SIR WILFRID LAURIER
Speaking at Strathroy, Ont., September 19th., 1908
Sir WILFRID LAURIER
BY
PETER McARTHUR
“Now is the stately column broke,
The beacon light is quenched in smoke,
The trumpet’s silver voice is still,
The warder silent on the hill!”
1919
J. M. DENT & SONS, Limited
LONDON TORONTO
Paris: J. M. DENT ET FILS
DEDICATION
This book is dedicated to my fellow-writersof the Canadian Press. Themerits of the book are due to their effortsfor I have helped myself lavishly to theirbest brains.
I have long been of the opinion that agenius is a man who knows a good thingwhen he steals it, and this is the first timeI have had a chance to steal on an ambitiousscale. I have stolen much, and if I had hadmore time, I would have stolen more.
Peter McArthur.
Toronto, March 19th., 1919.
ERRATA. Page 119, line 17, word “conquer” should read “contend”
Sir Wilfrid Laurier
The length of Sir Wilfrid’s public career alonechallenges admiration and respect. He hadbeen almost half a century in active politics; forty-sixyears a salient figure in Parliament; a leaderof the Liberal party for thirty years; Prime Ministerfor fifteen years. He saw generations of menand generations of statesmen. He saw Confederationin its cradle and watched it grow to nationhood.Since he entered public life Englandhas had three Monarchs, while the figures ofDisraeli and Gladstone, of Salisbury and Campbell-Bannermanhave passed across its nationalstage. He witnessed the rise of Cavour and sawthe sword of Garibaldi flash, and he sympathizedwith their aspirations for an United Italy. Hesaw the German States confederated by Bismarckinto blood and iron, saw France, hisMotherland, crushed and bleeding at the feet ofthe Teuton conqueror, and lived to see the structurewhich Bismarck reared crumbled into utterdust. Since he entered public life, Russia hashad two Emperors, emancipated its