Its most distressing failures were in those things which are very
essential. (1) Being a compromise body it had no power of progressive
development, and in the whole generation of its existence it did
practically nothing to advance the public, intellectual, or moral
interests of the people. (2) Perhaps its most serious breakdown took
place, as we shall see, in the failure of its judicial system. Executive
power it had none, as seen in the cases where jail-delivery took place
again and again by the friends of the prisoners boldly extricating whom
they would. (3) But most alarming and miserable was its failure to act
in its moribund days, when it allowed, as we shall see, a mob to seize
Fort Garry and bring in an era of disorder which made every
self-respecting British subject blush with shame.
[Illustration: FORT GARRY WINTER SCENES
SOUTH AND EAST FACES, 1840
From sketch by wife of Governor Finlayson.
EAST FACE IN 1882, WHEN FORT WAS DISMANTLED (From
painting in author's possession.) x Spot where Scott was Executed.]
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE OGRE OF JUSTICE.
The wild life of the prairie or mountain cultivates a spirit of freedom.
When individuals must become a law unto themselves, when the absence of
steamers, railways, electric power, work-shops, and mills, throws men on
their own resources, they find it irksome to obey the law.
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