2110-7-4-9

Rideau Cottage. Ottawa.

Private

May 27th 1935.

My dear John Buchan

Here is the "Apocrypha" I spoke of. I have some hesitation in sending it, because it is very frank - it would be useless were it not - and I would much rather have said most of it than written it. But it looks as if we should have little time for conversation before you sail. I know you will treat it as confidential; indeed, I hope you will show it to nobody at all, except your wife, and, if you wish, Pat Hodgson, whose comments on it might be very helpful to you.

I could not let my clerk handle it, so you must forgive its slovenliness; also, its incoherence, due to the fact that I have had to dash it off at odd moments, during a period of weeks.

I have put down just what came into my head, imagining myself talking to sombody who has never been in Canada at all; that, I realise, is not your position at all, and much of this stuff will probably be stale news to you. Indeed, I do not pretend that there is anything in it of much value to an Empire-traveller and biographer of Minto.

I have not said much about the Governor-General's lady, but nearly all I say about the G.G. applies, mutatis mutandis, to Her Excellency also. If to her it all sounds rather depressing, tell her that I set out to tell the worst; and that if my picture tends to be gloomy, the practical truth is that both my wife and I have had a very happy time here, and are resolved to come back to Canada whenever we get a chance to pay a visit.

Rideau Cottage. Ottawa.

Neither of us has any regret that we embarked on the Canadian adventure; in spite of inevitable tediums and worries, it has been a most successful one for us.

I will only add that what I have written is entirely my own impressions that is to say I have written unofficially, and not as a G.G.'s Secretary. The present G.G. would, I daresay, disagree with a good deal of it if he read it.

Pages 1 to 11 are the confidential ones; the remainder is quite innocuous.

I have a busy three weeks ahead, but later on things should be quieter, and if any points occur to you on which I can be of any help, please let me know.

By this mail, I am also sending you the first volume of the Bessborough series of the scrap-books recording the G.G.'s activities which are regularly kept in my office. This, I think, should be quite a help to both of you. There is no hurry about returning it, and your Secretary will, I think, be very glad of the chance to study it; had I had a similar opportunity when I was first appointed, it would have saved me much subsequent labour.

With this letter also, I will send copies of the replies made to Addresses by the present G.G. on his arrival. As he landed at Halifax, he had no need to speak in French, as you must do if you land in Quebec, so I send too the replies to Addresses made on his first official visit to that city some months after his arrival in Canada.

The King will doubtless impress on you that the G.G. should always speak

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RIDEAU COTTAGE, OTTAWA.

in English first and in French second - even in Quebec. May I send my congratulations on your recent honours? - We only heard tonight what your new name was to be, and both Mackenzie and Michael Adeane are disturbed at having written to you this morning under the wrong image and superscription!

A holograph letter you wrote in French to Judge Pouliot has been photostatically reproduced in one of the Quebec newspapers, with delighted commentary on the purity of its style. This will make a most favourable impression throughout that province.

yours ever

A. Lascelles

1. CONFIDENTIAL

The outward and visible function of a Governor-General of Canada is, of course, to represent the King in Canada.

But he has also an inward function, supremely important in these days - to represent the English to the Canadians.

It is unnecessary to dwell on the former; provided due attention is paid to the proper discharge of the formal ceremonies inherent in Viceroyalty, the exercise of it is comparatively plain sailing, save in times of constitutional crisis, when the works of recognized authorities on such matters - Anson, Dicey, Berriedale Keith, and so on - afford better guidance than I can pretend to offer. The most difficult thing about it is to know when it ends - to know when the Viceroy should become the Man.

The second function is more complex, and to perform it successfully is no easy matter. Any man of education and imagination who is used to public life can adequately play the King on ceremonial occasions, or in official relationships; to win the sympathy and affection of a very diverse, selfconscious, and politically restless people is more difficult .

Yet this second task is today the more important of the two; Canadians, as a whole, are so deeply loyal to the present King that their loyalty needs little stimulus - it is a hardy plant that requires only a minimum of tending. So, too, their affection for "The Old Country " is very strong; it has, moreover, recently had a strong practical tonic in their genuine admiration for the manner in which Great Britain has overcome her domestic difficulties, and recovered the financial and political leadership of the world.

What is not so strong, and needs constant reinforcement, is their affection for Englishmen, in general and in particular. The danger here is if Canadians do not like Englishmen in the flesh, sooner or later the spiritual British affiliation is bound to be weakened.

The G.G., however successfully he may identify himself - as he should do with Canada and the Canadians, is always the typical Englishman of the moment. I said above, he, his lady, his family, and his Staff, "represent the English" to the Canadians. Consequently, the personal popularity of all of them is, in varying degrees of importance, a major determinant in the success or non-success of any G.G.'s regime, which is ultimately gauged by the simple question "Has he weakened or strengthened the ties between Canada and the Mother-country?" - for, when all

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is said and done, it is as the chief guardian of those ties that he is sent out to Canada.

(In parenthesis, it may be pointed out that the work of any Englishman who is interested in the preservation of those ties does not cease on his return to England. He can then usefully devote himself to the other side of the medal - namely, to making Englishmen appreciate Canadians; always provided that he has himself learnt to understan and like them.)

English people who come to live in Canada for the first time, or without having had the opportunity of seeing the cou try through the eyes of some friend who has real knowledge of it, often experience a series of shocks in the early stages of their stay that warps their whole outlook; they become bewildered, bored, or comtemptuous, according to their individual temperaments.

Whatever the cause, the effect is to make them appear aloof; to the Canadian mind, obsessed as it is by the national "inferiority-complex", aloofness is indistinguishable from a sense of superiority; the Englishman, or Englishwoman, is written off as one more "high-hatted Britisher", and one more little rift is made in the imperial lute.

Such unfortunate impressions on either side can, of course, be lived down. Many Englishmen, having been completely miserable, and correspondingly unpopular for the first year or so of their Canadian life, find, when the time comes to go home, that they leave with real regret and are themselves regretted by a host of friends, whom they have made after becoming socially, and indeed physically, acclimatised.

Some, on the other hand, never overcome the first impressions they got and gave. In wither case, it would clearly be better if the mutual first impressions could be favourable, or, at any rate, neutral. There is no reason why they shou d not be so, if only newcomers approach the country in the right frame of mind.

The first thing any such new arrival should do is to rid himself both of pre-conceptions of Canada (e.g., the "great open spaces" legend; more of one's life in Canada is spent in stuffy trains and houses than it is in England.) and of standards of comparison with his English past. He should get into his head that he is going to live, not in an outpost of the British Isles, but in a totally different country, and, what is more, in a social environment and in a social period that area totally different from those