662 



OBITUAKIES, CANADIAN. 



resign the seat on the bench to which he had 

 just been appointed rather than come back to 

 Montreal daring the cholera then raging there. 

 Judge Gale retired from the bench in 1849, 

 forced into retirement by continued ill-health 

 and the gradual coming on of the infirmities of 

 old age. He had married in 1839 a Miss Haw- 

 le}', of St. Annand West. Born of parents 

 who had both suffered for their loyal adherence 

 to the British crown during the American Kev- 

 olution, and educated in their views, Mr. Gale 

 was, as long as he moved in politics, a staunch 

 conservative and defender of British connection 

 and British supremacy. He wrote a series of 

 letters to the " Montreal Herald " (in those 

 days the organ of the stoutest conservatism), 

 over the signature of " Nerva," which produced 

 a strong impression on the public mind at the 

 time. And in espousing the cause of Lord 

 Dalhousie and upholding the old constitution 

 (under the title Constitutionalists taken by the 

 conservatives of that day) against the advocates 

 of democracy or responsible government, he 

 was but consistently pursuing the course on 

 which he at first set out. While upon the 

 bench, he maintained in an elaborate and very 

 able judgment the right of the crown to estab- 

 lish martial law in 1837, refusing to theorize 

 about what abstract rights man had or ought 

 to have, declaring simply and firmly what the 

 law, as he read it, established the prerogative 

 of the sovereign to be in a colony. Both as 

 lawyer and judge he won the respect of his 

 confreres alike by his ability and learning. Of 

 late years his heart was most deeply interested 

 in the freedom of the slave. He could not 

 speak with patience of any compromise with 

 slavery, and waxed indignant in denunciation 

 of all who in any way aided, abetted, or even 

 countenanced it. When the Anderson case 

 was before the Upper Canada courts, he was 

 one of the most active among those who aroused 

 agitation. When the Prince of Wales visited 

 the country, he got up a congratulatory address 

 from the colored people of Canada, which how- 

 ever was not received, as the Prince was de- 

 sired by the Duke of Newcastle not to recog- 

 nize differences of race and creed wherever it 

 could be helped. He was a man of high prin- 

 ciple, and ever bore an unblemished moral 

 character. Yet once in his early career at the 

 bar he was forced by the then customs of so- 

 ciety to go out in a duel. His antagonist was 

 Sir James Stuart, who had quarrelled with him 

 in court. Mr. Gale was severely wounded. 



June 27. MoCoRD, Hon. J. S., one of the 

 Justices of the Superior Court of Lower Canada. 

 The deceased judge was born near Dublin, on 

 the 18th day of June, 1801. His father, who 

 had friends in Canada, emigrated in 1806, and 

 settled there. He studied law in the offices 

 first of the late Chief Justice Holland, and sub- 

 sequently in that of the late Mr. Justice Gale, 

 and was called to the bar in 1822 or 1823. He 

 continued to practise his profession until the 

 outbreak of the rebellion in 1837, when he en- 



tered the volunteer service, raising a cavalry 

 corps, and becoming commandant of a brigade 

 of cavalry, and for a time also of the whole 

 militia force in Montreal. On the reorganiza- 

 tion of the courts by the Special Council, he be- 

 came a District Judge and Judge of the Court 

 of Requests, and subsequently Judge of the Cir- 

 cuit Court. Later, on the reorganization of the 

 Judiciary in 1857, he became a Judge of the 

 Superior Court. He had thus been on the 

 bench for twenty-three or twenty-four years, 

 and in that time had done judicial duty in every 

 portion of the old district of Montreal, embrac- 

 ing about half the population of Lower Canada. 

 Although not standing foremost among the 

 jurists who have won celebrity among the mem- 

 bers of the bench and bar, he has yet proved 

 an eminently useful and painstaking judge, 

 whose decisions have uniformly stood the test 

 of appeal more successfully than those of most 

 other men upon the bench. Few or none of 

 them have, indeed, been altogether set aside. 

 Besides his soldiering for several years, he was 

 for years a zealous student of natural history, 

 and one of the founders of the Montreal Natural 

 History Society. He was known as a student 

 of meteorology, and contributed many important 

 papers on that interesting branch of study. But 

 the work into which he threw most of his heart 

 and soul during his later years next after his 

 judicial duties, if not equally even with them 

 was the promotion of the interests of the re- 

 ligious community to which he belonged. A 

 zealous, true-hearted member of the Church of 

 England, he was also a warm friend and ad- 

 mirer of the metropolitan Bishop of Canada, 

 and an ardent fellow-laborer with him in every 

 thing which could promote the interests or wel- 

 fare of the Church. He was successively vice- 

 chancellor and chancellor of the University 

 of Bishops' College, Lennoxville, which office 

 he held at the time of his death. Owing to the 

 illness and overtasking of several of the judges, 

 the Beauharnois circuit had been on several oc- 

 casions neglected, and the matter was brought 

 up in Parliament by the representatives of that 

 district. When urged by the Attorney-General 

 to take the duty there for one term, and the 

 difficulties of the Government pointed out to 

 him the blame, in fact, cast upon them by 

 Parliament for neglect he replied, " I will go, 

 if it kills me." He held Ms last term there, and 

 returned home ill. He was never fit for work 

 afterwards. 



Oct. . McLEAN, Hon. ex-Chief Justice, 

 was born at St. Andrews, near Cornwall, U. 0., 

 in April, 1791. He was the son of the Hon. 

 Neal McLean, M. L. 0., and his mother was a 

 daughter of an U. E. loyalist, Col. Maodonald. 

 The son was educated at the Cornwall Gram- 

 mar School, under Dr. Strachan, now Bishop 

 of Toronto. He studied law in the office of 

 Attorney-General Firth, at York, as Toronto 

 was then called ; but before he had been called 

 to the bar ho went through the American \var 

 as captain in the incorporated militia. While 



