLPH.
The author's contrasts of Mackenzie and Rolph are also rather
edifying. Here is one of them : — " No two human beings could well
be more unlike than were William Lyon Mackenzie and John Rolph.
They were compelled to work together in a common cause for
many years, but the two entities were thoroughly antagonistic,
and there was never much personal liking between them. The
structure of their bodies was not more dissimilar than was that of
their minds. The one, slight, wiry and ever in motion, seemed as
though it might be blown hither and thither by any strong
current. The other, solid almost to portliness, was suggestive of
fixity — of self-dependence, and unsusceptibility to outside influ
ence. The one was suggestive of being in a great measure the
creature of circumstances ; the other of being a law unto himself
— one who would be more likely to influence circumstances than
to be influenced by them. Mackenzie's nature, though it could not
strictly be called a shallow one, at any rate lay near the surface, and
its characters were not hard to decipher, even upon a brief acquaint
ance. There were depths in Rolph's nature which were never

113
fathomed by those nearest 'and dearest to him — possibly not even
by himself. Mackenzie seems to have long regarded Rolph with a
sort of distant awe — as a Sphinx, close, oracular, inscrutable," etc.
CHIEFLY CONCERNING " STRUCTURE."
The first three sentences in the above are more or less true.
We have seen already in what respects " the two entities " were
" unlike " or " antagonistic." As to some of these, it will be univer
sally admitted, they were as far apart as the poles. As well could
oil and water mix, as could several of the crowning qualities of each
blend in either " personal " or, for that matter, political combina
tion. Honest frankness and wily deceit were never twin " entities,"
and never will be. Mr. Dent, it will be seen, is great on " struc
ture," mental, bodily, and, let me add, book structure as well.
We have noticed before how he analyzed Mackenzie's " structure
of mind." He is here investigating, in pretty much the same
style, his " structure " of body. All this kind of historic anatomy
is exceedingly interesting. It is indispensable in graphic story
telling, as witness Charles Dickens' subtlety in the same line.
But the English master of fiction went deeper into the subject
than his Canadian rival. Mr. Dent has strangely enough passed
over a most absorbing line of enquiry in regard to both " person
alities." He has entirely omitted the " structure " of their clothes.
For a Court historian and literary dandy who only affects the
"bloods" of Reform, and looks awry upon the "unlettered"
hewers of wood and drawers of water for the party, what a field
for his genius was here? Clothes are a powerful element in
politics. It is not so many years ago since we had an animated
discussion in the Toronto press as to which of the rival parties
wore the best clothes. Some journalistic Yellowplush started the
momentous question, and finally proved to his own satisfaction,
that his political leaders were " the glass of fashion and the mould
of form " in this respect. Ergo they had the best right to rule
the party which ruled the country. Now Rolph, according to
Mr. Dent, was a great leader of a political party, the greatest '
in fact in it, and we are told that he had an " unerring instinct "
which always enabled him to lead it aright, but that Mackenzie,

114
whom some misguided persons think was also a leader of some
merit in the same party, was always sure, when the great man
allowed him, to lead it wrong. Pursuing the very nice analysis,
which he is here engaged in, of the minutest traits and peculiari
ties of "the two entities," how brilliant Mr. Dent might have
been had he only gone into the question of the influence of their
respective tailor shops on their respective public careers 1 How
thrilling would have been the theme as a starting point for " all
the worst consequences of the movement"? How tame and com
monplace beside it would have appeared that noble burst anent
the naughty woman in the stocks ? Did Rolph sport a broad
cloth cut-a-way with brass buttons, a " dignified " satin stock,
unspeakable knee breeches, silk stockings and pumps — all so
"suggestive of fixity, of self dependence and unsusceptibility to
outside influence," and hence his splendid success ? And did
Mackenzie take to " low radical " collars, a tweed shooting jacket,
wide-awake unmentionables • and Cobourgs — all so " suggestive
of being the creature of circumstances," not knowing where
he would get his next change of linen, and hence his dismal
failure 1 The equally interesting problem of which style the great
" unlettered " preferred, might be tackled at the same time.
This is a " pointer " for the author's second volume, and he must
not miss it. Mr. Dent has shone already like the character in
Hudibras who was An haberdasher of small wares
In politics and State affairs.
But what is all this to an exhaustive disquisition, even in a third
volume, on the relative merit and influence of two "" personalities,''
the one "extraordinary" and the other "notorious," from an every
day and Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes point of view ? The vexed
question, as to the " heroic " in their composition, might at once
be settled forever. THE " SPHINX "-LIKE " PERSONALITY."
As I have said elsewhere, there is not much humour in this
Story. The author is in too dead earnest in proclaiming his long
pent-up message, too seriously sober in telling the momentous,

115
solemn truth for the first time, and going about his missionary
business generally, to attempt the jocose in any shape. But after
all there is a good deal of jocoseness in this last extract from his
book. The " awe " with which Rolph inspired Mackenzie is about
as waggish as anything can be. After gazing in agony on Gour-
lay's "slow crucifixion," having our blood curdled with a duel
that was a " red-handed " murder, and escaping from the jaws of
the " half-famished tigers " of the Family Compact, Mr. Dent's
little joke operates like a grateful emetic. It is a good one, and we
must thank Mr. Dent for innocently cracking it, and letting out the
genial juices as we go wading up to the neck through Tory atroci
ties. Seriously speaking, did our ingenuous jester ever learn fiom
any source, except Rolph's vain imagination, that Mackenzie had
a particle of " awe " for human clay of any kind ? Or, that he
had any more " distant awe " for Rolph than any " canny Scot ''
might have for an infernal machine that had mysterious springs
of mischief in it ?
But this is not all. After regaling his readers, like a sly wag
as he is, on this sort of jocularity, he treats them to something else
pretty much in the same vein. They are carried, at one awful
bound, from those "far-away days that are gone" into the realms
of Grecian mythology or Egyptian antiquities. It is not very
clear which, nor does it matter, because it is not very clear in any
sense. We are told that Mackenzie not only regarded Rolph
with " a sort of distant awe," but " as a Sphinx, close, oracular,
inscrutable." In taking out specifications for an " oracular "
Sphinx it is very evident that Mr. Dent has got his luminous eye
on another patent. This monopolizing spirit of the author's
narrative is, to say the least, unfair, and in the name of our
common literature and the common public right to open compe
tition, I protest against it. Mr. Dent, however, could hardly have
got this idea from the Rolph memorice. It was, is, and always
will be, his own. Rolph, like all the great heroes of ancient and
modern times, had a pardonable share of vanity ; but if he was
the Bacon in knowledge that Mr. Dent says he was, he would
scarcely have written himself down as an " oracular " Sphinx.
But we must not be over finical. Mr. Dent in telling a Story is

116
entitled to considerable license ; he has taken a good deal ; and
it will not do to be exacting when he goes plunging about for
figures of speech amongst the dust of the ancient classics. To
give him full justice, however, he is not entirely "off his base"
in all this figurative talk about the only great man in his
narrative. The Sphinx of the Greeks was a she-monster, who
proposed a mean riddle to the Thebans, and just as meanly killed
every one who was unable to guess it. Oedipus, the king of the
Thebans, solved the riddle, whereupon the Sphinx' slew herself.
According to Mr. Dent the hero of his Story was a whole "riddle"
in himself. The " facts of his early life," he says, " afford no
clue to the reading of the riddle " of his " peculiarities." What is
more, he was always propounding riddles to his friends and follow
ers, and chief amongst these was — whether they could count upon
him or not when he was most needed ? This was summarily solved
at last, and the legend is that the political Sphinx thereupon suf
fered political strangulation. I don't know whether I have traced
out the parallel very lucidly. But that is doubtless what Mr. Dent
meant, and the comparison is probably as lucid as his own. At all
events, Mr. Dent is in a little difficulty just here. He has got
himself into a "Serbonian bog," and I want to help him out of it
if I can. My "intentions," like Mackenzie's, are "good," and as
the author appreciates Mackenzie's "good intentions," the least he
can do is to extend his appreciation to those of his critic.
But surely the author must have been wool-gathering when he
hit upon Rolph as a Sphinx. The comparison is not a bit compli
mentary ; it is really " the unkindest cut of all." The Sphinx
suicide that Oedipus got rid of was by no means a lovely "person
ality." She was a "tyrant-monster who had very little regard
for the feelings of the unlettered farmers and mechanics," and "the
rural section of the community " around old Thebes. But did Mr.
Dent never hear of another Sphinx — "The Sphinx of theTuileries,"
celebrated in John Hays' verse ?
. They call him a Sphinx, — it pleases him, —
And if we narrowly read,
We will find some truth in the flunkey's praise, —
The man is a Sphinx indeed.

117
For the Sphinx with breast of woman,
And face so debonair,
Had the sleek, false paws of a lion,
That could furtively seize and tear.
So far to the shoulders, — but if you took
The beast in reverse, you would find
The ignoble form of a craven cur
Was all that lay behind.
Mr. Dent will at once see how cynical is his comparison. He
has evidently got it in the wrong place. Why didn't he dovetail
it and gild it over amongst the hero's per contra ?
There is little to be added about the "extraordinary personality."
Rolph's abilities are unquestionable, but with his use or abuse of
them, outside the line of criticism here pursued, I have nothing
at present to do. Even were this not "the other side of the 'Story,' "
I feel that Mr. Dent's patent is too sacred a thing for unhallowed
hands to touch. The least said, and the least that is provoked to
be said, about his epic hero the better. Since the appearance of
the author's "extraordinary" estimate of his character, I have heard
from those who had the best means of knowing him, much that
has astonished me, and that would astonish any person. But I
have no desire to travel beyond the record, or to deal with Rolph
other than the actual necessities of the case require. Mr. Dent
has called forth all that has appeared about his hero in the news
paper press, or in these pages. Those who are most interested in
shielding Rolph's reputation, and defending him before the world,
may thank the story-teller's indiscretions for it all. The extract
from the Globe contained in "A Reformer's " letter is far less sur
prising to me now than when I first read it; I know some persons to
whom it caused no surprise whatever. There is little doubt that
the late Hon. George Brown knew more about the man whom he
thus etched in a leading article than Mr. Dent has ever "dreamt
of in his philosophy ; " and, after all said and done, the fact remains
that the Globe has dealt leniently with Rolph. In speaking of
Mackenzie's personal relations with Sir Francis Bond Head, Mr.
Dent gleefully announces that the former was "inexpressibly
odious " to " this diner-out of the first water." But why did he

118
fail to announce that, during the last years of his administration,
the Lieutenant-Governor never invited Rolph to his table? An
old resident of Toronto is authority for the statement once made
by Rolph, that he (Rolph) cared less about effecting a political
change by violent means than he did about ruining Sir Francis
Bond Head as a public man forever. Why was all this ? John
Rolph was in truth far better known and understood than the
author of this Story has for a moment supposed, and I can well
believe that, had Mr. Dent exercised that prudent spirit of enquiry
which every writer of history should exercise, and which is very
properly required, he would never have blundered into such ex
travagances of adulation. THE GENERAL ELECTION OF 1836.
1 now come to the author's lucubrations on the general election
of 1836. This was brought on by a stretch of the Royal preroga
tive in dissolving Parliament with the deliberate intention, as
afterwards appeared, of securing a Tory victory at any price.
The election was, from all accounts we have of it, carried against
the Reformers by improper and unfair means. Mr. Dent being
corroborated by other more trustworthy writers, we can readily
believe him when he says that " the official party entered upon
the contest with loaded dice and a determination to win." The
" loaded dice " were a profuse expenditure of money, partisan
returning officers, the personal intervention and assistance of the
Lieutenant-Governor, intimidation at the polls, and a free and
lavish distribution of Crown lands patents amongst the most
needy of the electors. This last, as most writers on the period
agree, was by all odds the most potent influence. The loyalty
trumpet was also sounded through the land. The author declares
that " the issue was an exciting, but not a doubtful one." He is
quite correct. The Reformers were utterly worsted at the polls
by their opponents determined and successful interference every
where with the freedom of election. They had gone in to win at
all hazards, and they did win. Speaking of the use made of the
nearly fifteen hundred patents issued by the Government, Mr.
Dent says : " Freedom of election was paralyzed. Reform voters

119
were literally overwhelmed, and their franchise rendered of no
avail." And, speaking of other adverse influences, he also says :
" They (the Reformers) needed all the courage of their opinions
to support them against the obloquy which official slander had
aroused. The courageous among them faced the polls in the
spirit of a forlorn hope. The more timid quietly remained at
home and refrained from voting, rather than subject themselves
to certain insult and probable physical violence." The victory,
at all events, was dearly bought. It brought on a political
reaction which plunged the country into a species of civil war, and
thereby hastened, by many years, the victors final overthrow.
A SLIGHT INCONSISTENCY.
We must, as I have said, accept the author's statements on
these points, because they are more or less corroborated by other
and better authorities. The triumph of the Tories by such means
being thus a foregone conclusion, and Mr. Dent having, as we
have seen, fully committed himself to that view of the matter,
what is to be thought of his consistency a few pages farther on
where he ascribes the defeat of the Reformers to other and
different causes ? He there (at page 333) says that " the ignomi
nious discomfiture of the Reformers had been brought about by
defections from their own ranks." His somersault is at once
explained. It arises from the natural bent of his mind as a story
teller. He fancies he sees an opening to "get in" another
staggering blow at Mackenzie, and, without stopping to consider
that it may prove a boomerang, he straightway delivers it. In
explanation of the Reform defeat he declares in the very next
sentence to that just quoted, that " moderate-minded Reformers
had come to think, with the Conservatives, that even. Family
Compact domination was preferable to the ascendancy of such
men as Mackenzie." In other words, coolly disregarding all that
he had stated just before about "freedom of election" being
"paralyzed," etc., he audaciously turns around and says that
Mackenzie was the bete noir who had caused the whole catastrophe !
Poor' Mackenzie ! When will his sins of omission and commission
ever be condoned ?

120

DENT VS. DENT.

Mackenzie was certainly not responsible in this instance any
more than the rest of his party. And it is perfectly clear from
this very portion of the narrative itself — if any more proof be
required — that the author is extremely unfair in his attempt to
make him responsible. That Mr. Dent has here misrepresented
the real state of feeling amongst Reformers at that particular
time, is evident from certain circumstances stated by himself,
which are also corroborated. The principal of these is that, in the
period intervening between the prorogation of the House of As
sembly and the dissolution immediately preceding the general
election, there was a great deal of public excitement which tended
to thoroughly unite and consolidate the Reform party. In proof
of this I quote Mr. Dent at pages 320 and 326 of his Story, where
he has no object to prove, and is plainly telling the unvarnished
truth, against Mr. Dent at page 333 before mentioned, where he
wishes to deal a foul blow at Mackenzie, and, for that purpose,
does not scruple to distort the truth. At page 320 he says :
" During the weeks following the prorogation the public excite
ment continued to increase until it had reached a height without
precedent in the history of the Province. The Reformers felt
that they had been wofully deceived in the Lieutenant-Govenor,
and many of them placed no bounds to their censure. Some of the
Reform newspapers hinted pretty strongly that no people could be
expected to remain permanently loyal when they were deprived
of their rights year after year, and when all their petitions were set
at naught. The political atmosphere was charged with electricity.
The outlook was lurid and ominous. Some of the loyalists began
to dread an actual uprising of the people." And at page 326 he
says : " The Reformers, moderate and radical, were brought closer
together by the agitated state of the public mind, and by the efforts
of the official party to destroy their influence. Several weeks be
fore the dissolution actually took place, it became known that
such a step was imminent, and quiet preparations were made for
the general election which was to follow." What is the only
reasonable and legitimate inference to be drawn from these state-

121
ments? Is it not that, amongst Reformers generally, the fears
of " the ascendancy of such men as Mackenzie " were not, as
Mr. Dent would have us believe at page 333, the predominating
cause of the Reform disaster ? Are not these statements wholly
inconsistent with his previous absurd assertion that " moderate-
minded Reformers " preferred " Family Compact domination " to
this so-called " ascendancy"? How could there be any pernicious
Mackenzie "ascendancy" about it, because that is what he means,
when, on his own showing, "moderate and radical" were united?
As often happens in the practical working of political parties, a
great common danger had brought the Reformers into thorough
harmony, if indeed that was required. But it really was not.
They had been thoroughly united during the last Parliament, and
the principal effect of the crisis that had arisen was to make them
show a more determined front than ever. At all events, there
was no change in Reform sentiment, as Mr. Dent has here stated
it, prior to the election. Mackenzie and his party were in perfect
accord. Why tfyen should the misfortune of defeat be laid at his
door ? Mr. Dent, be it observed, has also told us that " the more
timid" Reformers "quietly remained at home and refrained from
voting." The probabilities are that there were very many who
acted in this way. The intimidation that was being exercised
was noised about everywhere. The polling lasted for a week,
and, in sparsely settled sections of the country especially, timid
Reform voters were not likely to travel for miles over bad roads
to the polling places on what, they might well believe, would be a
" fool's errand." From this it plainly appears that the whole of
the Reform vote proper was not polled. Mackenzie was certainly
not to blame for that, unless Mr. Dent wants us to infer that the
Reform leader ought to have been omnipresent as well as omni
potent. Such an inference would be no more unreasonable than
many others in the same connection.
A NEST OF SELF-CONTRADICTIONS.
Further proof of this specious, but none the less studied,
injustice to Mackenzie is furnished by the author at page 321.
He there says that " it was no secret that the Upper Canadian

122
Reformers generally were in sympathy with the projects of Reform
entertained by the Lower Canadian agitators ; and it suited the
Tories to assume that the sympathy extended not only to legiti
mate projects of Reform, but to less openly-avowed schemes of
rebellion." So that their identification with their friends in the
Lower Province had also something to do with the disaster which
befell the Reformers in the Upper Province. It suits Mr. Dent,
however, " to assume " that Mackenzie was the rock that had
made shipwreck of their fortunes.
Still discussing the same subject in the same stumbling way,
the author, at another place in the same chapter, says : " The con
duct of the party in power had been such as to make temporary
radicals of not a few persons who had heretofore been known as
moderate Reformers. It may be said, indeed, that nearly all the
moderates had either made common cause with the Government
party for fear of the radicals, or had coalesced with the radicals from
a sense of official tyranny and injustice. Public meetings were
held, at which the Lieutenant-Governor and his myrmidons were
subject to the most vehement denunciations. At a meeting of
the Constitutional Reform Society, Dr. Baldwin, George Ridout,
James E. Small and others referred to His Excellency's conduct in
terms which public audiences had never before heard from their
lips." He also says, speaking of the same thing in another place,
that " these feelings were participated in by Reformers generally."
Here we have a still different account of the influences at work
amongst the people, and which at the same time throws a flood of
light on the author's pet theory of the baneful Mackenzie " as
cendancy." Robert Baldwin's father, and other leading men of
the Reform party, as well as " Reformers generally " are shown
to be quite as violently disposed against the Government as
Mackenzie. According to one opinion of the author, expressed
in the above quotation, the "moderate Reformers" were not
perverts at all, but as radical as Mackenzie or any of his party,
This is most probably the correct statement of the case, although,
as we . have seen, it is directly opposed to previous statements on
the very same point. Then again, according to another opinion in
the very next sentence, " the moderates " were divided between the

123
two parties, Reform and Tory. What then becomes of that little
pet theory, so flippantly advanced just before, that all the "mod
erate-minded Reformers " were against Mackenzie whose terrible
" ascendancy " had frightened them like a flock of sheep into the
Tory ranks 1 The only answer is that it is simply another con
tradiction and inconsistency. There is in short a whole series of
contradictions and inconsistencies about the same public trans
action, and they are almost incomprehensible except on the well
understood rule — which Mr. Dent hereafter would do well to
follow — that a straightforward story can only be told straight
forwardly, and that a crooked story will almost certainly trip the
story-teller unless he be a very clever man who tells it. That
species of cleverness Mr. Dent has not yet acquired. If he
wanted his readers to place any credence whatever in his narrative,
he should really have told it with some sort of consistency.
There are, I dare say, some statements in it that they would like to
believe. But when they find their author turning somersaults,
displaying his agility as a literary acrobat, and swinging all round
the circle in his explanation of a very simple occurrence, appar
ently for no other reason than to get a fling at one of the
principal characters in his Story, they may well be excused for
being strongly sceptical of the truth itself whenever they chance
to come across it.
Mackenzie's responsibility for the defeat.
Amidst this beautiful medley of accounts of the state of feel
ing amongst Reformers, during this memorable election contest,
it clearly appears that Mackenzie was not responsible, any more
than the rest of his party, for the ruinous result. The Reformers
as a party went into the struggle shoulder to shoulder, united in
policy and sentiment,, and the responsibility of defeat must be
justly shared by all alike. Their fate was sealed from the
outset, by reason of the agencies employed against them, and
Mr. Dent concurs in this view. Why then censure any one
man, or any one section of the party ? Mackenzie's publication
of the Hume letter, which Mr. Dent also refers to, could not
materially have affected the result. Its force, if it ever had any,

124
was long since spent. It appeared in the Adiiocate fully two
years before this time, and, at the general election a few months
afterwards in the same year, when it was still fresh in the public
mind, and when it was made to render all the Tory service pos
sible, the Reformers scored a victory. No doubt there were, as
Mr. Dent says, defections from the Reform ranks. His princi
pal authority for the statement is Sir Francis Hincks' "Remini
scences." There are other authorities as well, and being so cor
roborated, we must accept Mr. Dent again. The Methodists,
influenced more or less by Dr. Ryerson, who usually contrived
to be on the side of the ruling powers, but really influenced
far more, as we shall see, by a large money grant in aid of
the Cobourg Academy, went over in considerable numbers to
the enemy. But their defection alone could not possibly have
brought about the utter rout sustained by the Liberals. It was
really due to a combination of influences which Mr. Dent rightly
indicated when he followed in the beaten track of better authori
ties than himself, but which he wrongly indicated when he left
the path of honest narration to hit Mackenzie below the belt.
One of these influences, I venture to say, was one which is con
stantly upsetting the calculations of the most sagacious party
politicians. I refer to that of the middle or no-party electo
rate — the political " residuum," as it may here be called —
which had no strongly pronounced party leanings, which usually
hovered between the contending forces, attaching itself at one
time to one side, and at another time to the other. It goes
without saying, that, on some previous occasions, this middle
party had joined the Reformers. If it had not done so, it is
difficult to conceive how the latter could have succeeded in
securing the control of the Assembly, unsatisfactory as any
such control was with an irresponsible Executive in power. But
on this notable occasion, in the early summer of 1836, there
can hardly be any question that this middle party gravitated
towards the reactionist ranks, and fell into line under the Tory
banner. Their numbers may not have been large ; they were
probably small ; but it has been too often demonstrated within
recent years how small is the actual number of votes essential

125
to the rise and fall of parties, and to make and unmake Govern
ments, to leave any doubt as to the inevitable consequences, in
a severe contest, of such an influence being transferred from
one side to the other.
mr. dent's " moderate " politicians.
This important factor in the struggles of ante-Rebellion parties
does not seem to have come within the range of Mr. Dent's political
ken. There is no mention of it anywhere in this volume. It
would appear to be embraced in his idea of the "moderate" Reform
element. Such an idea is, to say the least, a very confused one.
It was certainly quite as much, if not more, a Tory element, but
it was in fact anything or nothing — a most fickle and uncertain,
but none the less potent, influence in all general election contests.
Moderation in politics is not to be despised. Many of the most
intelligent politicians of our own time are moderate, but, all the
same, their political principles are distinctive, and their opinions
very pronounced. There is no reason why this should not be.
They are in this respect very different from many of the "moderates"
whom Mr. Dent is so fond of patting on the back. Those nonde
script gentry were "neither fish, flesh, fowl nor good herring."
They were evidently persons of very easy political virtue, and the
author's unbounded admiration of their loose principles, and still
looser practices, is not at all surprising. Mr. Dent may, however,
be only in a secondary degree responsible for these free and easy
notions of political morality. His ideas, on some of the points
which I have noticed, are very probably derived from the Rolph
memorial. These Rolph papers are the bane of his book. He will
some day heartily wish that he had never seen them, and that, long
years before he had taken the highest seat in the story-telling
synagogue, they had been buried in the depths of oblivion. They
have led him far astray from the straight way and the narrow path
of literary rectitude, and have sent him nakedly wandering down
the aisles of history in deep, delusive dreams of Mackenzie vicious-
ness and Rolph virtue, to be awakened, I trust, some time, and
again clothed and in his right mind.

126
"THE ONE STREAK OF BRIGHT LIGHT."
Most of the prominent Reformers, Mackenzie included, were
defeated in this election. Mr. Dent, fancying that he has his
victim nicely saddled with the discredit of the defeat, concludes
his phenomenal description of it with a rhetorical sky-rocket for
his hero. No sooner does down go Mackenzie than up goes the
Doctor, in this Story. We are accordingly told that " the one
significant gain to the Reform party arose out of the election of
Dr. Rolph. His return was the one streak of bright light which
appeared in the Reform horizon at the close of the campaign."
It would be rather interesting, I fancy, to enquire how it happened
that, in Norfolk, where the Methodist vote and the Ryerson
influence were pretty strong, the cunning " Oily Gammon" of the'
Globe managed to squeeze in. From what I have been able to
discover, in old records of the campaign, of the influences employed
by the Reform candidate there, Rolph in his private canvass was
no more loyal to the leaders of his party than he was on numerous
occasions afterwards. He was a professional man in more senses
than one ; at times he made great political professions that were
in inverse proportion to his performances ; and he was not above
"running with the hare and hunting with the hounds " when he
was not under proper surveillance. Be this as it may, no one will
envy Mr. Dent his fresh extraction of sunbeams from cucumbers
in the case of his hero. Mr. Dent sends Rolph up like a rocket,
but he omits to add that he speedily came down like the stick.
For all the good that that worthy could accomplish, even if he
had had the chance, in the House of Assembly afterwards, he
might as well have been tied hand and foot, with his back broke,
in the depths of the Norfolk forest.
RYERSON AND MACKENZIE.
The meanly false impression which the author strives to create
of Mackenzie personally has already been noticed. In these
meanderings through the suburbs of old-time election history, Mr.
Dent again favours us with his " non-partisan " views on the
same point. It occurs in his remarks on the differences between

127
Mackenzie and the late Rev. Dr. Ryerson. He says that the
former " quarrelled with Dr. Ryerson," who, " in common with a
large and respectable portion of the Upper Canadian population,
cherished a feeling of personal contempt for Mackenzie, whose
character he thoroughly despised, and whose projects he regarded
as prejudicial to the welfare of the colony." He then proceeds to
speak of Dr. Ryerson's taking part in the election of 1836 against
the Reformers and adds — "his (Ryerson's) dislike of Mac
kenzie probably imparted zeal to his opposition." Let me ask,
has it never occurred to Mr. Dent, when writing in this uncalled-
for and gratuitously offensive strain, that he is stepping on rather
slippery ground ? That he is jeopardizing his own "character"
amongst " a large and respectable portion " of our people ? Can
Mr. Dent afford to do this ? I hardly think he can. I am not
aware that he can afford to " thoroughly despise," even at second
hand, the character of any Canadian public man, or to take the risk
of imputing to any person that sort of contempt for Mackenzie.
He knows best whereof he writes, but those who think most highly
of Dr. Ryerson, or who have any regard for him, will scarcely thank
Mr. Dent for his wanton indiscretion in dragging their old friend
into the miry ruts of his narrative, and leaving him there to be
scoffed at. Stories like this, replete with "hypocrisies, and envies
and all evil speakings," are very apt to provoke reprisals. They
certainly give rise to criticisms and animadversions of one kind or
another that a fair and dispassionate presentation of the facts
would never have called forth. I have every respect for Dr. Ryer
son, and for his services in the cause of education, but justice to
Mackenzie, which Mr. Dent denies him in this instance, compels
me to advert to the relations subsisting between the two men.
This is all the more necessary from the fact, known to Mr. Dent
and which probably gave zest to his insolent imputations, that
Mackenzie has always had many warm friends and admirers in the
influential religious body to which Dr. Ryerson belonged.
THE AUTHOR IN A NEW ROLE.
Mr. Dent, as we have seen, is gifted with many rare accom
plishments as a story-teller. He has enlarged the bounds of his
toric fiction to an indefinite extent, and has reduced story-telling,

128
both as a science and an art, to a very fine thing. But he is no
less distinguished as a literary juggler and contortionist. In this
very difficult role he is almost unequalled. No one who has faced
the garish footlights for many years in this country can at all
compare with him. He is the literary " Wizard of the North."
He can swallow himself with the greatest of ease in two different
treatises on the same subject ; he can go through a similar per
formance in one and the same treatise ; nay, in one and the same
chapter. He can do it, too, without so much as a wry face, and,
having got through the deglutition process, can come up smiling
and salute his wondering audience in the most approved fashion
The old literary trick of opening one's mouth and putting his
foot in it, is nothing new to Signor Del Dento. Indeed, he has
rather improved on it. He can open his historic mouth, and put
both his historic feet in it, without the slightest difficulty. He
does it so adroitly and gracefully that he seems rather to like it.
In fact, it has become a sort of passion with him, and like all
persons who have an overmastering passion for that sort of display,
the merest suggestion of his capabilities, as a leading performer in
his favourite role, sets him off at once in a fresh exhibition of his '
skill. Signor's contortions, in what may be called his Ryersonian
tricks of the stage, are superb.
Mr. Dent alleges that Mackenzie " quarrelled w ith Dr. Ryer
son." " The art of putting things," as the " Country Parson " has
told us in one of his best essays, is a most refined art. Mr. Dent
has evidently been studying the essay. In his way of putting
the so-called " quarrel " between the two men, he conveys, as he
no doubt means to convey, the' most unfavourable inference as to
Mackenzie. If he had stated the facts such an inference could
not possibly be drawn ; but facts that tell in Mackenzie's favour
are not what the author wants. In this case, as in many others, he
suppresses them. He tries to lead his readers to believe that some
wanton act of Mackenzie, which was intensified by "personal con
tempt " for the supposed wrong-doer, had driven Dr. Ryerson from the
path of political rectitude, and that the Doctor, having the Metho
dist body pretty much in his breeches pockets, Mackenzie was the
wolf who had also scared them from the true political fold.

129

MACKENZIES AND RYERSON S EARLY FRIENDSHIP.
Up to 1834 or '35 Mackenzie and Dr. Ryerson were personal
and political friends. In 1826 the latter made his debut as a con.
troversialist in. a review of a sermon by Archdeacon Strachan on
the death of Dr. Mountain, the Anglican Bishop of Quebec. The
sermon was obnoxious to the " dissenters," as they were then called,
and especially to the Methodist clergy, and the Doctor took up the
cudgels valiantly in behalf of his own order. Mackenzie gave
extensive circulation to the review through the Advocate, and was
largely instrumental in securing for the reviewer any credit which
he gained in the wordy war. Dr. Ryerson was at that time an
ardent Liberal, more extreme, it would appear, than Mackenzie
himself. For some years afterwards, in fact up to the close of
1833, he strongly sympathized with Mackenzie's political "plans
of operation," so much so that, as we shall see, he was " accused
of originating and supporting them." The Reform editor, in sub
sequently stating the Doctor's opinions at this period, said that
" he (Ryerson) was ultra-liberal, praised the United States as the
best of all human governments, and, acting with Mackenzie, Bid-
well, Bblph and others, exerted a strong influence over the public
mind." And, as to the Lower Canada Reformers, it was also said
that "Papineau's and Viger's career he steadily defended like
Dalton of the Patriot." Corroborative proof of this is readily
procurable. THE "CHRISTIAN GUARDIAN" ON MACKENZIE.
Dr. Ryerson was subsequently appointed to the editorship of the
Christian Guardian, which was then the organ, political as well
as religious, of the Methodist body. In the Guardian of Novem
ber 6th, 1833, we find an article, signed by him as editor, in which
the writer expresses himself as follows in regard to Mackenzie : —
"Of Mr. Mackenzie we have but little to say. We have never,
directly or indirectly, expressed our opinion publicly of his merits
or plans of operation; though we have often been accused of
originating and supporting them. Whatever measures Mr. Mac
kenzie may have originated and pursued, however beneficial many
9

130
of them may be, and whatever influence he may have acquired, he
is not indebted to us for the ingenuity, excellence, or success of the
one, nor thepower of the other, but to his own unparalleled industry,
his .financial taste and talents, and his extraordinary public exer
tions. Wishing, in private life at least, to be the ' friend of all
and enemy of none,' we have conversed, freely and friendly, in
years past, with both Mr. Mackenzie and his opponents, and have
always found Mr. Mackenzie as a man open, generous, ardent,
punctual and honourable in all his engagements : and have believed
that, however exceptionable much of his proceedings and writings
were, their general tendency would be to secure rigid economy in
the public expenditure, and remove abuses which candour must
admit have gradually grown up in some parts of the administration
of public affairs," etc.
There can be no mistaking the meaning and force of these senti
ments deliberately expressed, though necessarily guarded, in a
religious newspaper. How did it happen, then, that the two
friends became estranged ?
HOW THEY FELL OUT.
The simple truth is that Dr. Ryerson " quarrelled " with Mac
kenzie, and that the "quarrel" — if so inexpressive a word may be
used — was, so far as Mackenzie was concerned, on public grounds
alone. It seems that in 1833 the Doctor went to England, as a
delegate from the Canadian Conference, to submit a proposition of
union between the body which it represented and the English
Methodists. He made a second visit in 1835 to obtain a Royal
charter for the Upper Canada Academy, which was subsequently
merged in the University of Victoria College, and to solicit sub
scriptions for that institution. On his first visit he was met by
Mackenzie, who was then conferring with the Colonial Office as to
the grievances complained of in Upper Canada. Having all along
been one of his staunch political friends, the latter gave the Doctor
all the assistance possible in the object of his mission by introduc
tions to eminent Englishmen whose friendship the Reform leader
had formed. He also secured for him an introduction to the
Colonial Minister, which, as will be seen, was then an exceptional

131
favour. What first incensed Mackenzie in Dr. Ryerson's conduct
was that he abused the privileges thus afforded him, by " artfully
using them to injure the cause of the Reform party," and to thwart
the efforts of his friend as its accredited agent. This was greatly
aggravated afterwards by the Doctor's letters to the leading Eng
lish journal in which he grossly misrepresented the principles and
policy of the Liberal party in Canada. Mackenzie was most
indignant at this, as he had every right to be, and his feelings
were fully shared by his party. Mr. Lindsey in his biography of
Mackenzie, says : " Without entering into the merits of the case,
it will be sufficient to say that the course pursued by Mr. Ryerson,
while in England and after his return to Canada, gave Mr. Mac
kenzie great offence, and he used often, to the last years of his life,
to express regret that he had done anything to secure Mr. Ryerson
admission to the Colonial Office, which, in spite of the access which
Mr. Mackenzie obtained, had for nearly eighteen months shut its
doors in the face of Mr. Viger, who went as the delegate of the
Lower Canada Assembly. Mr. Baldwin, who afterwards visited
London, was never able to obtain an audience of the Colonial
Minister." Mackenzie's account of the " quarrel."
This whole matter was subsequently discussed in the Upper
Canadian press. The Toronto Examiner, then edited by the late
Sir Francis Hincks, and an able exponent of the views of the
Liberal party, severely criticized and condemned Dr. Ryerson's
conduct, which was fairly open to censure. In one of the numbers
of Mackenzie's Gazette, published at New York, I find the follow
ing reference to the discussion. The editor says :—" I see long-
articles in the Toronto Examiner in reply to some remarks, from
time to time, in the Guardian, which I seldom receive, about Mr.
Egerton Ryerson's principles, and his introduction to the Colonial
Office. * * I introduced him to Mr. Hume and others, and,
as to an interview with Mr. Stanley at the Colonial Office, he
never dreamt of it. But believing him sincerely attached to the
Canadian people, I went one Sunday morning to Cleveland Square,
saw the Secretary at War, Mr. Ellice, and after describing Mr.

132
Ryerson's talents and influence to him, I informed him that he
(Ryerson) intended to leave for the Irish Conference on the
morrow, and that I wanted much that Mr. Stanley, who was
greatly hurried, would consent to see him. Mr. Ellice promised
to procure him an interview, saw him himself next day, handed
him fifty sovereigns to aid the Methodists to build a College,
opened the portals of the Colonial Office for him, and then he
(Ryerson) tried to undo with the Minister all I had been doing
for the previous eighteen months. * * When I went to him
at the Mission House, after I" had seen the English Secretary, he
had as little intention of remaining twenty-four hours in London,
as I have of settling at Pekin in China. My confidence in him,
as in many others like him, was misplaced, but his professions of
friendship for the republican party up to that time had been most
ardent, and it is probable they were sincere, until inordinate
vanity and the hope of great gain turned his head and corrupted
his heart. I then publicly denounced and abandoned him."
These lines, be it observed, were prepared for publication in an
American newspaper supporting the " republican " party which
corresponded, more or less, in its views of popular liberty and
civil rights, with the Canadian Reform party.
the doctor's double deal.
In 1836, during his second visit to England, Dr. Ryerson con
tributed a series of letters to the London Times over the signature
of "A Canadian." These were exceedingly hostile to the measures
of Canadian reform which Mackenzie, Hume, Roebuck and others
had been advocating, and in regard to which they had created a
most favourable impression in the English mind. The letters were
also brimful of gushing loyalty to the mother country and British
institutions, which, the writer represented, were seriously menaced
by the attitude and policy of the Reformers in Canada. These
communications were republished in this country, and, along with
others from the same pen, were freely used by the' Tories against the
Reformers during the general election of 1836. But they served,
and were no doubt intended to serve, another purpose as well. In
England, where their anonymity was not concealed, they were a

133
capital card to play in the writer's itinerant collecting tour through
the country, and gave him material assistance in his mission.
Some time afterwards, in summing up the results of Dr. Ryerson's
two visits to England, Mackenzie said that "he (Ryerson) struggled
hard to obtain a slice or equivalent of the Clergy Reserves for his
order ; " that he " obtained an equivocal promise, returned to
Canada, and came out in his press in favour of Sir Robert Peel ;"
that he " slandered his old Reform friends," and " carried a
majority of the Methodist preachers in Conference with him ; "
that he' " held out the hope to them of pecuniary benefit to their
order, independent of the people, and of a $16,000 grant of money
promised him by Glenelg to a college at Cobourg ; " and that
he thereby " obtained the active and zealous co-operation of the
whole Conference, at the last Upper Canada election, of a Legis
lature to crush the Reform majority, who had stood up so man
fully for a domestic, frugal, responsible Government."
MACKENZIE AS A CONSTITUTIONAL REFORMER.
It is unnecessary to give the full quotation in which these
passages occur. They are merely cited as indicating some of the
material arguments employed to carry the elections. Dr. Ryer
son had published, far and wide in England, that his old Reform
allies here were un-British and disloyal. They were, as a matter
of fact, supreme in the House of Assembly prior to the dissolution,
and had gone the length of stopping the supplies. The Imperial
Government were naturally desirous of destroying a supremacy
that was represented to them, and which they believed, to be
dangerous, and they were very ready to listen to any proposal
that would weaken the Reformers in the contest. It was under
these circumstances that Dr. Ryerson successfully pressed them
to recommend to the Canadian Government a large money grant
to the Cobourg Academy in which his church was interested.
No one can regret that the grant was made. The Academy was
thereby enabled to blossom forth into a College and University
that have done yeoman service in the cause of higher education in
the Province. But all this might have been accomplished in a
different way. At all events, the recommendation was carried

134
out despite the opposition of Mackenzie and the Reform party,
and also against the plainly expressed wishes of the Lieutenant-
Governor, Sir Francis Bond Head. The Reformers, who were in
a majority in the Assembly, opposed it as unconstitutional, in as
much as it did not originate here, and was really a grant by the
Home Government of money which did not belong to them, but
to the people of the Colony who had no voice whatever in its
appropriation. Under responsible Government the grant would
never have been made as it was.
Mackenzie's references to this matter are fully borne out 'by Sir
Francis Hincks, who, it seems, had very strong opinions on the
subject. Writing editorially in the Montreal Pilot of August
19th, 1848, Mr. Hincks said: "Mr. Ryerson's grand weapon of
attack, however, was the hostility manifested to the Wesleyan
Methodist Church by the Reform majority in the 12th Parlia
ment of Upper Canada. This hostility was manifested simply
by opposing an unconstitutional pecuniary grant made to
that Church, and which there is no doubt whatever was given
for the very purpose of influencing their votes. It was indeed
a paltry, very paltry bribe, but it was the means of creating
discord." And here let me ask again, was Mackenzie responsible for all
this ? Surely Mr. Dent would not be so unfair as to say that
all those whose votes were thus unduly influenced were " moderate-
minded Reformers " who preferred " even Family Compact domina
tion " "to the ascendancy of such men as Mackenzie"? Yet, as
I have already shown, that is just what he does say. Why did
he not plainly give the 16,000 golden reasons for their submitting
to the yoke of the Compact, and not leave, as he no doubt intends
to leave, the odium upon Mackenzie of driving in a crisis a large
number of honest and virtuous electors beyond the pale of his
party, and making them apostates to Reform? The "modera
tion " of those who were thus won over may commend itself to
Mr. Dent, but there are few moderate politicians in our day,
either Reform or Conservative, who would care to accept so low
a criterion of their political virtue.

135

OLD bones of contention.

What I have written fully explains the relations subsisting,
during a long period, between Mackenzie and Dr. Ryerson. It
shows very clearly, I think, that the former was not to blame for
the rupture of their personal and political friendship. Dr. Ryerson
had a game of his own to play, and he found a ready excuse for
doing so when a fair chance of success was presented to him.
Let me say, however, that in striving to get a slice of the Clergy
Reserves for his own Church, he was only doing what he had a
perfect right to do. A large section of the Presbyterians did the
same thing. In fact all religious sects were then clamouring for
a share in a fund which they claimed was not created for the
exclusive benefit of any one Church or denomination. Mackenzie
was then in favour of the secularization of the Reserves, which,
as we have seen, was prayed for in the petitions which he carried
with him to England. On this and a number of other questions,
he and Reformers generally disagreed with the notions of Reform
which Dr. Ryerson sought to inculcate amongst his co-religionists,'
combatted them in the press and on the platform, and this led to
angry political as well as personal differences which may be called
a " quarrel," or whatever you will.
There is this also to be said that, although not avowedly a
politician, Dr. Ryerson was really a politician all his life. " The
structure of his mind," if Mr. Dent will permit me to borrow one of
his anatomical and physiological expressions, was largely political.
Had he devoted himself to politics, and entered the parliamentary
arena, his success, as that quality is generally esteemed, would
have been assured. As it was, he was very often a power behind, as
well as before, the shifting scenes. It was the knowledge of this
open secret, by all the politicians of his time, that so often
brought him into collision with them. At the time that he fell foul
• of Mackenzie his ideas of Reform were just the same as they
were in after years when he fell foul of the Hon. George Brown,
the Hon. Edward Blake and other prominent Liberal leaders.
His " Leonidas " letters, and his platform addresses, in defence of
the arbitrary and unconstitutional policy of Sir Charles Metcalfe,

136
are not yet forgotten. Nor is the fact that, for many years on
the eve of every general election, he was always to the fore with
a series of political letters, or a political brochure of some sort, in
support of his old Conservative patrons, and against his old Re
form friends. Those most favourably disposed to Dr. Ryerson
freely admit that the unaccountable attitude which he assumed
as " Leonidas " was one of the greatest mistakes of his life. Nor
is this impression lessened by the fact that he got his reward,
from the reactionary Governor, in his appointment in 1844 as
Chief Superintendent of the Public Schools of the Province.
A PAMPHLET THAT PAID.
There is a circumstance in connection with the publication of the
" Leonidas " letters which, I believe, has never before been men
tioned. It is said that their author was paid by Sir Charles
Metcalfe at the rate of four pence currency per printed line for
the writing of them, and that the total sum which he thus
•realized was about nine hundred or a thousand pounds. Mr.
Gwatkin, who died a few years ago, and who was a partner of the
late Mr. Hugh Scobie, the proprietor of the Colonist in which the
letters appeared, said he was assured of this on the best authority.
It is not at all improbable, and I do not mention it to Dr. Ryer
son's discredit. Lord Metcalfe was wealthy, and his liberality
was well known. The Doctor proved to be a powerful champion,
and his championship was apparently sincere. The late Hon.
George Brown used to say that he never knew of but two
pamphlets that paid both the author and the publisher. I think
the " Leonidas " pamphlet must have been one of them.
MACKENZIE AT THE COLONIAL OFFICE.
Mackenzie's visit to England, at the time of which we have been
speaking, was prolonged for about sixteen months. It had a very '
important influence on the early fortunes of Reform, and was at
tended with far-reaching results. Its success at once accounts for
Mr. Dent's singular reticence on the subject. He says very little
about it, and the little he does say is in the familiar strain of

137
ill-natured depreciation. At the request of Lord Goderich,
the Colonial Secretary, Mackenzie drew up a Memoir of the
most serious grievances complained of in Upper Canada. iDounter
petitions from the Tories had already been sent Home, and, as these
were backed by all the influence of the Canadian Government, it
was highly necessary that the Memoir, and the documents accom
panying it, should be considered by the Minister without delay.
It was probably prepared with some haste, but even Mr. Dent
admits that the facts were "pretty comprehensively embodied."
Some idea of Mackenzie's industry, and his powers of application
to work of this nature, may be got from the well attested fact that,
in the preparation of these papers, he spent six days and six nights
continuously at his desk, snatching only a few minutes occasionally
for sleep. Few men would be capable of such a task, but it was
one that, in a "minor degree, he very often performed in the course
of his public life. * Although, from the effect which it produced,
this Memoir must have been a powerful factum of the people's case,
Mr. Dent cannot restrain his cynicism in regard to it. He says
" the writer adopted a discursive and rhetorical style," but he does
not mention, as in fairness he should have done, that " the writer "
was only following the strict line of his duty. His instructions
were to bring before the Home Government every subject of politi
cal interest that affected the grievances set forth in the petitions.
These he conscientiously carried out, and a lengthy commentary
was inevitable. I shall not attempt to calculate the extent of Mr.
Dent's rhetorical discursiveness had he been in Mackenzie's
position. Judging by the wordy dimensions of this 384-paged and
padded out 'Story, we can form some idea of the quantity of politi
cal cant, rant and fustian that would have been unloaded at the
Colonial Office door. It would have been something appalling.
The author's further remarks are very brief and in his usual
pleasant strain. He says : "The perusal of the Memoir seems to
have produced an impression upon the Colonial Secretary's mind.
He wrote a long and elaborate despatch to Sir John Colborne, in
which the weak points of Mackenzie's arguments were exposed
with cutting severity, and wherein it was evident that very little
weight had been attached to most of his representations ; but at

138
the same time certain concessions to popular opinion were plainly
hinted at." These " concessions " are dismissed by Mr. Dent in
short order. In fact what he says altogether, about Mackenzie's
mission and its results, takes up scarcely one page of the whole
volume. He not only belittles Mackenzie's efforts, as he invariably
does his public services generally, but he actually misrepresents
them in his ungenerous allegation that the Minister had attached
very little weight to the representations addressed to him. Had
Rolph been the people's Agent-General, and accomplished half as
much as Mackenzie, what a prolonged trumpeting of praise there
would have been ! •
SOME OF THE FRUITS OF HIS MISSION.
The truth is that Mackenzie was received with great consider
ation by Lord Goderich, as well as by Mr. Stanley — afterwards
Lord Derby — his successor at the Colonial Office. He had
frequent interviews with both of them, was detained much longer
in his conferences than he had any reason to expect, and was treated
with distinguished kindness during his whole stay in England.
His mission, under all the circumstances, was an unexampled
success. He secured the payment of an indemnity to all members
of the Upper Canada House of Assembly representing borough
constituencies, thereby preventing the monopoly of the representa
tion by wealthy men exclusively, and inducing those of limited
means, whose services it was desirable to obtain, to accept seats in
Parliament. The conscientious objections by large numbers of
people to taking an oath in the usual form in Courts of Justice,
and otherwise, were removed. Before this only Quakers were
exempt, and were permitted to affirm. Similar privileges were
thereafter conferred upon members of all other religious bodies.
Hitherto the public lands of the Province had been parcelled out
by the Executive amongst their favourites without competition, in
many cases at a mere nominal figure, and often gratuitously. It
was a most crying grievance, and Mr. Dent devotes whole para
graphs to denouncing the iniquities of the system. But he has
not a word, in connection with it, in favour of Mackenzie,
who was mainly instrumental in having the iniquity swept

139
away. Prior to this British subjects, who had been abroad at
any time in foreign countries, were, on their coming to Canada,
deprived of one of the most valued rights of a British citizen.
They were thereby disqualified from voting at elections. This
hardship was also summarily removed. Public education was
then at a low ebb in this country. It was practically confined to
the children of the wealthy classes, and its priceless benefits
virtually denied to those of the yeoman and the artisan. Mac
kenzie, who had always been foremost in his advocacy of the
education of the masses, made a strong case on this point. The
Colonial Government were instructed by their Imperial masters
" to forward, to the utmost of their lawful authority and influence,
every scheme for the extension of education amongst the youth
of the Province, and especially the poorest and most destitute
amongst their number." In those days, too, no statements of the
public revenue and expenditure were laid before the Legislature.
The Lieutenant-Governors pleaded their Royal instructions in bar
of any such duty. Mackenzie had this grievance thoroughly
rectified by a despatch from Lord Goderich, in which the Execu
tive were directed to practise no further "concealments upon
questions of this nature." There was also the anomaly of ecclesi
astics of the Anglican Church holding seats in the Legislative
Council. Of these Archdeacon Strachan was one of the most active
and influential in supporting the policy of the ruling party. The
Colonial Secretary's representations on this head were no less dis
tinct and plain. He advised that the political churchmen should
resign their seats in the Council, and attend solely to the " spiritual
good of the people." A judiciary, independent of the government
of the day, had all ajong been one of the principal planks in Mac
kenzie's platform. Mr. Justice Willis, who had shown a mind
and will of his own on the Bench, had, some time before, been
arbitrarily removed by the Executive. The Colonial Office, for
some reason or other, had determinedly opposed any change in
these relations so compromising to the Government and the high
est functionaries of the law. Mackenzie and those who acted
with him, had, on the other hand, pressed continuously for an
independent judiciary. They were at last successful. The Upper

140
Canada Executive were directed to pass a bill for that purpose,
and it was passed. Messrs. Boulton and Hagerman, two high
Crown Officers and members of the Executive, had been most
active in procuring Mackenzie's expulsions from the Assembly.
Mackenzie urged their removal from office, and they were removed
accordingly. While Mackenzie was still in England a change of Government
occurred, Mr. Stanley taking Lord Goderich's place at the head of
the Colonial Department. At the suggestion of Mr. Stanley,
Mackenzie drew up an elaborate scheme of Post Office reform for
the Province, and thereby compelled the disclosure of a vast
amount of information about the Post Office revenue, and the de
partment generally, which had been persistently withheld from
the Legislature. He had, as will be remembered, brought this
same subject under the notice of Mr. Stanley's predecessor, who
had then offered him the Postmaster-Generalship of Upper
Canada. He also invoked successfully the Royal veto of an
objectionable bill for increasing the capital stock of the old bank
of Upper Canada. Such a proceeding, by one who was not even
a member of Parliament, will appear extraordinary now, but those
were the days of irresponsible government in Canada, and the
only appeal possible was to England. Mackenzie was the only
man who ever secured a Royal veto single-handed and alone.
Mackenzie's services and the author's thanks.
These were a few of the concessions — only " hinted at," as Mr.
Dent says — which Mackenzie was instrumental in securing from
the Imperial Government. The despatch of Lord Goderich, on the
various subjects which had been brought under his consideration
and pressed home with conviction, was one of the most important
that had ever yet been received in Canada with respect to the ad
ministration of its Government. It was important not merely in
its bearing on the general course of Canadian affairs, but in
its hopefully liberal spirit, and its decided tone throughout. It
was a despatch very different in these respects from any previous
messages from the same quarter, and was pregnant with political
meaning to all concerned. The best evidence of Mackenzie's

141
whole work in England was that the happy issues of it, as set
forth in this Imperial mandate of reform, were gall and worm
wood to the all-powerful Tory party in Canada. Their indigna
tion and resentment knew no bounds, and, in some instances,
expression was given to these by utterances of marked disloyalty.
Mackenzie had every reason to feel proud of the fruits of his
errand across the sea. No other Canadian, who ever went there,
had achieved anything like as much. And when it is considered
that he went in no official capacity ; that he had been thrice
expelled from the Assembly ; and that every effort was made in
this and other ways, by the official party and their ready instru
ment, the Lieutenant-Governor, to embarrass and defeat him in his
mission, his success was truly a marvel. Surely in a narrative
written from a " Liberal but non-partisan point of view," some
grateful appreciation should have been shown of the task which
he discharged. But what does he receive ? Mr. Dent awards
him the barest pittance ; he had much better have awarded him
none. He sneers, in the most churlish manner, at Mackenzie's
pecuniary sacrifices in spending his own money in the people's
service, leaves it to be inferred, as far as possible, that he was
practising a fraud upon the Reformers of Canada, and says that
" it would be much nearer the truth to say that Mackenzie en
joyed a sixteen months' holiday at the expense of his political
friends." The author's treatment of this whole topic which is
one of historic interest, is in the last degree unworthy of any
writer of Liberal instincts. Mr. Dent's Liberalism is as con
venient as his memory, and that is certainly a treasure which few
men, of any literary pretensions whatever, would care to be
blessed with. THE CLOVEN FOOT AGAIN.
In dealing with this subject of political grievances the author
again shows the cloven foot in a subsequent part of his Story.
Speaking of the famous Seventh Report on grievances he says :
"The famous Seventh Report, which did more to arouse the
Home Government on the subject of Upper Canadian affairs than
all previous efforts in that direction, was completed and presented

142
to the Assembly on Friday, the 10th of April (1835). It was a
truly formidable indictment. It recapitulated the various griev
ances under which the Province laboured, and which called loudly
for remedy. The prevailing tone of the Report was temperate
and calm, and there is little or nothing in it to which serious
exception can be taken." He then describes its " voluminous
dimensions," and adds : " The first copy that left the binder's
hands was forwarded to the Colonial Secretary. All the most
pressing grievances were dealt with in greater or less detail, but
special prominence was given to the necessity for a responsible
Government — a Government responsible to public opinion, which
must cease to exist when it ceases to command public confidence.
* * More than a third of the Report proper was devoted to
dealing with the question in its various aspects," etc. Mr. Dent
mentions Mackenzie as Chairman of the Committee appointed to
consider the whole question, and gives the names of the other
members composing the Committee, but just at this point, his
memory becomes as lubrical as ever. He entirely forgets to
mention the very well known fact which, one would suppose,
was of some consequence, that this "famous Seventh Report"
was the work of Mackenzie's hand. Now notice the author's
tactics. Some thirty pages farther on he describes an interview
between the Lieutenant-Governor, Sir Francis Bond Head, and
Mackenzie and some other leading members of the Reform party.
He there, for the first time, slyly unveils the paternity .of the
Report, according to his own imperfect idea, and with a chuckle
tells us that Mackenzie and Dr. Morrison were "chiefly respon
sible " for it. And why ? The reader is not left long in the
dark. After quoting one of the most offensive passages against
Mackenzie which he can find in the Lieutenant-Governor's narra
tive of the interview, the author proceeds : " He (the Governor)
attempted to discuss the merits of the Report with various
persons, but encountered what was to him an inexplicable
reluctance to talk about it. All were ready to discuss the griev
ances themselves, but no leading Reformer was disposed to admit
the Report into the discussion. The reason of this was doubtless
because the Report had been chiefly fathered by Mackenzie, and

143
they were unwilling to accept" him as their mouthpiece." A con
jecture so unfounded, and so pitifully contemptible, could only
emanate from Rolph or his alter ego the author. But Mr. Dent's
fertility of conjecture has already been noticed. He is ever ready
to supply the deficiencies of fact from the resources of his own
corrupt suspicions. His object here is very poorly concealed.
Suggested by the words of a man whom he elsewhere brands as a
liar of the first water, it is simply a very paltry attempt to
discredit Mackenzie's standing and reputation at the time as a
leader of the Reform party. After all said and done, what a
beautiful personification of Liberalism in literature Mr. Dent is !
And how faithfully he has mirrored it in the broad pages of this
only truthful Story !
THE TRUE VERSION BY AN OLD JOURNALIST.
I may here be permitted to quote something on the same subject
from another and better source. Not long since I had a letter from
a gentleman who was intimately acquainted with Mackenzie, and
some of those who took part in this interview, and who " learned
all the facts at the time from those who were present." Referring
to Mr. Dent's recital of what occurred, he says : "I notice some
remarks in this book as to how leading Reformers dealt with the
Report on grievances about which Lord Goderich had written Sir
John Colborne. It is said they did not want to discuss the Report
at all, and the statement is volunteered by the author that ' this
was doubtless because the Report had been chiefly fathered by
Mackenzie,' whom ¦ they were unwilling to accept as their mouth
piece.' I happen to know that this statement is as untrue as
anything can be. It is not true either that Mackenzie absolutely
refrained from discussing the Report. The others, I believe, did,
but their sole reason for so doing was the one given by Mr. Dent
for Mackenzie's silence on the subject, viz. : ' The feeling that it
would be unwise for him to tie himself down to a particular record,
beyond which he would not be permitted to travel.' I say this
with confidence because I learned all the facts at the time from
those who were present. Mackenzie's paternity of the Report had
nothing to do with it, and the slur cast upon him, whether an

144
invention of Rolph or of the author, is entirely undeserved. Rolph
may be its real inventor, because his jealousy of Mackenzie and
his influence was a well understood thing amongst the Reformers
of that time. He fomented it amongst others as far as he could,
but any feeling of that kind that existed was confined to a small
section of the party who had neither the breadth of mind nor the
toleration of true Liberals. Head may have had that idea impressed
upon him, and it may account somewhat for his going over so
completely to Strachan, Robinson and the Family Compact. If
he were led to believe that there were divisions amongst the Re
formers, he might well suppose that they were only pretenders to
reform. And hence his violent and revolutionary proceedings to
control the elections, as he did, for the Compact, and his utter
repudiation of the fact that there were any grievances to redress."
The writer of the above is an old journalist, long since retired
from the profession, who had the best means of ascertaining the
facts, and whose testimony is, I believe, unimpeachable. I am
quite willing that his statement of the matter should stand along
side those of Mr. Dent and Sir Francis Bond Head, a man whom
Mr. Dent elsewhere charges with deliberate, unblushing falsehoods,
but whom he is very ready to echo and endorse when Mackenzie
is made the subject of them.
ADIEU TO THE " STORY."
I am done for the present with this truly unique Story. Its
"idiosyncrasies" have not been exhausted; they are legion, for
they are many. But enough has been said, I trust, to shew the
spirit which animates the author and the burthen of his theme.
I am content to leave, all to the scanty measure of evanescent
credit to which they are evidently entitled. Conscious, no doubt,
of his hazardous experiment in a familiar field of enquiry — of
his arrogant presumption in trampling under foot old political
traditions, and the well settled record of history, the writer has
striven to popularize his narrative with an endless garniture of
words. These are a poor substitute for his conspicuous errors of
judgment, and the obliquities of his story-telling generally. Mr.
Dent has manifold tricks of style, and Sir Arthur H elps tells us

145
that " the style which has tricks in it is a bad style." Whether
this aphorism apply or not, it is abundantly clear that the body
of the true Story of the Rebellion has been sacrificed to the false
drapery that displays it. The proportion of truth to error, in
many parts of the narrative, is very like the proportion of bread
to sack in Falstaff s tavern score. If there had been more of the
substance and less of the drapery, more solid worth and less of
the fripperies and gew-gaws of the literary pawn shop, Mr Dent
might have gained something for his reputation. As it is he has
gained nothing, if indeed he has not blundered irretrievably. I
wish him well in his literary aspirations, but it would be uncandid
to say that these have been helped by his present venture. He
has thrown away a golden opportunity, and has strangely
paltered with the rich bounty of material that fell lightly to his
hand. I except, of course, the Rolph brief, which is a bad
one. Whether he be sincere or not, he has not accomplished
the main purpose of his book, nor the object of his own foolhardy
ambition. His harshly inquisitorial and censorious spirit will not
supplant, with a graven image of counterfeit heroism, the place
which William Lyon Mackenzie has long held in the affections of
Reformers, and the gratitude of the people. • It has not made, and
never will make, of John Rolph any more of a hero than he has
ever been. This, in a word, is not a fair Story ; it is not a trust
worthy Story ; it is not a credible Story. It is not a Story that
deserves to live, and, I believe, it never will live, as an authorita
tive record of the period which thus far it presumes to review.
Not long since I came across an old pamphlet entitled, "The
Answer to the awful Libel of the Spanish Freeholder against the
Cardinal Alberoni." It is apparently a defence of an occupant of
the Bench of Justice against a newspaper attack upon his character
and reputation. There are two passages in the pamphlet that I
shall not apologize for quoting, with some verbal alterations, leav
ing the application and the moral to Mr. Dent, and those who have
perused his narrative. The anonymous pamphleteer, "Diego,"
says: "Calumny ever directs its acrimony against some par
ticular object ; fair and candid criticism spreads its remarks over
the whole field of enquiry. Unrighteous resentment projects with
10

146
wanton fury against whatever accidentally provokes it ; bold and
patriotic views regard the whole system with its general aberrations.
Malevolence selects its victim*; honourable indignation animates
to just and general scrutiny. Prejudice is prone to hasty and
impassioned conclusions ; truth is displayed in the impartiality of
research. The one riots in excess, and is, therefore, ever incon
sistent ; the latter is an inmate of a wise and virtuous heart, and,
therefore, blends capacity for general enquiry with fairness of
induction." Directing his pen against the treatment which his distinguished
friend had received from the Spanish Freeholder, " Diego " says
further : " There is indeed, as you observe, something admirable
in honesty and sincerity, and there is, too, commonly something in
solent in those who disparage such virtues. That honesty and
sincerity about which you write with such sentimental hypocrisy,
neither silence you into respect, nor soften you into moderation.
Every base imputation that has been whispered about by the
tongue of slander ; every unjust and designing charge which politi
cal envy has raised against him ; every idle report, which sprung
up in malice and was for a season propagated by it, till each
perished in its ephemeral course, is sought out by you with insect
curiosity, and unfeelingly revived, and as unfeelingly recorded in
a style which bespeaks well of your head, and, therefore, the worse
of your heart."
There is one good end which this new " Story of the Upper
Canadian Rebellion" will certainly serve. It will quicken a
desire for a judicious, impartial and dispassionate narrative,
complete in detail and from a calmly philosophic point of view, of
the whole movement that led up to the establishment of respon
sible Government in Canada. When such a narrative appears,
Mr. Dent's will its per contra. Till then it will be simply a
ponderous, tinselled, " extraordinary " monument of " extraor
dinary " story-telling.
JOHN KING.
Berlin, March 15th, 1886.

APPENDIX.

The following letter from a son of Dr. Rolph, a Toronto solicitor,
appeared in the Globe of December 31st, 1885. The writer at once
assumes the first letter from "A Reformer "of Ottawa to have been
the production of Mr. Charles Lindsey, the well-known author of
" The Life and Times of William Lyon Mackenzie," and he thereupon
proceeds to make a violent attack on Mr. Lindsey and the Mackenzie
biography. He also touches, in the same harum-scarum style, upon
some controverted points in Canadian history, which are afterwards
dealt with, as will be seen, in a second letter from "A Reformer."
DR. ROLPH AND W. L. MACKENZIE.
Sib, — Mr. Charles Lindsey, dating his letter from Ottawa, writes under the
name of " A Reformer " to the Mail of the 26th instant, one of the most dis
graceful and unwarranted attacks on the memory of the dead that has charac
terized journalism in this country for the last half century. I am very much
surprised to find that the Mail should allow its columns to be prostituted in a,
mean attempt to bolster up W. L. Mackenzie's reputation at the expense of l)r.
Rolph's, by the repetition of stale and untruthful charges.
Mr. Lindsey evidently imagines that because he has published a book on the
Rebellion, no other must ever be written, that his fictions are to stand for history
to all future times, and that any attempt to show the truth and correct his
errors must be rigidly suppressed. His book (of which large portions of the
letter in the Mail are almost » verbatim rehash) is a fulsome laudation of Wil
liam Lyon Mackenzie at the expense of nearly every one of the patriots of the
time. It is the only professedly authentic account of the Rebellion ever
published, but all the information in it relative to the rising itself is the produc-
of Mackenzie's own pen, supported by two forged letters, one attributed to Wil
liam Alves and the other to Silas Fletcher. It is replete with errors of fact and
detail. Realizing the weakness of his position (and it is inconceivable that the
Mail does not see it), Mr. Lindsey, without waiting for the publication of the
whole of his rival's work, commences an anonymous and grossly vindictive
attack on Dr. Rolph, who is of necessity mentioned in Mr. Dent's first volume,
and will be treated of at length in his second.
Such venom must be patent to everyone. As a citizen of Canada, and as a
son of Dr. Rolph, I protest, in the name of fair play, against the unjustifiable
course pursued. Mr. Lindsey bases all his charges and criticisms on fictitious
statements long ago made by Mackenzie, and subsequently reiterated by him
self, which the testimony of witnesses, living and dead, now in Mr. Dent's
hands, will completely refute and overthrow. There is ample material in his

148
hands to sustain tlie consistency of the conduct of Dr. Rolph, and many other of
the patriots, heretofore basely misrepresented and maligned by Mackenzie and
his biographer. It will be proper, however, for me to say here that the nature of
the correspondence between my father and Mr. Baldwin up to 1849 (without
reference to living witnesses) enables me to contradict the absurd and untruth
ful statement that Mr. Baldwin never spoke to Dr. Rolph after the pretended
violation of the flag of truce in 1837.
Confident that the light of truth is about to be shed on no unimportant portion
of our country's history, I am content to give a general denial to the rest of Mr.
Lindsey's fictitious charges without at present further examining them and
exposing their falsity, and to leave the public to judge of the unfairness of his
methods of anonymous criticism. T. T. Rolph.
P.S. — I have no doubt Mr. Lindsey will rush into print with a denial that he
wrote the letter signed " Reformer," and meanly dated at Ottawa. He is, no
doubt, cunning enough to have placed himself in a position, with the help
of his friends and connections, to make such a denial. But whatever subterfuge
may be resorted to between him and the person he got to father his letter, the
public may rest assured that he and he alone is its responsible author. His
hero, Mackenzie, in 1852, declared in public print "that in the insurrection of
1837, I took no part civil or military, but merely acted as an individual,
friendly to a change in the Canadas." After such a denial by Mackenzie of
his earlier efforts (which is deliberately suppressed in " The Life and Times "),
we may expect a prompt denial of authorship from the biographer. T. T. R.

In the editorial columns of the Globe containing the above produc
tion there appeared the following comment thereon. The italics are
our own : —
"In another column will be found a letter replying to letters which have
appeared in another journal concerning the connection of Dr. Rolph with the
Rebellion of 1837. That such u, controversy should have arisen was inevitable,
however much it may be regretted. But in these days nobody thinks of
entering in the interests of Toryism into the much larger question, whether the
Family Compact was a blessing or a curse. Even the living representatives of
the Family Compact fight shy of the task of defending the infamous tyranny of
their ancestors."

Mr. Charles Lindsey, the gentleman assailed in the above letter,
made the following reply in the Globe of January 1st, 1886': —
"ROLPH AND MACKENZIE."
Sib,— In a letter published in your issue of this date, Mr. T. T. Rolph
attributes to me the authorship of a lette which appeared in the Mail of the
26th inst., dated Ottawa, and signed "' A Reformer." I neither wrote the letter
in question nor contributed in any way to its production. I demand that Mr.

149
Rolph at once make good his charge, which he cannot do, or unequivocally
withdraw it. If it be any satisfaction to him. I may say that it is my intention
to deal fully with Mr. Dent's book over my own signature. Should Mr.
Rolph refuse to do what, as a man of honour, is incumbent upon him, the public
will have no difficulty in deciding upon his conduct. Chaeles Liniisbt.
Tobonto, Dec. 31st.

Mr. T. T. Rolph now reappears on the scene with a second letter to
the Globe of January 5th, 1886. In this he refuses to accept Mr.
Lindsey's straightforward denial of the authorship of the Ottawa letter,
to withdraw his unfounded statements against that gentleman, or to
make any amende whatever. So far from that, he not only .reiterates
his former statements, but also endeavours to blacken the name and
memory of William Lyon Mackenzie by a false and reckless charge
against him of universal treachery : —
ROLPH AND MACKENZIE.
Sie, — It is too late for Mr. Lindsey to announce his intention of attacking
Mr. Dent under his own signature. He should have come out like a man
before he wrote anonymously to the Week and Mail, etc.
What right, I ask, has the son-in-law of William Lyon Mackenzie, the
author of the book, entitled his "Life and Times," etc., to attack Mr. Dent's
book, except under his own name ? Now, after having endeavoured to lead the
public to suppose that independent writers were giving their views in advance
of Mr. Dent's book, he volunteers the information that he himself is going to
do so in due time.
Does Mr. Lindsey really believe that, as William Lyon Mackenzie endeavoured
from the moment defeat stared him in the face on the outskirts of Toronto, to
criminate and betray friend and foe alike by a course of treachery defensible
to posterity on the ground of insanity alone, that I am to betray the confidences
reposed in me on the mere ipse dixit of the son-in-law ?
Do the public of Canada require mathematical proof that Mr. Lindsey and
his connections are the only men in the country to-day who would gratuitously
assail Dr. Rolph's memory and Mr. Dent's conduct by disgraceful anonymous
communications before even the completion of the latter's story, building, too,
their furious slanders simply and solely (with one exception) by quotations from
Mr. Lindsey'B own book ? Mr. Lindsey will learn to his cost, before this dis
cussion is ended, that he is not the only man who can quote from the old files of
the Globe. It will be for the public to judge when they have all the facts
before them whether he or Dr. Rolph appears to the better advantage. T. T. Rolph.
[Note. — The personal part of this controversy must here cease so far as the
Globe is Concerned. It is instructive to note that no one defends the Tory
Family Compact, however people may differ on other points.— Ed. Globe.]

150
To the above Mr. Lindsey made the following brief reply, in which
ho announces his intention of bringing out a second enlarged edition of
the Mackenzie biography. This letter, which was sent to both the
Globe and Mail, appeared only in the Mail of January 6th, 1886 : —
ROLPH AND MACKENZIE.
To the Editor of the Mail.
Sib, — Mr. T. T. Rolph charged me, in a letter published in the Globe, with
writing a communication which appeared in your columns, dated Ottawa and
signed " A Reformer." I met him with an unequivocal denial, and asked him
to do, what no man of honour would refuse, either to offer proof of his statement
or withdraw it. Mr. Rolph is unable to offer proof, and refuses to make the
amende which any gentleman in his position would make. I shall, therefore,
take no further notice of what may be said by him or anyone who guides his
pen. Mr. Rolph charges that I made a statement in my " Life of Mackenzie "
on the evidence of two forged letters. This statement, like the other, is false.
The historical evidence on the point in dispute will be fully treated by me in a
work intended to take a permanent form. Yours, etc.,
Toronto, January 5th. Chables Lindsey.

The above letter was sent to the Globe for publication. It did not
appear in that journal on account of the editor having previously shut
down on the controversy with the second letter of Mr. T. T. Rolph.

YATJEi