24 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
of rational liberty to destroy the only asylum wherein such liberty had taken 
refuge in the western world. 
“ But the principles of those chivalrous men [the Loyalists] had been 
fought for by his father, and were inherited by him; moreover, such prin- 
ciples had been tested anew in his experience and baptized afresh in his 
endeavours. His personal participation in the war of 1812 supplied the bond 
which united him with and enabled him to become an authority among the 
veterans of that period. To have been a militiaman in those perilous days,’ 
was his glory and his pride. To vindicate the character of that heroic force, 
to eulogize its resources, to promote its organization and increase its effi- 
ciency, were with him labours that he jealously loved. Objects as dear to 
his heart as they were necessary for the state. Every kind of militia gather- 
ing was attractive to him. He would attend the irregular muster jof the 
rank and file of the county with as much apparent relish as he would preside 
at some commemorative banquet. He would cheer the young, who had never 
seen a shot fired in anger, with as much zest as he would chat with the old 
whose precious recollections were covered with blood. He led the militia- 
man’s ‘ Three time three for the Queen, God bless her,’ with as true a heart 
and as ringing a voice as he drank in silence to the memory of those who 
had fallen in fight when George Third was king. He sympathized as heartily 
with youth in its determination to defend what it possessed, as he did with 
age in its desire to revere what it remembered. The chords of joy and 
sorrow were easily reached, for his soul was very sensibly attuned to both. 
He had joy for hope and grief for memory. The young men liked him because 
with them he was always young, and the old men liked him because in recall- 
ing their recollections he seemed to revive their youth and make them 
oblivious to the havoc of time. He knew how to tell, as well as how to listen 
to old stories ; and this interchange of anecdote and incident would either 
“wake the welkin’ with laughter and thus make mirth musical, or open 
afresh the sluices of grief while tears like the dew of yesternight would fall 
afresh on the unforgotten battle-fields of Canada. Thus it was that MacNab’s 
influence, taking its rise in sympathy and service, in common sufferings and 
common triumphs, was rooted and grounded in the very soil. It grew around 
the early settlements, and with vine-like beauty united the early settlers of 
the country with him. To them he was the heroic soldier of 1812; the cour- 
ageous standard-bearer of the old flag and the fast friend of the militia. 
“They enquired not whether his attainments were equal to his fame, 
whether his parts corresponded with his beauties, or whether the political 
needs of the Province had not outgrown his ability to deal with them. Being 
plain men, neither fancy thinkers nor economists, neither philosophers or 
statesmen, they were content to be represented by one of themselves, a 
fearless militia man, a thorough loyalist, and a ‘wholesoul’d’ British subject. 
Thus borne into parliament on the broad shoulders of the yeomanry, MacNab 
was always upheld by the broad shoulders on which he had been borne. 
Through all the fluctuations of his country’s history, the new combinations 
of parties and the various transitions of politics from one orbit to another, 
he found his position as a member, and his place in the House, equally well 
recognized and established. The good understanding between himself and 
his constituents continued to the last ; for though the electors of Hamilton 
belonged to a class somewhat different to the freeholders of Wentworth, they 
