"I hope and believe that the despatches in their final shape, as they
went out to N. Columbia on Friday last, and to Canada on Saturday, were
quite what you and the proposed 'N. W. Transit Company' would wish.

"I added words which (without dictation) will be understood as implying
'No Intercolonial, no Transit.'

"If you happen to be in this neighbourhood any day between 3 and 4.30,
I shall be glad to see you, though I have nothing at all pressing to
say.

"Yours very sincerely,
"NEWCASTLE."




CHAPTER IX.

_The Right Honorable Edward Ellice, M.P._


I have alluded to this remarkable man under the soubriquet attached to
him for a generation--"the old Bear." I assume that when his son, who
for many years represented the Scotch constituency of the St. Andrews
Burghs, grew up, the father became the "old" and the son the "young"
Bear. Mr. Ellice was the son of Mr. Alexander Ellice, an eminent
merchant in the City of London. Born, if the "Annual Register" be
accurate, in 1789, he died at the end of 1863. It is strange that he