law practically inoperative against bribery, and by the appointment of returning-officers unscrupulously obsequious to the interests of the party by whom they are appointed. Now, no one who watched impartially the elections for the second Parliament of the Dominion could avoid the conviction that the government had been using their power in all those ways to secure a verdict in their favor at the polls. The elections were brought on in an order which was wholly inexplicable except in the interest of the ministry. Votes were obtained from men whose employment in the service of the nation ought to keep them aloof from the service of a party. In more than one instance a returning-officer sent in a return so manifestly in opposition to the facts, that the government, out of selfrespect, should have at once subjected the offender to criminal prosecution.

24. But it was mainly by their conduct in reference to the laws against bribery, and by the advantage which they took of the laxity of these laws, that the ministry brought upon themselves their defeat. It had been well enough known to every one in Canada for a long time that representative government was being rendered a laughing-stock by the extent to which bribery was being carried on by all parties. All the evidence on the subject shows that neither party throughout the country could boast of superior freedom from this corruption. Only this can be said of the leaders in the opposition at the time, that they demanded the legislation which has since been obtained, and which has proved a very formidable impediment to bribery and other dishonorable influences at elections. The government, however, by its overpowering majority in Parliament, crushed all attempts at legislation in this direction, and the result was that the second election for the Dominion House of Commons was disgraced by an extensive system of bribery, in which, according to their own confession, the leaders of the government were deeply involved.

25. The sources from which the government obtained funds for bribery were various; but after every allowance for disinterested subscriptions from conscientious supporters, there remain enormous sums, which no statesman should ever have allowed himself to touch, or, if tempted to use, could ever have spoken of afterwards without a feeling of shame. There was even a prevalent suspicion that the public money was being misdirected to electioneering purposes; and, though it may be admitted that the suspicion was founded on a mistake, it must

also be borne in mind that the premier himself was entirely to blame for giving currency to the suspicion. A motion had been introduced into the House of Commons at Ottawa for a confidential audit of the expenditure on the Secret Service Fund,

and the motion was defended by a reference to British practice. The government, however, succeeded in defeating the motion, and Sir John Macdonald, in vindicating afterwards his opposition to the motion, not content with denying that the demand for a confidential audit was justified by British usage, made the astounding assertion that, if a cabinet in England went out of office with one hundred thousand pounds of secret service money to their credit, they could employ it in carrying the elections against their oppo

It is somewhat surprising that this statement did not attract attention or call forth any protest from the English press at the time, and that it was only after some years that Sir John Macdonald acknowledged his misapprehension about the practice of British statesmen in reference to the use of secret service funds.

26. But, however well or ill founded may have been the suspicion that the Dominion government were abusing the public money for party purposes, their own confession places beyond all controversy the notorious attempt to maintain their position by corrupt influences in connection with the projected Pacific Railway through Canadian territory. This scandal received such prominent notice in the English press at the time,' and is still so recent, that it is unnecessary to revive its details at present. One or two points of special political importance are all that require to be remembered.

27. In the first place, the Pacific Railway Bill contained in an aggravatod form those unconstitutional features which have been already pointed out in the earlier railway bill of the administration in Ontario. It handed over absolutely to the government, along with fifty million acres of land, the sum of thirty million dollars,—a sum fully equal to the public revenue of the whole Dominion for a year and a half; and the people

-the House of Commons - were thus left without a voice as to the route which the railway should take, or even the most general details of its construction. In the second place, members of the cabinet confessed to having accepted for electioneering purposes a sum-which in Canada must be accounted very large-from the gentleman who had been promised, or at least expected, the contract for the Pacific Railway, and who has declared that it was no political conviction, but simply the spirit of commercial speculation that induced him to advance so much money for the purpose of keeping the government in power. It was likewise a serious aspect of this political scandal that the government made an extremely questionable use of its prerogative, and showed a somewhat unseemly contempt of the privileges of Parliament, in order to prevent the House of Commons from itself carrying out the investigation on which it had determined.

28. It was no wonder, therefore, that, when at last the ministry met the house, they found the opposition vastly increased in strength, and, after a lengthened debate, resigned without waiting for a division. The new ministry, soon after its formation, dissolved the house; and the appeal to the electors showed that they were sustained by a very powerful element throughout the country. Whether they will retain that support for any length of time is a question on which, as on other social subjects, it is hazardous to form predictions; but it is a question which is of interest only in so far as the ministry realize the mission which they have undertaken, and to which they owe their position, of fighting the battle of constitutional government in Canada. Certainly nothing has happened which should make the country forget the serious faults of the previous administration; but the temper of political discussion, both in the House of Commons at Ottawa and throughout the Dominion, gives too great reason to fear that politicians are settling again into two factions, separated by no principle except the common conviction of the desirability of being in office. However convenient this state of things may be for the professional politician, it is a result which can be contemplated only with the deepest concern by every earnest student of political affairs. Not only would such a result deteat one great end of the Canadian confederation, but it would give a new force to one of the great perils of popular government. Let us hope that the premier of the Dominion and his associates may prove theires equal to their mission, and they may

find some safeguard for constitutional freedom against that despotism of party which has formed one of its most powerful foes at all times, and now forms its peculiar foe on the other side of the Atlantic.

CHAPTER XLI.

THE DOMINION OF CANADA — (continued).

EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS

THE NEWSPAPER PRESS.

1. BEFORE resuming the narrative of political events in the Dominion, during the administration of Lord Dufferin, we may pause to glance at the educational developments of the provinces. We will begin with Ontario. Here education was first encouraged by private enterprise. In pioneer days nearly every garrison, either by its chaplain or military school-master, also contributed towards the general fund of knowledge. Dr. Hodgins, a reliable authority, informs us that the first school opened in Ontario was by the Rev. Dr. John Stuart, a Protestant Episcopal clergyman and a united empire loyalist, who had been chaplain to the provincial volunteers, coming with them as a refugee. In 1785 this gentleman opened a select classical school at Cataraqui, Kingston. Soon after, Mr. Donovan taught a garrison school there; but we shall not occupy our space with any list of first school-teachers, as we might do. Most of the few rural schools in the country in those early days were taught either by discharged soldiers or itinerant teachers from the United States. It is said that the latter used their own school-books, thereby tincturing their pupils with their own political views. This may account for the fact that the municipal institutions of Ontario are more nearly like those of the United States than those of any other British American province. However, the Legislature early took means to exclude the American school-master. A writer who visited Kingston in 1795, says: "In this district there are some schools, but they are few in number. The children are instructed in reading and writing, and pay each a dollar a month. One of the masters, superior to the rest in point of learning, taught Latin; but he has left without being succeeded by another instructor in the same language. In 1795 the government took some initiative

steps in an educational direction, growing out of a correspondence between Governor Simcoe and Bishop Mountain of Quebec. The matter was referred to the Legislature, which in 1797 memorialized King George III., soliciting a grant of land for the endowment of a grammar school in each district, and a university for the whole province. To this request the king gave his consent; and in 1798 the chief civil officers of Upper Canada recommended that five hundred thousand acres of land be set apart for the establishment of a grammar school in each district, and a central university for the whole province. They also recommended a grant for a plain but solid and substantial building for a grammar school in each district, containing a schoolroom capable of holding one hundred boys, without danger to their health from too many being crowded together, and also a set of apartments for the master, large enough for his family and from ten to twenty boarders." The salaries proposed to be given were: one hundred pounds

for the head-master, fifty pounds for the assistant master, and thirty pounds for repairs, etc. Kingston and Niagara were recommended as eligible sites for schools; after which, when the funds were sufficient, schools. were to be established at Cornwall and Sandwich. Toronto was recommended as entitled to the university, and for the establishment and support of which a sum of at least equal to that granted to the four schools was named. The celebrated Rev. Dr. Chalmers was asked to take charge of the schools; but, declining, the place was offered to the Right Rev. Dr. Strachan, Bishop of Toronto, then a school-master at Kittle, Scotland, who occupied it. But on his arrival at Kingston, in 1709, he found that Governor Simcoe had gone to England, and that the project of the college had been in the mean time abandoned. In the same year an orphan school had been opened near St. Catherine's. It was now discovered that as land sold for a shilling an acre, the grant which had been recommended would do but little towards endowing grammar schools,