“Statement is unfortunately quite true. I have never had a child to baptize.”
Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s ability to remember faces which had presented themselves to his view, perhaps, years previously, was something to marvel at. Many men possess this power but few have ever held it in greater proportion than did the late statesman.
A Brockville man relates that on being introduced to Sir Wilfrid, not long ago, the “old chief” looked at him intently for a moment and then said: “Just a minute, let me think where I have seen you before.” He thought for a brief period and then exclaimed: “I have it. You are one of —— ——’s bad little boys and you sat in the front row at my meeting in Cornwall in 1912.” Such had been the case.
His first appearance in public life revealed the qualities that were to make him famous. His début in the Legislature is said by those whose memories go back to that time, to have produced a sensation, not more by the finished grace of his oratorical abilities than by the boldness and authority with which he handled the deepest political problems. The effect of his fluent, cultivated and charming discourse is described by Frechette, the poet, as magical. On the following day, he writes, the name of Laurier was on every lip, and all who then heard it will remember how those two syllables rang out true and clear, their tone that of a coin of gold, pure from all alloy, and bearing the impress of sterling worth.
The Royal tour of 1901 at times put the serenity of Sir Wilfrid to a severe test. He was a man who enjoyed manifestations of popular good-will as well as anybody; and as a politician was not oblivious to the necessity of avoiding offence to any well-meaning supporter. He accompanied the Heir-Apparent and the future Queen across the continent, and was sometimes embarrassed by the efforts of coteries in remote settlements to play the political game by making him the hero of the occasion. On one occasion, a Liberal association, learning that the Royal train was to lie on a railway siding for half an hour, sought to improve the occasion by presenting him with an address. The annoyance of Sir Wilfrid at so notorious a breach of etiquette, was undoubtedly great, but he managed to send the deputation home without ruffling their feelings, though preserving the decorum of his position as an official host of the future occupant of the throne.
Political leaders receive a great deal of honor, particularly while they are the custodians of power, but they have also much to put up with from indiscreet followers. In such cases, they have to display an unfailing tact, for they never know but that the gad-fly may have sufficient influence in his bailiwick to swing an entire township to the opposite party, if affronted. Twenty years ago, in the old station dining room at Palmerston, Ont., one saw Sir Wilfrid deal with such importunities. It was at a time when there was a great hullabaloo about the supposed attitude of the late Mr. Tarte toward the South African War. The room was thronged with spectators anxious to see whether a Prime Minister really ate like ordinary mortals; and a local Liberal magnate undertook to inform Sir Wilfrid that the “boys around here” did not like Tarte, and asked what he was going to do with the then Minister of Public Works. Sir Wilfrid first ignored the question and tried to change the subject, but the henchman did not take the hint. The Premier’s secretary was beside himself with rage at the bad taste of the interlocutor, but the leader himself betrayed no annoyance. “Oh, you don’t understand Mr. Tarte,” he said, genially, and suddenly bethought himself of a funny story illustrating misunderstandings. Nevertheless, he was a very relieved chieftain when the whistle blew and the brakeman cried “All aboard.”