Jean Olivier Chenier, was thrown up
by the evidence opened a way out of the difficult situation. A
year later Peel and Webster, representing the two countries,
exchanged formal explanations, and the incident was closed.
In Upper Canada many a rebel sympathizer lay for months in jail,
but only two leaders, Lount and Matthews, both brave men, paid
the penalty of death for their failure. In Lower Canada the new
Governor General, Lord Durham, proved more clement, merely
banishing to Bermuda eight of the captured leaders. When, a year
later, after Durham's return to England, a second brief rising
broke out under Robert Nelson, it was stamped out in a week,
twelve of the ringleaders were executed, and others were deported
to Botany Bay.
The rebellion, it seemed, had failed and failed miserably. Most
of the leaders of the extreme factions in both provinces had been
discredited, and the moderate men had been driven into the
government camp. Yet in one sense the rising proved successful.
It was not the first nor the last time that wild and misguided
force brought reform where sane and moderate tactics met only
contempt. If men were willing to die to redress their wrongs, the
most easy-going official could no longer deny that there was a
case for inquiry and possibly for reform. Lord Melbourne's
Government had acted at once in sending out to Canada, as
Governor General and High Commissioner with sweeping powers, one
of the ablest men in English public life.
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