proper and customary. The affidavits are public court documents. Later today or tomorrow, you will add your sworn statement to the docket.”
“The lieutenant has studied law at the Inns of Court,” Major Burns said.
“What I meant, sir,” Marc said, “was that the farmers who followed us, and were in a way witnesses to most of the events under question, might wish to have their say at a formal inquest, even though I am fully confident, as you are, that no other conclusion would be reached than the one made here this morning.”
“Purely a waste of time,” Sir Francis declared with some vehemence, “and you know from our previous conversations and my reports to Lord Glenelg in London that the time wasted here in the past eight years on committees and commissions and grievance petitions and the naming of this member and that in the Assembly has been the principal cause of the current deadlock and the hardening of positions on either side of every issue—petty or important.”
“I agree, sir, but my hunch is that these men are supporters of the Reform party, and that they are quite capable of suggesting to all and sundry in York County that themagistrates, as instruments of the Executive, simply protected their own by denying an inquest and aborting their right to testify.”
“Let them feed whatever rumour mill they like! You’ve seen for yourself over the past week the effectiveness of my strategy of following the politicians of both parties onto the hustings no more than two days after their own nomination speeches or public debates. Grit or Tory, the voters are getting a chance to see the vast difference between, on one side, a politician with all his rant and thunder and, on the other, a statesman who takes no partisan position but, rather, occupies the same wide ground that King William himself would, were he to voyage to this colony—which is, after all, the surrogate terrain of Britain herself. You have seen first- hand how efficacious my direct appeal for loyalty, patience, and trust in their sovereign has been and how well my calm denunciation of all extremism has been received. The fact that most of the extremists are republican and that in that quarter also lies the greatest threat to the Crown does not have to be spoken aloud. Nor would it be proper for me as the King’s representative to do so.”
Marc nodded, and finished the last of his coffee. It was cold.
“And I fully believe that the fact that I was appointed by a Whig government—and was not automatically accorded membership in that claque of bankers, lawyers, and men of property they call the Family Compact—has made it notonly more difficult for the fanatics on both sides, the Orange lunatics and the so- called Clear Grits, to label me partisan but also has given me credibility on the hustings and at the levees.”
“Quite true, sir.”
Sir Francis leaned back in his wing chair and took a deep breath, aware perhaps that he had just delivered a rostrum speech to two seated confederates in a small room. Then with a twinkle he said, more reflectively, “Oh, I know how many of those who now gather round me and cling to the royal hem once sniggered at my appointment: a half- pay major—down on his luck doing a hack job as commissioner of the poor law—daring to replace the dashing Sir John Colborne, high Tory and hero of Waterloo. But their skepticism then and their sycophancy now neither deters nor influences me. I was sent here by Lord Glenelg with a specific mission. And I intend to accomplish it. Let your farmers in York rant for a while. They’ll come onside after the election, you’ll see.”
But would they? Marc wondered. It was imperative that the governor have a less fractious Assembly if he were to begin to address the farmers’ many grievances, but a Constitutionist sweep at the polls could have unforeseeable consequences. As Marc had learned in January during his investigation in Cobourg, the Upper Canadian farmer
“The lieutenant has studied law at the Inns of Court,” Major Burns said.
“What I meant, sir,” Marc said, “was that the farmers who followed us, and were in a way witnesses to most of the events under question, might wish to have their say at a formal inquest, even though I am fully confident, as you are, that no other conclusion would be reached than the one made here this morning.”
“Purely a waste of time,” Sir Francis declared with some vehemence, “and you know from our previous conversations and my reports to Lord Glenelg in London that the time wasted here in the past eight years on committees and commissions and grievance petitions and the naming of this member and that in the Assembly has been the principal cause of the current deadlock and the hardening of positions on either side of every issue—petty or important.”
“I agree, sir, but my hunch is that these men are supporters of the Reform party, and that they are quite capable of suggesting to all and sundry in York County that themagistrates, as instruments of the Executive, simply protected their own by denying an inquest and aborting their right to testify.”
“Let them feed whatever rumour mill they like! You’ve seen for yourself over the past week the effectiveness of my strategy of following the politicians of both parties onto the hustings no more than two days after their own nomination speeches or public debates. Grit or Tory, the voters are getting a chance to see the vast difference between, on one side, a politician with all his rant and thunder and, on the other, a statesman who takes no partisan position but, rather, occupies the same wide ground that King William himself would, were he to voyage to this colony—which is, after all, the surrogate terrain of Britain herself. You have seen first- hand how efficacious my direct appeal for loyalty, patience, and trust in their sovereign has been and how well my calm denunciation of all extremism has been received. The fact that most of the extremists are republican and that in that quarter also lies the greatest threat to the Crown does not have to be spoken aloud. Nor would it be proper for me as the King’s representative to do so.”
Marc nodded, and finished the last of his coffee. It was cold.
“And I fully believe that the fact that I was appointed by a Whig government—and was not automatically accorded membership in that claque of bankers, lawyers, and men of property they call the Family Compact—has made it notonly more difficult for the fanatics on both sides, the Orange lunatics and the so- called Clear Grits, to label me partisan but also has given me credibility on the hustings and at the levees.”
“Quite true, sir.”
Sir Francis leaned back in his wing chair and took a deep breath, aware perhaps that he had just delivered a rostrum speech to two seated confederates in a small room. Then with a twinkle he said, more reflectively, “Oh, I know how many of those who now gather round me and cling to the royal hem once sniggered at my appointment: a half- pay major—down on his luck doing a hack job as commissioner of the poor law—daring to replace the dashing Sir John Colborne, high Tory and hero of Waterloo. But their skepticism then and their sycophancy now neither deters nor influences me. I was sent here by Lord Glenelg with a specific mission. And I intend to accomplish it. Let your farmers in York rant for a while. They’ll come onside after the election, you’ll see.”
But would they? Marc wondered. It was imperative that the governor have a less fractious Assembly if he were to begin to address the farmers’ many grievances, but a Constitutionist sweep at the polls could have unforeseeable consequences. As Marc had learned in January during his investigation in Cobourg, the Upper Canadian farmer
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