prosequi. The signal result of the Amnesty Act passed in 1849 by the Canadian legislature, in accordance with the recommendation in the speech from the throne, was the return of William Lyon Mackenzie, who had led an obscure and wretched life in the United States ever since his flight from Upper Canada in 1837, and had gained an experience which enabled him to value British institutions more highly than those of the republic.

An impartial historian must always acknowledge the fact that Mackenzie was ill-used by the family compact and English governors during his political career before the rebellion, and that he had sound views of constitutional government which were well worthy of the serious consideration of English statesmen.  In this respect he showed more intelligence than Papineau, who never understood the true principles of parliamentary government, and whose superiority, compared with the little, pugnacious Upper Canadian, was the possession of a stately presence and a gift of fervid eloquence which was well adapted to impress and carry away his impulsive and too easily deceived countrymen.  If Mackenzie had shown more control of his temper and confined himself to such legitimate constitutional agitation as was stirred up by a far abler man, Joseph Howe, the father of responsible government in the maritime provinces, he would have won a far higher place in Canadian history.  He was never a statesman; only an agitator who failed entirely throughout his passionate career to understand the temper of the great body of Liberals—­that they were in favour not of rebellion but of such a continuous and earnest enunciation of their constitutional principles as would win the whole province to their opinions and force the imperial government itself to make the reforms imperatively demanded in the public interests.[12] But, while we cannot recognize in him the qualities of a safe political leader, we should do justice to that honesty of purpose and that spirit of unselfishness which placed him on a far higher plane than many of those men who belonged to the combination derisively called the “family compact,” and who never showed a willingness to consider other interests than their own.  Like Papineau, Mackenzie became a member of the provincial legislature, but only to give additional evidence that he did not possess the capacity for discreet, practical statesmanship possessed by Hincks and Baldwin and other able Upper Canadians who could in those days devote themselves to the public interests with such satisfactory results to the province at large.

It was Baldwin who, while a member of the ministry, succeeded in carrying the measure which created the University of Toronto, and placed it on the broad basis on which it has rested ever since.  His measure was the result of an agitation which had commenced before the union.  Largely through the influence of Dr. Strachan, the first Anglican bishop of Upper Canada, Sir Peregrine Maitland, when lieutenant-governor,