Conservative cabinet, in which Mr. Draper was the only man of
conspicuous ability. The French Canadians were represented by Mr.
Viger and Mr. Denis B. Papineau, a brother of the famous rebel,
neither of whom had any real influence or strength in Lower Canada,
where the people recognized LaFontaine as their true leader and ablest
public man. In the general election which soon followed the
reconstruction of the government, it was sustained by a small
majority, won only by the most unblushing bribery, by bitter appeals
to national passion, and by the personal influence of the
governor-general, as was the election which immediately preceded the
rising in Upper Canada. In later years, Lord Grey[4] remarked that
this success was "dearly purchased, by the circumstance that the
parliamentary opposition was no longer directed against the advisers
of the governor but against the governor himself, and the British
government, of which he was the organ." The majority of the government
was obtained from Upper Canada, where a large body of people were
misled by appeals made to their loyalty and attachment to the crown,
and where a large number of Methodists were influenced by the
extraordinary action of the Rev. Egerton Ryerson, a son of a United
Empire Loyalist, who defended the position of the governor-general,
and showed how imperfectly he understood the principles and practice
of responsible government. In a life of Sir Charles Metcalfe,[5] which
appeared shortly after his death, it is stated that the
governor-general "could not disguise from himself that the government
was not strong, that it was continually on the brink of defeat, and
that it was only enabled to hold its position by resorting to shifts
and expedients, or what are called tactics, which in his inmost soul
Lord Metcalfe abhorred."

The action of the British ministry during this crisis in Canadian