"Please except my sincere thanks for the excellent photo of the lamented Dr. Ryerson which is an admirable likeness. It is I suppose, as nearly perfect in every respect as a statue could be. I am persuaded that the statue will be a splendid one, and I rejoice that his great name is thus to be handed down to successive generations of our Canadian youth as a sacred memory and a powerful stimulus."
[8] The Historical Paper—an abstract of which was read by Dr. Hodgins, will be found on page 26.
[9] W. Kerr, Q.C., Vice-Chancellor, of Victoria University, in explaining the causes of his absence from the ceremonies of unveiling, said:—"I thank you very much for your ever thoughtful kindness in sending me a programme of the ceremonies of unveiling of the statue of our late great chief founder of the peerless school system of Ontario. I should very much like to have the privilege of being present on the occasion and of listening to the speeches and addresses, but especially your 'Historical Paper on Education in Ontario,' which no man now living so well understands as yourself.... How often I think of the late chief's farsightedness and patriotic efforts in connection with the Upper Canada Academy and subsequently with Victoria University."...
[10] In his letter enclosing the manuscript of his address, Chancellor Fleming, said:—"I write to congratulate you on the complete success of the affair of last Friday. Even the weather was every thing we could desire. It was a genuine pleasure for me to be present on the occasion. In the few remarks I offered I meant every word I said, The only omission was the absence of any reference, or sufficient reference, to the right hand man of Dr. Ryerson during all the years he laboured. This often happens; but you have the happy consciousness that your work and your life has so largely entered into the imperishable monument which he has raised in the school system of the century."
[11] Dr. Rand, in sending the manuscript of his address, said:—"I think the exercises were very successful indeed, and that the memorial volume, if brought out with some expedition, will prove very helpful in quickening a true appreciation of the great work done by Dr. Ryerson in building up the educational system of Ontario."
[12] In a letter from Barbados, dated 31st May, 1856, he said: As to education, in which you will take the greatest interest, all I can say is that my own hopes are centered in getting a good Normal School in humble imitation of yours. I think with that all will be well. If we could train good teachers we would have an admirable system. There have been some attempts, but not to much effect. I want your advice as to the establishment of this school. Tell me how to go to work to get good men, etc. I must have your plan of boarding the Normal School pupils at the public expense, which I think essential. I also want to introduce the national books (as you did). Any advice or information will be conducive to good results.
[13] Full information in regard to the working of our system of education was communicated from time to time to the Privy Council Committee on Education in England. This was of great practical value (as he assured us) to the Right Hon. W. E. Forster, promoter of the noted English School Bill of 1870. In 1875 Mr. Forster visited the Education Department of Ontario. The Journal of Education of April, 1876, thus refers to Mr. Forster's visit:—
"During the recent visits of the Right Hon. W. E. Forster and Hepworth Dixon, Esq., to the Ontario Education Department, they were kind enough to explain and discuss some of the new problems in the English Educational system, and made enquiries as to the success of our attempts at a practical solution of the same question. The two principal subjects referred to by Mr. Forster were compulsory education and denominational schools, and on these two points full explanation of our Ontario system were given."—"Journal of Education," Province of Ontario, Volume xxviii., page 49.
[14] Thus, in regard to the chivalrous destruction of tea in Boston harbour, in 1773, an American historian says:
"The object of the mother country in imposing a duty of three pence per pound on tea imported by the East India Company into America, while it was twelve pence per pound in England, was mainly to break up the contraband trade of the colonial merchants with Holland and her possessions."... "Sons of the merchants [of Boston] had become rich in the traffic, and a considerable part of the large fortune which Hancock [President of the Insurgent Congress] inherited from his uncle was thus acquired."... "It was fit, then, that Hancock, was ... was respondent in the Admiralty Courts, in suits of the Crown, to recover nearly half a million of dollars, ... should be the first to affix his name to the [declaration of independence] which, if made good, would save him from ruin."...—Sabine's American Loyalists, Vol. I. (Boston, 1865), pages 8, 9, 13.