The session was already in progress. A Torymember was speaking to the question: the debate on the committeereport just received. The report contained the members’ response toLord Durham’s principal recommendations: a union of the twoCanadas, a unicameral or single legislature, and responsiblegovernment. Marc had assumed that the Tory group would assign theirstar performer the task of leading off the debate and setting thetone for the rest of the evening. But not only was Mowbray McDowellnot on his feet dazzling the Assembly, he was not, as far as Marccould see, anywhere in the chamber.
“And just where is this reincarnation ofAaron Burr?” Dougherty rumbled, his tiny, pig-like eyes dartingabout at the scene below him.
“I don’t see him anywhere. There’s an emptychair down there next to Ignatius Maxwell, the Receiver-General. Isuspect that’s where he’ll be sitting.”
Dougherty suppressed a yawn. “Christ, I mayhave had one or two glasses too many of Baldwin’s excellent port.”Someone behind him tut-tutted, and a woman coughed into herhand.
“I’m sure they won’t hold him back too muchlonger,” Marc said. “This gallery is packed, and I’ve rarely seenthis many members present.”
“Well, they certainly didn’t come to hear thefellow droning away down there. He’s an insomniac’s delight!”
“Shh!”
Dougherty swivelled around as far as hiscorpulence would permit. “I am deeply sorry, ma’am, if I haveinterrupted your slumber.”
This riposte earned him a full-throated“harrumph!”
Fortunately the speaking member had finishedhis oration, though it was a minute or more before anyone realizedit. Every head in the gallery now tilted forward in expectation.Would Mowbray McDowell make a dramatic entrance, stride down theaisle under the blazing candelabras, bow to the Speaker, and takehis rightful place in the front row?
He did not. A barely suppressed groanshuddered through the gallery as a well-known Orangeman wasrecognized, stood, and launched his jeremiad with the throttle wideopen. That anyone could reach such a pitch of umbrage so rapidlyseemed to startle the usually unflappable barrister from NewYork.
“Jesus,” Dougherty whispered to Marc, “didthe fellow start warming up in the lobby?”
Rant and invective though it was, themember’s speech was music to the ears of every Durhamite in thechamber, for the Loyal Orange Lodge – the staunchest monarchistsand anti-republicans in the province – had abruptly switched theirtune. It seemed that there were some features of Lord Durham’sreport that ought to be considered, supported even. The suggestionthat this softened attitude was the result of Lieutenant-GovernorArthur’s recent suggestion that the Loyal Orange Lodge should beoutlawed was indignantly denied. Indeed, the current spokesmandenied it yet again, amid the hoots and catcalls of men around himwho had once taken his support for granted. Three times the Speakerhad to call for order to silence the desk-thumping and shouts of“shame” and “sit down.”
“Just like home,” Dougherty said, vastlyamused.
However, when the member did sit down -unshamed – and the fellow next to him rose to address the House,the gallery’s cheerful engagement quickly changed to sullenresignation. It had become evident that the Tory strategy for theevening was to have a number of members, from several camps, speakto the pertinent issues, set them clearly in the minds of all thosepresent, and then have Mowbray McDowell make his entrance and havethe last – and devastatingly potent – word. Although disappointed,Marc could see the sense in this plan. The Reform group in theAssembly was a shadow of its former self. It had been dealt a neardeath-blow in the 1836 election. Mackenzie’s abortive rebellion thenext year had further depleted their ranks and disillusioned manyof their moderate supporters in the countryside. Perry, Bidwell,Rolph, Robert Baldwin, Mackenzie himself – all had been silenced,some of them now in exile in the United States. Only the arrival ofLord Durham last year and his subsequent Report had breathednew life into the movement. But, alas, its most eloquent spokesmenwere not here in this chamber.
However, after two years of heavy-handed (butnot inefficient) rule by George Arthur and the Tory-controlledAssembly, the conservative alliance itself had begun to show cracksin its solidarity. The Orange Order was disaffected. Long-time Torystalwart, William Merritt, had begun making noises in support ofthe union proposal. Many in the Family Compact, the ruling clique,simply wanted no change of any kind, despite the fact that it wasthe status quo that had prompted the rebellion. Others wanted tocut the backward and Pope-ridden Quebecers adrift by annexingMontreal and Anglicizing it. How anyone, whatever his rhetoricalprowess, could forge a consensus out of this political hodgepodge,was beyond Marc.
One hour and six speeches later, with thegallery glassy-eyed and sitting members slumped in their Moroccanleather, the wunderkind, at some cue Marc did not detect, steppedonto his stage. Mowbray McDowell, MLA, entered the chamber quietlyand walked demurely down the aisle towards the Speaker’s chair asif he were just an ordinary member arriving somewhat late for anordinary evening of parliamentary palaver. He wasn’t halfway along,however, before the restless and muttering gallery went silent.People simply gawked.
Marc was expecting someone tall and imposing,but McDowell was not much over five feet in height, and exceedinglyslim. His hair, slicked back and neatly brushed, was blond – andfurther bleached in the dazzle of the chamber’s centralcandelabrum. The skin of his face was correspondingly pale, theeyes a remarkable blue, the features subtle, almost ascetic. But hewalked like a patrician, with the practiced ease of a Romansenator. For a moment Marc thought that the Speaker might bow tothe new member, reversing the tradition.
Seconds later, McDowell stepped sprightly upto the chair beside Ignatius Maxwell, shook hands with theReceiver-General, tilted his head towards someone in the gallery,and turned as the Speaker, by prearrangement, called on the Memberfrom Frontenac to deliver his maiden speech in Queen Victoria’scolonial assembly.
Thus did he begin. Coming from such a smallman, the voice startled the spectators: it was deep, richlymodulated, authoritative. There was no rant in it, no bombast, nomanufactured dudgeon. Here was a man reasoning with men, laying outthe home truths that they, like him, must come to accept becauseall the alternatives were worse. Far worse. In spite of himself,Marc was enthralled – and very worried. McDowell’s approach wasmasterful. He began by pointing out a few sad but incontrovertiblefacts. Whatever the merits or demerits of Lord Durham’srecommendations, the earl had been chosen for the job because hisown caucus had found him too radical and unreasonable to bear, andhence he was safer off in North America than in England. The earlhad then selected several advisors whose own past was morallysuspect. Edward Gibbon Wakefield, who had undoubtedly penned muchof the Report, had once been imprisoned for kidnapping anheiress. Moreover, the earl himself had spent less than a week inUpper Canada, while devoting most of his time and effort to Quebec- with his sights set on freeing the French rebels or ensuring thatthose convicted were exiled to sunny Bermuda instead of VanDiemen’s Land. This latter folly had broken the terms of hiscommission, for which legal indiscretion he had been summarilyrecalled. Back in England he had promptly fallen ill from somemysterious ailment, letting his ill-starred advisors, and even hiswife, complete the Report. The Melbourne administrationbalked at even tabling the document, but finally relented underpublic pressure. It was clear to any objective eye that the Whiggovernment in London was in disarray, and due to collapse any daynow. Little wonder that the earl’s Report – whatever itsmerits or demerits – was languishing in parliamentary limbo.