It was announced at the end of last week that
the Duke of Connaught will retire from the Governor-Generalship of Canada in October, after having served five years. His conduct of his office has been unfailingly successful, and his consent to continue in office when war broke out in order that Prince Alexander of Teck, who was to have succeeded him, might serve as a soldier, increased the respect and admiration of tho Canadians. It is not easy to find a successor, but we are certain that the Government could not possibly have done better than to choose the Duke of Devonshire. The Duke is a typical Englishman, with whose family it is an hereditary habit to serve, on the lines of their punning motto, Cavenclo tutus. As Pope said, the Caveadishes care not to be great except to serve and save the State. Sir Horace Walpole wrote about a Duke of Devonshire building himself a house in Piccadilly as solid and simple—or some such words—as himself. And more famous is the language of Dr. Johnson about a Duke of Devonshire : "He was not a man of superior abilities, but he was a man strictly faithful to his word. If, for instance, he had promised you an acorn, and none had grown that year in his woods, he would not have contented himself with that excuse : he would have sent to Denmark for it." "Dogged veracity" was what Johnson found in the Cavendishes, and we do not doubt that the people of Canada will discover the quality and appreciate it as it deserves.
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