The delegates were swept up in a new and optimistic nationalist mood. The party continued that evening at a dinner held by Premier John Hamilton Gray at his estate, Inkerman House. His daughters, Margaret and Florence, helped him host at the dinner, as their mother was ill. Margaret was one of the daughters who also went to the Quebec conference.** There was a short piece, titled “She Saw Canada Born,” in the Winnipeg Free Press on September 1, 1937, that told some of Margaret’s story in Quebec.
George Coles gave a grand luncheon at Stone Park Farm on Monday, September 5. Brown was taken by the Coles women: “At four we lunched at the residence of Mr. Coles, leader of the Parliamentary opposition. He is a brewer, farmer and distiller … and gave us a handsome set out. He has a number of handsome daughters, well educated, well informed and as sharp as needles.”2
On Tuesday, September 6, Edward Palmer gave the luncheon, and the lieutenant-governor and his wife gave a grand ball at Government House in the evening. On Wednesday, September 7, the Canadians hosted the lieutenant-governor and his wife, and the delegates and theirs, on the Queen Victoria. Mercy’s newspaper extract doesn’t include this event, though one imagines she must have attended.
Thursday was a holiday for the delegates — from the talks, at least, though not necessarily from the festivities — and they went on excursions into the country and to PEI’s warm north shore beaches. The evening held the final grand ball and banquet at Province House. There was dancing that started at ten o’clock in the assembly room, a bar and refreshments in the library, and a lavish dinner at one in the morning in the council chamber. And then the speeches began and went on for nearly three hours, even though the women were still part of the party. No doubt Mercy Coles came home very tired and “went immediately to bed,” as she wrote later of other, similar occasions.
This last event, the famous “Ball and Supper,” received a mishmash of odd comments in the press. Especially disparaging was the piece comparing the event to the circus.
The less-than-enthusiastic comments the Ball and Supper received after it was held matched the skeptical reception it had garnered beforehand. In the beginning, there had been such little interest in the Canadians’ arrival and their proposals for union that the tickets for this last big event hadn’t sold well. On September 15, Ross’s Weekly wrote, the Ball and Supper “numerically considered was a failure; the attendance would have been a skeleton one, had not the Executive, finding at the last hour … twenty tickets only had been sold [sent free invitations to Charlottetown’s elite].”
A week earlier, on the night of the banquet itself, the editor had complained how the government and its friends were attending the big ball for free, while “the citizens, Tom and Dick, and Pat, really and bonafide the givers of the Banquet and the Hop, [attended] at their own expense.” The Protestant newspaper lambasted the circus as evil, and another retorted back that it was the Ball and Supper at which evil showed itself.
Nevertheless, the Ball and Supper, in the end, was a success. The speeches went well, if long, and the partying and drinking had continued. The Canadians and the Maritimers went back to the Queen Victoria together at five o’clock, reportedly as befogged as the harbour. They were to head together to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, but a thick mist had descended, and they waited till mid-morning to leave, no doubt a good thing for their “foggy” heads.
In contrast to the time in Prince Edward Island, with its unseasonably warm temperatures and sunny times, the conference at Quebec City involved lots of work, long hours, and incessant rain. There were still plenty of balls, dinners, and events to showcase the women; the Canadians wanted to show the Maritimers a good time in order to persuade them to join Confederation after all. The terrible weather, however, certainly affected the conference. The newspaper accounts talk of the endless rain; there was an early snowstorm when the Queen Victoria arrived with the rest of the Maritime delegates; and both the men and women fell sick and missed crucial discussions and the all-important events. Mercy Coles caught potentially deadly diphtheria.
* This is but a brief note on the why and how Union appealed to the people of 1864 — there is much more discussion of the topic in many history books and journals. Here, as our interest is in Mercy Coles, I am including but the briefest of notes for some context on Canada’s Confederation.
** Margaret Gray wrote diaries throughout her long life, and likely kept one for 1864, but it hasn’t been found. She lived to be ninety-six, and died in December 1941. The last diary in her collection is from 1937.
Three
The Journey Begins: The Lure of Travel, the New — and Leonard Tilley
Here Mercy Coles’s first big journey away from home, away from Prince Edward Island and the Maritimes, starts. Here, at twenty-six years of age, Mercy would encounter the possibility of a future — of, one imagines, a desired married life, beyond the limitations of her father’s home, perhaps beyond the borders of her small island. Although Mercy wouldn’t be considered too old to marry, the fact that four of her seven sisters were already either married or about to be, and another was of marriageable age, would no doubt make her feel the pressure of time and opportunity, especially as she had no apparent suitors waiting for her.
As the journey starts, we have our first, and rather unexpected, romantic lead. Sir Samuel Leonard Tilley — who, his biographer C.M. Wallace in the Dictionary of Canadian Biography pointedly says, has been “stigmatized as a colourless druggist and temperance advocate” — was forty-six years old, and a widower of two years with seven children. He is first (and last) up.
Reminiscences of Canada in 1864
By Mercy Coles
Wednesday 5th October /64
Left Charlottetown at 8 am. Arrived at Shediac [New Brunswick] at half past 2. I was very ill it was so rough. Monk came off in a small boat and was taken on board off Summerside. Found a special train waiting for us at Shediac, arrived at St John at 1/2 past six. Mr. Tilley and Mr. Steeves* at the Hotel to receive us. Ma, Pa, Mr. Tilley and I went to see Mrs. Perley.** Mr. Tilley did not come in.
Thursday [October 6, 1864, Saint John, NB]
We had a walk before breakfast and came on board New Brunswick. I am going to share a stateroom with Miss Alexander. Arrived at Eastport at 12, went on shore and dined, left at 1 for Portland [Maine].***
Friday morning, [October 6], Portland, Preble House.
We arrived here this morning after being 24 hours on board the New Brunswick. I went to bed at 6 and was just up in time this morning. We had an awful stormy night. We leave here in the Grand Trunk Railroad at one o’clock. We parted with Mr. Haines**** at the wharf, he was very attentive and kind.
Saturday, [October] 8th
We arrived at Island Pond last night at half past 9.***** We got up this morning at half past 4. We have just started in cars again and one might just as well try to write on horseback. We saw some beautiful scenery coming through New Hampshire, it was too dark to see the White Mountains. Mr. Tilley helped me admire it. It is rather a joke, he is the only beau of the party and with 5 single ladies****** he has something to do to keep them all in good humour [emphasis mine].
Saturday Afternoon, October 8, Quebec
We arrived here yesterday at ½ past 5. There was no person there to meet us as they did not expect us to arrive for half an hour. We drove to the Russell