Complete Fictional Works of John Buchan (Illustrated)

by John Buchan

  One of the recognized Ottawa expeditions was to shoot the lumber slides on the Chaudiere Falls, a comparatively tame performance; but to add zest to the exploit the Governor-General was advised to use a lumberman’s boat instead of a prosaic raft. Arrangements were accordingly made, and the Mintos, accompanied by the Drummonds and the Grenfells,* embarked above the Falls, quite unaware of the extreme danger of the adventure. Once in the boat it was too late to draw back. The lock gates were open, the river was exceptionally high, the current carried them off, and soon they were plunging down a drop of twenty feet into the surging rapids of the Falls. The nose of the boat was completely submerged, and the two men who were attempting to guide her were powerless. The torrent took command and flung the boat like a cork first one way then the other, till, with its drenched occupants, it was providentially carried into calmer waters.

  * Lord and Lady Desborough.

  In the early spring of 1902 Minto had another narrow escape from drowning. When walking one day on the frozen Ottawa River the ice suddenly gave way with him and he found himself in the water: —

  “At first I thought it was only the snow crust, but soon realized it was more than that. I could see the solid ice about three feet below the surface, and close to it was the unmistakable black-looking deep water, just under my head. I fell full length, and luckily the crust supported my arm, but on the right side I was wet up to the neck. I cautiously raised myself on to the crust on my hands and knees and was then all right. I must have struck an air hole connected with the deep water, and only thinly covered. It does not do to take liberties with the Ottawa River!”

  It was a great grief to Minto that the fishing on the Cascapedia was no longer the perquisite of the Governor-General; for the enjoyment of this sport he had to be beholden to private owners, or to accept the hospitality of the American clubs who had purchased the fishing of many Canadian rivers. The luxury of the newcomers seemed to him to suburbanize the sport. “Very hospitable, certainly,” the journal notes, “but an unworkmanlike look about them; very smart sporting clothes, looking as if they never had been and never would be rained on. X himself in a grey hat and white puggaree, variegated waistcoat, new putties under white low gaiters, and brand new leather boots. He would have startled them on the Tweed.” Minto loved the river, frozen or running free; the whole family skated, Lady Minto brilliantly, and during their term of office the Minto Skating Club was inaugurated, which has since produced competitors for the world’s championship. Throughout the winter there were weekly skating parties, but the favourite entertainments were by moonlight, when the bonfires blazed and the rinks were brilliant with fairy lights. There would be an occasional tramp with the Snow-shoers in their picturesque costumes to the rhythm of French-Canadian songs. Minto also took up ski-ing with enthusiasm, and with Lady Minto and the children was often seen careering over the snow-clad hills at Fairy Lake.*

  * As a Scotsman Minto was also a curler, and had the pleasure of entertaining the Scottish team that came over to play Canada. In the dry and electric air of the Canadian winter it is possible to light the gas by placing a finger on the jet. This was pointed out to one of the visitors, who duly performed the feat, and observed that “it cowed a’.” “When I get hame,” he said, “I’ll hae some queer things to tell the wife, but I’ll no tell her that. She would say I had been drinkiin’.”

  No sport came amiss to the Governor-General, and an adventure while on a moose-hunt in the Matawa district of Ontario is described in a letter to his wife: —

  “We started at 8:30 a.m. through nice open bush. I got a shot at a moose in the afternoon, and thought I had killed him, but he went on. He was close in front of us, but we could not quite manage to get up to him. As it was getting late we thought we had better make for camp; the guide assured me we should get the moose the next day, so we started for home. We tramped along for some time, but before long I was convinced that neither of the guides knew in the least where we were; however, we struggled on due north, steering by the compass. At last we came down to a little lake; it was getting dark, and the guide, Frank Le Claire, pulled up, looked at me and said,’We must make fire.’”

  It is a pretty dismal feeling to be utterly lost in these huge forests. We had practically nothing to eat, and very thin coats on, though we luckily had our sweaters. We had eight small biscuits left from our lunch, some tea, and a spoonful of whisky in my flask. There was nothing for it but ‘to make fire,’ and the guide at once tackled a huge dead pine with his small axe, an enormous tree which came down with a tremendous crash. It was rotten all through, and the hollow tree formed a sort of draught chimney, at the end of which we lighted our fire, and kept it burning all night. It was certainly an unpleasant experience, bitterly cold, but fine, the new moon just showing itself. The guides cut us some spruce boughs, and we lay down on these, getting roasted on one side so that our things scorched, and frozen on the other, so that one had to keep revolving like a kitchen spit.

  “The morning came at last; we started again at 7:30 a.m., still steering north. A very rough walk till we hit a lumber trail. Soon we got down to the lake, doubtfully frozen over, and nervously crossed till within a few yards of the other side; but seeing no signs of the trail in the bush, and not knowing where in the world we might get to if we still went on our course, we decided to turn back to our bivouac and take up our old trail of the day before and hunt it out if we could stick the distance, as we knew it must eventually get us home unless snow came and obliterated our marks. About 4 o’clock, after tramping all day through the snow, we heard a shout, and to our intense delight found that one of the guides had come out from the camp to meet us, bringing whisky and sandwiches. We had practically eaten nothing since 12 o’clock the day before, and had had tremendously hard walking, up to our knees in snow. Another hour brought us into the camp. I do not think I have ever had such a hard time, and have never been so played out; we had been on the go for about 34 hours. I wondered how much further it was possible for us to keep on. To-day we felt we must have a rest, but the guides went out, and the Indians have just brought in my moose, a splendid head measuring 49, and the whole establishment is wild with excitement.”

  Canada is not famous as a hunting country, and Minto had few chances of indulging in his favourite pursuit. On one occasion, however, shortly after his arrival in the country, he was out riding with his children —

  “When, to our intense surprise, we heard hounds running in the cemetery, and five and a half couple crossed the road, running hard, with a tremendous cry, and not a soul with them.” The promise of this ghostly hunt was not fulfilled, but the journal records one day with the hounds at St. Anne’s, near Montreal: “What recollections of old days! Red coats and all the panoply of the chase! We found in a large wood and went away very fast for twenty minutes quite straight and lost him. Found again late in the afternoon, over very difficult country, stone walls, and stiff timber with no end of ditches. My horse was the cleverest I ever rode. A very good day’s sport!” The gusto with which he recounts the details of the run showed that the passion of the old Limber days had not abated.

  IV

  In June 1902 Minto returned to England on a flying visit to attend the Coronation, where he was just in time to prevent the announcement of a peerage for Sir Wilfrid Laurier which Sir Wilfrid had refused. He found it difficult to get any serious talk with the Ministers.

  “They are generally head over ears in work and interested only in their own departments. Mr. Chamberlain’s accident too has prevented my having much conversation with him. He himself has done a great work in developing the colonial and imperial connection, but I doubt if he is in touch with colonial sentiment — I mean, if he entirely realizes the sentimental affection for the motherland, or judges fairly of the unwillingness of colonial statesmen to commit themselves hastily to an imperial policy. He appears to be a hard-headed man of business, bent on the idea of utilizing our colonial possessions for imperial benefit. . . . H
e is a very strong man but not a sympathetic one, and therefore his colonial administration is not without risk. I suppose my eyes have been opened by my life on the other side of the Atlantic, for I confess I feel that there is much that is very insular at home in ideas and knowledge of mankind.”

  About military affairs Minto was pessimistic. He thought Lord Roberts incapable of carrying through any real army reforms, and the conditions of the War Office seemed to him primeval chaos. “Kitchener said at luncheon the other day at the Duke of Connaught’s, ‘One could run a War Office elsewhere for a year without the War Office finding one out.’ There have only been telephones at the War Office for the last few months, for fear, it is said, that some one should say something down them of which there was no record!” *

  * The journal for 1902 closes with this entry: “This year has been full of events; the Peace, the Coronation, and all its sensational interest, and latterly the completion of the Pacific Cable and the ‘All-round-the-World’ message to me, and still more Marconi’s wonderful success, and my wireless message to the King. For the future Sir Wilfrid’s delicate health makes me anxious both in a public and a private sense, for he is a great friend, and a stormy session is approaching. . . . And now we shall advance at midnight for the next campaign. The bells are ringing in the New Year, and Mary wishes me a happy one.”

  In April 1903 Mr. Chamberlain, in terms of high compliment, begged Minto to remain another year in Canada, since the office was in reality a six-year appointment, though custom had curtailed it to five. Minto consented, as he was bound to do, especially as Sir Wilfrid Laurier added his entreaties. That same month we find the first mention of the possibility of his going to India as Lord Curzon’s successor. Mr. Chamberlain referred to it in his letter, and Sir Wilfrid spoke privately to the Governor-General, saying that he would do all in his power to urge the appointment, adding that Minto had “his foot in the stirrup, if he was not yet in the saddle,” and that he would be glad to see Lord Palmerston’s advice followed—”When in difficulty send an Elliot.” There had been other suggestions as to his future, one of which, the Embassy at Washington, he had unhesitatingly rejected. India appealed to him on every ground of past connection and present-day opportunity; but it was never his habit to ask for things, and for the next eighteen months the subject dropped. Lady Minto, who was in England in the summer of 1904, reported that the inclination seemed to be to send a Cabinet Minister, somebody like Lord Selborne, and that Lord Curzon had told her that no man over fifty should be appointed, as the post was the most arduous in the Empire. The letters Minto wrote to his wife during these brief absences are perhaps the most full and characteristic of all his correspondence, for from her he had no reservations, and to her he could reveal much which his natural reticence withheld from others.

  The extra year of office passed, and in August 1904 came the last state function, the prorogation of Parliament, when the retiring Governor-General received an address of thanks from both Houses, Lady Minto taking her place on the dais beside him, and the speeches of Sir Wilfrid Laurier and Sir Robert Borden constituted such a tribute as no man could listen to unmoved. Minto had before this been privately informed that his successor would be his brother-in-law, Lord Grey. He paid a farewell visit to Quebec—”Our last night at the Citadel; very sad; everything full of old recollections” — and then started with his wife and eldest daughter for a final trip to the North-West and British Columbia. The tour was saddened by a horrible railway accident near Sintaluta, in which five lives were lost and the Governor-General’s party had a narrow escape. The journal, amidst its lists of addresses and receptions, falls often into a mood of wistful regret, for Minto was too deeply in love with the country to leave it easily. When he records “Struck our camp for the last time — my last camp in all human probability” — it is the reflection of a man who, in the great spaces of the prairie and amongst the pioneers of a new land, had found a life after his own heart.

  On Friday, 18th November, the party sailed in the Tunisian from Quebec, after a trying time of presentations and farewells. There had been far more in the leavetaking than a formal ceremony, for there was affection on both sides, and if Minto was loth to go, Canada was loth to lose him. Says the journal: —

  “At sea. So our life in Canada is over at last, and it has been a great wrench parting from so many friends and leaving a country which I love and which has been very full of interest to me. We have had nothing but ‘good-byes’ for weeks. . . . We left Government House, Ottawa, for the last time in brilliant sunshine, and drove to the Armoury, where I received a farewell address, Mary afterwards being presented with a beautiful diamond maple leaf by Belcourt on behalf of the city. Her speech in expressing her thanks was perfect. The station was crowded with our friends; the inside of the car was decorated with flowers, and the band played ‘Auld Lang Syne’ as we moved off. We arrived at Quebec and drove to the Frontenac as guests of the city. The last evening we gave a banquet, and our guests accompanied us to the wharf through an avenue of lighted torches, and amidst cheering and waving of handkerchiefs we put off at 10 p.m., the old Citadel blazing away her nineteen guns.

  “So ends our career in Canada. Innumerable addresses and speeches, but it has been a very affectionate farewell, and one cannot but feel very pleased at what has been said on every side. I cannot write a memoir now, but the six years have been far from ordinary ones, very full of history, imperial and Canadian, with much that is fraught with meaning for the future. And now the task is over, and I am grateful for the appreciation of the country I have worked for; and through it all Mary has been more than splendid.”

  Minto arrived at Liverpool and found a host of friends to greet him. Mr. Alfred Lyttelton had succeeded Mr. Chamberlain at the Colonial Office, and his official dispatch was cordial in its tribute: —

  “The six years during which you have represented the Sovereign in Canada have been marked by events of great importance to the Dominion and the Empire at large, including a war in which the military forces of the United Kingdom and Canada acted together in an imperial cause. These years have also been marked by a splendid development in the prosperity and greatness of Canada, and His Majesty’s Government has been glad to recognize that during this period the highest office in the Dominion has been held by one upon whose discretion, ability, and courageous sense of duty they could confidently rely on all occasions. . . . I also note with pleasure the appreciation of the admirable qualities and services of the Countess of Minto, shown by the Canadian Parliament and people.”

  It had been a happy time, and Minto brought away from it that legacy of delectable memories which is the reward of the traveller. Lady Minto, in a paper in the National Review in March 1905, tried to tell something of the wonders of the great Dominion. “With vivid distinctness scenes too numerous to recount come back to me. I see again the foaming waters of the St. John River racing in wild career through turbulent rapids for 45 miles to the Saguenay, my frail canoe tossing like a leaf on the mighty stream, gliding swiftly past the treacherous whirlpools and the sharp rocks, safe in the skilful hands of the half-breeds. And now I am galloping once more on the boundless prairie, over that fragrant carpet woven of wild spring flowers, elated by the pure air and transparent atmosphere, exulting in the freedom of my life. And now the silence of the night has fallen, and in the awe-inspiring forests or in the sweet stillness of the prairie the camp sleeps, watched over by a myriad stars.” Minto, no less than his wife, was intoxicated by the beauty of Canada’s deep winters and riotous summers and flaming autumns. To a Border Scot the land provided on a magnificent scale the fir woods, the clear waters, and the wide spaces of his own countryside. With all classes of the people he felt an immediate kinship, and he could appraise the quality alike of an Indian chief and a Montreal lawyer, a Scots settler in Manitoba and a Quebec habitant. He shared in their hopes, rejoiced in their triumphs, and mourned with them in their sorrows. When the skating tragedy took place at Ottawa in Decem
ber 1901, of which Mr. Mackenzie King has written in his Secret of Heroism, it was the Governor-General who was out at dawn next day helping to recover the bodies. The humanity learned hi the democratic Borders, and ripened by years of racing and soldiering, enabled him to meet men of every rank and breed with friendliness and understanding.

  Minto gave much to Canada, but he received much in return. He was enabled to look within the mechanism of the constitutional State. His party politics, never cherished with much conviction, were mellowed and liberalized by an insight into the eternal difficulties of all parties and their curious alikeness in fundamentals. He acquired perspective, and learned to separate the accidental from the essential. His imperialism, which had been a dream, became a reasoned faith. More and more he came to value the moral qualities in statesmanship above the intellectual; for, since democracy among men of British blood is practically the same whatever party governs, excellence is found rather in character than in creed. His flair for the true constitutional path, an inheritance from his Whig forbears, developed into a sure instinct, which was often in advance of that of Ministers both in Canada and at home. Earlier in his life he had disliked the game of politics, now he came to see the gravity of it, and he exerted himself to ensure that it was played wisely and honestly. There was much in the Canadian parties that he disliked, but he saw that reform could not come merely by reprobation, and he did his best to set before the youth with which he came in contact a high, if undogmatic and unpharisaic, ideal of public service. To Mr. Mackenzie King, then a young man on the threshold of his career, Minto wrote: —