AN EKA OF CONSTITUTIONAL STRUGGLE, 1864-1868 135 



acted otherwise "the political contest, now happily at an end, 

 would still be raging, to the great injury of the country ". The 

 fourth paragraph read : " We therefore thank your Excellency for 

 having saved the colony from anarchy, and for having effected a 

 settlement of the serious political differences from which we have 

 just emerged ". Finally, the committee recommended that in view 

 of Sir Charles having been recalled for political reasons only, and 

 of the heavy pecuniary loss he would sustain by his removal, a 

 grant of 20,000 be made to Lady Darling for her separate use. 

 The address was carried in the Assembly by a vote of forty to 

 nineteen, but the recommendation as to the gratuity was postponed 

 in consequence of the Governor intimating that he would not feel at 

 liberty to accept the bounty of the people of Victoria until he had 

 ascertained Her Majesty's commands thereon. He stated that he 

 had applied for an independent tribunal, to which he desired to 

 submit to the most rigid inquiry and investigation the whole of his 

 conduct as Governor of Victoria. 



With a view to help any such tribunal to a friendly decision, 

 the Assembly, on the 8th of May, the day after the Governor's 

 departure for Sydney, whence he proposed sailing for England, 

 adopted an address to the Queen, praying that she would sanction 

 the acceptance by Lady Darling of the 20,000 which it was pre- 

 pared to vote. Pending a reply to this appeal there was a season 

 of peace, if not of goodwill. 



For three months after Sir Charles Darling's departure the 

 Government was administered by the senior military officer, 

 Brigadier-General Carey, and during most of that period Parlia- 

 ment was not in session, having been prorogued on the 1st of June. 

 On the 15th of August Sir J. H. Manners-Sutton, who had been 

 appointed Governor by Lord Derby's Cabinet, assumed the by no 

 means easy office with the confidence of one well posted in con- 

 stitutional law, who, as Disraeli is reported to have said of him in 

 evidence of his fitness, was " the son of a speaker and bred up in 

 Palace Yard ". 



Outside of politics the year now drawing to a close had not 

 been eventful. In the early months, and during an acute stage of 

 the " crisis," the whole community was deeply moved by the news 



