Part 8

A report of the proceedings of that eventful day has been published and Sir Wilfrid’s speech in endorsement of the resolutions adopted may be summarized as follows: Fair treatment of soldiers and sailors, generous care for dependents of the fallen, maintenance of British preferences restored and unimpaired, reciprocity between Canada and the United States in foodstuffs, gradual progress toward freer trade, democratization of labor, abolition of Government by order-in-council, abolition of press censorship, repeal of the War Times Election Act, and for a League of Nations.

* * * * *

Sir Wilfrid’s acceptance of a Knighthood in 1897, came as a big surprise to all his followers, because his views had been clearly defined on the subject; and it was common talk that he had been offered a knighthood on attaining the Premiership. In the first year of his ministry as such, he went to England to attend the Jubilee of Queen Victoria. The reception accorded him by the British people was remarkable for its warmth. The handsome, distinguished young French-Canadian statesman took London by storm; the press and public acclaiming his talents, and Queen Victoria bestowing upon him particular attention and respect. One evening the Queen gave a dinner for the overseas Prime Ministers. When the young Canadian Premier, who was again honored by being seated next to Her Majesty, took his seat at the banquet table, he found a card upon which Queen Victoria herself had written, “Rt. Hon. Sir Wilfrid Laurier.” There was no way out of such a situation. The aged Queen had taken this means of honoring him, and Sir Wilfrid’s chivalry and gallantry, as well as his genuine affection for the great good monarch, triumphed over his democratic views.

* * * * *

At the time of his death a Canadian poet wrote, “When I was a boy at Woodstock College, I heard a phrase that floated upon the air, like the magic carpet of the Arabians. It contained the simple news that ‘Laurier is coming.’ He came, we heard him, and in my boyish heart that night was born a new Canada. I was no longer a Conservative or a Liberal. I only knew a white light had passed that I must follow. I had exchanged my knight of arms in history for a crusader in life. The years that poured the first strength of youth into my heart came to the crusader with her gift of silver. One day I walked the streets of London with an unsold story in my pocket, and a four days’ yearning for bread in my soul. Suddenly the white light shone. Laurier had passed me in his carriage upon Piccadilly. I forgot my hunger and cheered, and the multitude, seeing not the light in its brightness, wondered over my joy.”

* * * * *

“Big John Canadien,” Canada’s most famous guide, made this following curious prediction:—

“When I die you shall be frightened,” he said to Sir Wilfrid Laurier.

The death of Sir Wilfrid Laurier and of Big John at one day’s interval brings to mind a scene witnessed in 1884. They were preparing to celebrate the national holiday, St. Jean Baptiste Day, and the late Mr. A. Corriveau, one of the most zealous organizers of the great national celebration, was conversing with Wilfrid Laurier on Notre Dame Street, near Place D’Armes in Montreal.

When big John arrived with a band of his braves, M. Corriveau, who was acquainted with “Big John,” introduced him to his friends. After a few words of conversation, Sir Wilfrid Laurier asked the Indian how old he was.

“I am 43 years old,” he replied.

“We are almost of the same age,” said Mr. Laurier, “I will be 43 at my next birthday.”

“Well,” replied Big John, “when I die, you shall be frightened.”

Everybody nearby had a good laugh on hearing the Indian’s words, and Big John went away.

Big John died on Sunday, February 23rd., and Sir Wilfrid on Monday, February 24th.

* * * * *

Some years ago a retired Baptist minister told the following story: “When I was a young man I lived in a small town in Eastern Canada, and about the only well educated men in the place were a lawyer and a doctor, both Roman Catholics. We used to meet almost every afternoon in the lawyer’s office and discuss the affairs of the nation, and almost every subject from religion to politics. One day the young lawyer made a certain statement, when the doctor asked: ‘Where did you get that idea?’ and the lawyer replied (pulling open a drawer in his desk and bringing forth a well-worn Bible), ‘Why, from this Book.’ The doctor said, ‘Why, you don’t read that Book, do you?’ ‘Yes,’ replied the lawyer, ‘I have had this with me since I left home. I promised my mother to read it every day, and I have never broken my word, because, no matter where I am, I have read a portion of this good Book every day of my life since I gave that promise.’” Mr. Richardson asked me who I thought the young lawyer was, but I could not tell, so he said, “It was Sir Wilfrid Laurier, and we have been close friends ever since, although he is a Roman Catholic and I am a Baptist minister. Does this not in some manner account for Sir Wilfrid’s broad-mindedness in matters of religion?”

A gentleman brought a friend in to lunch at the Reform Club. On that particular day Sir Wilfrid happened to be there, lunching. The friend’s name was Mr. Lambe and he expressed a desire to be introduced to Sir Wilfrid, so, after luncheon in the clubroom, he was presented. When shaking hands with the “Chief” he started to explain that he was not a supporter of the Liberal party. Sir Wilfrid continued shaking hands during the short explanation, and then reached over with his left hand, and, placing it on Mr. Lambe’s shoulder, said:

“Well, never mind, Mr. Lambe, you know there is more rejoicing in Heaven over the return of one lost sheep,” etc.

* * * * *

In 1906, when Sir Wilfrid was returned to power, the Liberals gave him a reception at the old Horticultural Gardens. The “Chief” arrived, accompanied by quite a party, and, as a prominent supporter was about to shake hands with him, a little man who had been imbibing, pushed him aside, held out his hand, and said in a loud voice:

“Welcome to ‘Taranta,’ Mr. ‘Larier’.”

This was momentarily embarrassing to those assembled, but the “Chief” shook hands heartily with him and asked his name. The little man gave his name as Lynch, whereupon the “Chief” exclaimed:

“A good Irish name, and a good Irish welcome,” and thus passed off lightly what might have proved embarrassing.

* * * * *

A very illuminating incident occurred at the Union Station on one of Sir Wilfrid’s last visits to Toronto which reveals the manner of his appeal to his people. Two young ladies spied the old statesman walking up and down the platform by his private car. One of them insisted that it was Sir Wilfrid, the other that it was not. A newspaper reporter overheard the argument and settled it by answering them that it was, indeed, the dean of the House of Commons.

“I wonder if we could shake hands with him?” enquired the girls, excitedly.

The reporter approached Sir Wilfrid and said:

“There are two young ladies who would esteem it an honor to shake your hand. May I bring them to you, Sir Wilfrid?”

“You may NOT, my young friend!” said Sir Wilfrid, “But you may take me to them.”

Which he did, and so gracefully added to his legions.

Much has been said of his affection for children, another expression after all, of that same kindness and dignity. A Toronto newspaper editor when a boy of fourteen, wrote a long letter to Sir Wilfrid from the boy’s point of view, referring to politics and to Sir Wilfrid’s stand on prohibition and other reforms. Deep as he was in the work of Parliament at the time, Sir Wilfrid did not neglect to reply promptly, and in a fine, courteous letter, said that he would be glad to discuss the questions at greater length when he should happen to visit the lad’s home-town. And when Sir Wilfrid passed through that way, the lad was invited to dinner with him. The politically “kind” man couldn’t do that. It required Sir Wilfrid’s genuine emotions towards the young.

While humor did not abound in Sir Wilfrid’s speeches and debates, he had a shrewd wit, equal to all occasions. In a debate twitting Sir Charles Tupper on Sir Charles’s reminiscences of his political services, Sir Wilfrid said that between Sir Charles and Sir John A. Macdonald they had sailed the ship of state pretty successfully, Sir John supplying the brains and Sir Charles supplying the wind to fill the sails.

* * * * *

Campaigning through the country Sir Wilfrid was always master of the situation. There was withal, something of the “grand seigneur” about him. He had a keen sense of dramatic values. While he yielded to the worship of those who crowded his car to shake his hand, he did not show himself to the public one moment before it was necessary. Sometimes the clamor of admirers forced him from his bed at midnight. With all the love for applause, characteristic of his race, and of the dramatic temperament, his common sense never deserted him. During his last tour of Nova Scotia, one morning his boat barely landed when an enthusiastic young woman crossed the gang plank and handed him an armful of flowers. Such is to be expected as part of every meeting, but there on the bare deck of a steamer the chieftain was nonplussed. As he laid the gift on the hatch he turned and said over his shoulder: “Is a man ever so helpless as he is with a bouquet?”

* * * * *

On one occasion an excited supporter telegraphed:

“Report in circulation here, that your antagonism to religion is so strong, that you have never had any of your children baptized. Very damaging to party. Telegraph me if untrue.”

Sir Wilfrid’s reply was characteristic:

“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.”

* * * * *

Another tribute to Sir Wilfrid Laurier has been paid by L.-Col. Johnson Paudash, now in Lindsay, who served for some time overseas with a Central Ontario battalion. The late Premier, it is stated, presented Col. Paudash with a service of silver, and also wrote to him several times while he was on active service in France. Col. Paudash had interviewed Sir Wilfrid several times, while he was Premier, on behalf of the different Indian tribes, and states that he at all times found him courteous and kind, and a good friend of the Indian. He and others of his tribe sincerely mourn the passing of the great “White Chief,” as they affectionately called the late Sir Wilfrid Laurier.

* * * * *

Sir Wilfrid Laurier maintained his pride and interest in Ottawa to the last. It is understood that a clause in his will dedicates to the Capital City all the tokens of honor bestowed on him during his distinguished public career.

Many of these are almost of priceless value. They include the testimonials conveying the freedom of cities in the United Kingdom. The casket containing the freedom of the city of Edinburgh, one of the most beautiful of the collection, is solidly encrusted with diamonds.

The intention is that these souvenirs shall find a place in the war memorial building which will doubtless be erected in Ottawa before long.

* * * * *

In his early days, at a campaign meeting, a Mr. Mousseau, a man of gigantic bulk, accused the Ministers of the Government of fattening on the sweat of the people. Sir Wilfrid, tall, slender, and frail, rose, pointed to his huge and bulky accuser and asked: “Who is fattening on the people?”

* * * * *

His hold on the hearts of his countrymen in Quebec was tremendous, and is best illustrated in the famous yarn of the old habitant, who on hearing that Queen Victoria had died and the Prince of Wales was now to become King, said:

“By gar, dat Prince of Wale must have a good pull wit’ Laurier!”

* * * * *

His visit to the Queen’s Jubilee in 1897, was greeted with a reception that was almost regal. He was made a member of the Privy Council, appointed a Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George, and received in audiences by the Queen. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge conferred honorary degrees upon him, and the Cobden Club admitted him to honorary membership, and awarded him its gold medal, in recognition of his exceptional and distinguished services to the cause of international and free exchange. The new departure in Imperial policy, the Preferential Tariff, which Sir Wilfrid was able to arrange during this visit, caused the London Times to say: “Laurier’s name must live in the annals of the British Empire.”

A few years later, 1902, he again visited Great Britain to be present at the ceremonies in connection with the crowning of His late Majesty King Edward VII., the Sovereign of the British Empire and British Dominions beyond the Seas. Again in 1907, Sir Wilfrid attended with a number of Ministers upon the invitation of the Imperial Government, a Conference of all the Premiers in His Majesty’s possessions. In 1911 he attended the ceremonies in connection with the crowning of King George V. Upon this, as upon other occasions, he was admirably received by the press and people wherever he went throughout Great Britain. In 1904, the London Daily News of September 14th., of that year, remarked that “Sir Wilfrid Laurier is easily the first statesman of Greater Britain.”

The following are some of the Press comments on Sir Wilfrid during the Imperial Conference of 1907:—The Daily News of London in a review of “The Race Question in Canada,” declared “Sir Wilfrid Laurier has won his title to be considered as a true statesman because, although always a faithful Catholic, he has declined to be dominated by the forces of Ultramontanism. The hope of the fusion of the races, Sir Wilfrid Laurier once declared, into a single one is Utopian. It is an impossibility. The distinctions of nature will exist always. But he went on to say, if we remember rightly, that the two races would none the less form a great nation under the British Flag, and it is, of course, the supreme achievement of Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s political career that he has devoted himself to the attainment of this ideal.”

The Western Daily Press of Bristol, England, stated:—“Sir Wilfrid Laurier is in himself an excellent illustration of the success of the British plan of making various great parts of the Empire responsible for the control of their own affairs. There was a time when the race problem in Canada was one affording cause for gravest anxiety; that belongs to the past; and the world is familiar with the fact that Sir Wilfrid, the first French-Canadian who has been Premier of the Dominion, is a man probably without a rival in the confidence felt in him in this country.”

The London Times of April 15th., 1907, editorially stated:—Sir Wilfrid Laurier, whom we welcome as probably the best known of all Canadian statesmen, comes of French-Canadian stock, but he has shown by his career that this is no disqualification for doing valued service to the Empire.

The Tribune of London, referring to Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s stirring speech at the Guildhall in 1907, characterized the Canadian Premier’s deliverance on that occasion as:—A speech that will certainly find a place in future histories of the British Empire.

The Daily News of London stated:—The destinies of Canada were not settled by the war which made England instead of France supreme in North America. There came the second crisis, and if that second crisis had not been faced with the courage, genius, and imagination of Liberalism, there would have been no men of Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s race and blood at yesterday’s lunch, and the Colony which is proud to count in its ancestry the heroism of a Montcalm as well as the heroism of a Wolfe would have sent no representative to the capital. For the distinction of the British Empire consists not in the conquests of its arms, but in the reconciliation of its statesmanship, in the generous wisdom which has shown that the British flag can shelter and respect the traditions, the sympathies, and the consciences of races that are not British by blood or history. This is what was in Sir Wilfrid Laurier’s mind when he pointed with pride to the great British act of the present government. (The Great British Act was the Constitution granted to South Africa, or the Transvaal.)

A few days after the coronation of their Majesties King George V. and Queen Mary, a thanksgiving service was held in St. Paul’s Cathedral. The high place which Sir Wilfrid Laurier occupies in the esteem of the British people of all classes is indicated by the manner in which he was greeted on his way to the cathedral and received there. The cable message reproduced below from the Montreal Star (Conservative), of June 29th., 1911, gives a brief summary of this grand cordiality:—

Sir Wilfrid Laurier, as he passed through the crowded streets from the Palace to the Cathedral (St. Paul’s), had, perhaps, the greatest reception of his entire visit. In his full levee uniform and cocked hat, he sat alone in the first of the State carriages, looking every inch of him a great personage.

Upon the box of the carriage were two magnificently attired Royal servants, whose brilliant scarlet coats flashed all down the line of route, and as the prancing steeds drew the carriage along the broad centres, between strictly kept lines of police and soldiers, the London populace, who crowded the sidewalks, cheered again and again.

“That’s Laurier,” they cried. “That’s Canada. Give them a cheer,” and they did it right heartily.

Sir Wilfrid Laurier was obviously delighted. He kept his hand moving up and down to and from his cocked hat, thus giving a military salute of the Royal pattern and not raising his hat as lesser mortals might do.

When Sir Wilfrid reached the Cathedral, another honour awaited him. The Lord Mayor of London and other dignitaries, no matter how gorgeous their attire, were sent around to the smaller north or south doors; but Sir Wilfrid’s carriage was directed by the police to none other than the Royal and crimson carpeted entrance at the main west door, where the Bishop of Ripon received him on behalf of the Anglican Church. As he passed up the steps into the Cathedral, his uniform, slashed with the blue band of a Knight of the Grand Cross of St. Michael and St. George, came into full view, and made him a most notable figure.

Some of the notable expressions regarding Sir Wilfrid’s achievements in 1907, in Great Britain were penned by the late Sir Charles Tupper, ex-Premier of the Dominion of Canada and formerly for some years High Commissioner at London, England. Writing in the Nineteenth Century, May, 1907, Sir Charles expressed himself as follows:—“My distinguished successor in the Prime Ministership of Canada has during these past few memorable days asserted with a persuasiveness all his own that the British Empire ‘rests upon foundations firmer than the rock and as endurable as the ages.’”

* * * * *

A noted English writer has said: “I have seen and heard many colonial public men, but Sir Wilfrid is the only one who would have become a national figure had he been transplanted to Westminster. I have never seen him in the Canadian Parliament without wishing that instead he was at Westminster, for then it would be easy to decide as to the leadership of the Liberal party.”

* * * * *

In office or out of office, he is the most considerable figure in Greater Britain. Such was the estimate of Sir Wilfrid Laurier, made by one of the premier political observers of England, Mr. John L. Garvin.

* * * * *