Part 6 (2/2)

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Though he was merciless in conflict, bitterness did not dwell in his heart. He was always willing to shake hands, in true English fas.h.i.+on, when the war was over. If friends expostulated about the generosity of his language or actions to political opponents, 'Oh! what's the use,'

he would reply, 'he has got a pretty wife'; or, 'he is not such a bad fellow after all'; or, 'life is too short to keep that sort of thing up.' He was generous partly because he felt he could afford it, for he had boundless confidence in his own resources. This self-confidence gave him a hearty, cheery manner, no matter what straits he was in, that acted on his followers like wine.

The one thing lacking was that he had not wholly subordinated self to duty and to G.o.d. He was immersed in active engagements and all the cares of life from early years. He was capable of enjoying, and he did enjoy without stint, every sweet cup that was presented to his lips.

He was conscious of great powers that never seemed to fail him, but enabled him to rise with the occasion ever higher and higher. Small wonder, then, that he cast himself as a strong swimmer into the boiling currents of life, little caring whither they bore {153} him, because proudly confident that he could hold his own, or, at any rate, regain the sh.o.r.e whenever he liked.

A thorough intellectual training would have done much for him. The discipline of a university career enables even a young man to know somewhat of his own strength and weakness, especially somewhat of his own awful ignorance; and self-knowledge leads to self-control.

Circ.u.mstances put this beyond his reach; but something more excellent than even a college was within his reach, had he only been wise enough to understand and possess it as his own. In his father he had a pattern of things in the heavens; a life in which law and freedom meant the same thing; in which the harmony between his own will and the will of G.o.d gave unity, harmony, and n.o.bleness to life and life's work. The teaching of the old Loyalist's life was the eternal teaching of the stars:

Like as a star That maketh not haste, That taketh not rest, Let each be fulfilling His G.o.d-given hest.

But the veins of the son were full of blood and his bones moistened with marrow. Pa.s.sion {154} spoke in his soul, and he heard and loved the sweet voices of nature, and of men and women. Not that the whispers of heaven were unheard. No; nor were they disregarded; but they were not absolutely and implicitly obeyed. And so, like the vast crowd, all through life he was partly the creature of impulse and partly the servant of principle. Often it would have been difficult for himself to say which was uppermost in him. Had he attained to unity and harmony of nature, he could have been a poet, or a statesman of the old heroic type. But he did not attain, for he did not seek with the whole heart. And he puzzled others, because he had never read the riddle of himself.

All Nova Scotians are glad that he spent his last days in Government House. It was an honour he himself felt to be his due--a light, though it were but the light of a wintry sun, that fell on his declining days.

Many old friends flocked to see him; and the meetings were sometimes very touching. An old follower, one who had never failed him, came to pay his tribute of glad homage. His chief had reached a haven of rest and the height of his ambition. When the door was opened, the governor was at the other end of the room. {155} He turned, and the two recognized each other. Not a word was spoken. The rugged face of the liegeman was tremulous. He looked round; yes, it was actually old Government House, and his chief was in possession. After all the storms and disappointments, it had actually come to this. The two men drew near, and as hand touched hand the two heads bowed together, and without a word they embraced as two children would. Are there many such little wells of poetry in the arid wilderness of political life?

On the day of his arrival in Halifax a true and tried relative called.

'Well, Joseph, what would your old father have thought of this?'

'Yes,' was the answer, 'it would have pleased the old man. I have had a long fight for it, and have stormed the castle at last. But now that I have it, what does it all amount to? I shall be here but a few days; and instead of playing governor, I feel like saying with Wolsey, to the Abbot of Leicester:

An old man, broken with the storms of State, Is come to lay his weary bones among ye; Give him a little earth for charity.'

That was almost all that was given him. The only levee he held in Government House was {156} after his death, when he lay in state, and thousands crowded round to take a long last look at their old idol.

On the morning after Howe's death a wealthy Halifax merchant, one who had been a devoted friend of his, saw as he was entering his place of business a farmer or drover, one well known for 'homespun without, and a warm heart within,' sitting on a box outside near the door, his head leaning on his hand, his foot monotonously swinging to and fro, looking as if he had sat there for hours and had no intention of getting up in a hurry. 'Well, Stephen, what's the matter?' 'Oh, nauthin',' was the dull response. 'Is it Howe?' was the next question, in a softer tone.

The sound of the name unsealed the fountain. 'Yes, it's Howe.' The words came with a gulp, and then followed tears, dropping on the pavement large and fast. He did not weep alone. In many a hamlet, in many a fis.h.i.+ng village, in many a nook and corner of Nova Scotia, as the news went over the land, Joseph Howe had the same tribute of tears.

Vex not his ghost; O let him pa.s.s! he hates him That would upon the rack of this rough world Stretch him out longer.

{157} He sleeps in Camphill Cemetery, not far from the pines and salt sea water of his boyhood, a column of Nova Scotian granite marking his resting-place; and his memory abides in the hearts of thousands of his countrymen.

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BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

Besides the two n.o.ble volumes, _Speeches and Public Letters of Joseph Howe_, edited by Joseph Andrew Chisholm, K. C. (Halifax, 1909), the reader should consult the biography of Howe by Mr Justice Longley in the 'Makers of Canada' series, and the account of Nova Scotian history by Professor Archibald MacMechan in _Canada and its Provinces_, vol.

xiii. See also _Recollections of Sixty Years in Canada_ by Sir Charles Tupper (London, 1914); and, in this Series, _The Winning of Popular Government_ and _The Railway Builders_. For an intimate study of life in Nova Scotia there are no books equal to the works of Thomas Chandler Haliburton.

THE CHRONICLES OF CANADA

Edited by George M. Wrong and H. H. Langton of the University of Toronto

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