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Updated: May 28, 2025
In one of his memorandum-books I find, 'Sunday, went to church at Streatham. Templo valedixi cam osculo. He met Mr. Philip Metcalfe often at Sir Joshua Reynolds's, and other places, and was a good deal with him at Brighthelmston this autumn, being pleased at once with his excellent table and animated conversation. Mr.
The man who made these remarks was not a gallant of the ninety-ninth degree, but was a sober, intellectual man of threescore-and-ten and, judging from the clear, penetrative eye, one who had seen much of the world as it is. "From St John did you say, Mr. Metcalfe?" "Yes, sir. Her father is engaged in the shipping business there, and I am told is a very fine sort of fellow.
The city of St. John also, to show its loyalty, presented a similar address; and one signed by one thousand persons was sent from the county of York. Yet nothing can be more clear than that the stand taken by Sir Charles Metcalfe in 1844 was wholly wrong, for it consisted in refusing to consult with his council in regard to appointments, and in making appointments contrary to their advice.
Until the political traditions, which most of the recent immigrants had brought with them from Britain, had disappeared or been transformed into a new Canadian tradition, and so long as certain grave constitutional defects which cried for remedy remained unaltered, Canadian Tories and Reformers must exist, and government, as Metcalfe discovered, was impossible, unless it recognized in these provincial divisions the motive power of local administration.
It was not, however, until the session of 1845, when the Draper-Viger ministry was in office, that an address was passed to the governor-general, Lord Metcalfe, praying him to take such steps as were necessary "to insure to the inhabitants of that portion of this province, formerly Lower Canada, an indemnity for just losses suffered during the rebellions of 1837 and 1838."
William Carey, who unceasingly applied his great talents, abilities, and influence in advancing the happiness of India more especially by the spread of an improved system of husbandry and gardening desire to mark, by some permanent record, their sense of his transcendent worth, by placing a marble bust to his memory in the Society's new apartments at the Metcalfe Hall, there to remain a lasting testimony to the pure and disinterested zeal and labours of so illustrious a character: that a subscription, accordingly, from among the members of the Society, be urgently recommended for the accomplishment of the above object."
"Perfectly," replied Nicholas. "I drink at John Lawe's to-night, Sir Thomas." So saying, he walked away. Metcalfe would have followed him, but was withheld by Potts. "Let him go, Sir Thomas," said the little man of law; "let him go. Once master of Raydale, you can do as you please. Leave the settlement of the matter to me.
In an election in which Metcalfe himself took the platform and in which once more British connection was said to be at stake, the Ministry obtained a narrow majority. But opinion soon turned, and when Metcalfe, the third Governor in four years to whom Canada had proved fatal, went home to die, he knew that his stand had been in vain.
The historian Macaulay calls him 'the ablest civil servant I ever knew in India. Durham, Sydenham, Bagot, Metcalfe Britain had few more distinguished or more able servants of the state; and they devoted all their powers, without a thought of the cost to themselves, to solving a vital problem in the maintenance of the Empire. Their more obvious rewards were obloquy and death.
Outside of the greater figures of the time, he was one of the first citizens of the Empire, and Bagot, as he thought of possible successors, only dismissed the suggestion of Metcalfe's appointment because it seemed too good news to be true. Nevertheless Sir Charles Metcalfe had one great initial disadvantage for work in Canada.
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