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Four able lawyers, including Sir Charles Fitzpatrick, the present chief justice of Canada, were assigned to Riel's defence. The trial opened at Regina on July 20, 1885, and on August 1 Riel was found guilty of high treason and sentenced to be hanged on September 18. In deference to those who professed to doubt Riel's sanity, a stay of execution was granted.
Well, anyway, the principal thing is that Big Bear, Beardy, Poundmaker though I am not sure about Poundmaker have runners on every reserve and they are arranging for a big meeting in the spring, to which every tribe North and West is to send representatives. That Frenchman what's his name? I'll forget my own next " "Riel?" suggested the Inspector. "Yes, Riel.
"It seems to me this Monsieur Scott is a great favourite with your folk, Monsieur?" Said M. Riel, when the young man had left the cottage. "Now I came with my friend also for sport, but no pretty eyes had seen any flocks to reserve for me."
Now there is one thing very evident from the fact, and that is that Riel and his immediate followers were themselves conscious of the enormity of the deed they had committed, for had they believed that the taking of this man's life was really an execution justified upon any grounds of military or political necessity, or a forfeit fairly paid as price for crimes committed, then the hole inside the gateway of Fort Garry would have held its skeleton, and the midnight interment would not have been a senseless lie.
The Ontario Orangemen were filled with anger at the brutal murder of Thomas Scott by Louis Riel at Fort Garry and the failure of the Government at Ottawa to seize the murderer. The anti-confederate feeling was still strong in Nova Scotia. There was dissatisfaction over the appointment of Sir Francis Hincks. In many quarters the Washington Treaty was unpopular.
From many sources I was advised that it would be dangerous to do so; but those who tendered this counsel had in a manner grown old under the despotism of M. Riel, and had, moreover, begun to doubt that the expeditionary force would ever succeed in overcoming the terrible obstacles of the long route from Lake Superior. I knew better.
One of their chief medicine-men, an old Swampy named Bear, laboured long and earnestly to convince me that Riel had got on what he called "the track of blood," the devil's track, and that he could not get off of it. This curious proposition he endeavoured to illustrate by means of three small pegs of wood, which he set up on the ground.
Riel, you know, has been back for some time and we believe his agents are busy on every reservation at present. This outbreak of horse-stealing and whiskey-smuggling in so many parts of the country at the same time is a mere blind to a more serious business, the hatching of a very wide conspiracy. We know that the Crees and the Assiniboines are negotiating with the half-breeds.
This was not large enough either for his purposes, so with stupendous enterprise he cut a canal nine miles long, and through it decoyed the waters of the little Seine into the arms of the "Greasy" paramour. At this mill was ground the grain that grew for many a mile around; and in a little while Louis Riel became known as the most enterprising and important settler in Red River.
It was a gloomy Christmas time in Red River, and the gloom was increased by the suspense of not knowing what the Government at Ottawa would do in the circumstances. On Christmas Day, 1870, John Bruce, who was but a figurehead, resigned his office of President of the so-called Provisional Government of Red River Settlement, and the ambitious Louis Riel was chosen in his stead.
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