Lord Elgin did not fail to point out to the colonial secretary "the
severe strain" that this sad state of things made, not only upon
charity, but upon the very loyalty of the people to a government which
had shown such culpable negligence since the outbreak of the famine
and the exodus from the plague-stricken island. He expressed the
emphatic opinion that "all things considered, a great deal of
forbearance and good feeling had been shown by the colonists under
this trial." He gave full expression to the general feeling of the
country that "Great Britain must make good to the province the
expenses entailed on it by this visitation." He did full justice to
the men and women who showed an extraordinary spirit of
self-sacrifice, a positive heroism, during this national crisis.
"Nothing," he wrote, "can exceed the devotion of the nuns and Roman
Catholic priests, and the conduct of the clergy and of many of the
laity of other denominations has been most exemplary. Many lives have
been sacrificed in attendance on the sick, and administering to their
temporal and spiritual need.... This day the Mayor of Montreal, Mr.
Mills, died, a very estimable man, who did much for the immigrants,
and to whose firmness and philanthropy we chiefly owe it, that the
immigrant sheds here were not tossed into the river by the people of
the town during the summer. He has fallen a victim to his zeal on
behalf of the poor plague-stricken strangers, having died of ship
fever caught at the sheds." Among other prominent victims were Dr.
Power, Roman Catholic Bishop of Toronto, Vicar-General Hudon of the
same church, Mr. Roy, curé of Charlesbourg, and Mr. Chaderton, a
Protestant clergyman. Thirteen Roman Catholic priests, if not more,
died from their devotion to the unhappy people thus suddenly thrown
upon their Christian charity. When the season of navigation was nearly
closed, a ship arrived with a large number of people from the Irish