A Cyclopaedia of Canadian Biography: Being Chiefly Men of the Time by Rose

common school education; and at the early age of thirteen he was apprenticed to a general merchant. Here he remained until he was sixteen, and then started business on his own account. He visited Halifax and made his own purchases, and after a few years’ successful operations, he began to import his merchandise direct from foreign markets, and has continued to do so ever since. In 1866, he joined the Orange association by becoming a member of Derry lodge, No. 25, Truro, and is still a member of the same lodge. He occupied the position of worshipful master three years, and at the present time is grand master of the Grand Orange lodge of Nova Scotia. In 1873 he joined the Independent Order of Good Templars, and was elected chief templar the same year. In 1878 he was sent as a delegate to the Grand Lodge of Nova Scotia, and was nominated for grand chief templar, but declined. In 1880 he was elected one of the delegates to the Right Worthy Grand Lodge which met in New York city in 1880; also to Washington in 1884; Toronto in 1885; Richmond in 1886; and to Saratoga in 1887; and at Washington session was elected right worthy grand marshal. In 1880, he was elected grand chief templar of his own Grand Lodge. He held the office for four successive years; but on being elected the fifth time, he resigned, and was unanimously elected grand secretary. This office he held for two years, declining re-election at the last session of the Grand Lodge, on account of business engagements. When he assumed the office of grand chief templar in 1880, the Grand Lodge for Nova Scotia had less than 2,000 members, with a debt of over $400; but when he retired from the office the membership was over 6,000, and a surplus of cash on hand. During the four years he held the office of grand chief templar, he travelled extensively through the province of Nova Scotia as a lecturer and organizer, and was very successful. In 1886 he received an appointment as deputy right worthy grand templar from his very intimate friend, the late Hon. John B. Finch, R.W.G.T., and two weeks afterward he received a commission to proceed at once to Newfoundland and look after the interests of Good Templary there. His trip was a grand success, and on the eve of leaving the island he was tendered a grand reception and was presented with a very flattering address, signed by the leading Good Templars of Newfoundland. For three years he held the position of chairman of lecture work, and it was through his influence that the following celebrated lecturers visited Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island, namely, Hon. John B. Finch, Colonel J. J. Hickman, Lou. J. Beauchamp, Hon. John Sobieskie, Professor Crozier, and others. In one year he reported over 300 lectures delivered and 60 lodges organized; the greatest number of lodges ever organized in one year in Nova Scotia. At the present time he holds no office in the Grand Lodge, but he is ever in demand as a lecturer and organizer. At the present time he is president and manager of the Nova Scotia lecture and concert bureau. He is a member of the Independent Order of Foresters. In politics, Mr. Chisholm has always been a strong Liberal; and in religion, a Presbyterian. Mr. Chisholm has been in business for twenty years in the town of Truro, and no one living in that beautiful town takes such great delight as he does in pointing out its beauty and advocating its advancement. During the last ten years great inducements have been offered him to leave his beautiful town, but to all such offers up to the present time he has given a refusal. In 1872 he married Bessie A. Cock, of Brookside, Colchester county. Her great-grandfather, Rev. Daniel Cock, was the first settled Presbyterian minister in the province of Nova Scotia. This is the oldest Presbyterian church in the Dominion. The Rev. William McCulloch, D.D., who retired from the ministry about a year ago, was pastor of the above congregation forty-eight years. Rev. John Robbins, late of Glencoe, Ontario, is now pastor of this church. Mr. Chisholm has been blessed with a family of two boys. Mrs. Chisholm is a very active church member; a worker in the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, and other moral reforms. * * * * * =Guillet, Major George=, Merchant, Cobourg, Ontario, M.P. for West Northumberland, Ontario, was born in Cobourg, on the 19th July, 1840. His father, John Guillet, was born in St. Helier, Island of Jersey, and after coming to America resided several years in St. John’s, Newfoundland, where he acted as agent for a Jersey firm engaged in the fisheries. His mother, Charlotte Payne, was the second daughter of John Payne, and was born in Frome, Somersetshire, England. Mr. Guillet received his elementary education at the public schools, and at a private school of John Wilson, M.A., LL.D., and then entered Victoria College, Cobourg. He enlisted at the time of the _Trent_ difficulty in the Cobourg Rifle Company, was promoted to the ensigncy of that company, and afterwards received a lieutenant’s commission in No. 2 company, 40th battalion, becoming its captain in October, 1873. He is now quartermaster of the 40th, with the rank of major. He sat in the municipal council of Cobourg seven years, and was also for four years mayor and commissioner of the town trust. His municipal career was marked by the liberal encouragement given to the manufacturing interests of the town; the obtaining of the passage of an act in the Ontario legislature providing a property qualification for commissioners of the town trust, and declaring the position shall be held without emolument, save by the chairman and treasurer of the board. Several important street improvements in the town also owe their origin to him. In addition, he was active in promoting the educational interests of Cobourg, particularly in getting erected the Faraday Science Hall, in connection with Victoria University, and the Collegiate Institute. He contested the West Riding of Northumberland in the provincial election of 1879, but was defeated by 21 votes. On the resignation of the Hon. James Cockburn, in 1881, Mr. Guillet was nominated for the vacant seat, and was elected by a majority of 79 votes over the Reform candidate, George Waters, M.D. He was re-elected at the general election of 1882, but his election having been voided by the Supreme Court, he was again nominated for re-election, and was returned, defeating for the second time his opponent of 1882, William Kerr. At the general election of 1887, he again defeated the Reform candidate, J. H. Dumble, police magistrate of Cobourg, and now represents West Northumberland in the House of Commons at Ottawa. He is a firm supporter of British connection, and all lines of national policy consistent therewith. He is, however, in favour of reciprocal trade in natural products with the United States, and the abolition of the canal tolls on Canadian trade. While he is opposed to frequent changes in the British North America Act, he favours the idea of transferring the power of prohibiting the sale of intoxicating liquors to the provinces. In the session of 1882, he introduced the bill granting to seamen a first lien and the right of recovery of wages in _rem_, and by a summary process, which resulted in the amendment of the Merchants’ Shipping Act of 1873 to that effect; and he received the thanks of the Seamen’s Union for obtaining these concessions. He is opposed to commercial union, on the ground of impracticability, save at the sacrifice of distinctively Canadian interests and institutions, and at the cost of humiliation and dishonour to the Canadian name. He is a member of the Masonic fraternity, also of the Oddfellows, and the Ancient Order of United Workmen. In politics Mr. Guillet is a Liberal-Conservative, and in religion an adherent of the Methodist church. He has lived continuously in Cobourg since the day of his birth, and has been engaged in the wholesale and retail grocery and crockery business for over twenty-five years. This business was first established by John Guillet, and is now one of the oldest of its kind in Cobourg. Mr. Guillet has been a successful merchant; his career not having been interrupted by either suspension, assignment, or compromise. In addition to his regular line of business, he has invested considerable of his means in lake shipping. * * * * * =McKinnon, Hon. John=, Farmer and Trader, Whycocomagh, M.P.P. for Inverness, Nova Scotia, was born at Whycocomagh, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, on the 14th July, 1833. The family belongs to the McKinnons, of Skye, Scotland, and the subject of our sketch is the second son of Lauchlan McKinnon, who emigrated to Cape Breton from North Uist in 1828. His mother was Anna McLean. Mr. McKinnon received his education at the Free Church College, in Halifax. Apart from his business operations, he has devoted a good deal of his time to public concerns. He taught for several years, as Grammar school teacher in Halifax and Victoria counties. He was gazetted captain in No. 5 Inverness Infantry of militia, previous to confederation. In 1874 he was elected to represent the county of Inverness in the House of Assembly of Nova Scotia. In May, 1875, he was sworn in as member of the Executive Council, and held office without a portfolio in the Hill administration until its resignation, in October, 1878. He was an unsuccessful candidate at the general elections, held in 1878 and 1882; but at the general election in 1886 he was again returned to the Legislature by his old constituency. Mr. McKinnon was a strong supporter of confederation, and assisted in promoting the building of the railway extension from New Glasgow to the Strait of Canso. He takes a deep interest in the temperance movement, and has held several offices in the orders of the Sons of Temperance and Good Templars. He actively supports the Scott Act. In politics, he is a Liberal; and in religion, an adherent of the Presbyterian church. He was married on the 19th December, 1878, to Harriet, daughter of the late D. McQueen, of Sydney, Cape Breton. * * * * * =Owens, William=, Stonefield, Lachute, M.P.P. for Argenteuil, was born at Stonefield, province of Quebec, in 1840. His father, Owen Owens, was a native of Denbigh, Wales, and his mother, Charlotte Lindley, of Brantford, England. Mr. Owens received his education in the schools of his native parish; and afterwards adopted commerce as his profession. In 1861 he joined his brother in partnership, under the firm name of T. & W. Owens, and they have since carried on an extensive business as merchants and forwarders, until 1887, when Mr. Owens retired from business. Mr. Owens was an officer in the active militia from 1863 to 1883, and retired with the rank of captain. For many years he held the position of postmaster of Chatham, and also filled several terms as councillor, and latterly as mayor, of the township of Chatham. In 1881 he entered political life, and at the general election of that year was returned to the Legislative Assembly of Quebec province, as representative of his native county. At the general election held in 1886 he was again elected for Argenteuil, this time by acclamation. In politics Mr. Owens is a Conservative; and in religion is an adherent of the Church of England. He is a widower. * * * * * =Taschereau, Hon. Henry T.=, B.L., B.C.L., Montreal, Judge of the Superior Court of the province of Quebec, was born in the city of Quebec, on the 6th October, 1841. He is the son of the Hon. Jean Thomas Taschereau, late one of the judges of the Supreme Court of the Dominion, who, after being on the bench for nineteen years, was forced to resign his position in consequence of ill-health, in October, 1878. His grandfather, Hon. Jean Thomas Taschereau, was in his lifetime one of the puisne judges of the Court of Queen’s Bench of Lower Canada, and his grandmother, Marie Panet, was a daughter of the Hon. Jean Panet, first speaker of the House of Assembly for Quebec province, which he held for twenty consecutive years. Judge Taschereau, the subject of our sketch, is the fifth member of the Taschereau family who have sat on the bench of the province of Quebec, or of the dominion of Canada, and is a nephew of his Eminence the Cardinal Archbishop of Quebec. The family is one of the oldest and most distinguished in that province, its founder in Canada having been Thomas Jacques, of Touraine, France, son of Christopher Taschereau, King’s counsellor, director of the mint, and treasurer of the city of Tours. This gentleman came to Canada about the beginning of the last century, was appointed treasurer of the marine, and in 1736 obtained the cession of a seigniory on the banks of the Chaudière river, Quebec province. Judge Taschereau was educated at the Quebec Seminary, and at Laval University, and received from Laval the degree of B.L., in 1861, and B.C.L. in 1862. He took up law as a profession, and practised in Quebec, with marked success, until he was elevated to the bench, in 1878. He was at one time a member of the city council of Quebec, and represented the city on the North Shore Railway Board. In 1862 he edited the newspaper, _Les Debats_, and in 1863 was one of the editors of _La Tribune_, of Quebec. He entered active political life in 1863, and ran as candidate for the county of Dorchester in the Legislative Assembly of Canada, but failed to secure his election. In 1872 he was more successful, and was returned as member for Montmagny county to the House of Commons. In 1874 he again presented himself for election, and was returned by acclamation. In politics, he was a Liberal. Being possessed of good talents and fine culture, with a good judicial mind, he has already done credit to his family of eminent parents. He was first married to a daughter of E. L. Pacaud, advocate of Arthabaska, on the 22nd June, 1864, and has a family of nine children. After the death of his first wife (Nov., 1883), he married in April, 1885, Mrs. Marie Masson, widow, of Montreal, sister-in-law of ex-Lieut.-Governor Masson. No children by last marriage. * * * * * =McLachlan, Alexander=, Erin, Ontario, was born at the Brig o’ Johnston, Scotland, in the year 1820. He is the son of a mechanic, and has had few of the advantages to be derived from a liberal education, yet from boyhood he was a great reader, and thus became acquainted with the works of the principal British authors. In early life he was apprenticed to a tailor, and worked at his trade for many years. In this way he fostered his inborn love of song, as few occupations are more conducive to the growth of poetic sentiment than a mechanical movement of the fingers, which leaves thought free to soar to heights that idleness could never hope to attain. In early life he became connected with the Chartist movement, but afterwards changed his views. In 1840 he emigrated to Canada, and, for a short time, made his home in the wild-wood; but since appearing before the public as an author and lecturer, he has resided at Erin, Wellington county, Ontario. The height of Mr. McLachlan’s ambition is to be to Canada what Burns was to Scotland: the poet of the people; and in this, we think, he has succeeded thus far. We cannot say that a greater than he may not appear in the future; but we have not yet seen any volume of Canadian verse equal to his in the simplicity that goes to the heart of the poor and lowly. In this respect he meets a want of the community, and occupies a position of honor that a poet of higher culture might vainly aspire to fill. It does not fall to the lot of every man to receive an education that will enable him to appreciate the classic beauties of a “Mulvaney” or a “Roberts,” or the chaste imagery of a “Maclean”; nor has nature gifted everyone with the “wild wealth of imagination” (we quote Collins) that would lead him to revel in the love-songs, of a “Caris Sima”; but what Canadian farmer, with a soul large enough to survive the transit to another sphere, would not feel the pathos of the lines that he writes on the death of his ox. This poem, though faulty in construction, brings the trials and sufferings of the early settler so graphically before the reader that it is impossible for us to overlook it. We quote the following lines: Here, single-handed, in the bush, I battled on for years; My heart sometimes buoyed up with hope; sometimes bowed down with fears. I had misfortunes not a few, e’en from the very first; But take them altogether, “Bright,” thy death’s the very worst. And again he writes, How can I ever clear the land? How can I drag the wheat? How can I keep my credit good? How can my children eat? The reader of these lines, perhaps, at the moment, a judge of the supreme court, a member of parliament, or a minister of the Gospel, will instantly look back to his boyhood’s days and see the meek-eyed oxen standing before the log-cabin door, from which issues the form of his father, bearing a long slender switch, which he twirls round in front of the gentle animals as he says “haw, Buck, gee, Bright”; and again he will see them struggling in the yoke, their wide-spreading horns clashing together as they draw the great logs into a heap for the burning; and seeing the result of the early settlers’ efforts in the magnificent stretches of cleared land, and waving fields of grain, he will sing, with our poet, in patriotic strain: Hurrah! for the grand old forest land, Where freedom spreads her pinion; Hurrah with me, for the maple tree, Hurrah! for the new Dominion. It is, though portrayed in the humblest language, a very pathetic picture he draws of “Old Hannah,” poor old woman, husband and children all gone, sitting, on the Sabbath morn, on the doorstep of her desolate home, with her Bible on her knee, looking as sweetly patient as only those purified by affliction can look, and silently teaching us to thank God for the suffering that alone can fit us for the kingdom of heaven. We quote these lines: In her faded widow’s cap; She is sitting alone On the old grey stone With her Bible in her lap. . . . . . . Her years are o’er three score and ten, And her eyes are waxing dim, But the page is bright With a living light, And her heart leaps up to Him Who pours the mystic harmony Which the soul can only hear, She is not alone On the old grey stone, Though no earthly friend is near. For his poem, “Halls of Holyrood,” Mr. McLachlan, in a world-wide competition, won the prize offered some years ago by the _Glasgow Workman_ newspaper, for a national song for Scotland. In 1863 he was appointed by the Canadian government to lecture throughout Great Britain in favor of emigration to Canada. He has also lectured in the principal Canadian towns and villages on various subjects. He speaks with much earnestness and simplicity. As a poet, we would say, Mr. McLachlan has written many pretty musical pieces, while all his work evinces much force, fervor, and simplicity. Here is a line of great beauty that he gives birth to when he speaks of the humming bird as Wandering spirit of the flowers. And here is a pretty stanza from “Indian Summer”: Down from the blue the sun has driven, And stands between the earth and heaven, In robes of smouldering flame; A smoking cloud before him hung, A mystic veil, for which no tongue Of earth can find a name; And o’er him bends the vault of blue; With shadowy faces looking through The azure deep profound; The stillness of eternity, A glory and a mystery, Encompass him around. The air is thick with golden haze, The woods are in a dreamy maze, The earth enchanted seems. Have we not left the realms of care And entered in the regions fair, We see in blissful dreams? Here our poet has left the logging-field and is enjoying the beauties of nature, while giving more attention to the rhythmic tone of the muse. We understand that Mr. McLachlan is now writing for _Grip_, and we have seen some lines of his entitled “May Song” which, as a lyric, is far in advance of his previous work. We give the first stanza: Now morn is ascending from out the dark sea, A light crimson veil hanging o’er her; The lark leaves her nest on the bonny green lea, And flutters aloft to adore her. And, oh, how the living beams revel and leap! In purple and gold to enfold her; And how the wild cataract roused on the steep, Is shouting with joy to behold her. Here is good word-painting, and shows what heights our poet is capable of attaining. We would say, in conclusion, that we think Mr. McLachlan should be looked upon as a benefactor to his country, in that he has thrown a halo over the humblest home. Well would it be, for those who are seized with the “brick and mortar craze” of the present day, to pause and read “The Old Settler’s Address to his Old Log House,” before he lays the foundation stone of the new brick mansion that too often leads to ruin, and sometimes to disgrace. * * * * * =O’Connor, Hon. John=, Q.C., Puisne Judge of the Divisional Court of Queen’s Bench, who died at Cobourg, on the 3rd November, 1887, was of Irish descent. His parents, both of whom were named O’Connor, were representatives of two distinct branches of that family, and emigrated in 1823 from Kerry to Boston, Massachusetts, where deceased was born, in January, 1824. Four years later his parents removed to Canada, and settled in Essex county, Ontario, where he grew to manhood. When about nineteen years of age he sustained an accident which materially influenced his future career. While cutting timber on his father’s farm a heavy tree fell upon him, jambing one of his legs in the brushwood. Young O’Connor struggled hard to liberate the limb, but failed, and as night was fast approaching, and a biting frost prevailed, he feared he might be frozen to death. There was no hope of assistance. Under these desperate circumstances the young fellow took out his jackknife, cut off the limb, and crawled to his home over the snow, bleeding profusely. This disabled the future judge for manual labor, and from that date he devoted all his energies to study. Mr. O’Connor was called to the bar in 1854, settled down to practice in Windsor, and was successful, not only in gaining a profitable business, but in acquiring a good deal of local influence, political and otherwise. He was also a member of the Michigan bar. He filled the offices of reeve of Windsor, warden of Essex, and chairman of the Windsor School Board. In politics, he was a Conservative, and in religion a Roman Catholic. Mr. O’Connor represented Essex in the Canadian Assembly for a short period, and he was member of the same constituency in the House of Commons from 1867 to 1873, being one of Sir John Macdonald’s cabinet from 1872 till it resigned in 1873. Defeated in Essex in 1874, he was out of Parliament until 1878, when he was elected for Russell county, and again became a member of the Conservative government, holding the portfolios successively of president of the Council, postmaster-general, and secretary of state. From the cabinet he went to the bench, having been a judge of the Ontario Queen’s Bench since September, 1884. * * * * * =Moffat, William=, Treasurer of the county of Renfrew, Pembroke, Ontario, was born on the 29th November, 1825, in Haddingtonshire, Scotland. His father, Alexander Moffat, came to Pembroke in 1840, and laid out the village (now town) of Pembroke. He was its first postmaster, and subsequently became an extensive mill owner. In his day he was a leading Reformer, and was on one occasion nominated by his party to represent it in the Legislative Council, but declined the honor. Mr. Moffat’s mother was Margaret Dickson Purvis, who died in