38. CHAPTER XXXVIII.
A NEW ADVOCATE.
“This seems rather hard, Sir George. Don't you think it
might do to unbend a little in a case like this, and give these
people a chance to try their fortunes with the queen's ministers?”
This remark was addressed to the governor by the young gentleman
who has been described, immediately on the withdrawal
of the despairing petitioners, and it was spoken in the familiar
tone in which a man addresses his equal.
The governor started in surprise, and gazed a moment at his
young companion, without reply, and when he spoke, it was no
longer in the official tone in which he had addressed his late
auditors.
“No, Hadley, there certainly is no other course for me to pursue
than the one I have adopted. If you had been present during
the last half hour, you would have heard sufficient reasons to
convince you of this.”
“I have heard everything in the next room, and am not convinced,”
replied the young man, smiling. “I really cannot believe
it necessary to sacrifice these people to a question of state
policy, because I do not think the stability of her majesty's government
in these provinces is endangered by all these Quixotic
enterprises. Pray, Sir George, let me beg you to reconsider this
matter. I will wager fifty guineas that if these fair creatures
should have the good fortune to obtain a direct audience of the
queen, they will gain their ends.”
“I am sorry to say they will never have that good fortune,
Hadley, happy as I should be to gratify you”—
“In anything else,” replied the youth, smiling broadly; “that
is the usual formula, I believe, when you intend to deny a person
the only favor he is like to ask of you.”
“Yes, in anything else. This affair is res adjudicata. I am
convinced, too, that a different decision on my part would be of
no avail to the petitioners, excepting to prolong their suspense
and subject them to a long and dangerous journey, ending in disappointment.
They would never see the queen, and I should be
blamed for permitting her ministers to be annoyed by their importunities.”
“But I think the very fact that they had travelled so far alone
and unfriended, on such an errand of mercy, would ensure them
an audience.”
“If that fact could be made known to her majesty, it possibly
might; but she would never know it; and even then, the utmost
she would do would be to refer the question to her council, who
are much too frightened about the state of affairs over here to
recommend a pardon which was not asked for either by the court,
the jury, or myself.”
“But you can ask it.”
“I can not, consistently with the rules I have laid down for my
official actions, and a little experience in my place, Hadley would
make you of the same mind. If you had heard as many earnest
petitions for pardon as I have heard (for not a man suffers death
in this province who has not some hopeful and sanguine friend to
importune for him), you would learn the necessity of disregarding
all which are not founded on some substantial claims.”
“By Hercules! Sir George, I wish you would try me for a
week. Go on a visit to Sir John Colborne, in the lower province,
and make me your lieutenant until next Monday.”
“You had better swear by Phæton than by Hercules,” replied
the governor, laughing, “if you ask me to place the reins of
government in your hands. I think you would pilot the ship of
state about as skillfully as he guided the chariot of the sun.”
“I might rival his achievements,” replied the young man,
“but it would not be in granting a three months' respite to this
unfortunate youth, nor even in recommending his pardon. I
really do not know how to abandon this request, Sir George. Is
there nothing in our relative positions, or in our family alliance,
upon which I can found so trifling a claim.”
“Much, certainly, on which you can base far weightier demands,
so that they do not trench upon my official prerogatives. I am
surprised, Hadley, at the pertinacity with which you cling to this
boy-like fancy. Your father, Lord B., would certainly take an
entirely opposite view of the case, and should I yield to you, no
one, I am convinced, would censure me quicker or more severely
than he.”
The Honorable Edward Hadley B— could not deny the truth
of this statement, nor the force of the argument. He recalled to
mind how often he had heard his father speak of the American
leaders in this war in terms of the harshest censure and vituperation,
and he knew that his verdict against them would be unpitying
and unsparing. His own benevolent instincts revolted against
the opinions of both father and governor; but he felt persuaded
that further argument or importunity would be useless. After a
few moments' reflection, he walked silently from the room, nor did
Sir George seek to stay his departure.
Young B— was only a visitor in Canada, having come from
England a few weeks before the time now spoken of, and proposing
to return to London after a short sojourn in the provinces.
He was distantly related to the governor, and upon that affinity,
and upon his own high social position, he had based the intercession,
which he had so reluctantly abandoned. Yet he did not
readily relinquish any enterprise in which he had once embarked.
At home, in not much younger years, he had borne the reputation
of a reckless and daring youth, who was wont to indulge his
caprices at almost any risk, and with small regard to personal reputation.
He was called thoughtless, wild, hare-brained, fool-hardy,
and sometimes unprincipled, yet all his many faults had been
mingled with so much that was amiable, high-minded and generous,
that he seldom became the subject of severe and not often
even of just rebuke. Such as his character was, we are not his
apologist, but simply the historian of that episode in his life which
briefly connects him with the personages and events of our
story.
