SIR EDMUND HEAD

Dogberry, —An two men ride of a horse, one must ride behi:it —Mucx Apo ABouT Norxine, Act III. Sc. 5.

MZ. IR EDMUND WALKER HEAD, the new Governor, was " a kinsman of Sir Francis Bond Head, whose disastrous administration of Upper Canadian affairs nearly twenty years before this time had done much to provoke the rebellion which broke out in that Province towards the close of 1837. Sir Edmund and Sir Francis were descended

from a common stock ;

“but there I doubt all likeness ends between the pair.”

Sir Francis was a shallow, impulsive, superficial man, who never made a study of politics in their widest sense, and whose mental tone unfitted him for important public responsibility. Sir Edmund was a scholar and a thinker, who had had the advantage of a careful intellectual training, and had devoted much time to the study of politics as a science. He was the only son of the Reverend Sir John Head, baronet, Perpetual Curate of Egerton, in Kent, and Rector of Raleigh, Essex. He was born near Rochester, Kent, in 1805, and was educated at Oriel College, Oxford, where he obtained a first-class in classics in 1827. He subsequently became a Fellow of Merton College, and in 1834 was appointed a University Examiner, in which capacity, às already mentioned,* it fell to his lot to examine

* Ante, page 218.

318 The Last Forty Years.

the future Earl of Elgin for a Merton Fellowship. In point of scholastic acquirements we have never had a Governor of Canada who could seriously claim to be the peer of Sir Edmund Head. He was, more especially during his early life, a frequent contributor to the periodical press. A clever article of his in the Foreign Quarterly Review is said to have been the means of dete:mining his vocation in life, by attracting the attention of the Marquis of Lansdowne, who in consequence of it advised him to turn his attention to ecclesiastical law. Such advice, from such a quarter, was not to be despised, as it implied a tacit promise of patronage. He devoted himself industriously to the prescribed course of study, and was soon after appointed an Assistant Poor-Law Commissioner, which led erelong to a Chief Commissionership at a salary of £2,000 a year. Having meanwhile succeeded, upon the death of his father in 1838, to the baronetcy, he in the same year married Miss Yorke, a greatgrand-daughter of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke. He gave much attention to colonial affairs, and in 1847 reaped the reward of his studies by receiving the appointment of Lieutenant-Governor of New Brunswick. This position he retained until his appointment as Lord Elgin’s successor in September, 1854. He was sworn into office on che 19th of December, and thereupon assumed the direction of affairs.

The only matters of importance that occurred before the reassembling of Parliament were the reconstruction of the Lower Canadian section of the Ministry, which took place during the last week of January (1855), and the appointment, on the 8th of February, of six new Legislative Councillors. The latter consisted of Messieurs Ébenezer Perry, of Cobourg, David Morrison Armstrong, of Berthier, Benjamin Seymour, of Bath, Eusèbe Cartier, of St, Hyacinthe, Walter Hamilton Dickson, of Niagara, and Joseph Légaré, of Quebec. These appointments were distasteful to the Opposition, as it was well known that the authority conferred by

Sir Edmund Head. 319

the Imperial Act of 1854* would shortly be acted upon, and that the Legislative Council would be made an elective body. A more important matter, however, was the ministerial reconstruction. The state of Mr. Morin’s health had for some months past been unsatisfactory, and for that and other reasons he was desirous of being relieved from the cares of a department. A vacancy occurring on the bench of the Superior Court of Quebec afforded him an opportunity for a dignified retirement from political life. He availed himself of the cpportunity, and exchanged the ministerial for the judicial bench. As a judge he displayed the same characteristics which had always distinguished him in professional and political life: namely, great industry, scrupulous integrity and high-mindedness, allied to becoming modesty and a courteous sweetness of disposition which endeared him to all who came within the circle of his personal influence. He continued to discharge his judicial duties until a short time before his death, which occurred near St. Hyacinthe, in June, 1865.

His retirement from the Ministry took place on the 26th of January. Colonel Taché, the Receiver-General, considered that the withdrawal of his sectional chief involved the dissolution of that wing of the Ministry which had acknowledged allegiance to him. In this view all the Lower Canadian Ministers concurred, and they accordingly placed their resignations in the hands of the Premier. Sir Allan conferred with Colonel Taché, as the senior Lower Canadian Minister, who cr:sented to resume his portfolio; and at their joint request Mr. Drummond did the same. Messieurs Chauveau and Chabot did not resume office. The Provincial Secretaryship was conferred upon Mr. G. E. Cartier, the Commissionership of Public Works upon Mr. François Lemieux, member for Levis, and the Commissionership of Crown Lands, which had just been vacated by Mr. Morin, upon Mr. Cauchon. Under such cireumstances was formed the MacNab-

* Ante, p. 298.