"Having experienced for many years your lordship's mild and auspicious administration of his Majesty's Government, and being aware that during that period the resources, prosperity, and happiness of this province have increased in a degree almost unequalled, we, the inhabitants of the city of Quebec, respectfully request your lordship to accept our sincere and most grateful thanks and acknowledgments.
"The length of your residence in the province; the advantages derived to our society from the example of private virtues shown by yourself and your family; your lordship's uniform prudent and paternal attention, under every change of time and circumstance, to the true interests of his Majesty's subjects entrusted to your immediate care, and that gratitude which we feel (and must be permitted to repeat), excite in our minds the warmest sentiments of personal attachment, of which allow us to tender you the strongest assurance.
"Under these impressions, we view your lordship's intended departure with the deepest regret; and submitting to your determination to leave us with unfeigned reluctance, we entreat you to accept our most sincere wishes for the future prosperity of yourself and all your family."
In the Montreal address we have the following expressions of sentiment and feelings:
"The inhabitants of Montreal, penetrated with gratitude for the happiness enjoyed by them under your lordship's administration of the government of this province during a great number of years, embrace the present opportunity of your intended departure for Great Britain to entreat you to receive their humble acknowledgments and accept their most sincere wishes for your health and prosperity, and for that of all your family.
"The prudence and moderation which distinguished your conduct in the province assured internal peace and tranquillity, and in reflecting infinite honour on your lordship, have fully justified the confidence reposed in you by our august Sovereign, and assured to you the affections of the inhabitants."
The grateful and affectionate answers of Lord Dorchester to both addresses may be easily conceived. The comparatively happy state of things indicated by these addresses continued, with interruptions, for about ten years after Lord Dorchester's departure.
Lord Dorchester was succeeded by General Prescott, who became lieutenant-governor, until he was relieved the 31st of July, 1799, by the appointment of Sir Robert S. Milnes, who acted as lieutenant-governor of the province during the ensuing six years, when the senior Executive Councillor, Thomas Dunn, succeeded to the administration of the government for two years, until the appointment, in 1807, of Sir James Craig as lieutenant-governor and commander-in-chief, under whose administration the reign of discord and strife of race became predominant, with the natural results which in long years afterwards ensued. These matters, however, do not come within the province of my history of the Loyalists of America.
But it is to be observed that though the French had much to complain of, having scarcely any representation in the Legislative Council, none in the Executive, and none in the Provincial Board of Education, called the "Royal Institution," which had the care of education in the province,[169] and therefore had to depend alone upon their own elected representatives in the House of Assembly for the protection of their rights and feelings; yet they evinced a loyalty through all these years, and through the war of 1812-1815, not excelled by the British inhabitants of Lower Canada, or of any other colony, notwithstanding the efforts of French and American emissaries to create disaffection in the province. A remarkable illustration of the loyalty of the French in Lower Canada occurred in 1805: "The horrors of the French revolution had passed by, but Great Britain and France were still engaged in a desperate war. By land, on the continent of Europe, the French, under Napoleon I., were everywhere victorious against the countries in alliance with Great Britain. But England by sea was more than a match for France; and on October 21st, 1805, won the battle of Trafalgar, by which the French naval power was destroyed. The news of this victory reached Canada early in January, 1806. The Canadians of French origin immediately showed that they felt less sympathy for their own race, and less pride in its military prowess, than gratification at the naval success of the empire of which they formed a part. They indulged in patriotic songs, and testified their interest by illuminations and other modes of rejoicing."[170]