Lord George Bentinck, who led the opposition to the measure, saw reason to
think that, in the published despatches from Canada on the subject, a
letter had been suppressed which would have furnished arguments against
the Government; and, under this impression, he moved in the House of
Commons for 'copies of the omitted correspondence.' The motion was
negatived without a division, on Lord John Russell's pointing out that it
involved an imputation on the Governor's good faith; but the Premier
himself was probably not aware at the time, how completely the mover was
at fault, as is shown in the following letter from Lord Elgin to Mr. C.
Bruce, who, being a member of Parliament and a strong Protectionist, had a
double interest in the matter:--

You ask me about this mare's nest of Bentinck. The facts are these:
the Montreal Board of Trade drew up a memorial for the House of
Commons _against the Navigation Laws_, containing _inter
alia_ a very distinct threat of separation in the event of their
_non-repeal_. My secretary (not my private secretary, mark, but
my responsible Government Secretary) sent _me a draft_ of a
letter to the Board containing very loyal and proper sentiments on
this head. I approved of the letter, and sent a copy of it home with
the memorial, _instead of a report by myself_, partly because it
saved me trouble, and partly because I was glad to show how perfectly
my liberal government had expressed themselves on the point. Two or
three weeks later, the Board of Trade, not liking Mr. Sullivan to have
the last word, wrote an answer, simply justifying what they had
already stated in their memorial, which had already gone with my
comment upon it to be laid before the House of Commons. To send such a
letter home in a separate despatch would have seemed to me worse than
absurd, because it would really have been giving to this unseemly