But while Lord Durham was bound to emphasize this unsatisfactory state of things he had not lost his confidence in the loyalty of the mass of the Canadian people, notwithstanding the severe strain to which they had been subject on account of the supineness of the British government to deal vigorously and promptly with grievances of which they had so long complained as seriously affecting their connection with the parent state and the development of their material resources.  It was only necessary, he felt, to remove the causes of discontent to bring out to the fullest extent the latent affection which the mass of French and English Canadians had been feeling for British connection ever since the days when the former obtained guarantees for the protection of their dearest institutions and the Loyalists of the American Revolution crossed the frontier for the sake of Crown and empire.  “We must not take every rash expression of disappointment,” wrote Lord Durham, “as an indication of a settled aversion to the existing constitution; and my own observation convinces me that the predominant feeling of all the British population of the North American colonies is that of devoted attachment to the mother country.  I believe that neither the interests nor the feelings of the people are incompatible with a colonial government, wisely and popularly administered.”  His strong conviction then was that if connection with Great Britain was to be continuous, if every cause of discontent was to be removed, if every excuse for interference “by violence on the part of the United States” was to be taken away, if Canadian annexationists were no longer to look for sympathy and aid among their republican neighbours, the Canadian people must be given the full control of their own internal affairs, while the British government on their part should cease that constant interference which only irritated and offended the colony.  “It is not by weakening,” he said, “but strengthening the influence of the people on the government; by confining within much narrower bounds than those hitherto allotted to it, and not by extending the interference of the imperial authorities in the details of colonial affairs, that I believe that harmony is to be restored, where dissension has so long prevailed; and a regularity and vigour hitherto unknown, introduced into the administration of these provinces.”  And he added that if the internal struggle for complete self-government were renewed “the sympathy from without would at some time or other re-assume its former strength.”

Lord Elgin appeared on the scene at the very time when there was some reason for a repetition of that very struggle, and a renewal of that very “sympathy from without” which Lord Durham imagined.  The political irritation, which had been smouldering among the great mass of Reformers since the days of Lord Metcalfe, was seriously aggravated by the discontent created by commercial ruin and industrial paralysis